Ricerc@Sapienza

The Fosso di Vallerano valley, Rome (Italy), is an alluvial valley characterized by a complex geological setting which implies significant vertical and horizontal heterogene- ities. In the last decade, this area experienced an intense urbanization which changes the ori- ginal seismic response conditions of free field. According to these features, the Fosso di Vallerano valley has been chosen as case study to analyze the influence of buildings on the local seismic response (Site-City Interaction – SCI).

This paper describes a pseudo-static approach developed for geosynthetic-reinforced earth (GRE) retaining walls, calibrated against given levels of wall performance defined by specified values of earthquake-induced displacements. The GRE walls generally show a good performance under severe seismic loading due to the capability of reinforcements to redistribute the deformations induced by the seismic actions within the reinforced zone.

Anomalies in Radon (222Rn) concentrations prior to earthquakes have been widely documented in seismogenic areas worldwide, but questions about their predictability remain largely unanswered. Even if it is not universally accepted, the analysis of the high-resolution time series of Rn (222Rn) concentrations in groundwater, air and soil has been proposed as a suitable method to identify seismic precursors.

Chemical and physical responses of groundwater to seismicity have been documented for thousands of years. Among the waves produced by earthquakes, Rayleigh waves can spread to great distances and produce hydrogeological perturbations in response to their passage. In this work, the groundwater level, which was continuously recorded in a monitoring well in Central Italy between July 2014 and December 2019, exhibited evident responses to dynamic crustal stress. In detail, 18 sharp variations of the groundwater level due to worldwide Mw ≥ 6.5 earthquakes were observed.

Exposure to environmental contextual changes, such as those occurring after an earthquake, requires individuals to learn novel routes around their environment, landmarks and spatial layout. In this study, we aimed to uncover whether contextual changes that occurred after the 2009 L’Aquila earthquake affected topographic memory in exposed survivors.

The paper provides, as a first step, a critical, although not-exhaustive, review of the steps required for assessing the resilience of electric distribution systems to natural hazards, and identifies the required metrics and models still to be defined. Aiming to contribute towards that, the paper proposes an empirical-based analytical formula for estimating the expected damage frequencies to underground cable joints, when subjected to overheating. Empirical-based formulas for estimating the damage frequency to underground cables, subjected to earthquakes are also reported in the paper.

A society that believes wealth to be determined by random “luck”, rather than by merit, demands more redistribution. We present evidence of this behavior by exploiting a natural experiment provided by the L’Aquila earthquake in 2009, which hit a large area of Central Italy through a series of destructive shakes over eight days.

In this paper we examine the use of Twitter and Facebook in two dramatic earthquakes that hit Italy: L’Aquila (in 2009) and Emilia (in 2012). Indeed, disasters disrupt everyday life and engage people in meaning-making processes aimed at recovering meaning and control of their world. In these cases, we argue that the use of social media may contribute to social representa- tions processes and functions: cognitive coping, social sharing of emotions, preserving self-efficacy, boosting identity, and community empowerment.

In the aftermath of an earthquake, broadcast and traditional media play a crucial role, fulfilling complex social and psychological functions.

Earthquakes cannot be predicted with precision, but algorithms exist for intermediate-term middle-range prediction of main shocks above a pre-assigned threshold, based on seismicity patterns. Few years ago, a first attempt was made in the framework of project SISMA, funded by Italian Space Agency, to jointly use seismological tools, like CN algorithm and scenario earthquakes, and geodetic methods and techniques, like GPS and SAR monitoring, to effectively constrain priority areas where to concentrate prevention and seismic risk mitigation.