943 research outputs found
A Compact Antipodal Vivaldi Antenna for Food Investigation
No full textIn food industry, the analysis of the integrity of packaging and the quality of the food inside it is becoming increasingly important. Thus, the food industry is looking for a low-cost solution for the inspection of food during the production and packaging process, in order to detect any small foreign body. This is the aim of this work, i.e., to develop a microwave device capable of inspecting foodstuffs, directly on the production line. The solution proposed for this work is a microwave imaging system that detects fragments in homogenous food packaged in circular plastic/glass jars. The system relies on a particular Antipodal Vivaldi antenna which, due to its ultra-wideband characteristics, can carry out the detection of various types of food, thus avoiding the need to use multiple antennas working at different frequencies to inspect foods with different characteristics. Numerical analysis of the designed antenna shows Ultrawideband behavior (1-15GHz), suitable for applications in food quality control. Additionally, its detection capabilities are numerically proved
The role of social medicine in the COVID-19 pandemic era
No full textOVID-19 has proved to be a social disease due to its widespread diffusion in the general population, the serious harm it causes on affected patients and its impact on the economy and social life of burdened countries. While socialization is a risk factor for the spread of the SARS-C0V-2, health protection measures such as isolation and lockdown further aggravated the “social” burden of COVID-19. Diseases with social impact require a management approach based on social medicine, integrating health, social and economic responses
Assicurazioni e Internet
No full textNel lavoro è analizzato l'impatto sull'operatività delle compagnie del cambiamento nella distribuzione dei prodotti assicurativi derivante dall'utilizzo del canale Internet
A Simple Differential microwave Imaging Strategy for In-Line Inspection of food,
No full textRecently, microwave imaging is gaining particular attention in food industry as an alternative diagnostic tool for the non-invasive inspection of food. To this end, a microwave system could be specifically devised to perform the imaging directly when the food item moves on the production line. In this work, a simple imaging strategy, specifically meant for the above system, enabling to detect the presence of possible foreign bodies in the food, and image them, is presented. The idea is to perform a differential imaging by exploiting the symmetries commonly characterizing the food products which are broken by the presence of foreign bodies, thus revealing their presence. A quite common case is that of homogeneous food packaged in circular plastic/glass jars. A simple 3D numerical example is provided, showing the effectiveness of the approach
Design and Numerical Characterization of a Low-Complexity Microwave Device for Brain Stroke Monitoring
No full textThis paper presents the design of a novel low-complexity microwave imaging system for monitoring brain stroke. In particular, the design is concerned with the determination of the optimal layout of the antennas array, namely, minimum number, positions, and polarization of the radiating elements, enabling the acquisition of an amount of data such to assure a reliable imaging. This goal is achieved by adopting a rigorous design procedure based on the inspection of the singular value decomposition of the relevant discretized scattering operator and taking into account the actual dynamics and signal-to-noise ratio of the measurement system. The design is first carried out in the case of ideal dipoles and then extended and assessed for actual printed monopole antennas, developed for the imaging system. The resulting system is a helmet equipped with 24 antennas, whose performances have been numerically validated in terms of both spatial resolution and reconstruction capabilities, by employing full-wave numerical simulations, realistic 3-D phantoms of the human head, and an accurate modeling of the actual antennas employed in the system
Birth control knowledge among freshmen of four italian universities
No full textSince sexual health education (SHE) is not mandatory in Italian schools, we conducted a survey on
freshmen of four Italian university campuses in 2012 to investigate the respective level of sexual
health knowledge (SHK) in relation to birth control, with the aim to inform public health policy
makers. A convenience strategy was employed to sample 4,552 freshmen registered with various
undergraduate courses at four Italian universities: Padua university (Veneto Region); university of
Milan (Lombardy Region); university of Bergamo (Lombardy Region); university of Palermo (Sicily
Region). We investigated the level of SHK on birth control using 6 proxy indicators: (1) the average
length of a woman’s period [outcome with 3 levels: wrong (base) vs. acceptable vs. correct]; (2) the
most fertile interval within a woman’s period (binary outcome: correct vs. wrong answer); (3) the event
between the end of a period and the beginning of the next cycle (binary outcome: correct vs. wrong
answer); (4) the average survival of spermatozoa in the womb (binary outcome: correct vs. wrong
answer); (5) the concept of contraception (binary outcome: correct vs. wrong answer); (6) the efcacy
of various contraceptives to prevent unintended pregnancies (linear score: 0–17). We ftted 6 separate
models of multiple regression: multinomial for outcome 1; logistic for outcomes 2, 3, 4, 6; linear for
outcome 6. Statistical estimates were adjusted for a number of socio-demographic factors. Results
were expressed as odds ratios (OR) for the 4 multiple logistic regression models, linear coefcients
(RC) for the linear regression model and relative risk ratio (RRR) for the multinomial logistic regression
model. The level of signifcance of each risk estimate was set at 0.05. The level of SHK of freshmen
sampled was rather low, as 60% interviewees did not know the average length of a woman’s period,
the average survival of spermatozoa in the womb and the concept of contraception, whilst the most
fertile interval within a woman’s period was known only to 55% of interviewees. The mean score of
SHK on the efcacy of various contraceptive methods was only 5 (scale 0–17). Some categories of
students were consistently and signifcantly less knowledgeable on birth control at multivariable
analysis: males; students from the university of Palermo; those with vocational secondary school
education and those not in a romantic relationship at the time the survey was conducted. The results
of this survey clearly call for the introduction of SHE programs in Italian schools, as already done
in several European countries. School SHE should start as early as possible, ideally even before
secondary school. SHE should be holistic and delivered with a multiple agency coordinated approach
involving the Ministry of Health, the Ministry of Education, University and Scientifc Research (MIUR),
families, schools, public health departments, primary health care providers, pharmacists, media,
other
Feasibility Study of a Novel Microwave Breast Cancer Imaging Approach Exploiting Magnetic Nanoparticle as Contrast Agents
No full textThe communication deals with Microwave Imaging (MWI) of breast cancer and aims at investigating the feasibility of an approach, recently proposed, which exploits Magnetic Nanoparticles (MNP) as magnetic contrast agents selectively delivered to the tumor. The numerical study herein presented is mainly devoted to test the reconstruction capabilities of the approach in quasi realistic conditions. To this purpose, 3D anthropomorphic breast phantom and an experimental characterization of the MNP response have been considered
- …
