Danilo Bersani

Università di Parma | UNIPR · Department of Physics and Earth Sciences

Villa di Teodorico in Galeata (Forlì-Cesena, Emilia Romagna) is an important archeological site in the north of Italy occupied from sixth century BC to twelfth century AD. The most interesting results concern the Roman age, when a large villa was built, and the late antiquity, when the Ostrogothic king Theodoric decided to build in this area his pa...

The church of San Francesco del Prato in Parma (Italy) is a masterpiece of the Gothic style, dated back to the 13th century. However, its historical and monumental value could not be appreciated for a long time, especially due to the transformation of the building into a city jail. The recent restoration works brought back to light valuable frescos...

Among the most promising material for thin-film photovoltaics, Antimony Selenide plays a pivotal role, being constituted of Earth-abundant elements and owing to its optical and electrical properties. Recently, ASe solar cells exhibited relatively good photovoltaic performances, reaching a considerable efficiency close to 9 %. Despite these remarkab...

Copper-doped antimony selenide (Cu-doped Sb2Se3) thin films were deposited as absorber layers in photovoltaic solar cells using the low-temperature pulsed electron deposition (LT-PED) technique, starting from Sb2Se3 targets where part of the Sb was replaced with Cu. From a crystalline point of view, the best results were achieved for thin films wit...

Epidote group minerals are one of the three most abundant kinds of heavy minerals in orogenic sediments, the other two being amphibole and garnet. They resist diagenesis better than amphibole and resist weathering in soils better than garnet. Their chemical composition and optical properties vary markedly and systematically with temperature and pre...

Antimony selenide (Sb2Se3) is today one of the most promising alternative materials for p-type absorbers in thin-film photovoltaics, with an optimal band-gap and a very high absorption coefficient. However, its crystal structure is extremely anisotropic and its natural carrier density is generally very low. Sb 2 Se 3 thin films have been deposited by...

Unintentionally doped (001)‐oriented orthorhombic κ‐Ga2O3 epitaxial films on c‐plane sapphire substrates are characterized by the presence of ≈ 10 nm wide columnar rotational domains that can severely inhibit in‐plane electronic conduction. Comparing the in‐ and out‐of‐plane resistance on well‐defined sample geometries, it is experimentally proved...

Glauconite mineral is one of the most sensitive indicators of low sedimentation rate in the marine environment. The time of residence of glauconites at the sea bottom before burial is reflected by their so-called maturity that is differentiated based on their K2O content. The present work aims to investigate the evolution of glauconites during the...

Chrysotile, one of the six regulated asbestos minerals, is classified as carcinogenic to humans by the International Agency for Research on Cancer. The Balangero mine (Turin, Italy) was the largest asbestos mine in Europe, providing extraction of chrysotile fibres until 1990. Chrysotile from Balangero is currently of great interest in fibres toxici...

This study deals with the materials of the sub-arch painting of the Del Bono Chapel of the Abbey Church of S. Giovanni Evangelista in Parma, Italy, datable to around 1523. The artist is Antonio Allegri, known as Correggio (1489–1534), who is considered to be one of the greatest painters of the 16th century. Micro-Raman spectroscopy, micro-Fourier t...

Alveolar macrophages are the first line of defence against detrimental inhaled stimuli. To date, no comparative data have been obtained on the inflammatory response induced by different carcinogenic mineral fibres in the three main macrophage phenotypes: M0 (non-activated), M1 (pro-inflammatory) and M2 (alternatively activated). To gain new insight...

Raman spectroscopy is a powerful and efficient tool that is being used more and more frequently in high-resolution provenance analysis. This study is dedicated to Ca-poor orthorhombic pyroxene, which for its low durability during diagenesis can be considered as a diagnostic first-cycle phase. We focused on 15 samples of modern sands representing a...

The street art murals ‘The Big Mother’ by Gola Hundun, the ‘Big Sacral Bird’ by Kenor, the ‘Oriental Carpet” by H101 and “The Economy Subdues You” by Zosen, belonging to the Cooperative Popular Houses of Mancasale and Coviolo in Reggio Emilia (Italy), were investigated by the use of various mobile Raman spectrometers coupled to different lasers and...

Asbestos inhalation is associated with fatal respiratory diseases and raises concerns from the perspective of workplace safety and environmental impacts. Asbestos and asbestos-like minerals naturally occur in rocks and may become airborne when outcrops or soils are disturbed by anthropic activities. In situ detection of these minerals is a crucial...

The family of compounds with formula [NH4][M(HCOO)3], with M a divalent d-metal, is characterized by porous frameworks hosting NH4⁺ cations exhibiting at low temperature a spontaneous ferroelectric polarization. The presence of magnetically active divalent metal determines the occurrence of antiferromagnetic ordering below 30 K opening the avenue f...

Zeolites are present in numerous outcrops of volcanites of different ages in Sicily (Italy). Some of these outcrops are important because they constitute the ideal genesis conditions of some of these minerals, which represent geological indicators of chemical and geothermal gradients involved during their formation. For this purpose, a group of zeo...

An altered fluffy type A CaAl‐rich inclusion in the CR2 Renazzo carbonaceous chondrite was examined by combined Raman, scanning electron microscopy with energy dispersion system (SEM‐EDS) and cathodoluminescence (CL) mapping. Blue CL at 450 nm and orange emission at 600 nm were related to anorthite and calcite, respectively. Raman spectra were hig...

Tanzanite is the blue to violet‐blue variety of the sorosilicate zoisite; its colour is due to vanadium substitution of aluminium in the octahedral sites and is proved to appear after natural or artificial heating to approximately 500°C. Its colour makes it a highly appreciated gemstone, for this reason often imitated or thermally treated with the...

Sb2Se3, (ASe) thin-films were deposited as the absorber layers in photovoltaic solar cells using the radio frequency magnetron sputtering deposition technique. Starting from a binary target, high quality crystallization and good vertical alignment of Sb4Se6 ribbons were attained at growth temperatures below 300 °C, and use of an additional seleniza...

Several glass mosaic tesserae were found during the archeological excavations at the Villa di Teodorico in Galeata (Forlì‐Cesena, Emilia Romagna, Italy), dated to early sixth century AD. This work reports the results of an archeometrical investigation realized through a multi‐technique approach on 16 tesserae. The aims of the study were the determi...

Graphene-based miniaturized supercapacitors, obtained via laser conversion of suitable precursors, have been attracting recent attention for the production of energy storage small-scale devices. In this work, a one-pot synthesis of TiO2 nanoparticles embedded in porous graphene-based electrodes has been obtained with the LightScribe® technology, by...

Wooden artefacts embrace wide-ranging types of objects, like paintings on panel, sculptures, musical instruments, and furniture. Generally, in the manufacturing process of an artwork, wood is firstly treated with organic and inorganic materials to make it nonporous and morphologically homogeneous, and, at last, the surface treatment consists of var...

We report on the high-pressure solid-state synthesis and the detailed structural characterization of the metastable, CuAu-type CuInS2 (CA-CIS) phase. Although often present in CIS thin films as unwanted phase, it has been never synthesized in pure form, and its effect on the performance of CIS-based solar cells has been long debated. In this work,...

The study of manufacture technologies and provenance of raw materials in archaeological potteries are two fundamental aspects in providing information about sociocultural aspects on past societies. The most acknowledged technique in this field is represented by minero‐petrographic analysis, allowing to describe the compositional features of the art...

Several proof of concepts of nanodevices based on Germanium nanowires (Ge NWs) have been already developed, but their mass production is hard to achieve. The use of cheaper substrate materials allows to reduce R&D and fabrication costs: glass is a viable option due to its advantageous characteristics such as transparency to visible light, wide avai...

The investigated mantle bodies from the External Ligurians (Groppo di Gorro and Mt. Rocchetta) show evidences of a complex evolution determined by an early high temperature metasomatism, due to percolating melts of asthenospheric origin, and a later metasomatism at relatively high temperature by hydrothermal fluids, with formation of rodingites. At...

Since thousands of years, gems were used as tools and amulets often associated with social status and money. At the beginning, gems were used in their rough form, or polished with curved surfaces or engraved. Simple forms of faceting appeared around the start of thirteenth century and it radically improved after the industrial revolution. During di...

The main scope of gem analysis is the identification of a gem, finding out the material of which it is made, whether it is natural or synthetic and if it has been treated/enhanced. The identification depends to some extent on whether the gems are in the rough state, polished, cut, and even on the way in which they are mounted. Sometimes gems mounte...

The São Domingos area (Corte do Pinto, Portugal) represents a large sulfide ore deposit in the Iberian Pyrite Belt that was mined primarily for copper and sulfur in the past. Currently, the deserted mine and mine wastes are the reason for the production of acid mining drainage releasing potentially harmful elements. Because metastable secondary sul...

Here we explore and review some of the latest ideas and applications of Raman spectroscopy to the volcanological sciences. Firstly, we provide a brief overview of how Raman spectral analysis works and how spectra from silicate glasses are interpreted. We then look at specific applications of Raman spectral analysis to the volcanological sciences ba...

When examining a piece of antique jewellery or object for its authenticity, it is not only important to know about the types of gemstones that existed at the time, but also about the various types of treatments, imitations and synthetic gems. Treatments involve all processes used to modify the appearance of gem materials in order to make the more a...

An answer to most archaeometrical questions can be obtained via the gem analysis presented in the previous chapters. The vast majority of published studies on items of archaeometrical interest are focused on gem identification. Usually the items are mounted, so the possible methods to use are restricted. Additionally, for security reasons most of t...

It is generally believed that the modern violin has emerged in Italy in the first half of the 16th century. The scientific study of its complex stratigraphy began approximately in the 1980's with invasive standard methods. Only since the last decade or so, the focus of diagnostic investigations has been increasingly shifted towards the use of non-i...

This paper presents the study of four gypsum mixtures, focusing on the role of both inorganic and organic additives and on the micro-structural features and mechanical properties. Additives have been chosen among those most reported in historical recipes, for example magnesia, lime putty, rabbit glue. The selected mixes refer to gypsum-based materi...

Carbonate-bearing wedge peridotites attest the mobilization of carbon (C) by slab fluids/melts circulating in a subduction setting. In general, COH fluids are thought to derive from the dehydration/partial melting of the crustal portions of slabs, especially during the exhumation of crust-mantle mélanges along continental subduction channels. In th...

This work reports the results of an extensive study carried out on the wall paintings preserved inside the Saint Stephen's chapel in Montani (Val Venosta, Bozen, Italy), by means of μ‐Raman spectroscopy, portable X‐ray fluorescence (XRF) spectrometry, and powder X‐ray diffraction, in order to characterize materials and their alteration products tha...

Covered by ultrabasic units for more than a third of its surface, the New Caledonia (South West Pacific) is one of the largest world producers of Ni-ore from lateritic deposits. Almost all outcrops of geological units and open mines contain serpentine and amphibole, also as asbestos varieties. In this geological context, in which weathering process...

This paper presents the results of a fully non-invasive photographic and spectroscopic study on a masterpiece by the famous Venetian painter Jacopo Tintoretto (1518–1594): “The Wedding feast at Cana” (1561), located inside the sacristy of the Santa Maria della Salute Basilica in Venice. A restoration campaign was carried out on the painting between...

Dating and authenticating stone-sculpted works of art is a challenging aspect of cultural heritage studies. In fact, it is often possible to provenance the rock, by comparison of petrological, mineralogical and geochemical data, but no dating of the sculpture can be obtained. Also, stylistic observations need to be considered with care. However, in...

The Raman spectra of the end member pyroxenes CaZnSi2O6 and Zn2Si2O6 are calculated by quantum mechanical modeling and compared with the experimental ones measured in synthetic (CaxZn1−x)ZnSi2O6 pyroxenes with x = 0, 0.2, 0.3, 0.5, 0.7, 1. The calculated spectra correctly predict the intensity and peak positions of the spectra recorded on the end m...

Nanocrystalline nitrogen-doped TiO2 photocatalysts were applied as surface coatings to three typical Israeli limestones, Maccabim, Halila and Hebron, widely used for historic buildings. Two different N-doped TiO2 sols were synthesised by sol-gel method starting from titanium oxysulfate ( TiOSO4 as Ti precursor: a new N-doped TiO2 coating (N-TiF), o...

Amphiboles are an important family of rock forming minerals, whose identification is crucial in provenance studies as well as in many other fields of geology, archaeology and environmental sciences. This study is aimed to find a quick way to characterize Ca-amphiboles in the tremolite (Ca2Mg5Si8O22(OH)2)–ferro–actinolite (Ca2Fe5Si8O22(OH)2) series....

The physical properties of silicate melts are of critical importance for understanding magmatic and volcanic processes on Earth and other planets. Most physical properties of melts are, ultimately, a consequence of the structural organization of the melt. Robust and fully generalizable strategies for the prediction of properties of naturally occurr...

One of the challenges in the development of germanium nanowires (Ge NWs) is to increase their length beyond the 10 µm limit without enlarging the nanowire diameter, i.e. minimizing the tapering. Here we report how it is possible to overcome this hurdle by using isobutyl germane (iBuGe) as a metal organic precursor during MOCVD growth, instead of th...

Huenite, Cu4Mo3O12(OH)2, is a new copper and molybdenum oxy-hydroxide mineral found in the San Samuel Mine, Carrera Pinto, Cachiyuyo de Llampos district, Copiapó Province, Atacama Region, Chile. This new species forms flattened orthorhombic prisms up to 60–70 μm in size, weakly elongated along [001]. Huenite crystals were found on fractured surface...

The crystal structure of jervisite, ideally NaScSi2O6, was refined using single-crystal X-ray data collected using a crystal from the Seula quarry (Baveno, Verbano-Cusio-Ossola province, Italy). The refinement was carried out in the C2/c space group giving the following unit-cell dimensions: a = 9.8478(2) Å, b = 9.0575(1) Å, c = 5.3409(3) Å, β = 10...

We report on the preparation of a novel hierarchically-porous super-activated carbon originating from organic waste with specific surface area exceeding 3000 m ² /g, obtained starting from biochar derived by the pyrolysis of poultry litter. The chemical activation process proved to be efficient to remove the majority of impurities other than carbon...

Orogenic peridotites associated with high-grade felsic rocks occasionally occur in HP-UHP orogenic systems and offer the opportunity to provide quantitative constraints on slab-to-mantle mass transfer in these collisional settings. Ascending fluids and/or hydrous melts originating from the subducting continental lithosphere are assumed to enrich th...

IR and Raman spectroscopy have been extensively used to identify synthetic organic colorants (dyes and pigments) as masstone and powders as well as in works of art. Besides the experimental difficulties in their identification, the vibrational analysis of the individual colorant is challenging owing to the numerous vibrational bands usually observe...

Raman spectra of a low albite single crystal were collected during annealing at 1076°C for up to 46 days. At seven annealing stages, the single crystal structure was refined by X‐ray intensity data to determine the degree of AlSi order using the tetrahedral bond distances. Single‐crystal X‐ray diffraction showed that residuals in the difference‐Fo...

We report a detailed study on the magnetic properties of the pyroxene series M2 M1 Si₂O₆, with M2 = Ca and M1 = Mg, where magnesium and then calcium are progressively substituted by cobalt. For cobalt site occupancy larger than 0.7 at the M1 site, a collinear antiferromagnetic phase is detected for T < T_N1 = 12 K wi...

Plagioclase undergoes complex exsolution and ordering and phase transition processes during their evolution in nature, and this has hindered attempts to define simple trends relating the major peaks of their Raman spectra with composition. Here, the peak position and linewidth of major Raman features have been calibrated for a set of 20 plagioclase...

Raman spectroscopy has been positively evaluated as a tool for the in-line and real-time monitoring of powder blending processes and it has been proved to be effective in the determination of the endpoint of the mixing, showing its potential role as process analytical technology (PAT). The aim of this study is to show advantages and disadvantages o...

The New Caledonia is one of the largest world producers of nickel ore which is formed by the alteration of ultramafic rocks. Mining activity, focused on nickel extraction from lateritic ore deposits, must deal with the natural occurrence of asbestos and fibrous minerals. Almost all outcrops of geological units and open mines contain serpentine and...

In this paper, a series of beryl varieties with the accent on emeralds was investigated using seven portable Raman spectrometers equipped mainly with 785- and 532-nm excitation lasers. Additionally, one dual system and a new portable sequentially shifted excitation Raman spectrometer were applied. The advantage of using handheld instrumentation for...

Questo progetto nasce dalle difficoltà riscontrate in alcune operazioni di conservazione di manufatti in gesso. Si tratta infatti di un materiale poco studiato ma ricorrente nella storia delle tecniche artistiche. Da qui nasce lanecessità di approfondire gli studi focalizzandosi sulla formulazione delle diverse miscele e degli additivi impiegati.Du...

Despite their strong Raman scattering and importance in several applications in the geological and biological sciences, Mg-calcites have not been thoroughly investigated by Raman spectroscopy. In this study, we investigated whether Raman spectra of carbonates are sensitive to the structural and chemical changes occurring when Mg²⁺ substitutes Ca²⁺...

The New Caledonia is covered by ultrabasic units for more than a third of its surface, and it is one of the largest world producers of nickel ore. Mining activity, focused on extraction from lateritic ore deposits formed by the alteration of ultramafic rocks, must deal with the natural occurrence of asbestos and fibrous minerals. Almost all outcrop...

In situ high-pressure Raman spectra were collected on four pyroxenes, with composition CaCoSi2O6, CaMgSi2O6, CaCoGe2O6 and CaMgGe2O6, up to P = 7.6 and 8.3 GPa for silicates and germanates, respectively. The peak wavenumbers υi increase almost linearly with pressure; the slope dυi/dP is more pronounced for the modes at higher wavenumbers, and highe...

This paper presents the results of analyses carried out on three decorative phases of the presbytery of the church of Santa Maria Antiqua al Foro Romano in Rome: the fourth-century AD mosaics setting bed; the Adoration of the Cross, dated to the papacy of John VII (AD 705–7); and the paintings in the apse of the Pope Paul I (AD 757–68) phase. The r...