Papers by Massimo Brambilla
Lecture notes in civil engineering, 2023
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Lecture notes in civil engineering, 2023
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Lecture notes in civil engineering, 2023
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Lecture notes in civil engineering, 2023
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Agriculture, May 24, 2023
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Food and Environmental Virology, Nov 16, 2016
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European Biomass Conference and Exhibition Proceedings, 2017
Introducing a composting treatment of raw digestate could provide an interesting opportunity to f... more Introducing a composting treatment of raw digestate could provide an interesting opportunity to facilitate the handling due to the volume reducing of by-products to dispose. In order to achieve the right conditions for the composting process, absorbing solid substrates are required. This work presents the preliminary results related to the technical feasibility of this process utilising different mixtures of absorbing agents. Three different formulations of adsorbing agents with the adding of different amounts of raw digestate were tested for a period of 90 days. The preliminary results show that the process is feasible under technical aspect, allowing the obtainment of an organic fertilizer respecting the quality parameters required. Interesting results have been obtained considering the reduction of weight and volume. As matter of fact, the composting process could imply a reduction in a range between 78-86% of the initial total weight. These preliminary results suggest interesting perspectives for the management of liquid agricultural wastes allowing the reduction of mechanisation inputs needed for their disposal.
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Biosystems Engineering, Sep 1, 2019
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Applied Engineering in Agriculture, 2018
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Journal of Applied Microbiology, Jul 12, 2019
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Applied Engineering in Agriculture, 2022
HighlightsImprovement of tractor traction provides better field efficiency.Drawbar pull increased... more HighlightsImprovement of tractor traction provides better field efficiency.Drawbar pull increased with tire footprint length.Drawbar pull decreased with increasing tire footprint volume and depth.3D footprint parameters, which the 2D footprint do not contain, affected the drawbar pull significantly.The ANN highlighted the relation adequately..Improving the traction of an agricultural tractor on the field increases its working efficiency and capacity. Heavy work, like plowing, entails high levels of tire slip, which is directly related to power loss when the transmission of drawbar pull is required. Accordingly, it is possible to hypothesize that a tire with a higher traction capability could increase the working efficiency of the machine. The natural evolution for measuring the geometrical parameters of tires has led to the consideration of three-dimensional (3D) footprints since the distribution of the vertical stresses at the soil–tire interface may be highly non-uniform. In this study, the data acquired from 3D footprints of 10 sets of tires underwent processing along with the data from drawbar tests carried out with the same tires on soil terrain at different slip ratios. Subsequently, artificial intelligence multivariate methods based on artificial neural networks allowed traction prediction and verified the importance that the acquired geometrical parameters have on the measured drawbar pull. The study confirmed the correlation of the geometrical parameters of the 3D tire footprint with the drawbar pull and the results of the artificial intelligence modelling underlined the impact of these acquisitions. However, further work that considers various lug geometries is required to extend the generalizability of the studied methodology. Keywords: Field efficiency, Phenolic resin, Traction, Tractor.
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Trends in green chemistry, Nov 27, 2018
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Journal of Near Infrared Spectroscopy, Nov 23, 2021
Parallel transformation tests on pineapple slices using two micro drying plants (M1 and M2) opera... more Parallel transformation tests on pineapple slices using two micro drying plants (M1 and M2) operating with solar energy were carried out. Method M1 consisted of an active fan at the top, whose ventilation rate depended on the internal temperature. Method M2 had a continuously working fan at the bottom. The dehydration performance of these two micro-plants was compared by collecting spectra from pineapple slices in reflectance mode (900–1600 nm) at three different times: (0) process start, (1) during the process [48 h] and (2) process end [56 h]. Simultaneously, dry matter, titratable acidity (SH°), pH and aw (water activity) were measured. For these parameters, significant differences ( p < 0.05) were detected between the fresh (t = 0) and the dried product (t = 56). Near infrared (NIR) spectroscopic analysis was carried out according to previously published methods. Spectral data in the wavelength region from 1300 to 1550 nm underwent statistical processing to perform aquaphotomics evaluation and chemometric analysis using PCA (Principal Component Analysis) and LDA (Linear Discriminant Analysis). The aquagrams highlighted differences among fresh, half-dried and dried slices where water molecules were highly organized between the water matrix coordinates C1 to C3 at t = 0 and C2 to C6 for the other evaluated times. The PCA could explain about 98% of the total variance in the PC1–PC3 scores plot. And the additional LDA classified the NIR spectra with an accuracy of 100, 98 and 83% for t = 0, t = 56-M1 and t = 56-M2, respectively. Such preliminary results suggest the applicability of Aquaphotomics and chemometrics for the continuous monitoring of fruit drying processes using an adequate NIR probe. Further experiments are already in progress.
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<p>Accurate estimates of canopy cover (CC),tree and stand structure are req... more <p>Accurate estimates of canopy cover (CC),tree and stand structure are required to manage poplar plantations effectively. However, traditional measurements are limited by the cost and time-consuming nature of field methods, which inherently have limited the large scale adoption of <em>in situ</em> approaches. Satellite remote sensing has the advantage of broader geographical coverage, but its spatial and temporal resolution is often not suited for tree- to stand-scale applications as required in precision plantation forestry. Recently, unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) have become very popular in forestry. In this contribution, we tested the use of UAVs for retrieving plot-level canopy and stand attributes in hybrid poplar plantations, which were sampled in Northern Italy. A multispectral camera sensor was equipped to a multi-rotor UAV, and was used to acquire orthorectified images of 50 poplar plantations, each 0.25 ha in size, with varying age and plant density. In addition, field optical measurements of canopy structure made by digital cover photography and mensurational attributes derived from tree inventory were also performed and used as ground truth data.</p><p>The very high resolution of UAV imagery (<10 cm) allowed to efficiently perform a Simple Linear Iterative Clustering (SLIC) algorithm for superpixels generation, which was used to delineate individual poplar crowns automatically. The segmented images were then processed using Gray-Level Co-occurrence Matrices (GLCM) to calculate specific texture attributes, which were benchmarked against ground truth measurements.</p><p>Results indicated that multispectral UAVs can estimate canopy and stand structure attributes in poplar plantations reliably and accurately. Based on model performance indicators, the best model is that relating stand features to image dissimilarity. Its RMSE is in line with the standard deviations of the observed values, meaning that the error associated with the prediction is in line with the uncertainty of the calibration dataset.</p><p>The basal area, the volume of the trunk and the crown volume were the most correlated attributes with image dissimilarity valued from GLCM.By contrast, crown cover (CC) and leaf area index (LAI) were the model's attributes that could fit the worse following the clustering effect of plants’ age and the leverage occurring in some stands that results in ground truth data overestimation.</p><p>We concluded that use of UAVs can be considered an efficient tool in poplar plantation forestry. Considering the multi-scale nature of poplar plantation interventions, UAVs are particularly relevant as they can bridge between field and satellite measurements. Regarding the latter, the high resolution of UAV imagery also allows calibrating metrics from coarser scale satellite products, avoiding or reducing the need for field calibration efforts.</p>
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Advances in Environmental and Engineering Research, 2021
Soil is a very complex medium made of minerals, organic matter, microorganisms, air, and water. V... more Soil is a very complex medium made of minerals, organic matter, microorganisms, air, and water. Vibrational spectroscopy techniques are exceptionally well-suited to be used with portable and hand-held devices. In this study, NIR spectroscopy was applied using portable instrumentation and the holistic Aquaphotomics approach to identify the differences in three Mediterranean soil profiles from Sardinia (Italy). The soil samples (95) collected from alluvial and loess-sampling sites in the three study areas of North Sardinia (i.e., Arborea, Berchidda, and Ottava) underwent preliminary oven-drying at 40 °C and sieving (mesh size of 2 mm) to remove skeletal particles, large roots, and organic debris. Data on soil spectra were collected in duplicate using the microNIR OnSite-W spectrometer (VIAVI Srl, Italy) in reflectance mode from 900 – 1,600 nm (50 scans; 125 reading points). Then, the data on the absorbance from 1,300 to 1,550 nm were statistically processed to construct the aquagrams ...
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Sensors, 2020
Sturgeon caviar quality relies not only on the perfect dosage of the ingredients but also on the ... more Sturgeon caviar quality relies not only on the perfect dosage of the ingredients but also on the long sturgeon breeding cycle (about 12–15 years) and the exact timing of the egg extraction. For the improvement and the promotion of Italian caviar, the development of an analytical system dedicated to fish products, and caviar, in particular, is fundamental. The use of near-infrared spectrometry (NIRS) technology is auspicious. The aquaphotomics approach proved to be an adequate analytical tool to highlight, in real-time, the differences in caviar quality stored with, or without, borax as a preservative. Seventy-five sturgeon caviar (Acipenser transmontanus) samples underwent spectral NIR characterization using a microNIR1700 in the 900–1700 nm range. Data processing was carried out according to the literature. Tenderometric and sensory analyses were also carried out in parallel. The results suggest that a process line under strict control and monitoring can result in high-quality cavi...
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International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health, 2020
Hepatitis E virus (HEV) is an emerging causative agent of acute hepatitis worldwide. To provide i... more Hepatitis E virus (HEV) is an emerging causative agent of acute hepatitis worldwide. To provide insights into the epidemiology of HEV in Italy, a large-scale investigation was conducted into urban sewage over nine years (2011–2019), collecting 1374 sewage samples from 48 wastewater treatment plants located in all the 20 regions of Italy. Broadly reactive primers targeting the ORF1 and ORF2 regions were used for the detection and typing of HEV, followed by Sanger and next generation sequencing (NGS). Real-time RT-qPCR was also used to attempt quantification of positive samples. HEV RNA detection occurred in 74 urban sewage samples (5.4%), with a statistically significant higher frequency (7.1%) in central Italy. Fifty-six samples were characterized as G3 strains and 18 as G1. While the detection of G3 strains occurred in all the surveillance period, G1 strains were mainly detected in 2011–2012, and never in 2017–2019. Typing was achieved in 2 samples (3f subtype). Viral concentration...
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Biomass and Bioenergy, 2019
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Cereal Research Communications, 2018
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Papers by Massimo Brambilla
The present study aimed to develop a variable-rate (VRT) system capable of automatically controlling the nitrogen distribution rate in the open field specifically designed for pressurized slurry tanker (the most diffused spreading technology used in Italy. For field-testing purposes, this system was mounted on a double-axis 10 m3 slurry tanker equipped with a crawling nozzle distribution unit. Field experiments were conducted at two typical forward speeds (2 and 3 km/h) and three different nitrogen application rates (170, 250, and 340 kg/ha).
Based on the experimental results, the system was generally capable of limiting the differences between the nominal and measured application rates to less than 7% and the transverse field distribution resulted uniform throughout the working width of the machine and at all tested operating conditions, with maximum deviations of about 15% (limit value imposed by UNI EN 13406:2002 standard
Cattolica del Sacro Cuore (UCSC) in Piacenza, Italy. Among the fruit crops studied, strawberry, blackberry, grapevine, apple, pear, and olive, research on strawberry and blackberry was funded by the Food Standard Agency (UK). Fruit plants were grown in pots, kept under tunnels or in open field, and contaminated with 134Cs and 85Sr via leaves or via soil. Interception in strawberry plants ranges 39–17 % for 134Cs, from anthesis (April) to predormancy (November). Leaf-to-fruit translocation occurs to a greater extent for 134Cs than for 85Sr. The distribution of contamination in fruit crops is an element-specific process: 134Cs is preferentially allocated to fruits and 85Sr to leaves. However, the activity in leaves is also species-specific: fruit species show different leaf-to-fruit translocation. Results on apple, pear, and grape crops indicate that the highest transfer from leaf to fruit occurs in apple crops. Olive plants also
show 134Cs translocation from leaves to trunks. Grapevines grown on mineral soil show a root uptake higher for 85Sr than for 134Cs, while strawberries grown on a peat substrate show a root uptake higher for 134Cs than for 85Sr. Rinsing directly contaminated fruits removes 85Sr (36 %) to a greater degree than 134Cs (24 %). Transfer to olive oil is low. A 57%of 134Cs is transferred from grapes to white wine.