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A digital low power pulse compressed ionosonde was developed at the Istituto Nazionale di Geofisica e Vulcanologia (INGV), Rome, Italy. The aim of this Advanced Ionospheric Sounder, AIS-INGV, is to reduce the transmitted power and, consequently, weight, size, power consumption and hardware complexity. To compensate the power reduction the most advanced HF radar techniques such as the pulse compression and a phase coherent integration are used. The ionosonde is completely programmable and a PC supports the data acquisition, control, storage and on-line processing. The first prototype was installed at Gibilmanna Ionospheric Observatory (Sicily), an interesting location in the center of Mediterranean area. The new ionosonde will contribute to ionospheric database and real time knowledge of South European ionospheric conditions for space weather applications. In this work the first results (ionograms and autoscaled characteristics) are presented and briefly discussed.

A new digital ionosonde called AIS-INGV (Advanced Ionospheric Sounder) was designed both for research and for routine service of HF radio wave propagation forecast. Nearly the entire system was developed in the Laboratorio di Geofisica Ambientale at the Istituto Nazionale di Geofisica e Vulcanologia (INGV), Rome. It exploits advanced techniques for signal analysis, recent technological devices and PC resources. This paper describes design concepts and performance of the new ionosonde.

The Italian Ionospheric Antarctic Observatory of Terra Nova Bay (74.70S, 164.11E) was recently equipped with the AIS-INGV ionosonde developed at the Istituto Nazionale di Geofisica e Vulcanologia (INGV), Rome, (Italy). This paper aims to describe briefly which are the main characteristics of the instrument and show the good quality and reliability of the recorded ionograms.

The ionosonde is a system which exploits the radar technique: it applies electromagnetic waves with variable frequency in the HF band to measure the ionospheric layers electron density, height and other parameters. This paper is a technical report on the new digital ionosonde (AIS-INGV), which was designed both for research purposes and for the routine service of the HF radiowave propagation forecast. It has been developed almost completely within the Laboratorio di Geofisica Ambientale (LGA) at the Istituto Nazionale di Geofisica e Vulcanologia (INGV). It exploits advanced techniques for the signal analysis, recent technological devices and PC resources. The report is divided into two parts; the first is a general description of the design development, the second is a more detailed description of the blocks and circuits actually built and tested, directed to a specialist reader.

www.earth-prints.org aims to satisfy the increasing demand of fast, up-to-date, easy-accessible, and free-of-charge sources of information in all branches of Geosciences. It allows earth scientists to deposit electronic documents into its collections and to index them by subjects and keywords. Earth-prints provides a time-stamp to all deposited materials to insure precedence rights to original ideas and scientific results. It deals with copyright issues through Creative Common standards that offer a wide variety of licenses. All deposited material is made immediately available to the public. Subscribers will be sent a daily newsletter according to the topics they have signed in. The archive has a three-level hierarchical structure. The top level includes Atmosphere, Cryosphere, Hydrosphere, Solid Earth, and General. It then branches into several disciplines within the other two levels. Different collections take in different kinds of material, such as pre-prints, oral presentations, extended abstracts, published papers, conference papers, books and book chapters, posters, and Web products and databases. Earth-Prints main language is English but it accepts documents in other languages also, giving visibility to data and studies at local scale that are indeed of general interests. An abstract in English is always required. We will present a virtual tour into the many features of Earth-prints to provide all its potential users with an easy acquaintance of the system and make them explore its capabilities. Although the archive is based on latest information technology it requires no specific knowledge to be used because it manages all procedures for access, navigation, upload of documents and information retrieval through a user-friendly interface. What is the limit of open archive development? We think that the one and only limit of open archives is the eagerness of its users to share information and knowledge.

We set up a computational tool to numerically model static and quasi-static deformation generated by faulting sources embedded in plane or spherical domains. We use a Finite Element (FE) approach to automatically implement arbitrary faulting sources and calculate displacement and stress fields induced by slip on the fault. The package makes use of the capabilities of CalculiX, a non commercial FE software designed to solve field problems (see for details), and is freely distributed by request.

This book contains the proceedings of the 1st WSEAS International Conference on Environmental and Geological Science and Engineering (EG'08) which was held in Malta, September 11-13, 2008. This conference aims to disseminate the latest research and applications in Renewable Energy, Mineral Resources, Natural Hazards and Risks, Environmental Impact Assessment, Urban and Regional Planning Issues, Remote Sensing and GIS, and other relevant topics and applications. The friendliness and openness of the WSEAS conferences, adds to their ability to grow by constantly attracting young researchers. The WSEAS Conferences attract a large number of well-established and leading researchers in various areas of Science and Engineering as you can see from http://www.wseas.org/reports. Your feedback encourages the society to go ahead as you can see in http://www.worldses.org/feedback.htm The contents of this Book are also published in the CD-ROM Proceedings of the Conference. Both will be sent to the WSEAS collaborating indices after the conference: www.worldses.org/indexes In addition, papers of this book are permanently available to all the scientific community via the WSEAS E-Library. Expanded and enhanced versions of papers published in this conference proceedings are also going to be considered for possible publication in one of the WSEAS journals that participate in the major International Scientific Indices (Elsevier, Scopus, EI, ACM, Compendex, INSPEC, CSA .... see: www.worldses.org/indexes) these papers must be of high-quality (break-through work) and a new round of a very strict review will follow. (No additional fee will be required for the publication of the extended version in a journal). WSEAS has also collaboration with several other international publishers and all these excellent papers of this volume could be further improved, could be extended and could be enhanced for possible additional evaluation in one of the editions of these international publishers. Finally, we cordially thank all the people of WSEAS for their efforts to maintain the high scientific level of conferences, proceedings and journals.

The historical sources of large and moderate earthquakes, earthquake catalogues and monographs exist in many depositories in Syria and European centers. They have been studied, and the detailed review and analysis resulted in a catalogue with 181 historical earthquakes from 1365 B.C. to 1900 A.D. Numerous original documents in Arabic, Latin, Byzantine and Assyrian allowed us to identify seismic events not mentioned in previous works. In particular, detailed descriptions of damage in Arabic sources provided quantitative information necessary to re-evaluate past seismic events. These large earthquakes (I0>VIII) caused considerable damage in cities, towns and villages located along the northern section of the Dead Sea fault system. Fewer large events also occurred along the Palmyra, Ar-Rassafeh and the Euphrates faults in Eastern Syria. Descriptions in original sources document foreshocks, aftershocks, fault ruptures, liquefaction, landslides, tsunamis, fires and other damages. We present here an updated historical catalogue of 181 historical earthquakes distributed in 4 categories regarding the originality and other considerations, we also present a table of the parametric catalogue of 36 historical earthquakes (table I) and a table of the complete list of all historical earthquakes (181 events) with the affected locality names and parameters of information quality and completeness (table II) using methods already applied in other regions (Italy, England, Iran, Russia) with a completeness test using EMS-92. This test suggests that the catalogue is relatively complete for magnitudes >6.5. This catalogue may contribute to a comprehensive and unified parametric earthquake catalogue and to a realistic assessment of seismic hazards in Syria and surrounding regions.

Keys to risk management in the energy efficiency conversion of government buildings   1. The importance of risk management in the energy efficiency building conversion   The energy sector is an important part of any economy and the risks associated with it can be significant. Risk management is essential to ensure that the transition from conventional buildings to Near Zero Energy Buildings (NZEB) remains viable and sustainable. There are five key steps to effective risk management in the energy sector. 1. Identifying Risks: The first step in effective risk management is to identify and assess the risks in a NZEB building. This includes identifying potential sources of risk, such as market fluctuations, regulatory changes, and technological advances. It also involves assessing the likelihood of these risks occurring and their potential impact on operations.  2. Developing a Risk Strategy: Once the risks have been identified, it’s essential to develop a strategy for managing them. This involves creating processes and procedures to mitigate the risks and ensuring they are implemented effectively. This strategy should also include contingency plans so that if a risk occurs, it can be managed effectively. 3. Monitoring and Reviewing: Risk management isn’t a one-time process – it needs to be continuously monitored and reviewed to ensure it remains effective in dealing with changing circumstances or emerging risks. Regular reviews should be conducted to evaluate whether existing strategies are still appropriate or whether new ones need to be developed or existing ones modified or replaced. 4. Training & Awareness: Training employees about risk management is essential for ensuring its effectiveness across all departments within an organisation. Employees must be aware of what constitutes a risk and how best to manage it when it arises so that they can take appropriate action when required. 5. Communication: Effective communication between all departments within an organisation is critical for successful risk management, as it ensures everyone is aware of any potential risks and understands how they need to be handled when they arise. This also helps foster collaboration between teams when dealing with any issues related to risk management. In conclusion, effective risk management in NZEB building conversions is essential for ensuring its sustainability over time and avoiding costly mistakes or disruptions caused by unexpected events or circumstances arising from existing or emerging risks. By following these five key steps, organizations can ensure they have an effective strategy in place for managing risk in their operations now, as well as in the future.

This work is the first step of a comprehensive long-term volcanic hazard assessment of the Vestmannaeyjar volcanic system focusing on critical infrastructure on Heimaey and is suitable for long-term planning during the quiescent time between eruptions. It can be further developed after more geologic mapping and dating of deposits has been made to include more knowledge of the eruptive history and the magmatic system and be refined after acceptable volcanic risk in Iceland has been defined. Probabilistic modeling of lava flows and tephra fall from potential future eruption scenarios is used to analyze how different eruption conditions produce hazards of different sizes from various locations. The impacts of the hazards on the community are quantified by considering their potential to destroy critical infrastructure and the resulting potential economic damage in the absence of mitigation actions. Eruption frequency for the Vestmannaeyjar volcanic system is low relative to the frequently active volcanoes of the Eastern Volcanic Zone. In the case of an eruption within the whole system there is only a 3–8% likelihood that a vent will open on Heimaey. In other words, there is a 92–97% likelihood that the next eruption within the volcanic system will not be on Heimaey. The most densely populated parts of Heimaey in the north and around the harbor are the most vulnerable to Moderate and Large lava flows originating on the island. Almost all infrastructure on the island is vulnerable to lava inundation from a Large eruption originating anywhere on the island. Half of the Heimaey residence roofs are at risk of collapsing due to tephra load within six days of some Moderate sized eruptions only if an eruption occurs on or close to Heimaey; if the winds promote transport over the island; and if the tephra is wet (as precipitation adds to the mass). Mitigation actions have proved to be extremely beneficial and the experiences from the 1973 eruption should be relied on to help with future actions. Pre-eruption mitigation can occur in a variety of ways including Civil Protection contingency planning, building up specialist knowledge and within vulnerable communities and via land-use planning.

We present a new seismotomography investigation providing a 3-D overall model of Vp, Vs and Vp/ Vs for Mt. Etna, the largest and most active volcano in Europe. We estimated and jointly evaluated P-and S-wave velocity patterns together with the Vp/Vs ratio, particularly useful to discriminate the presence of groundwater, gas, and melts and thus very precious for volcano investigations. We applied the LOTOS software to ~ 4600 crustal earthquakes that occurred in the Etnean area during the last 26 years, the longest time-interval ever analysed for Mt. Etna. This wide dataset has allowed us to characterize the volcano velocity structure getting over possible singularities due to specific eruptive phases. Our results further refined the high velocity body widely recognized in the southeastern sector of Mt. Etna by furnishing new clues on the possible former magma pathways. Moreover, the obtained 3D seismic velocity model depicted new anomalies revealing the presence of: (i) two shallow underground aquifers in the northern Etnean sector; (ii) a volume of strongly fractured rocks filled of fluids along the eastern flank; (iii) a quite deep region of probable fluid accumulation apparently not linked to the volcanic activity in the western sector. Seismic tomography based on arrival times of the P-and S-waves from local earthquakes is a powerful tool actively used for studying volcanic systems. For several volcanoes around the world, tomography allowed to successfully reconstruct the shallow-depth volcanic structure (see e.g., Refs. 1-4). Tomographic analyses have furnished, in particular, accurate pictures of the feeding systems and very precious constraints for modelling the volcanic processes also highlighting that each volcano has some peculiar features that makes it unique. In the last decades, tomographic studies have strongly benefited from the strengthening of seismic networks and computational progresses that, particularly for volcanic regions, allowed to carefully reconstruct 3D velocity models by furnishing P-and S-wave velocities and the Vp/Vs ratio, a key parameter to discriminate the presence of groundwater, gas, and melts (Refs. 5-7 , among others). On these grounds, in the present study we collected data from more than 4600 earthquakes recorded between 1997 and 2022 in order to perform a new tomographic inversion of Mt. Etna (South Italy) by applying the software LOTOS 8. Mt. Etna is the largest and most active volcano in Europe 9. It is a composite strato-volcano rising 3300 m above the sea level in eastern Sicily (Fig. 1). Mt. Etna is located at the intersection between several major structural units, where the Apennine-Maghrebian thrust belt, the Hyblean Plateau of the Africa foreland and extensional structures on the western side of the Ionian basin coexist (Fig. 1). Its activity primarily consists of nearly continuous degassing from summit craters, strombolian phases of highly variable intensity, and frequent basaltic lava flows, representing a main source of volcanic hazard in the area. Moreover, flank eruptions during which the magma bypasses the central plumbing system, intrudes as dikes and erupts along the volcano flanks, periodically occur. This kind of event produces a massive deformation affecting the entire morphology of the edifice (e.g., Refs. 10-12). In particular, in the last decade it has experienced a significant increase in eruption frequency together with the development of some of the most energetic paroxysmal sequences recorded at Mt. Etna in recent times 13. These include the three-year-long sequence of lava fountaining occurred between 2011 and 2013 14 and the very recent sequence of eruptions that took place between December 2020 and February 2022 15. Moreover, also during the writing of this paper, some episodes of explosions with ash emissions were recorded.