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In this experimental study the influence of fissuring orientation and confinement pressure on the mechanical behaviour of natural clays is investigated. The tested material, the scaly clay from Santa Croce di Magliano (south of Italy), is characterised by an intense network of pre-existing fissures of single orientation. Several plane strain compression tests have been conducted, under different confinement pressures (i.e., from 50 to 600 kPa), on specimens having fissures with vertical, medium and horizontal inclination. Digital Image Correlation has been used to follow the deformation processes of the specimens throughout the tests by measuring incremental shear and volumetric strain maps. The results showed a strong coupling between the total confinement and the fissure inclination, that is controlling both the onset and the development of the patterns of the localisation processes. The new results have been compared with previous ones carried out on the same material without confinement. The comparison shed light on the role of total confinement that becomes particularly relevant from certain levels of pressures and fissuring inclination.

The mechanical behaviour of timber loaded in compression perpendicular to grain is essential for a rational design of many timber structures. Structural components frequently exposed to such loading include studs on bottom rails, stress-laminated timber decks, timber elements lying in between vertical load-bearing columns as well as traditional timber joints mating surfaces in compression. Compression perpendicular to grain has been a repeated topic for discussion both in the current European regulations for timber structures, as well as in the ongoing work with the next generation of Eurocode 5-timber structures. However, the long-term behaviour is quite complex, taking both time and moisture variation into consideration, and to improve the understanding and the ability to consider the long-term effects in practical design, a simplified one-dimensional model is given herein. The paper presents novel results from long-term compression orthogonal to grain tests performed with load and moisture control. The purpose of the testing was to evaluate the effect of transversal creep on the long-term behaviour of timber elements including the effect of the mechanosorptive deformation. The test results were in turn used to calibrate a one-dimensional model for the prediction of the long-term response of timber. The model takes into account the combined effects of loading and moisture variations. The effective material properties are defined by use of effective pith locations together with the orthotropic material parameters. Finally, a comparison between the model results and experimental observations is given, showing an overall good prediction of the response.

Thanks to the data of the WISE all-sky survey we discovered that the non-thermal infrared emission of blazars, the largest population of associated γ-ray sources, has peculiar spectral properties. Here we provide a summary of all results achieved on the infrared–γ-ray connection. We also show results on the latest statistical analysis of the tight correlation between the mid-infrared colors and the γ-ray spectral index for Fermi blazars, a connection that links both emitted powers and spectral shapes of particles accelerated in blazar jets over ten decades in frequency of the electromagnetic spectrum. Finally, we outline all developments performed in the last decade achieved using the infrared– γ-ray connection to discover hundreds of new blazars within the sample of unidentified γ-ray sources thanks to optical spectroscopic observations.

As part of its institutional skills, the INAIL (National Institute for Insurance against Accidents at Work) promotes and carries out activities aimed at preventing the risks to which workers may be subjected to in different work scenarios, in this case, in collaboration with Livanova and WOW Technology S.p.A. (Wonderful Water Technology, Monselice, PD, Italy). An open problem at the Livanova plant, located in Saluggia (VC, Italy), is the decontamination of many concrete structures. Precisely because of its radioactive content, simple mechanical removal wasn’t possible for the high production of the contaminated dust, which may endanger the health of workers. The solution adopted was to insert decontaminant liquids into the concrete structures and, after a period of soaking, treating these liquids with an evaporative machine that is able to separate contaminants. The combination of these systems proved to be suitable for this experimental decontamination activity. As a result, this activity has shown a certain efficiency in removing radioactivity from the walls of the structures, ensuring the safety of the workers involved during the operations and reducing the potential risk of exposure in comparison to mechanical removal.

At present, the mechanical properties of laterally loaded threaded fasteners with large diameters embedded in timber elements remain unknown. An experimental study of laterally loaded threaded rods with wood screw threads embedded perpendicular to grain in softwood elements (spruce and pine glulam and spruce LVL) is presented in this paper. Embedment tests with the load acting parallel and perpendicular to grain were carried out and the embedment strength and stiffness were quantified. For some test series, the experimental embedment strengths were lower compared to the predictions according to Eurocode 5 in terms of both mean and characteristic values. This finding indicates that the predictions by Eurocode 5 are not always conservative. To investigate the effect of the thread, additional series of embedment tests were carried out with smooth dowels featuring a diameter approximately equal to the core diameter of the threaded rods. Finally, the yielding moment of threaded rods was quantified based on a series of three-point bending tests of threaded rods. The experimentally determined yielding moment was significantly higher than the prediction of Eurocode 5.

The Chandra X-ray Observatory is the only X-ray facility with sub arcsec resolution, permitting detailed studies of radio galaxies and quasars. We review a short list of projects contributing to our goal of obtaining Chandra observations of all 3C extragalactic sources. Radio source samples, unlike most surveys at other wavelengths, should be completely unbiased with respect to viewing angle: the radio lobes are sign posts indicating the location of AGN (obscured or unobscured nuclei). The X-ray data allow us to estimate excess absorption towards nuclei, to find new examples of X-ray emission from jet knots and hotspots, and to isolate sources in clusters of galaxies together with signatures of feedback (e.g. cavities in the ICM). This work is supported by NASA grants GO1-12125A and GO2-13115X.

The massive amount of data produced by the recent multi-wavelength large-area surveys has spurred the growth of unprecedentedly massive and complex astronomical datasets that are proving the traditional data analysis techniques more and more inadequate. Knowledge discovery techniques, while relatively new to astronomy, have been successfully applied in several other quantitative disciplines for the determination of patterns in extremely complex datasets. The concerted use of different unsupervised and supervised machine learning techniques, in particular, can be a powerful approach to answer specific questions involving high-dimensional datasets and degenerate observables. In this paper I will present CLaSPS, a data-driven methodology for the discovery of patterns in high-dimensional astronomical datasets based on the combination of clustering techniques and pattern recognition algorithms. I shall also describe the result of the application of CLaSPS to a sample of a peculiar class of AGNs, the blazars.

We explore the properties of the large-scale environment of FR0 radio galaxies belonging to the FR0CAT sample which includes 104 compact radio sources associated with nearby (z<0.05) early-type galaxies. By using various estimators we find that FR0s live in regions of higher than the average galaxies density and a factor two lower density, on average, with respect to FRI radio galaxies. This latter difference is driven by the large fraction (63%) of FR0s located in groups formed by less than 15 galaxies, an environment which FRIs rarely (17%) inhabit. Beside the lack of substantial extended radio emission defining the FR0s class, this is the first significant difference between the properties of these two populations of low power radio galaxies. We interpret the differences in environment between FR0s and FRIs as the due to an evolutionary link between local galaxies density, BH spin, jet power, and extended radio emission.

About one third of the gamma-ray sources detected by Fermi have still no firmly established counterpart at lower energies. Here we propose a new approach to find candidate counterparts for the unidentified gamma-ray sources (UGSs) based on the 325 MHz radio survey performed with Westerbork Synthesis Radio Telescope (WSRT) in the northern hemisphere. First we investigate the low-frequency radio properties of blazars, the largest known population of gamma-ray sources; then we search for sources with similar radio properties combining the information derived from the Westerbork Northern Sky Survey (WENSS) with those of the NRAO VLA Sky survey (NVSS). We present a list of candidate counterparts for 32 UGSs with at least one counterpart in the WENSS. We also performed an extensive research in literature to look for infrared and optical counterparts of the gamma-ray blazar candidates selected with the low-frequency radio observations to confirm their nature. On the basis of our multifrequency research we identify 23 new gamma-ray blazar candidates out of 32 UGSs investigated. I will also present the first analysis of very low frequency radio emission of blazars based on the recent Very Large Array Low-Frequency Sky Survey (VLSS) at 74 MHz. I show that blazars present radio flat spectra when evaluated at 74 MHz, about an order of magnitude in frequency lower than previous analyses. The implications of these findings in the contest of the blazars – radio galaxies connection will be discussed.

The question of whether and how the properties of radio galaxies (RGs) are connected with the large-scale environment is still an open issue. For this work we measured the large-scale galaxies' density around RGs present in the revised Third Cambridge Catalog of radio sources (3CR) with 0.02 < z < 0.3. The goal is to determine whether the accretion mode and morphology of RGs are related to the richness of the environment. We considered RGs at 0.05 < z < 0.3 for a comparison between optical spectroscopic classes, and those within 0.02 < z < 0.1 to study the differences between the radio morphological types. Photometric data from the Panoramic Survey Telescope & Rapid Response System (Pan-STARRS) survey were used to search for \"red sequences\" within an area of 500 kpc of radius around each RG. We find that 1) RGs span over a large range of local galaxies' density, from isolated sources to those in rich environments, 2) the richness distributions of the various classes are not statistically different, and 3) the radio luminosity is not connected with the source environment. Our results suggest that the RG properties are independent of the local galaxies density, which is in agreement with some previous analyses, but contrasting with other studies. We discuss the possible origin of this discrepancy. An analysis of a larger sample is needed to put out results on a stronger statistical basis.