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Two of the elements of the Cabibbo–Kobayashi–Maskawa quark mixing matrix, | V ub | and | V cb | , are extracted from semileptonic B decays. The results of the B factories, analysed in the light of the most recent theoretical calculations, remain puzzling, because for both | V ub | and | V cb | the exclusive and inclusive determinations are in clear tension. Further, measurements in the τ channels at Belle, Babar, and LHCb show discrepancies with the Standard Model predictions, pointing to a possible violation of lepton flavor universality. LHCb and Belle II have the potential to resolve these issues in the next few years. This article summarizes the discussions and results obtained at the MITP workshop held on April 9–13, 2018, in Mainz, Germany, with the goal to develop a medium-term strategy of analyses and calculations aimed at solving the puzzles. Lattice and continuum theorists working together with experimentalists have discussed how to reshape the semileptonic analyses in view of the much higher luminosity expected at Belle II, searching for ways to systematically validate the theoretical predictions in both exclusive and inclusive B decays, and to exploit the rich possibilities at LHCb.

This article reports world averages of measurements of b -hadron, c -hadron, and τ -lepton properties obtained by the Heavy Flavor Averaging Group using results available through summer 2016. For the averaging, common input parameters used in the various analyses are adjusted (rescaled) to common values, and known correlations are taken into account. The averages include branching fractions, lifetimes, neutral meson mixing parameters, C P  violation parameters, parameters of semileptonic decays, and Cabbibo–Kobayashi–Maskawa matrix elements.

A bstract Production cross-sections of prompt charm mesons are measured with the first data from pp collisions at the LHC at a centre-of-mass energy of 13 TeV. The data sample corresponds to an integrated luminosity of 4.98 ± 0.19 pb −1 collected by the LHCb experiment. The production cross-sections of D 0 , D + , D s + , and D *+ mesons are measured in bins of charm meson transverse momentum, p T , and rapidity, y , and cover the range 0 < p T < 15GeV/c and 2.0 < y < 4.5. The inclusive cross-sections for the four mesons, including charge conjugation, within the range of 1 < p T < 8 GeV/c are found to be σ pp → D 0 X = 2460 ± 3 ± 130 μ b σ pp → D + X = 1000 ± 3 ± 110 μ b σ pp → D s + X = 460 ± 13 ± 100 μ b σ pp → D ∗ + X = 880 ± 5 ± 140 μ b where the uncertainties are due to statistical and systematic uncertainties, respectively.

A measurement of the phase difference between the short- and long-distance contributions to the [Formula: see text] decay is performed by analysing the dimuon mass distribution. The analysis is based on collision data corresponding to an integrated luminosity of 3[Formula: see text] collected by the LHCb experiment in 2011 and 2012. The long-distance contribution to the [Formula: see text] decay is modelled as a sum of relativistic Breit-Wigner amplitudes representing different vector meson resonances decaying to muon pairs, each with their own magnitude and phase. The measured phases of the [Formula: see text] and [Formula: see text] resonances are such that the interference with the short-distance component in dimuon mass regions far from their pole masses is small. In addition, constraints are placed on the Wilson coefficients, [Formula: see text] and [Formula: see text], and the branching fraction of the short-distance component is measured.

The LHCb detector will be upgraded for the LHC Run 3 and will be readout at 30 MHz, corresponding to the full inelastic collision rate, with major implications on the full software trigger and offline computing. If the current computing model and software framework are kept, the data storage capacity and computing power required to process data at this rate, and to generate and reconstruct equivalent samples of simulated events, will exceed the current capacity by at least one order of magnitude. A redesign of the software framework, including scheduling, the event model, the detector description and the conditions database, is needed to fully exploit the computing power of multi-, many-core architectures, and coprocessors. Data processing and the analysis model will also change towards an early streaming of different data types, in order to limit storage resources, with further implications for the data analysis workflows. Fast simulation options will allow to obtain a reasonable parameterization of the detector response in considerably less computing time. Finally, the upgrade of LHCb will be a good opportunity to review and implement changes in the domains of software design, test and review, and analysis workflow and preservation. In this contribution, activities and recent results in all the above areas are presented.

LHCb is planning major changes for its data processing and analysis workflows for LHC Run 3. Removing the hardware trigger, a software only trigger at 30 MHz will reconstruct events using final alignment and calibration information provided during the triggering phase. These changes pose a major strain on the online software framework which needs to improve significantly. The foreseen changes in the area of the core framework include a re-design of the event scheduling, introduction of concurrent processing, optimizations in processor cache accesses and code vectorization. Furthermore changes in the areas of event model, conditions data and detector description are foreseen. The changes in the data processing workflow will allow an unprecedented amount of signal events to be selected and therefore increase the load on the experiments simulation needs. Several areas of improvement for fast simulation are currently being investigated together with improvements needed in the area of distributed computing. Finally the amount of data stored needs to be reflected in the analysis computing model where individual user analysis on distributed computing resources will become inefficient. This contribution will give an overview of the status of those activities and future plans in the different areas from the perspective of the LHCb computing project.

Two of the elements of the Cabibbo–Kobayashi–Maskawa quark mixing matrix,$$|V_{ub}|$$| V ub | and$$|V_{cb}|$$| V cb | , are extracted from semileptonic B decays. The results of the B factories, analysed in the light of the most recent theoretical calculations, remain puzzling, because for both$$|V_{ub}|$$| V ub | and$$|V_{cb}|$$| V cb | the exclusive and inclusive determinations are in clear tension. Further, measurements in the$$\\tau $$τ channels at Belle, Babar, and LHCb show discrepancies with the Standard Model predictions, pointing to a possible violation of lepton flavor universality. LHCb and Belle II have the potential to resolve these issues in the next few years. This article summarizes the discussions and results obtained at the MITP workshop held on April 9–13, 2018, in Mainz, Germany, with the goal to develop a medium-term strategy of analyses and calculations aimed at solving the puzzles. Lattice and continuum theorists working together with experimentalists have discussed how to reshape the semileptonic analyses in view of the much higher luminosity expected at Belle II, searching for ways to systematically validate the theoretical predictions in both exclusive and inclusive B decays, and to exploit the rich possibilities at LHCb.

Data preservation is a mandatory specification for any present and future experimental facility and it is a cost-effective way of doing fundamental research by exploiting unique data sets in the light of the continuously increasing theoretical understanding. This document summarizes the status of data preservation in high energy physics. The paradigms and the methodological advances are discussed from a perspective of more than ten years of experience with a structured effort at international level. The status and the scientific return related to the preservation of data accumulated at large collider experiments are presented, together with an account of ongoing efforts to ensure long-term analysis capabilities for ongoing and future experiments. Transverse projects aimed at generic solutions, most of which are specifically inspired by open science and FAIR principles, are presented as well. A prospective and an action plan are also indicated.

The acceleration of Digital Agriculture is evident through the increased adoption of digital technologies on farms including smart machines, sensors and cloud computing. In this paper we present the preliminary results of the research project funded by Università Politecnica delle Marche in 2018 \"PFRLab: Setting of a precision farming robotic laboratory for cropping system sustainability and food safety and security\", which is still underway. In this context, as first result, an interdepartmental Research and Services Center called \"Smart Farming\" has been set up with the aim to strengthen multidisciplinary collaborations in the fields of Agriculture and Forestry, Geomatics, ICT and Robotics. Regarding field activities the SPAD 502 as well as Normalized Difference Vegetation Index (NDVI) provide a good estimate of the Chlorophylla+b content in durum wheat leaves so can be used to predict in a quickly and non-destructively way, the crop greenness status and to identify any nutritional deficiencies in real time. Future research activities are certainly needed to fully explore the potentialities of conservation agriculture and precision farming, and to drive the transition process from conventional agriculture to modern conservation agriculture and precision farming techniques. In-depth studies are planned on the combined effect of nitrogen fertilization and soil management on the main production variables of durum wheat in order to evaluate whether specific tools for precision agriculture applications can find significant diffusion even in Mediterranean cereal based cropping systems.

A measurement of Z → τ$^{+}$τ$^{−}$ production cross-section is presented using data, corresponding to an integrated luminosity of 2 fb$^{−1}$, from pp collisions at $ \\sqrt{s}=8 $ TeV collected by the LHCb experiment. The τ$^{+}$τ$^{−}$ candidates are reconstructed in final states with the first tau lepton decaying leptonically, and the second decaying either leptonically or to one or three charged hadrons. The production cross-section is measured for Z bosons with invariant mass between 60 and 120 GeV/c$^{2}$, which decay to tau leptons with transverse momenta greater than 20 GeV/c and pseudorapidities between 2.0 and 4.5. The cross-section is determined to be $ {\\sigma}_{pp}{{}_{\\to Z\\to {\\tau}^{+}}}_{\\tau^{-}}=95.8 \\pm 2.1 \\pm 4.6 \\pm 0.2 \\pm 1.1 $ pb, where the first uncertainty is statistical, the second is systematic, the third is due to the LHC beam energy uncertainty, and the fourth to the integrated luminosity uncertainty. This result is compatible with NNLO Standard model predictions. The ratio of the cross-sections for Z → τ$^{+}$τ$^{−}$ to Z → μ$^{+}$μ$^{−}$ (Z → e$^{+}$e$^{−}$), determined to be 1.01 ± 0.05 (1.02 ± 0.06), is consistent with the lepton-universality hypothesis in Z decays.