ALBERT

Description: No abstract available

Description: The present report describes a desktop computer-based method for the quantitative assessment of the area occupied by immunoreactive terminals in close apposition to nerve cells in relation to the perimeter of the cell soma. This method is based on Fast Fourier Transform (FFT) routines incorporated in NIH-Image public domain software. Pyramidal cells of layer V of the somatosensory cortex outlined by GABA immunolabeled terminals were chosen for our analysis. A Leitz Diaplan light microscope was employed for the visualization of the sections. A Sierra Scientific Model 4030 CCD camera was used to capture the images into a Macintosh Centris 650 computer. After preprocessing, filtering was performed on the power spectrum in the frequency domain produced by the FFT operation. An inverse FFT with filter procedure was employed to restore the images to the spatial domain. Pasting of the original image to the transformed one using a Boolean logic operation called 'AND'ing produced an image with the terminals enhanced. This procedure allowed the creation of a binary image using a well-defined threshold of 128. Thus, the terminal area appears in black against a white background. This methodology provides an objective means of measurement of area by counting the total number of pixels occupied by immunoreactive terminals in light microscopic sections in which the difficulties of labeling intensity, size, shape and numerical density of terminals are avoided.

Description: An episode of nonsustained ventricular tachycardia was recorded from a crew member during the second month aboard the MIR space station. Although asymptomatic, this cardiac event increases the concern that serious cardiac dysrhythmias may be a limiting factor during long-duration spaceflight.

Description: We report on the discovery and follow-up timing observations of a 63-ms radio pulsar, PSR J1105-6107. We show that the pulsar is young, having a characteristic age of only 63kyr. We consider its possible association with the nearby remnant G290.1-0.8 (MSH 11-61A) but uncertainties in the distances and ages preclude a firm conclusion.

Description: We report the design of a new application-specific integrated circuit (ASIC) for use in radio telescope correlators. It supports the construction of correlators for an arbitrarily large number of signals. The ASIC uses an intrinsically low-power architecture along with design techniques and a process that together result in unprecedentedly low power consumption. The design is flexible in that it can support telescopes with almost any number of antennas N. It is intended for use in an "FX" correlator, where a uniform filter bank breaks each signal into separate frequency channels prior to correlation.

Description: Radio telescopes that employ arrays of many antennas are in operation, and ever larger ones are being designed and proposed. Signals from the antennas are combined by cross-correlation. While the cost of most components of the telescope is proportional to the number of antennas N, the cost and power consumption of cross-correlationare proportional to N2 and dominate at sufficiently large N. Here we report the design of an integrated circuit (IC) that performs digital cross-correlations for arbitrarily many antennas in a power-efficient way. It uses an intrinsically low-power architecture in which the movement of data between devices is minimized. In a large system, each IC performs correlations for all pairs of antennas but for a portion of the telescope's bandwidth (the so-called "FX" structure). In our design, the correlations are performed in an array of 4096 complex multiply-accumulate (CMAC) units. This is sufficient to perform all correlations in parallel for 64 signals (N=32 antennas with 2 opposite-polarization signals per antenna). When N is larger, the input data are buffered in an on-chipmemory and the CMACs are re-used as many times as needed to compute all correlations. The design has been synthesized and simulated so as to obtain accurate estimates of the IC's size and power consumption. It isintended for fabrication in a 32 nm silicon-on-insulator process, where it will require less than 12mm2 of silicon area and achieve an energy efficiency of 1.76 to 3.3 pJ per CMAC operation, depending on the number of antennas. Operation has been analyzed in detail up to N = 4096. The system-level energy efficiency, including board-levelI/O, power supplies, and controls, is expected to be 5 to 7 pJ per CMAC operation. Existing correlators for the JVLA (N = 32) and ALMA (N = 64) telescopes achieve about 5000 pJ and 1000 pJ respectively usingapplication-specific ICs in older technologies. To our knowledge, the largest-N existing correlator is LEDA atN = 256; it uses GPUs built in 28 nm technology and achieves about 1000 pJ. Correlators being designed for the SKA telescopes (N = 128 and N = 512) using FPGAs in 16nm technology are predicted to achieve about 100 pJ.

Description: Ground deformations are among the main volcanic phenomena occurring within the caldera system and pres- ently recorded at different volcanoes worldwide including the Campi Flegrei active caldera (southern Italy). A new stratigraphic, sedimentological and paleontological survey carried out in the central sector of the Campi Flegrei caldera both along the already known La Starza succession and through a new excavated tunnel provided new insights into the ground movement episodes occurred in the last 15 kyr. This study, which has also benefited of unpublished boreholes stratigraphic data, shows that the most uplifted sector of the Campi Flegrei caldera, presently marked by the morphological structure of the La Starza cliff close to the Pozzuoli coastline, was charac- terized by a complex sedimentary evolution. It results from different phases of alternating marine transgressions and regressions, the latter marked by both continental volcanic and/or palustrine/lacustrine sediments. These al- ternations result from the interplay between (i) subsidence and uplift episodes of the caldera floor and (ii) sea level variations during the Holocene. A rest period of volcanism accompanied by a sea level rise determined a sig- nificant submersion phase in about 3000 years between 8.59 and 5.5 ka. This phase was defined by a sea level with a maximum water depth value of 60–80 m and a late stage recording significant episodes of ground move- ments. Subsequently, between 5.5 and 3.5 ka, a ground uplift of about 100 m occurred, with short subsidence around 4.5 ka following the Plinian Agnano-Monte Spina eruption. The net vertical displacement represents the recorded deformation linked with a volcanism period in which ~2.5 km3 of magma were erupted by different vents within the caldera. It is worth to note as the general trend of ground movement through the time indicates a similarity in the pattern, beyond its scale.

Description: Published

Description: 143-158

Description: 1V. Storia eruttiva

Description: JCR Journal

Description: Campi Flegrei caldera (Southern Italy) is among the areas with the highest volcanic risk in the world. The megacity of Naples, hosting more than 1 million inhabitants, lies across the caldera borders. In recent years Campi Flegrei caldera has experienced an accelerating uplift rate of the ground deformation. In particular, during the April 2012 - January 2013 time interval the caldera has shown a rapid uplift of about 6 cm with a peak rate of about 3 cm/month in December 2012. This event led the Italian Civil Protection to raise the alert level of the volcano from green to yellow. We exploited the displacement time series obtained by processing 90 SAR images acquired from the COSMO-SkyMed sensor constellation along ascending orbits via the well-known DInSAR algorithm referred to as SBAS algorithm, and the measurements provided by 14 continuous GPS stations deployed within the caldera and belonging to the permanent INGV-OV monitoring network. To study the detail of the intrusion process we have applied novel geodetic imaging technique to determine the spatial and temporal kinematics of the ground deformation source in the selected period. The retrieved temporal pattern of the source geometry reflects that of a growing sill which, at the end of the considered period, has a roughly elliptical geometry with an extension of about 6 km in the EW direction and about 4 km in the NS one. The maximum aperture of the sill is of about 30 cm at its center. To understand the dynamics of this phenomenon we used a recently developed numerical model of the emplacement of a magmatic sill, to fit the retrieved geometry. The parameters to be determined are: the average magma viscosity, the amount of magma already present in the sill before the 2012-2013 episode and the magma injection rate. Results show that the most likely value for the viscosity is between 103 − 104Pa · s and that to justify the observed deformation pattern it is required that the reservoir should have contained at least 1010kg of liquid magma before 2012. The injection rate has two main peaks on September and December 2012, and a smaller one on March 2013. The first two peaks have a value of about 400 kg/s and duration of 3-4 months. The total amount of injected magma is of about 8.2 · 1010kg. The magma viscosity value is compatible with that of the most common magmas erupted in the past 40 ky: phonolites, while the total inferred amount of liquid magma is of the same order of magnitude of small-size eruptions (VEI 2-3) occurred in the caldera during the last 15 ky. The first injection peak is associated with a seismic swarm, located beneath the town of Pozzuoli. The swarm consisted in about 200 earthquakes (maximum magnitude 1.8) occurring within an interval of about 1.5 hours. The hypocenters were located outside the area usually affected by microearthquakes in the previous years. Using finite element structural mechanical modeling we show that the inferred source caused a marked increase in the maximum shear stress along the rim of the sill. In fact hypocenters were located very close to the northern edge of the growing magmatic reservoir. Our findings suggest a key to interpret the caldera unrest that, started about 60 years ago, has led to a maximum uplift in the area of more than 3 m. Consequently, the observed uplift phenomenon could be interpreted in terms of injection of limited magma batches feeding the growth of a shallow magmatic reservoir. Similar mechanisms have been inferred for other calderas, where the repeated emplacement of magmatic sills has been recognized having an important role in the evolution of the volcano. Accordingly, the observation of short evolution of volcanic precursory phenomena as well as the development of innovative real- time analysis techniques should be taken into account for an effective surveillance of the Campi Flegrei caldera. This work has been supported by the Italian Department of Civil Protection and by the Italian Space Agency under theSAR4Volcanoes project (agreement n. I/034/11/0) and by MED-SUV project (European Union’s Seventh Programme for research, technological development and demonstration under grant agreement No 308665).

Description: Published

Description: Vienna

Description: 2V. Dinamiche di unrest e scenari pre-eruttivi

Description: open

Description: INGV - Sezione di Napoli Osservatorio Vesuviano

Description: Unpublished

Description: 5V. Sorveglianza vulcanica ed emergenze

Description: 1IT. Reti di monitoraggio e Osservazioni

Description: open

Description: INGV- Sezione di Napoli Osservatorio Vesuviano

Description: Unpublished

Description: 5V. Sorveglianza vulcanica ed emergenze

Description: open