1,721,002 research outputs found
A systemic design application for resources management in urban green spaces
Full text linkUrban green spaces are often analyzed by the quantity of provided services, the kind of benefits they supply for the community and the human actions that modify the urban ecosystems. Moreover, urban green spaces and green infrastructures can produce important resources, even if these latter are not always considered during the preparation of management plans. To this extent, the Systemic Design can help to show the qualitative aspects of these resources and how they can be managed. Aim of this study is therefore to illustrate how a holistic approach like the Systemic Design can be applied to the management of urban green infrastructure, their ecosystem services and the raw materials and resources useful for the community.With an application to a real case, we will show how a Systemic Design approach is able to state resources' availability in a green urban area with the consequent identification of the area in which these resources can be employed. This identification is the essential prerequisite for the creation of a plan that stress the links among ecosystem services, resources and urban dwellers and the consequent best management practices, with particular emphasis on challenges related to climate changes and increasing urbanization.When necessary, Systemic Design can also provide viable indications to redesign a new context with different fluxes of materials and energy and can contribute to the creation of a set of new activities deeply connected with local green spaces. The final results can be identified in the creation of work tools for administrators and urban designers interested in the integrated management of green infrastructures and the suggestion of a new urban model, with stronger connections between society and territory, for more sustainable and resilient cities
Urban sustainability: the role of ecosystem services provided by an italian green infrastructure
Full text linkCurrent population growth, climate change and the increase in derived pollution represent a significant threat to the delicate balance that governs the exploitation of resources on Earth. In recent decades, this balance has been undermined, coming to an over-exploitation condition, or a growing demand for natural raw materials that the planet is no longer able to satisfy, with impacting consequences on human well-being and the health of natural ecosystems. Cities represent the main collectors of such reactions: it is necessary to analyze which mitigation actions can be the best in order to counter their uncontrolled development. This work focuses on a specific tool aimed at achieving the goal: green infrastructures constitute a valid source of sustainability in the urban environment, slowing down the processes derived from climate change and intensifying the recovery of ecological functions. Specifically, the role of the "Le Vallere" park was analyzed, a green area of about 35 hectares that is part of the metropolitan context of the Municipality of Turin, in collaboration with the related management institution ("Ente di gestione delle Aree Protette del Po piemontese", ex "Ente di gestione delle aree del Po torinese"). The main purpose was to quantify the ecosystem services offered by the green infrastructure to the surrounding urban area, through the use of i-Tree, a specific software suite able to evaluate benefits offered by vegetation. Reduction of atmospheric pollutants, carbon storage and sequestration, avoided surface water runoff, improvement of water quality are the main aspects investigated, obtaining an estimate of these parameters also from a monetary point of view. The survey carried out has, therefore, made it possible to obtain an assessment of the sustainability produced by the infrastructure, providing essential information to the related management institution, in view of a future territorial planning
Comportamento del dittero Simulium monticola (Simuliidae) in differenti condizioni idrologiche: uno studio in laboratorio
No full textRainwater harvesting for home-garden irrigation: a case study in Italy
Full text linkIn residential buildings, drinking water is often used for tasks that do not necessarily require high quality water, such as home-garden irrigation. Our research focuses on the idea of harvesting rainwater to promote sustainable management of low-quality water resources on a building scale for irrigation purposes. The effectiveness of a collection system depends on the weather conditions, which determine also the water need of the plants, on the size of the cultivated area and on the collection surfaces. In this research, a rainwater harvesting system (RWH) for the irrigation of home-gardens in the city of Celano (L'Aquila - Italy) has been analysed. The obtained results show that to maximize water savings a great investment is necessary, i.e. not refundable in a reasonable period due to the low cost of drinking water. On the contrary, to maximize the economic return, it is required a smaller and cheaper tank, but the maximum water savings efficiency decrease to about 60%. In the latter case the RWH system can be cheaper than an irrigation plant supplied by the aqueduct. In the work graphs are provided for practical design use for realizing a RWH system in areas with meteorological conditions similar to those of the survey area, according both the highest water savings efficiency or the highest economic return
A 60-year drought analysis of meteorological data in the western Po River basin
No full textSince the start of the 21st century, increasing focus has been put on drought and its wide range of environmental and socioeconomic effects, particularly in the context of climate change. The identification of changes in drought occurrence has been done at different spatiotemporal scales and using different approaches, with results that may not be fully comparable. This study aims to analyse drought trends in the northwestern region of Italy, encompassing the Piedmont and Aosta Valley regions, characterized by diverse topography and warming rates. The analysis is carried out over the last 60 years using the Standardized Precipitation Index (SPI) and the Standardized Precipitation Evapotranspiration Index (SPEI) at 3- and 12-month timescales and deriving drought events at the local and regional spatial scales. By leveraging on a continuous and spatially coherent precipitation and temperature dataset, we explore the temporal and spatial variability of drought conditions and compare results obtained with different approaches. Our results reveal widespread drying trends in the region, with temperature playing a crucial role. The SPEI indicates more extensive and steeper negative trends than the SPI due to temperature increases. However, the onset and cessation of drought events are predominantly driven by precipitation anomalies, while temperature plays a key role in longer-term drought conditions. Both the SPI and SPEI consistently identify local and regional drought events. In the 1990-2020 period, drought event severity, duration, and intensity generally increased compared to during the 1960-1990 period, even though this increase is less significant than the one shown by the SPI and SPEI. Nevertheless, the spatial scale of the analysis plays a significant role in interpreting these trends. Local-drought characteristics are more influenced by temperature increases in the SPEI, whereas regional droughts are more affected by precipitation patterns, as seen in the SPI, with more frequent short-term droughts aggregating into longer-term deficits. Drying trends are more pronounced in lower, less rugged areas, while alpine regions show fewer drought trends. Interestingly, drought characteristics and trends are found to be more correlated with terrain ruggedness than with mean elevation. In fact, a clear drying trend is not found at a region-wide level but is instead found when considering homogeneous areas defined by terrain ruggedness. Furthermore, changes in the number of drought episodes and in their severity, duration, and intensity are found to be correlated with terrain ruggedness at all timescales. These findings emphasize the need for high-resolution, region-specific studies to better understand how droughts evolve in complex terrains like the northwestern Italian Alps. Future research should investigate whether similar outcomes are found in other regions and what the potential causes are as this is instrumental for evaluating how these trends may continue to evolve under projected climate change scenarios
Going Beyond Counting First Authors in Author Co-citation Analysis
Full text linkThe present study examines one of the fundamental aspects of author co-citation analysis (ACA) - the way co-citation
counts are defined. Co-citation counting provides the data on which all subsequent statistical analyses and mappings
are based, and we compare ACA results based on two different types of co-citation counting - the traditional type that
only counts the first one among a cited work's authors on the one hand and a non-traditional type that takes into
account the first 5 authors of a cited work on the other hand. Results indicate that the picture produced through this non-traditional author co-citation counting contains more coherent author groups and is therefore considerably clearer. However, this picture represents fewer specialties in the research field being studied than that produced through the traditional first-author co-citation counting when the same number of top-ranked authors is selected and analyzed. Reasons for these effects are discussed
Variations on the Author
Full text link“Variations on the Author” discusses two of Eduardo Coutinho’s recent films (Um Dia na Vida, from 2010, and Últimas Conversas, posthumously released in 2015) and their contribution to the general question of documentary authorship. The director’s filmography is characterized by a consistent yet self-effacing form of authorial self-inscription: Coutinho often features as an interviewer that rather than express opinions propels discourses; an interviewer that is good at listening. This mode of self-inscription characterizes him as an author who is not expressive but who is nonetheless markedly present on the screen. In Um Dia na Vida, however, Coutinho is completely absent form the image, while Últimas Conversas, on the contrary, includes a confessional prologue that moves the director from the margins to the center of his films. This article examines the ways in which these works stand out in the filmography of a director who offers new insights into the notion of cinematic authorship
Appropriate Similarity Measures for Author Cocitation Analysis
Full text linkWe provide a number of new insights into the methodological discussion about author cocitation analysis. We first argue that the use of the Pearson correlation for measuring the similarity between authors’ cocitation profiles is not very satisfactory. We then discuss what kind of similarity measures may be used as an alternative to the Pearson correlation. We consider three similarity measures in particular. One is the well-known cosine. The other two similarity measures have not been used before in the bibliometric literature. Finally, we show by means of an example that our findings have a high practical relevance.information science;Pearson correlation;cosine;similarity measure;author cocitation analysis
The Very Low Head Turbine for hydropower generation in existing hydraulic infrastructures: State of the art and future challenges
Full text linkThe Very Low Head turbine (VLHT) is an axial flow turbine developed for heads below 4.5 m and flow rates up to 30 m3/s. In this work, the state of the art, the technological advancements and the scientific gaps were discussed and generalized, with a special focus on design, ecological behavior, costs, performance at different flows, heads and rotational speeds. The flow field and the hydraulic behavior under different configurations (e.g. in presence of cavitation and with an upstream obstacle) were described, with the aim of deriving engineering suggestions. Results of ecological tests were generalized (fish survival rate is more than 90%) by using the blade strike model, proposing an expeditious method for a preliminary appraisal of the ecological impact on downstream migrating fish. Despite the hundreds of installations worldwide, especially in existing barriers, some scientific gaps need to be better addressed yet, e.g., the influence of the number of blades and axis inclination on the efficiency, the influence of flow, head and rotational speed on the flow field and a quantification of the head losses through the trash rack above the runner
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