Stand-alone Case Research Articles

La Maison Des Comptables: A Tax Research, Data Management, and Data Visualization Case

ABSTRACT This teaching case integrates the tax and accounting information systems curricula to help students apply research-based outcomes to critical business processes. The setting involves sales and excise tax compliance for out-of-state alcohol shipments, a complex context given the variation between state laws and nuances in the application of general tax rules created by the 21st amendment. The various case components require students to research state tax law, employ data management techniques to apply those laws to a large dataset, and create data visualizations to aid managers with business decision-making. Components of the case can be implemented concurrently or sequentially across multiple courses in the accounting curriculum or as a stand-alone case in a single course. Requiring students to identify and apply tax law across multiple courses helps students see through individual course silos and understand how various accounting disciplines are interconnected. JEL Classifications: M49; M41.

What to do when the unwanted happens? Negative event management in studies on internet- and mobile-based interventions for youths and adults with two case reports

BackgroundDespite severely burdened individuals, often being excluded from research studies on internet- and mobile-based interventions (IMIs), negative events (NEs) including suicidal thoughts and behaviors (STBs) can still occur during a trial. NEs require monitoring and adequate safety measures. However, study protocols frequently lack comprehensive descriptions of procedures for managing NEs. AimsThis study aimed to illustrate the assessment, monitoring, and procedures for addressing NEs in two studies on IMIs in adults and youth using case reports, to identify strengths and weaknesses of the NE management approaches, and to derive key learnings and recommendations. MethodsTwo case reports were drawn from two distinct IMI studies. The first study, PSYCHOnlineTHERAPY, evaluates the combination of an IMI with on-site psychotherapy for anxiety and depressive disorders in adults (adult blended study). The second study evaluates a standalone, therapist-guided IMI for post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) in youth (youth standalone study). Potential NEs were predefined depending on the study sample. The case studies thoroughly document the systematic recording and ongoing monitoring of NEs through self-report and observer-based assessments during the interventions. The cases illustrate a variety of NE management strategies, including automated and personalized approaches, adapted to the specific nature and severity of the NEs. The NE management approaches are visualized using decision trees. ResultsIn the adult blended case study, online questionnaires detected STBs and triggered automated support information. As on-site therapy had already ended, a telephone consultation session allowed for the identification and discussion of the heightened intensity of suicidal thoughts, along with the development of specific additional help options. In the youth standalone case study, heightened tension in an adolescent with PTSD during trauma processing could be addressed in a telephone therapeutic session focusing on resource activation and emotion regulation. The referral to on-site treatment was supported. Overall, advantages of the NE management included automated procedures, multimodal assessment of a wide range of NEs, and standardized procedures tailored to different severity levels. Weaknesses included the use of single-item assessments for STBs and lack of procedures in case of deterioration or nonresponse to treatment. ConclusionThis study provides practical insights and derives key learnings and recommendations regarding the management of NEs in different IMI contexts for both adults and youth.

Public pedagogues of change: advocacy networks, civil society organisations, and self-help authors in Mexico

ABSTRACT This article explores informal adult education for change in Mexico through the conceptual lens of social movement learning and public pedagogy. It adopts a multiple case design featuring two advocacy networks, two civil society organisations, and two self-help authors. It analyses how they position themselves as change agents addressing issues of food sovereignty, violence against women, social justice, environmental justice, financial insecurity, and emotional health. The article deconstructs how such agents diagnose problems and prescribe solutions that share a common logic: the unlearning of hegemonic knowledges and the learning of alternatives. It presents a continuum of pedagogical strategies, ranging from the most public (spectacular protests and social media work) to most private (targeted lobbying and workshopping). It contributes, methodologically and analytically, to literature at the intersection of social movement learning and public pedagogy. Methodologically, in a field dominated by stand-alone case studies from North America, it offers a comparative study of three domains of informal adult education in Mexico. Analytically, it unpacks public pedagogical messaging common to these domains and explain the strategies, interests and political implications that differentiate them. We encourage educators to assess the range of public pedagogical work that may be mobilised in the pursuit of change.

Cost-optimal Power-to-Methanol: Flexible operation or intermediate storage?

The synthesis of methanol from captured carbon dioxide and green hydrogen could be a promising replacement for the current fossil-based production. The major energy input and cost driver for such a process is the electricity for hydrogen production. Time-variable electricity cost or availability thus motivates flexible operation. However, it is unclear if each unit of the process should be operated flexibly, and if storage of electricity or hydrogen reduces the methanol production cost. To answer these questions, we modeled a Power-to-Methanol plant with batteries and hydrogen storage. Using this model, we solved a combined design and scheduling optimization problem, which provides the optimal size of the units of the plant and their optimal (quasi-stationary) operation. The annualized cost of methanol was minimized for a grid-connected and a stand-alone case study considering current and future (2030) unit cost scenarios. The optimization results confirm that storage, especially hydrogen storage, is particularly beneficial when the electricity price is high and highly fluctuating. In future unit cost scenarios, batteries could play an even bigger role due to the expected significant cost reduction. Irrespective of the presence of storage, the whole Power-to-Methanol plant should be operated flexibly: even moderate flexibility of the methanol synthesis unit significantly reduces the production cost.

Initial refinement of data from video-based single-cell tracking.

Video recording of cells offers a straightforward way to gain valuable information from their response to treatments. An indispensable step in obtaining such information involves tracking individual cells from the recorded data. A subsequent step is reducing such data to represent essential biological information. This can help to compare various single-cell tracking data yielding a novel source of information. The vast array of potential data sources highlights the significance of methodologies prioritizing simplicity, robustness, transparency, affordability, sensor independence, and freedom from reliance on specific software or online services. The provided data presents single-cell tracking of clonal (A549) cells as they grow in two-dimensional (2D) monolayers over 94 hours, spanning several cell cycles. The cells are exposed to three different concentrations of yessotoxin (YTX). The data treatments showcase the parametrization of population growth curves, as well as other statistical descriptions. These include the temporal development of cell speed in family trees with and without cell death, correlations between sister cells, single-cell average displacements, and the study of clustering tendencies. Various statistics obtained from single-cell tracking reveal patterns suitable for data compression and parametrization. These statistics encompass essential aspects such as cell division, movements, and mutual information between sister cells. This work presents practical examples that highlight the abundant potential information within large sets of single-cell tracking data. Data reduction is crucial in the process of acquiring such information which can be relevant for phenotypic drug discovery and therapeutics, extending beyond standardized procedures. Conducting meaningful big data analysis typically necessitates a substantial amount of data, which can stem from standalone case studies as an initial foundation.

Laparoscopic vs. Robotic Gastrectomy in Patients with Situs Inversus Totalis: A Systematic Review.

Situs inversus totalis (SIT) is a rare genetic anomaly involving the mirror-image transposition of organs. This transposition can potentially make surgical treatments difficult because of the reversed anatomy and intraoperative confusion. The aim of this systematic review is to compare the perioperative outcomes and safety of robotic and laparoscopic gastrectomy in patients with SIT. We included full-text case reports with brief reviews and standalone case studies on SIT patients age ≥21, undergoing laparoscopic or robotic gastrectomy. We excluded case studies focusing on procedures other than laparoscopic and robotic gastrectomy, namely, open gastrectomy, gastric banding, and gastric bypass. English was selected as the language and articles published in the last 10 years were selected with a date range from Jan, 2011, to Aug, 2021. We focused on intraoperative and postoperative outcomes including blood loss, vascular aberrancy, operation duration, mortality, operative complications, duration of hospitalization, and follow-up interval. Online databases included Clinical Key, Embase, ScienceDirect, Ovid, and Google Scholar. The last search was conducted on Aug 15, 2021. For all eligible articles, risk of bias assessment was carried out using JBI critical appraisal checklist (Table 1). Continuous data were analyzed using t-test with p value of 0.05. From our search, we retained 29 case reports which reported information from 30 cases. The results reported in each study were summarized (Table 2). The laparoscopic procedure was used in 21 cases and robot-assisted surgery was used in 9 cases. Operative time was mentioned in 24 out of the 30 cases and the average operative time was 205.67 min. Blood loss was reported in 16 out of the 30 cases, with an average blood loss of 51.9 mL. Hospital stay information was provided in 26 out of the 30 cases, with an average length of stay of 8.5 days. A statistically significant difference was not found for the operative time, length of hospitalization, or age of the patient. However, intraoperative blood loss in robot-assisted gastrectomy was lower compared to laparoscopic gastrectomy, with a p value of 0.0293. Perioperative death was not reported in any of the cases. Only three cases of postoperative complications were reported in laparoscopic surgery. Only one of the three cases suggested that the complication was due to an anomaly, whereas the other two of them reported complications due to procedural errors. Laparoscopic and robotic gastrectomy can be safely used for SIT patients if performed cautiously. Some precautions include thoroughly assessing anatomical aberrations using preoperative imaging, adjusting the operative set up, and having experienced surgeons. The robotic approach may have a few advantages over laparoscopic procedures that may enhance the surgical safety for SIT patients and need to be further explored in future research. Advantages of the robotic approach may include improved surgical safety with better visualization of the surgical field, promoting the stability of surgical instruments and perhaps allowing ease of surgical orientation and positioning when operating on patients with SIT. Further research in this field is merited.

A Study on the Application of TensorFlow Compression Techniques to Human Activity Recognition

In the human activity recognition (HAR) application domain, the use of deep learning (DL) algorithms for feature extractions and training purposes delivers significant performance improvements with respect to the use of traditional machine learning (ML) algorithms. However, this comes at the expense of more complex and demanding models, making harder their deployment on constrained devices traditionally involved in the HAR process. The efficiency of DL deployment is thus yet to be explored. We thoroughly investigated the application of TensorFlow Lite simple conversion, dynamic, and full integer quantization compression techniques. We applied those techniques not only to convolutional neural networks (CNNs), but also to long short-term memory (LSTM) networks, and a combined version of CNN and LSTM. We also considered two use case scenarios, namely cascading compression and stand-alone compression mode. This paper reports the feasibility of deploying deep networks onto an ESP32 device, and how TensorFlow compression techniques impact classification accuracy, energy consumption, and inference latency. Results show that in the cascading case, it is not possible to carry out the performance characterization. Whereas in the stand-alone case, dynamic quantization is recommended because yields a negligible loss of accuracy. In terms of power efficiency, both dynamic and full integer quantization provide high energy saving with respect to the uncompressed models: between 31% and 37% for CNN networks, and up to 45% for LSTM networks. In terms of inference latency, dynamic and full integer quantization provide comparable performance.

The impact of climate on solvent-based direct air capture systems

Direct air capture (DAC) is increasingly seen as a critical technology to reach mid-century net-zero targets and limit climate change to well below 2 °C. While the commercialization of DAC technologies is being pursued by numerous companies, there remains remarkably little information on their performance under “real-world” conditions. In this paper, for the first time, we investigate the influence of temperature and relative humidity of air on the CO2 capture rate at the air contactor, overall energy requirement, CO2 capture efficiency, and levelized cost of liquid-solvent based DAC systems. We observe that the overall energy demand decreases from 11.1 to 8.3 GJ/tCO2 as the CO2 capture rate increases from 40 to 85 % and that high capture rates can only be achieved in hot and humid climate conditions. We observe that a CO2 capture rate of 75 % is only possible above 17 °C and 90 % relative humidity, and this drops dramatically at lower temperatures. It is also observed that water evaporation in the air contactor is highest at dry and low relative humidity, as expected. The sensitivity analysis showed that CO2 capture efficiency is relatively insensitive to climate conditions for the liquid-solvent based DAC plant. Lastly, the levelized cost of natural gas standalone scenario varies from $240/tCO2 to $409/tCO2, and this is more sensitive to temperature than relative humidity. The levelized cost of the natural gas stand-alone case is between 7 % and 10 % lower than that of an electric grid-connected case across all climate conditions.

Wind loading and its effects on photovoltaic modules: An experimental–Computational study to assess the stress on structures

Photovoltaic modules are one of the intensively used technologies that provide a renewable energy alternative to electricity generation. Consequently, these devices have been studied using different approaches in order to determine their aerodynamic characteristics. Nevertheless, there is still a lack of guidelines from the codes of practice that could enable users and manufacturers to chose/recommend different types of photovoltaic modules according to siting and operation conditions.In order to provide more data about the influence of the photovoltaic module aerodynamics on its constitutive structural elements, an interdisciplinary approach is advisable. In this study the subject is addressed through experimental measurements and numerical assessment of a standard photovoltaic module under different conditions. Boundary layer wind tunnel tests were performed to determine wind loads over ground mounted photovoltaic modules, considering two situations: stand-alone and forming an array of panels. Several wind directions and inclinations of the photovoltaic modules were taken into account in order to detect possible wind load combinations that may lead to a condition not prescribed by the codes of practice. All tests were carried out using rigid models of the photovoltaic modules, that is, the experimental analysis is limited to static wind tunnel testing. A detailed numerical evaluation is performed using the finite element method (FEM) to identify critical structural sections. For the stand-alone case, the most influential wind flow directions correspond to oblique directions for local pressures and along wind direction for overall forces. For the case of the photovoltaic module array, it is observed that the wind loading over the leading panels is decisive for the design. According to the numerical results, the central support device is the most critical structural component.

Unlocking Grey Scientific Data on Resident Behaviour to Increase the Climate Impact of Dutch Sustainable Housing

A “community of knowledge” of representatives of the housing sector in the Netherlands investigated the impact of the behaviour of residents in sustainable housing, both newly constructed and renovated stock. For this, grey scientific data were used, i.e., data and reports from non-university agencies reflecting research commissioned by civil society NGOs and commercial enterprises. The aim was to find perspectives for action (practical “rules of thumb”) to increase the impact of sustainable housing on CO<sub>2</sub> reduction and facilitate the implementation of the Dutch national sustainability program. First, a conceptual framework and research model were created to generate the relevant research questions for the sustainable construction sector. An innovative research approach was used where data from academic non-university researchers were enriched by university academic researchers. Experiences with the methodology used are: (a) It implicitly places the many factors that influence sustainable resident behaviour in context; and (b) it makes clear that data from such research can complement university research with useful data from practice, data that are scientifically difficult to use because they are mostly derived from stand-alone case studies. The perspectives for action that were generated are: (a) Sustainable technologies must add new useful functionalities for acceptance; (b) sustainable supply must be tailor-made because households differ and tenants behave differently from homeowners; (c) decision-making about sustainable investments is not only based on financial factors; (d) residents are reluctant to become involved, so it is important that (e) the people representing contractors should be reliable; and (f) people want personalised plans and on-time delivery. Finally, the collected reports turned out to be focused on practice and therefore provided less theoretical information about the rebound effect.

Influence of Excess Pore-pressure on the Seismic Response of Single and Closely Adjacent Structures on Saturated Sand

ABSTRACT This study was initiated following recognition that most structures exist, not in isolation, but in a setting where there is sharing of the common supporting foundation soil. Generally, structures exist in clusters, particularly in CBDs, with varying degrees of interaction. In truth, engineers deal with “systems”, where no structure exists in isolation. However, experimental evidence of the seismic response of multiple structures, particularly on saturated sand, is scarce since most studies are numerical and focus on stand-alone structures. The present study helps bridge this paucity of experimental work by developing an understanding of the seismic response of closely adjacent structures on saturated loose sand. A variety of configurations of single degree-of-freedom structures, with different fixed-base fundamental frequencies, were studied using a large laminar sand-filled box on a shake table. Recorded ground motions from the Canterbury earthquake sequence were used. The free-field and the stand-alone case for dry and saturated sand were studied as references. Differences between the response of stand-alone structures on saturated and dry sand are discussed. The response of a structure of focus, standing adjacent to neighbouring structures, on saturated sand is compared to that of the stand-alone case. In general, structures in a cluster experienced an attenuated response.

Indian And Sri Lankan Counterinsurgency Campaigns: A Comparative Analysis

The South Asian region has been marred by various insurgencies, internal conflicts, and civil wars. Multiple conflicts are mainly discussed and deliberated in piecemeal and standalone case studies. This paper will carry out a comparative study of Indian and Sri Lankan insurgencies while facing protracted insurgencies with different natures, magnitudes, and cultural propensities. Some conflicts were bloody and ultra-violent, and some resistance movements and insurgencies (Indian) have spanned more than five decades. Though Sri Lanka had defeated the insurgents, it is imperative to analyze the causes and factors that led to its success. Both India and Sri Lanka adopted a response pattern in the form of Counterinsurgency, which brought forth distinct consequences. Counterinsurgency is complex irregular warfare involving various logical operations lines such as political, economic, information, psychological, and military operations. But the chief consideration is non-kinetic. The non-kinetic procedures are administered under the ‘Population centric Counterinsurgency approach, in which the counterinsurgent is more inclined toward securing and protecting the population. This paper will ascertain whether India and Sri Lanka have launched the ‘population-centric Counterinsurgency’ or ‘enemy-centric Counterinsurgency.’ Moreover, it will also draw the parallels and variations followed in the respective theaters of insurgencies by both countries and discover how successful they are in suppressing their separate insurgencies. Lastly, this paper will provide the intellectual foundation for understanding the counterinsurgency paradigm for the whole of South Asia.

Using synthesis gas heat to produce work via an externally fired gas power cycle

Synthesis gas production requires significant amounts of energy. Efficiency improvements and introduction of renewable or non-carbon energy sources are needed to reduce carbon dioxide emissions. Downgrading of high level heat in synthesis gas cooling trains contributes significantly to exergy losses. Recently, turbine expansion of synthesis gas was investigated by various authors, as one method to reduce exergy losses. However, using synthesis gas as a working fluid poses risks to rotating machinery. Thus an externally fired gas power cycle is proposed, which also allows flexibility to incorporate various types of renewable energy sources. In this study helium is the working fluid and nuclear energy the heat source. A helium-steam combined cycle arrangement is simulated and analysed using energy, exergy and cost analysis. Hot synthesis gas is used to provide additional heat to the helium-steam combined cycle via indirect heat exchange, thereby allowing a close match between the temperatures. Further cooling of the synthesis gas via steam generation is also employed. The work output of the integrated system versus a standalone case was increased by at least 19%. The specific exergy destruction in kW/MW work output was reduced by 38% and the specific equipment cost in $/MW work output increased by 22%.

Understanding the stimuli, scope, and impact of organizational transformation: The context of eBusiness technologies in supply chains

AbstractWith eBusiness technologies seen as a source of competitive edge, supply chains are facing organizational transformation. The supply chain transformation has been widely explored in the context of standalone case studies focusing on either systems, relationships, or implications of projects to supply or manufacturing risk. The research has been limited to address the underlying reasons for variance in organizational transformations effort. This study employs a case study in an automotive supply chain, followed by a questionnaire distributed to four automotive supply chains achieving 65 responses. The findings indicate that organizational transformation can vary based on the relationship between individual eBusiness technology and its stimulus (responsive, anticipatory, and/or proactive), its scope (evolutionary vs. radical change), and the extent of organizational transformation impact (departmental and/or business unit and/or supply chain level impact). Within this context, the current study brings forth new findings in automotive supply chains in which the individual eBusiness technologies indicated a variance across the supply chains.

Experimental study of the seismic response of a structure set amongst closely adjacent structures

AbstractThe influence of soil on the dynamic response of soil‐structure systems is usually studied on a stand‐alone (SA) structure, even though closely adjacent structures form the vast majority of the population, especially in large cities. When structures are closely adjacent to each other, the wavefield in the soil, generated by the vibration of the footings, produces a complex interaction between them. Scant attention, especially by physical experiments, has been paid to this interaction. This work addresses the seismic response of a single degree‐of‐freedom structure (structure of focus) considering the influence of one and two closely adjacent neighbours. Experiments were performed using a large laminar box filled with sand sitting on a shake table. Results from utilising four recorded ground motions from the 2010–2011 Canterbury earthquake sequence are analysed. The effect of adjacent structures on the acceleration and displacement of the top mass of each structure, as well as the uplift of the footings, are discussed. Changes in the fundamental frequency due to the presence of neighbouring structures are identified. The use of the SA system, without consideration of closely adjacent structures, may result in a significant error in the estimation of the response of the structure of focus. In general, acceleration, lateral displacement and uplift reduced in comparison with that of the corresponding SA case. A footing settlement mechanism, resulting from uplift of the system that reflects the influence of adjacent structures, is also revealed.

Estimation of wind pressure coefficients on multi-building configurations using data-driven approach

Wind load acting on a standalone structure is different from that acting on a similar structure which is surrounded by other structures in close proximity. The presence of other structures in the surrounding can change the wind flow regime around the principal structure and thus causing variation in wind loads compared to a standalone case. This variation on wind loads termed as interference effect depends on several factors like terrain category, geometry of the structure, orientation, wind incident angle, interfering distances etc., In the present study, a three building configuration is considered and the mean pressure coefficients on each face of principle building are determined in presence of two interfering buildings. Generally, wind loads on interfering buildings are determined from wind tunnel experiments. Computational fluid dynamic studies are being increasingly used to determine the wind loads recently. Whereas, wind tunnel tests are very expensive, the CFD simulation requires high computational cost and time. In this scenario, Artificial Neural Network (ANN) technique and Support Vector Regression (SVR) can be explored as alternative tools to study wind loads on structures. The present study uses these data-driven approaches to predict mean pressure coefficients on each face of principle building. Three typical arrangements of three building configuration viz. L shape, V shape and mirror of L shape arrangement are considered with varying interfering distances and wind incidence angles. Mean pressure coefficients (Cp mean) are predicted for 45 degrees wind incidence angle through ANN and SVR. Further, the critical faces of principal building, critical interfering distances and building arrangement which are more prone to wind loads are identified through this study. Among three types of building arrangements considered, a maximum of 3.9 times reduction in Cp mean values are noticed under Case B (V shape) building arrangement with 2.5B interfering distance. Effect of interfering distance and building arrangement on suction pressure on building faces has also been studied. Accordingly, Case C (mirror of L shape) building arrangement at a wind angle of 45° shows less suction pressure. Through this study, it was also observed that the increase of interfering distance may increase the suction pressure for all the cases of building configurations considered.

Creating a comprehensive peaceful assembly law for Ukraine: Idea and ideal

The right to freedom of peaceful assembly is guaranteed by Article 39 of the Ukrainian Constitution. However, there is no stand-alone law or case law that defines, regulates and supports the process of organizing and conducting peaceful assemblies. This is largely due to the fact that until the 2014 Maidan Revolution (Euromaidan), Ukraine’s history was one of autocratic rule. This article argues that given this historical context, secondary legislation is needed to safeguard this freedom and entrench it into Ukrainian legal culture. The idea of the right to peaceful assembly is sacrosanct. This article analyses the key elements needed to transform this idea into an ideal law. For example, any such legislation should follow the spirit of the European Convention of Human Rights (ECHR), especially in the area of limitations of the personal freedom. Ukraine has moved forward on a broad reform agenda including reforms of the judiciary in order to create an independent and competent court system. It is widely recognized that such a system is needed to fight widespread corruption. The article argues that now is the time to enact a law on peaceful assembly in order to elevate Ukraine’s legal system to EU and international standards.

Experimental Study of the Effect of Proximity between Adjacent Buildings on their Dynamic Response

Most of the experimental works on adjacent structures consider a short distance between them to analyze the interaction. Additionally, the majority of these studies focus on changes in the dynamic response of the buildings (e.g. acceleration, lateral displacement, or rocking) assuming that the fundamental frequency and the damping of the structures remain the same as those for the stand-alone case. This work intends to reveal the effect of distance on the interaction between adjacent structures and the effect of neighboring buildings on the dynamic properties of a structure. This was achieved by studying the dynamic response of single degree-of-freedom (SDOF) structures in a laminar box filled with sand sitting on a shake table. This study initially addressed the attenuation of the acceleration through the soil with the distance considering the structures at different distances. The second part of the study considers multiple configurations of adjacent structures to estimate the influence of the number of neighbors on the fundamental frequency and damping ratio of a subject building. An increasing fundamental frequency with an increasing number of participating structures was observed. An equation to estimate the influence of the number of neighboring buildings on the fundamental frequency of the subject structure is proposed. For the damping ratio, a considerable influence of the soil was observed. The lowest damping was obtained for an intermediate number of structures.

Shared service implementation in multidivisional organizations: A meta-synthesis study

The purpose of this article is to explore shared service center (SSC) implementation. Shared service is a key concept by which corporations organize their resources. Research indicates that some organizations struggle with implementing SSC and sometimes entirely fail to implement them. Although prior research exploring the determinants of implementation success is relatively scarce, researchers have conducted several SSC implementation case studies. However, these valuable findings remain isolated in stand-alone case studies. We aggregated the results of these studies using a qualitative meta-synthesis to identify, extract, and synthesize variables, their interrelations, and their relationships to SSC success. The outcome is a theoretical model that describes which factors are important and how and why they are related to SSC success. Overall, we make important contributions to the growing SSC research by shedding theoretical light on SSC implementation. We also provide a set of propositions and make suggestions for future research.

Two new indices for preventive conservation of the cultural heritage: Predicted risk of damage and heritage microclimate risk

The conservation and safeguarding of historic buildings, and of everything that is housed within them, represents a challenge whose value is currently shared at a world level. The conservation of these cultural assets depends on a number of variables, with the microclimate playing a decisive role among them. For at least two decades, scientific literature in the field has been reporting experiences on individual case studies relative to the study of the microclimate and criteria for the conservation of the cultural and architectural heritage, in this regard, standards have also been enacted. Nevertheless, in our view, the research involves stand-alone case studies that are not comparable among one another, in particular with regard to the risk assessment of the place where the assets are located and/or the damage that these assets may undergo as a result of the microclimate of their environment. In this contribution we intend to present two risk indices related to the microclimate: the Heritage Microclimate Risk (HMR) index, which defines the level of risk to which an indoor room is exposed, compared to maximum and minimum values defined according to standards or based on the historical microclimate; and the Predicted Risk of Damage (PRD) index, which links the value of the HMR with the risk of damage to a specific material/object, which is exhibited or conserved within the room. The HMR and PRD are determined by the microclimate variables monitored on site, in particular, Air Temperature and Relative Humidity, or they can be obtained by means of Building Simulation. The proposed indices make it possible to define the potential microclimate risk within a room, as well as the probability that these conditions can cause damage to the objects of value therein conserved (collections, paintings, etc.). As an example, we have reported the application of the two HMR and PRD indices to the case study of a hall of the Royal Palace of Venaria Reale in Turin (Italy).