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The rapid development and wide application of the IoT (Internet of Things) has pushed toward the improvement of current practices in greenhouse technology and agriculture in general, through automation and informatization. The experimental and accurate determination of soil moisture is a matter of great importance in different scientific fields, such as agronomy, soil physics, geology, hydraulics, and soil mechanics. This paper focuses on the experimental characterization of a commercial low-cost “capacitive” coplanar soil moisture sensor that can be housed in distributed nodes for IoT applications. It is shown that at least for a well-defined type of soil with a constant solid matter to volume ratio, this type of capacitive sensor yields a reliable relationship between output voltage and gravimetric water content.

ObjectiveThe objective was to compare the results of performance-based and self-assessed measures of health literacy (HL) and to evaluate the contribution of their joint use in assessing some HL antecedents.DesignThis was a cross-sectional study.SettingThe study was conducted on the general population in Florence (Italy).ParticipantsThis study is part of a larger one, where participants were randomly selected from the registries of 11 general practitioners working in the municipality of Florence. Inclusion criteria were the following: 18–69 years of age and Italian speaking. Exclusion criteria included cognitive impairment, severe psychiatric disease or end-stage disease. In this paper, 212 adults were included.Outcome measuresHL was measured using the European Health Literacy Survey Questionnaire (HLS-EU-Q16) and the Newest Vital Sign (NVS). The HL levels obtained by means of the two measurement tools were combined into a new variable that described three different levels of HL skills: low HL skills, partial HL skills and high HL skills. Multivariate ordinal logistic regression analysis was performed to assess the predictive roles of age class, educational level and financial resources with respect to HL skills.ResultsTwenty-two per cent of the sample had high HL skills, 28.3% had low HL skills and 49.5% had partial HL skills. Educational level, age class and financial resources were significantly associated with HL skills, with OR values being higher than those obtained using the NVS or the HLS-EU-Q16 individually.ConclusionThe combination of the results obtained using the NVS and the HLS-EU-Q16 improves the understanding of HL. The new variable generated by this combination could be considered as a different way to assess HL and its multidimensional contents.

The traditional method of carrying out few-nucleon calculations is based on the angular momentum decomposition of operators relevant to the calculation. Expressing operators using a finite-sized partial wave basis enables the calculations to be carried out using a small amount of numerical work. Unfortunately, certain calculations that involve higher energies or long range potentials, require including a large number of partial waves in order to get converged results. This is problematic because such an approach requires a numerical implementation of heavily oscillating functions. Modern computers made it possible to carry out few-nucleon calculations without using angular momentum decomposition and instead to work directly with the three dimensional degrees of freedom of the nucleons. In this paper we briefly describe the, so called 3D approach and present preliminary results related to the 3 He bound state obtained within this formalism.

We investigate the π– + 2H → γ + n + n, π– + 3He → γ + 3H, π– + 3He → γ + n + d, π– + 3He → γ + n + n + p and π– + 3H → γ + n + n + n capture reactions using realistic two-nucleon and three-nucleon potentials and the single nucleon Kroll-Ruderman-type transition operator. We obtain predictions for the total capture rates for all these processes, calculating rigorously the initial and final nuclear states.

Health literacy(HL) has recently been proposed as a potential mediator in the pathway through which socio-economic status(SES) affects health. However, empirical research investigating the contribution of HL in this relationship remains scarce. This study investigated whether functional HL mediates the association between SES and self-reported health(SRH) in an adult population-based sample. The study adopted a cross-sectional design. Education level and financial status were used as measures of SES, while functional HL was assessed with the Newest Vital Sign. Moderated mediation analyses were conducted using SES variables as independent variables, SRH as dependent variable and functional HL as mediator variable. Furthermore, age, sex and chronic diseases were tested as moderators of the effect mediated by functional HL. 452 subjects completed the study (58,8% female; mean age 53,25±11,7). Results showed that functional HL mediates on average 18.5% of the association between education and SRH (p = 0.02) and 12.9% (p = 0.01) of the association between financial status and SRH. Furthermore, the proportion of effect mediated by functional HL was found to be higher in lower socio-economic classes for both SES variables considered. No significant moderation effects of age, sex or chronic diseases were observed for both SES variables. Findings suggest that functional HL may serve as a pathway by which SES affects health status, especially in lower SES groups. HL may be a valuable and actionable intermediate target for addressing health inequalities. However, further studies are needed to better define the mediating role of HL across socio-economic classes.

A brief review on the second Lithium problem is presented. In particular the focus is on the$\\alpha + d \\to {}^{6}{\\rm{Li}} + \\gamma $reaction and on the details of the different$\\alpha - d$potential models and the theoretical approximations done during the evaluation of the astrophysical S -factor.

A brief review on the second Lithium problem is presented. In particular the focus is on the reaction and on the details of the different potential models and the theoretical approximations done during the evaluation of the astrophysical S-factor.

A brief review on the second Lithium problem is presented. In particular the focus is on the α+d→L6i+γ$\\alpha + d \\to {}^{6}{\\rm{Li}} + \\gamma $ reaction and on the details of the different α−d$\\alpha - d$ potential models and the theoretical approximations done during the evaluation of the astrophysical S-factor.

We investigate the π – + 2 H → γ + n + n, π – + 3 He → γ + 3 H, π – + 3 He → γ + n + d, π – + 3 He → γ + n + n + p and π – + 3 H → γ + n + n + n capture reactions using realistic two-nucleon and three-nucleon potentials and the single nucleon Kroll-Ruderman-type transition operator. We obtain predictions for the total capture rates for all these processes, calculating rigorously the initial and final nuclear states.

The mitigation potential of vegetation-driven biophysical effects is strongly influenced by the background climate and will therefore be influenced by global warming. Based on an ensemble of remote sensing datasets, here we first estimate the temperature sensitivities to changes in leaf area over the period 2003–2014 as a function of key environmental drivers. These sensitivities are then used to predict temperature changes induced by future leaf area dynamics under four scenarios. Results show that by 2100, under high-emission scenario, greening will likely mitigate land warming by 0.71 ± 0.40 °C, and 83% of such effect (0.59 ± 0.41 °C) is driven by the increase in plant carbon sequestration, while the remaining cooling (0.12 ± 0.05 °C) is due to biophysical land-atmosphere interactions. In addition, our results show a large potential of vegetation to reduce future land warming in the very-stringent scenario (35 ± 20% of the overall warming signal), whereas this effect is limited to 11 ± 6% under the high-emission scenario. Vegetation changes have been suggested as a climate mitigation option, but the numerous feedbacks between vegetation and climate are not well understood. Here, the authors show that greening leads to surface cooling in many areas, but the size of the effect depends on the background climate.