Several studies exist on the effects of chemical and physical weathering processes on different r... more Several studies exist on the effects of chemical and physical weathering processes on different rock types as predisposing factors of landslides. However, role of morphological and physical discontinuities caused by pedogenetic processes on parent rocks as potential triggering factors of shallow landslides and related risk assessment has been poorly investigated. Also sampling strategies for geotechnical or hydrological laboratory analyses can be biased by the lack of detailed information about the soil spatial variability and of a consequent horizon-wise selection of samples from soil profiles. This research focuses on the assessment of shallow landslide susceptibility along the A3 highway section between Cosenza Sud and Altilia in northern Calabria (southern Italy). It is part of a wider project (PON01-01503: "Integrated systems for hydrogeological risk monitoring, early warning and mitigation along the main lifelines"), aimed at hydro-geological risk mitigation and earl...
Soil spectroscopy can provide low-cost and high- density data for predicting various soil propert... more Soil spectroscopy can provide low-cost and high- density data for predicting various soil properties. However, a relatively weak correlation between the spectra and the measurements of salinized soil properties makes spectroscopy difficult to use in salinity assessment, especially for low and moderately saline soils. The main objective of the study was to propose an approach based on Vis-NIR spectroscopy and geostatistics for mapping soil salinity in the Neretva river valley (Croatia). An effective spectral index (SI), which synthesizes some of saline soil properties, was defined and used as a covariate in ordinary cokriging (COK) for improving electrical conductivity (ECe) estimation. The proposed approach was compared with a univariate estimator (ordinary kriging, OK), which uses only ECe data and a multivariate estimator (ordinary cokriging, COK) using some chemical properties of primary importance in salt affected soils (Ca++, Mg++, Na+, SO4–, Cl- concentrations and pH) as covar...
Gamma-rays emitted from the ground surface relate to the primary mineralogy and geochemistryof th... more Gamma-rays emitted from the ground surface relate to the primary mineralogy and geochemistryof the bedrock, and the secondary weathered materials. This information can contribute significantly to anunderstanding of the geochemical and pedogenetic history of a region. The main aim of this paper was to study the relationship between ground gamma-ray data and basement geochemistry in the Lese catchment (Calabria, southern Italy) and to map them, using geostatistics, from in-situ γ-ray spectrometry. The activities of naturally occurring radionuclides were measured at 179 locations by in situ measurements of 40K, 238U, 232Th and total radioactivity and by using gamma-ray spectrometry. Then a multi-Gaussian approach was used to explore and map the activity of naturally occurring radionuclides (40K, 238U, 232Th) and total radioactivity. Locations and lithological compositions of bedrock appear to be responsible for variations in radioelement activity. From radiometric investigations it ha...
Accounting for secondary exhaustive variables (such as elevation) in modelling the spatial distri... more Accounting for secondary exhaustive variables (such as elevation) in modelling the spatial distribution of precipitation can improve their estimate accuracy. However, elevation and precipitation data are associated with different support sizes and it is necessary to define methods to combine such different spatial data. The paper was aimed to compare block ordinary cokriging and block kriging with an external drift in estimating the annual precipitation using elevation as covariate. Block ordinary kriging was used as reference of a univariate geostatistical approach. In addition, the different support sizes associated with precipitation and elevation data were also taken into account. The study area was the Calabria region (southern Italy), which has a spatially variable Mediterranean climate because of its high orographic variability. Block kriging with elevation as external drift, compared to block ordinary kriging and block ordinary cokriging, was the most accurate approach for m...
The paper proposes a geostatistical framework to solve the issues of heterogeneous support for sp... more The paper proposes a geostatistical framework to solve the issues of heterogeneous support for spatial estimation. Apparent soil electrical conductivity (ECa) was measured in a field cropped with San Marzano tomato using a multiple frequency electromagnetic profiler with 6 operating frequencies. Mixed support kriging was used to estimate ECa taking into account the change of support. The method includes punctual kriging with the error being the dispersion variance associated with each frequency. The individual ECa maps were weighted by the dispersion variance to obtain a map which was used for field partition in management zones.
Northeast China is an intensive area of resource-exhausted city, which is facing the challenges o... more Northeast China is an intensive area of resource-exhausted city, which is facing the challenges of industry conversion and sustainable development. In order to evaluate the soil environmental quality influenced by mining activities over decades, the concentration and spatial distribution of arsenic (As), cadmium (Cd), chromium (Cr), copper (Cu), nickel (Ni), lead (Pb), and Zinc (Zn) in surface soils (0-20cm) of a typical resource-exhausted city were investigated by analyzing 306 soil samples. The results showed that the average concentrations in the samples were 6.17 mg/kg for As, 0.19 mg/kg for Cd, 51.08 mg/kg for Cr, 23.27 mg/kg for Cu, 31.15 mg/kg for Ni, 22.17 mg/kg for Pb, and 54.21 mg/kg for Zn. Metals distribution maps produced by using the inverse distance weighted interpolation method and results revealed that all investigated metals showed distinct geographical patterns, and the concentrations were higher in urban and industrial areas than in farmland. Pearson correlation ...
Several studies exist on the effects of chemical and physical weathering processes on different r... more Several studies exist on the effects of chemical and physical weathering processes on different rock types as predisposing factors of landslides. However, role of morphological and physical discontinuities caused by pedogenetic processes on parent rocks as potential triggering factors of shallow landslides and related risk assessment has been poorly investigated. Also sampling strategies for geotechnical or hydrological laboratory analyses can be biased by the lack of detailed information about the soil spatial variability and of a consequent horizon-wise selection of samples from soil profiles. This research focuses on the assessment of shallow landslide susceptibility along the A3 highway section between Cosenza Sud and Altilia in northern Calabria (southern Italy). It is part of a wider project (PON01-01503: "Integrated systems for hydrogeological risk monitoring, early warning and mitigation along the main lifelines"), aimed at hydro-geological risk mitigation and earl...
Soil spectroscopy can provide low-cost and high- density data for predicting various soil propert... more Soil spectroscopy can provide low-cost and high- density data for predicting various soil properties. However, a relatively weak correlation between the spectra and the measurements of salinized soil properties makes spectroscopy difficult to use in salinity assessment, especially for low and moderately saline soils. The main objective of the study was to propose an approach based on Vis-NIR spectroscopy and geostatistics for mapping soil salinity in the Neretva river valley (Croatia). An effective spectral index (SI), which synthesizes some of saline soil properties, was defined and used as a covariate in ordinary cokriging (COK) for improving electrical conductivity (ECe) estimation. The proposed approach was compared with a univariate estimator (ordinary kriging, OK), which uses only ECe data and a multivariate estimator (ordinary cokriging, COK) using some chemical properties of primary importance in salt affected soils (Ca++, Mg++, Na+, SO4–, Cl- concentrations and pH) as covar...
Gamma-rays emitted from the ground surface relate to the primary mineralogy and geochemistryof th... more Gamma-rays emitted from the ground surface relate to the primary mineralogy and geochemistryof the bedrock, and the secondary weathered materials. This information can contribute significantly to anunderstanding of the geochemical and pedogenetic history of a region. The main aim of this paper was to study the relationship between ground gamma-ray data and basement geochemistry in the Lese catchment (Calabria, southern Italy) and to map them, using geostatistics, from in-situ γ-ray spectrometry. The activities of naturally occurring radionuclides were measured at 179 locations by in situ measurements of 40K, 238U, 232Th and total radioactivity and by using gamma-ray spectrometry. Then a multi-Gaussian approach was used to explore and map the activity of naturally occurring radionuclides (40K, 238U, 232Th) and total radioactivity. Locations and lithological compositions of bedrock appear to be responsible for variations in radioelement activity. From radiometric investigations it ha...
Accounting for secondary exhaustive variables (such as elevation) in modelling the spatial distri... more Accounting for secondary exhaustive variables (such as elevation) in modelling the spatial distribution of precipitation can improve their estimate accuracy. However, elevation and precipitation data are associated with different support sizes and it is necessary to define methods to combine such different spatial data. The paper was aimed to compare block ordinary cokriging and block kriging with an external drift in estimating the annual precipitation using elevation as covariate. Block ordinary kriging was used as reference of a univariate geostatistical approach. In addition, the different support sizes associated with precipitation and elevation data were also taken into account. The study area was the Calabria region (southern Italy), which has a spatially variable Mediterranean climate because of its high orographic variability. Block kriging with elevation as external drift, compared to block ordinary kriging and block ordinary cokriging, was the most accurate approach for m...
The paper proposes a geostatistical framework to solve the issues of heterogeneous support for sp... more The paper proposes a geostatistical framework to solve the issues of heterogeneous support for spatial estimation. Apparent soil electrical conductivity (ECa) was measured in a field cropped with San Marzano tomato using a multiple frequency electromagnetic profiler with 6 operating frequencies. Mixed support kriging was used to estimate ECa taking into account the change of support. The method includes punctual kriging with the error being the dispersion variance associated with each frequency. The individual ECa maps were weighted by the dispersion variance to obtain a map which was used for field partition in management zones.
Northeast China is an intensive area of resource-exhausted city, which is facing the challenges o... more Northeast China is an intensive area of resource-exhausted city, which is facing the challenges of industry conversion and sustainable development. In order to evaluate the soil environmental quality influenced by mining activities over decades, the concentration and spatial distribution of arsenic (As), cadmium (Cd), chromium (Cr), copper (Cu), nickel (Ni), lead (Pb), and Zinc (Zn) in surface soils (0-20cm) of a typical resource-exhausted city were investigated by analyzing 306 soil samples. The results showed that the average concentrations in the samples were 6.17 mg/kg for As, 0.19 mg/kg for Cd, 51.08 mg/kg for Cr, 23.27 mg/kg for Cu, 31.15 mg/kg for Ni, 22.17 mg/kg for Pb, and 54.21 mg/kg for Zn. Metals distribution maps produced by using the inverse distance weighted interpolation method and results revealed that all investigated metals showed distinct geographical patterns, and the concentrations were higher in urban and industrial areas than in farmland. Pearson correlation ...
Uploads
Papers by Gabriele Buttafuoco