Recent progress in IoT and software development has simplified data acquisition and immutability of information in the agri-food supply chain. In the last few years, several frameworks and applications were proposed to ensure traceability in the agri-food-sector using distributed ledger technologies (DLT) such as Blockchain technologies. Still, no other study has presented a Blockchain-based traceability platform with a lower impact on the environment and lower cost for each transaction sent by the supply chain. This article presents a traceability platform based on Green Blockchain with low energy consumption and costs savings applied to the Fontina PDO cheese supply chain, part of the project “Typicalp”, funded by the European Union (EU). The proposed traceability system is based on Algorand Blockchain, which uses the Pure Proof-of-Stake mechanism of consensus that requires minimal computational power, is highly scalable and environmentally sustainable. In addition to the environmental and financial benefits, the developed traceability platform has made it possible to digitize the entire production chain, making the data immutable and available in real-time for Fontina consortium operators and final consumers.

The Mediterranean region is frequently struck by severe rainfall events causing numerous casualties and several million euros of damages every year. Thus, improving the forecast accuracy is a fundamental goal to limit social and economic damages. Numerical Weather Prediction (NWP) models are currently able to produce forecasts at the km scale grid spacing but unreliable surface information and a poor knowledge of the initial state of the atmosphere may produce inaccurate simulations of weather phenomena. The STEAM (SaTellite Earth observation for Atmospheric Modelling) project aims to investigate whether Sentinel satellites constellation weather observation data, in combination with Global Navigation Satellite System (GNSS) observations, can be used to better understand and predict with a higher spatio-temporal resolution the atmospheric phenomena resulting in severe weather events. Two heavy rainfall events that occurred in Italy in the autumn of 2017 are studied—a localized and short-lived event and a long-lived one. By assimilating a wide range of Sentinel and GNSS observations in a state-of-the-art NWP model, it is found that the forecasts benefit the most when the model is provided with information on the wind field and/or the water vapor content.

Traditional usage models of Supercomputing centres have been extended by High-Throughput Computing (HTC), High-Performance Data Analytics (HPDA) and Cloud Computing. The complexity of current compute platforms calls for solutions to simplify usage and conveniently orchestrate computing tasks. These enable also non-expert users to efficiently execute Big Data workflows. In this context, the LEXIS project (‘Large-scale EXecution for Industry and Society’, H2020 GA 825532, https://lexis-project.eu) sets up an orchestration platform for compute- and data-intensive workflows. Its main objective is to implement a front-end and interfaces/APIs for distributed data management and workflow orchestration. The platform uses an open-source Identity and Access Management solution and a custom billing system. The data management API allows data ingestion and staging between various infrastructures. The orchestration API allows execution of workflows specified in extended TOSCA. LEXIS uses innovative technologies like YORC and Alien4Cloud for orchestration or iRODS/EUDAT-B2SAFE for data management, accelerated by Burst Buffers. Three pilot use cases from Aeronautics Engineering, Earthquake/Tsunami Analysis, and Weather and Climate Prediction are used to test the services. On the road towards longer-term sustainability, we are expanding this user base and aiming at the immersion of more Supercomputing centres within the platform.

Battery-less sensors need a fast and stable wireless charging mechanism to ensure that they are being correctly activated and properly working. The major drawback of state-of-the-art wireless power transfer solutions stands in the maximum Equivalent Isotropic Radiated Power (EIRP) established from local regulations, even using directional antennas. Indeed, the maximum transferred power to the load is limited, making the charging process slow. To overcome such limitation, a novel method for implementing an effective wireless charging system is described. The proposed solution is designed to guarantee many independent charging contributions, i.e., multiple tones are used to distribute power along transmitted carriers. The proposed rectenna system is composed by a set of narrow-band rectifiers resonating at specific target frequencies, while combining at DC. Such orthogonal frequency schema, providing independent charging contributions, is not affected by the phase shift of incident signals (i.e., each carrier is independently rectified). The design of the proposed wireless-powered system is presented. The main advantage of the solution is the voltage delivered to the load, which is directly proportional to the number of used carriers. This is fundamental to ensure fast sensor wakes-up and functioning. To demonstrate the feasibility of the proposed system, the work has been complemented with the manufacturing of two rectennas, and the analysis of experimental results, which also validated the linear relationship between the number of used carriers.