Elenco degli insegnamenti offerti nell’a.a. 2019/2020
Intercurricular courses
| Teacher | Samuel Albani (UNIMIB, dep. Earth and Environmental Sciences) |
| Language | English |
| CFU | 1 |
| Hours | 10 |
| Program | Introduction to the use of free online software in support to atmospheric research: HYSPLIT, a simple, extensively used atmospheric transport and dispersion model. The model can be run interactively on the Web, or the code executable and meteorological data can be downloaded to a Windows or Mac PC. |
| Two introductory lectures on the theoretical bases and possible applications (2 hours each) will be followed by 3 practical sessions in the computer lab (2 hours each). | |
| Evaluation | YES (presentation of a case study) |
| Calendar | last two weeks of May |
| To attend the course, please contact samuel.albani@unimib.it between 15-30 April |
| Teacher | Emilio Padoa-Schioppa, Elena Collina (UNIMIB, Dept. of Earth and Environmental Sciences) |
| Language | English |
| CFU | 1 |
| Hours | 8 |
| Program | Concepts of sustainability: from ecology to environmental sustainability; the pillars of sustainability; ecosystem services approaches. |
| How to measure environmental sustainability: ecological and carbon footprint; global warming potential; life cycle assessment. | |
| Analysis of case studies from different perspectives. | |
| Evaluation | YES (Activity during the course) |
| Calendar | April 21, 22 |
| To attend the course, please contact elena.collina@unimib.it before April 1st |
| Teacher | Claudia Pasquero, Nadia Malaspina, Elisa Malinverno, Pietro Sternai, Luca Ferrero (UNIMIB, dep. Earth and Environmental Sciences) |
| Language | English |
| CFU | 2 |
| Hours | 20 |
| Program | The detailed program will be decided based on participant interests. Possible topics include climate dynamics, climate variability and change, effects of climate variations, climate feedbacks, risks related to climatic extremes, carbon cycle, greenhouse gases, Earth dynamics effects on climate, proxy data, anthropogenic changes and their effects onto the environment. |
| Evaluation | YES: PhD students will have to present a paper of their choice and lead the discussion. |
| Calendar | I & II semester |
| Teacher | Micol Rossini and Biagio Di Mauro (UNIMIB, dep. Earth and Environmental Sciences) |
| Language | English |
| CFU | 2 |
| Hours | 16 |
| Program | The aim of the course is to provide expertise in Earth Observation (EO) and monitoring. The course will be structured as follows: |
| Lecture I: Basic concepts of optical remote sensing: physical principles, digital images | |
| Lecture II: Availability of Earth Observation data (in particular ESA-Sentinels): presentation of different satellite missions and their the potential applications | |
| Lecture III & IV & hands-on exercises: two Earth Observation applications according to PhD needs and requests (e.g. hydrological and cryospheric applications; land surface and ecological applications) followed by corresponding hands-on exercises. | |
| Suggested years of attendance: I and II | |
| Expected outcome: introduction of EO data-based approaches in the students own PhD projects | |
| Evaluation | YES with a final oral presentation |
| Calendar | May 2020 |
| Teacher | Micol Rossini and Biagio Di Mauro (UNIMIB, dep. Earth and Environmental Sciences) |
| Language | English |
| CFU | 2 |
| Hours | 16 |
| Program | The aim of the course is to provide expertise in the use of open source software for data analysis. This will be done: |
| - explaining basic principles on digital images and statistical exploration; | |
| - giving hands-on practice with tools and methods for satellite data exploitation; | |
| - stimulating the exploitation of these open tools and methods in individual student research projects. | |
| Examples of the use of open source software across a wide variety of disciplines, covering topics such as glacier dynamics, landslide mapping, volcanic activity, global forest change, inland water monitoring, urban mapping, post fire recovery, flood mapping, will be provided. | |
| Hands-on exercises will be developed using: | |
| - Google Earth Engine: a cloud-based platform for planetary-scale geospatial analysis. | |
| - QGIS for remote sensing applications. | |
| - ESA Sentinel Application Platform (SNAP). | |
| Evaluation | YES with a final oral presentation |
| Calendar | June 2020 |
| Teacher | Davide Ballabio - Department of Earth and Environmental Sciences |
| Language | English |
| CFU | 2 |
| Hours | 16 |
| Program | The course will introduce principles and theory of the main multivariate modelling for chemical data (chemometrics) and machine learning approaches. These can be useful for exploratory analysis, i.e. to find and visualise main patterns in complex data systems (Principal Component Analysis), as well as to relate a set of independent variables to a modelled qualitative or quantitative response (Support Vector Machines and Partial Least Squares). |
| Objective of the program: This course is an introduction to different key aspects of advanced multivariate data analysis in science. This includes mathematical and statistical methods able to face, analyse and describe complex systems, that is, systems characterised and influenced by several factors (variables). It is thus addressed to PhD students who want to acquire or intensify knowledge on multivariate analysis from different disciplines (Chemistry, Physics, Biology, Geology, Environmental Sciences, etc.). | |
| The intended learning outcomes will be the following: understanding of complex data structure, learning of the principles and operating conditions of the main multivariate approaches, capability to independently apply suitable solutions to multivariate problems, choice of coherent and appropriate multivariate methods to deal with a specific issue. | |
| Evaluation | NO |
| Calendar | May/June 2020 |
Curriculum in Terrestrial and Marine Environmental Sciences
| Teacher | Roberto Comolli and Chiara Ferré, DISAT, UNIMIB |
| Language | English/Italian |
| CFU | 2 |
| Hours | 16 |
| Program | Aims |
| The aim of the course is to provide: | |
| - knowledge on traditional and innovative mapping methods; | |
| - practical skills in mapping of environmental variables; | |
| - ability to interpret results. | |
| Contents | |
| - Spatial variability of environmental variables: causes (anthropic and natural) and effects; | |
| - introduction to spatial data processing: traditional and innovative methods of assessing and mapping environmental variability; | |
| - basic concepts of univariate and multivariate geostatistics and geostatistical data fusion techniques; computer session on variogram modelling and production of thematic maps; case studies on spatial variability assessment in precision farming; | |
| - geomorphometric variables for production of thematic maps; case studies on soil thickness and soilscape. | |
| Methods | |
| Lectures, presentation of case studies and practical activities (PC sessions using specific software). | |
| Expected outcome | |
| Application of the investigated mapping techniques in research projects. | |
| Evaluation | Yes, through practical activities. |
| Calendar | from April 16 to 30 |
| To attend the course please contact roberto.comolli@unimib.it between 15-30 March |
| Teacher | Daniela Basso, Alessandra Savini (UNIMIB, dep. Earth and Environmental Sciences) |
| Language | English |
| CFU | 1 |
| Hours | 8 |
| Program | The monitoring programme of the Marine Strategy Framework Directive (MSFD) and the role of seafloor mapping |
| The habitats considered by the MSFD and why | |
| The role of remote data for benthic habitat characterization and classification | |
| Characterization and classification of benthic habitat dominated by cold-water carbonates in Mediterranean Sea (coralligenous and cold-water corlas) | |
| Presentation of case studies from the Ionian and south Adriatic Seas | |
| Evaluation | YES - Questionare: Ten questions with multiple choice and a short discussion on results |
| Calendar | First two weeks of October 2020 |
| To attend the course, please contact daniela.basso@unimib.it between 1-15 September |
| Teacher | Andrea Franzetti (UNIMIB, dep. Earth and Environmental Sciences) |
| Language | English |
| CFU | 5 |
| Hours | 48 |
| Program | Bioinformatic tools will be applied to amplicon and shotgun metagenomic data to describe structure and function of microbial communities in different natural habitats. |
| Topics: | |
| - Introduction to linux commands and file system | |
| - Free databases for ribosomal and metagenomics sequences | |
| - Use of Uparse and dada2 pipelines for amplicon analysis | |
| - Gene-centric and genome-centric analusis of metagenomes | |
| - Analysis and interpretation of the relults | |
| Evaluation | NO |
| Calendar | II semester |
| Teacher | Paolo Galli (UNIMIB, dep. Earth and Environmental Sciences) |
| Language | English |
| CFU | 2 |
| Hours | 16 |
| Program | Course Description |
| In this course we will cover the basics of statistics applied to marine ecology from a very practical perspective, with real data sets and realistic case studies. | |
| This course offered in English will develop hands-on expertise for analysing and interpreting ecological data based on applications to field-oriented problems. Hypothesis tests will be explained in light of data with non detects, outliers, and skewed distributions using a computer-aided analysis approach. Methods for estimation and prediction (e.g. regression methods) will be also illustrated along with their common pitfalls. After taking this course students will be able to prepare their own data set for the following analysis and to choose the most appropriate among the available statistical methods to evaluate background values, trends or statistical differences in their data. | |
| At the course participants will learn to address questions such as geographical distribution of communities, interactions between communities and their physical environment, ecological change through time in response to sudden or gradual environmental change (pollution, climate), and patterns of diversity. | |
| First part | |
| Introduction to the course and to data that will be used. Brief overview on case studies/sampling conditions. The use of statistics: what is statistics and why is it needed; planning surveys, experiments and collecting data; types of data. Descriptive statistics: Finding the average (mean, median, mode); standard deviation, variance and standard error; degrees of freedom and coefficient of variation; descriptive statistics. Processing and presenting data: Displaying whole data sets; displaying summarised data; presenting data | |
| The normal distribution and data transformations: How to know if data are normally distributed. Introduction to hypothesis testing | |
| Second part | |
| Analysing frequencies: Chi-square test, goodness of fit and contingency tables. Confidence intervals and comparisons of two sample means: parametric vs. non-parametric tests; paired vs. non-paired tests; comparing means with equal or unequal variance; t-tests | |
| When to use non-parametric statistics: Mann-Witney U-test; Wilcoxon test; Kruskall-Wallis test; non-parametric statistics; Introducing analysis of variance: One-way and two-way ANOVAs; post-hoc tests; randomised block design, repeated measures design, analysis of covariance design | |
| Correlation, covariance and the correlation coefficient; Pearson product moment correlation coefficient; coefficient of determination; Spearman rank correlation coefficient. Regression analysis: Simple linear regression; residuals, confidence intervals, transformation of axes; reduced major axis regression. ANOVAs and General Linear Models; introduction to multivariate statistics | |
| Evaluation | YES |
| Calendar | II semester |
| Teacher | Elisa Malinverno (UNIMIB, dep. Earth and Environmental Sciences) |
| Language | English |
| CFU | 1 |
| Hours | 8 |
| Program | The course will first describe the effects of ocean acidification on the marine biotha and its link to the global carbon cycle, then explore the paleoceanographic records of past events of ocean acidification and variations in atmospheric carbon dioxide concentration |
| Evaluation | YES (written test, 5 questions with brief answer) |
| Calendar | II semester |
| Teacher | Antonio Finizio (UNIMIB, dep. Earth and Environmental Sciences) |
| Language | English |
| CFU | 2 |
| Hours | 16 |
| Program | - The concepts of ecological risk assessment endpoints, defining the problem, the conceptual model, and risk hypotheses |
| - Explore methods for measuring, estimating, and characterizing exposure and effects for deterministic and probabilistic assessments | |
| - Discuss how data are applied in the decision-making process | |
| - Demonstrate how to communicate risk findings in a professional setting | |
| Evaluation | YES: discussion on the program topics |
| Calendar | from June 15 to July 15 |
| To attend the course, please contact antonio.finizio@unimib.it between 15-30 May |
| Teacher | Barbara Leoni (UNIMIB), Marco Rotiroti (UNIMIB) |
| Language | English or Italian |
| CFU | 2 |
| Hours | 16 hours (12 of lectures + 4 of PC lab session) |
| Program | This course aims to provide basic general concepts on environmental isotopes and, at the same time, specific applications to different environmental problems. The main expected outcome is that students, at the end of the course, could be able to evaluate and propose an application of isotopic methods in their own PhD projects. |
| Suggested year of attendance: I or II. | |
| Part 1 – General Principles: stable isotopes, radioisotopes, chart of nuclides, isotope ratio, fractionation, general applications. | |
| Part 2 – Water Isotope: water cycle and water isotopes, precipitation and water isotopes, global and local meteoric water lines, global and local effects, deuterium excess, surface water and water isotopes, groundwater and water isotopes, groundwater dating. | |
| Part 3 – Stable isotope ratios and food webs, applications of stable isotopes in a food-web context, the trophic position of an organism in a food web, species-specific baselines, long-lived consumers as baselines, which resource pools support consumers?, quantitative approaches for analyzing stable isotope, what additional information does relative position of consumers in isotopic space reveal about food-web structure? | |
| Part 4 – Environmental Isotopes: tracing the carbon cycle, tracing contaminants sources and processes, nitrogen isotopes, boron isotopes, sulfur isotopes, field applications, case studies and numerical elaborations in computer labs. | |
| The teaching will be based on active methods centered on students’ interests: students will be grouped at the beginning of the course on the basis of their PhD research topics, then during the course each group should evaluate and propose an application of isotopic methods in its own research topic. At the end of the course, each group should present to the class the results of the group work. | |
| Evaluation | YES, the final presentation to the class of activities and results of each work group will be considered as the evaluation of students |
| Calendar | October/November 2019; lectures of 6 hours per day; laboratory of 4 hours per day; total duration of the course will be 3 days. |
Curriculum in Chemical Sciences
| Teacher | Various |
| Language | English |
| CFU | 1 |
| Hours | 12 |
| Program | Seminars carried out by Ph.D. students |
| Evaluation | YES (based on attendance) |
| Calendar | I semester |
| Teacher | Airoldi Cristina (UNIMIB-BTBS) |
| Language | English |
| CFU | 2.5 |
| Hours | 20 |
| Program | Dissection of specific NMR-based molecular recognition experiments (STD, trNOESY, WaterLOGSY, 15N-HSQC) from both theoretical and experimental point of view |
| Objectives of the program: Understanding how advanced NMR experiments can be exploited in drug discovery and development for ligand screening and optimization – I or II years | |
| Evaluation | Yes |
| Calendar | January 2020 |
| Teacher | Luca Bertini, Claudio Greco, Antonio Papagni |
| Language | English |
| CFU | 2 |
| Hours | 16 |
| Program | Photophysics: |
| - light-matter interaction and photostimulation processes | |
| - Interactions between atoms and molecules and photographic processes | |
| - Frank-Condon's Principle | |
| - Dynamics and time scale for decaying an excited state (fluorescence, phosphorescence) | |
| Photochemistry: | |
| - Organic photochemistry and photochemical processes | |
| - Organic photochemistry: Photostimulate organic reactions | |
| - Radical or ionic dissociation | |
| - Intrameloogic rearrangements and photoisomers | |
| - Hydrogen atom abstraction | |
| - Photodimerization, photoaddition, photoionisation reactions | |
| - Photochemical activity of aromatic compounds | |
| - photochemistry of diazo- and azide compounds | |
| - Photo-removable protective groups | |
| - Chemiluminescence | |
| Technical and experimental aspects of organic photochemistry | |
| - Inorganic photochemistry and coordination compounds | |
| - Characterization of the inorganic and coordinated electron spectra | |
| - Decay and Lifetime kinetics of an excited state | |
| - Energy transfer: Förster and Dexter mechanism | |
| - Electron transfer: Markus theory and quantum approach | |
| - Proton-coupled electron transfer | |
| - Redox properties of excited states of coordination compounds: the case of [Ru(bpy)3]2+; | |
| Objective of the program: The mini-course of photochemistry is an introduction to a selection of general, organic, inorganic, biological, solid state and theoretical photochemical themes with the aim of providing to phd students knowledge in basic principles and application of photochemistry. | |
| Evaluation | NO |
| Calendar | May – July 2020 |
| Teacher | Dr. Matteo Piazza, Cerbios Pharma SA |
| Language | English |
| CFU | 1 CFU |
| Hours | 8 |
| Program: | 1. Bioconjugation |
| a. Intro on bioconjugation | |
| b. Bioconjugates as ‘’Magic bullets’’ for tumor treatment | |
| c. Industrialization of bioconjugation processes | |
| 2. From Proof-of-concept to the counter | |
| a. Pharmaceutical manufacturing framework applied to therapeutics bioconjugates | |
| b. CRO for early stage | |
| c. CMO for GMP manufacturing | |
| d. Pharma for outsourcing, product development and manufacturing | |
| The objectives of the program are: | |
| 1) to show the state-of-the-art techniques of bio-conjugation applied to the development of anti-tumor drug and other drugs; | |
| 2) Introduce to the students the concept of process industrialization | |
| 3) to present to PhD students the current strategies of pharmaceutical companies in the research and development and in the drug market | |
| Evaluation | NO |
| Calendar | II semester |
| Teacher | Massimo Moret / Riccardo Ruffo - Department of Materials Science |
| Language | English |
| CFU | 2 |
| Hours | 18 |
| Program | - Symmetry in crystals |
| - Examples of crystalline structures | |
| - Mechanisms Crystal growth | |
| - Diffraction of X-ray by crystals | |
| - Experimental methods in X-ray: from single crystal to powders | |
| Objectives of the program: To understand the role of symmetry in periodic structures, basics of crystal growth, theory of diffraction in crystals, the use of diffraction to study solids. To make and interpret experiments on powdered polycrystalline samples. | |
| Evaluation | YES, Oral examination |
| Calendar | 1st semester |
Curriculum in Geological Sciences
| Teacher | Maria Luce Frezzotti (UNIMIB, dep. Earth and Environmental Sciences), Robert Bodnar (Virginia tech), Leonid Danyuchevsky (University of Tasmania), Benedetto De Vivo |
| Language | English |
| CFU | 5 |
| Hours | 40 |
| Program | Topics include fluid and melt inclusion studies and applications to different geological environments, phase equilibria modeling and thermodynamics of C-O-H fluids at high P and T, and advanced analytical techniques for analysis of fluid and melt inclusions. |
| Evaluation | YES (written exam) |
| Calendar | I semester |
| Teacher | Federico Agliardi (UNIMIB, Dep. Earth and Environmental Sciences) |
| Language | English |
| CFU | 2 (the actual n. CFU depends on whether a fieldwork session will be held or not and/or shared with other courses) |
| Hours | 20 (8 lessons, 6 field work, 6 lab work) |
| Program | Geometrical and mechanical characterization of fractured media to: a) improve conceptual models in geological and engineering applications; d) provide consistent input datasets for 2D and 3D discontinuum, continuum-based and hybrid numerical models FEM numerical models. |
| Detailed contents: | |
| 1) theoretical aspects. | |
| 2) field survey techniques (outcrops, boreholes). | |
| 3) remote techniques (terrestrial and airborne LiDAR and photogrammetry; analysis of digital outcrops). | |
| 4) data collection, processing and problem-specific analysis. | |
| Evaluation | NO |
| Calendar | II semester |
| Teacher | Andrea Bistacchi, Stefano Zanchetta (UNIMIB, dep. Earth and Environmental Sciences) |
| Language | English |
| CFU | 2 |
| Hours | 1-day field trip |
| 1-day lab, processing, analysis & discussion | |
| Program | Digital Outcrop Models (DOMs) are becoming a very effective tool to collect quantitative data on natural outcrops and artificial exposures (e.g. quarries). Applications include structural analysis and lithological mapping that can be applied to studies in sedimentology, petrography, metasomatism, veining, etc.; other applications might be envisaged. DOM datasets represent the best (more complete and statistically significant) input for quantitative analysis and modelling at the outcrop scale (1m – 1km). The course will cover field data collection, processing, and analysis in different scenarios. |
| Evaluation | YES |
| Calendar | I semester |
| Teacher | Riccardo Castellanza (UNIMIB, dep. Earth and Environmental Sciences) |
| Language | English |
| CFU | 2 |
| Hours | 20 |
| Program | Provide to students a general overview of advanced numerical modelling (3D FEM based) in geotechnical engineering and engineering geology. |
| A specific and detailed critical discussion on existing and new techniques for numerical analyses of instable slopes and underground geostructures will be provided. | |
| The course is suggested for the 1st and 2nd year. | |
| The expected outcome is related to the knowledge on advanced numerical techniques (advantages and restrictions) to be applied as tools in the PhD topics. | |
| 1- Introduction to numerical modelling of geotechnical problems | |
| 2- Definition of the global PDE (Partial Differential Equations) system to cope with complex geotechnical problems including slopes ans geostructures. | |
| 3- New trend related to the numerical modelling for geostructures and geomaterials. | |
| 4- 3D Finite Element Method (3D FEM) introduction and specific aspects | |
| 5- Explicative cases studies on instable 3D slopes | |
| 6- Explicative cases studies on 3D geostructures | |
| 7- New trends in numerical modelling in geomechanics: MPM (Material Point Method) and PFEM (Particles Finite Elelement Methods) | |
| Evaluation | YES |
| Calendar | May 2020 |
| Teacher | Riccardo Castellanza (UNIMIB, dep. Earth and Environmental Sciences) |
| Language | English |
| CFU | 2 |
| Hours | 20 |
| Program | Provide to students a general overview of key advanced tests to evaluate the physical and mechanical properties of intact, weathered and consolidated geomaterials. A specific and detailed critical discussion on existing and new techniques will be provided. |
| The course is suggested for the 1st and 2nd year. | |
| The expected outcome is related to the knowledge on advanced laboratory tests in engineering geology. | |
| Detailed program | |
| 1- Introduction to the physical and mechanical characterization of rocks | |
| 2- Weathering of rock mass: overview and practical aspects | |
| 3- Standard tests for geomaterials (with specific emphasize for intact and weathered rocks | |
| 4- Advanced and new experimental apparatus for intact, weathered and consolidated geomaterials. | |
| 5- Introduction to grouting and freezing of soil | |
| 6- Introduction of rock mass improvements with chemical products | |
| 7- Laboratory test execution on soils (standard and advanced) | |
| 8- Laboratory test execution on rocks (standard and advanced) | |
| 9- Final discussion including critical analyses of the different tests analyzed. | |
| Evaluation | YES |
| Calendar | April 2020 |
a cura di Scuola di dottorato, ultimo aggiornamento il 06/01/2021