An adaptive perception-based image preprocessing method

The aim of this paper is to introduce an adaptive preprocessing procedure based on human perception in order to increase the performance of some standard image processing techniques. Specifically, image frequency content has been weighted by the corresponding value of the contrast sensitivity function, in agreement with the sensitiveness of human eye to the different image frequencies and contrasts. The 2D Rational dilation wavelet transform has been employed for representing image frequencies. In fact, it provides an adaptive and flexible multiresolution framework, enabling an easy and straightforward adaptation to the image frequency content. Preliminary experimental results show that the proposed preprocessing allows us to increase the performance of some standard image enhancement algorithms in terms of visual quality and often also in terms of PSNR

Thermal Emission from HII Galaxies: Discovering the Youngest Systems

We studied the radio properties of very young massive regions of star formation in HII galaxies, with the aim of detecting episodes of recent star formation in an early phase of evolution where the first supernovae start to appear. Our sample consists of 31 HII galaxies, characterized by strong Hydrogen emission lines, for which low resolution VLA 3.5cm and 6cm observations were obtained. The radio spectral energy distribution has a range of behaviours; 1) there are galaxies where the SED is characterized by a synchrotron-type slope, 2) galaxies with a thermal slope, and, 3) galaxies with possible free-free absorption at long wavelengths. The latter SEDs were found in a few galaxies and represent a signature of heavily embedded massive star clusters closely related to the early stages of massive star formation. Based on the comparison of the star formation rates determined from the recombination lines and those determined from the radio emission we find that SFR(Ha) is on average five times higher than SFR(1.4GHz). We confirm this tendency by comparing the ratio between the observed flux at 20 cm and the expected one, calculated based on the Ha star formation rates, both for the galaxies in our sample and for normal ones. This analysis shows that this ratio is a factor of 2 smaller in our galaxies than in normal ones, indicating that they fall below the FIR/radio correlation. These results suggest that the emission of these galaxies is dominated by a recent and massive star formation event in which the first supernovae (SN) just started to explode. We conclude that the systematic lack of synchrotron emission in those systems with the largest equivalent width of Hb can only be explained if those are young starbursts of less than 3.5Myr of age.Comment: Accepted for publication in Ap

IMPACT OF AGRICULTURAL MANAGEMENT ON COMMUNITIES OF ORIBATIDA, GAMASINA AND COLLEMBOLA IN ITALIAN AND FRENCH VINEYARDS

Quantitative and qualitative analyses among the soil microarthropods can be used in biomonitoring as tools in multi-disciplinary approach to characterize soil quality. Three groups of microarthropods - Collembola and Oribatida as detrivores and Gamasina as predators - were selected to evaluate the impact of different management treatments adopted to recover degraded soil in organic. Differences in arthropod populations between French and Italian sites were registered. In Italy, after two years of recovering treatments, an increase of the abundances of all groups, particularly detritivores in degraded plots, was observed. The population of gamasids increased, in all sites, only in non degraded plots. Soil invertebrates of similar trophic groups, like collembolans and oribatids, seem to differently respond to treatments: the collembolans were more affected by some agronomic practices enhancing soil fertility

The Radio Properties of Composite LINER/HII Galaxies

Arcsec-resolution VLA observations -- newly obtained as well as published -- of 40 nearby galaxies are discussed, completing a study of the radio properties of a magnitude-limited sample of nearby galaxies of the composite LINER/HII type. Our results reveal an overall detection rate of at least 25% AGN candidates among these composite sources. The general properties of these AGN candidates, as compared to non-AGN composite sources and HII galaxies, are discussed.Comment: Accepted for publication in ApJ

The Core-Collapse Supernova Rate in Arp299 Revisited

We present a study of the CCSN rate in nuclei A and B1 of the luminous infrared galaxy Arp299, based on 11 years of Very Large Array monitoring of their radio emission at 8.4 GHz. Significant variations in the nuclear radio flux density can be used to identify the CCSN activity in the absence of high-resolution very long baseline interferometry observations. In the case of the B1-nucleus, the small variations in its measured diffuse radio emission are below the fluxes expected from radio supernovae, thus making it well-suited to detect RSNe through flux density variability. In fact, we find strong evidence for at least three RSNe this way, which results in a lower limit for the CCSN rate of 0.28 +/- 0.16 per year. In the A-nucleus, we did not detect any significant variability and found a SN detection threshold luminosity which allows only the detection of the most luminous RSNe known. Our method is basically blind to normal CCSN explosions occurring within the A-nucleus, which result in too small variations in the nuclear flux density, remaining diluted by the strong diffuse emission of the nucleus itself. Additionally, we have attempted to find near-infrared counterparts for the earlier reported RSNe in the Arp299 nucleus A, by comparing NIR adaptive optics images from the Gemini-N telescope with contemporaneous observations from the European VLBI Network. However, we were not able to detect NIR counterparts for the reported radio SNe within the innermost regions of nucleus A. While our NIR observations were sensitive to typical CCSNe at 300 mas from the centre of the nucleus A, suffering from extinction up to A_v~15 mag, they were not sensitive to such highly obscured SNe within the innermost nuclear regions where most of the EVN sources were detected. (abridged)Comment: 12 pages, 4 figures and 7 tables. Accepted for publication in MNRA

Dust tori in radio galaxies

We investigate the validity of the quasar - radio galaxy unification scenario and detect dust tori within radio galaxies of various types. Using VISIR on the VLT, we acquired sub-arcsecond (~0.40") resolution N-band images, at a wavelength of 11.85 micron, of the nuclei of a sample of 27 radio galaxies of four types in the redshift range z=0.006-0.156. The sample consists of 8 edge-darkened, low-power Fanaroff-Riley class I (FR-I) radio galaxies, 6 edge-brightened, class II (FR-II) radio galaxies displaying low-excitation optical emission, 7 FR-IIs displaying high-excitation optical emission, and 6 FR-II broad emission line radio galaxies. Out of the sample of 27 objects, 10 nuclei are detected and several have constraining non-detections at sensitivities of 7 mJy, the limiting flux a point source has when detected with a signal-to-noise ratio of 10 in one hour of source integration. On the basis of the core spectral energy distributions of this sample we find clear indications that many FR-I and several low-excitation FR-II radio galaxies do not contain warm dust tori. At least 57+-19 percent of the high-excitation FR-IIs and almost all broad line radio galaxies display excess infrared emission, which must be attributed to warm dust reradiating accretion activity. The FR-I and low-excitation FR-II galaxies all possess low efficiencies, calculated as the ratio of bolometric and Eddington luminosity log (L_bol/L_Edd) < -3. This suggests that thick tori are absent at low accretion rates and/or low efficiencies. We argue that the unification viewing angle range 0-45 degrees of quasars should be increased to ~60 degrees, at least at lower luminosities.Comment: 17 pages, 9 figures, published in Astronomy and Astrophysics. Version 2 matches published version

Sardinia Radio Telescope wide-band spectral-polarimetric observations of the galaxy cluster 3C 129

We present new observations of the galaxy cluster 3C 129 obtained with the Sardinia Radio Telescope in the frequency range 6000-7200 MHz, with the aim to image the large-angular-scale emission at high-frequency of the radio sources located in this cluster of galaxies. The data were acquired using the recently-commissioned ROACH2-based backend to produce full-Stokes image cubes of an area of 1 deg x 1 deg centered on the radio source 3C 129. We modeled and deconvolved the telescope beam pattern from the data. We also measured the instrumental polarization beam patterns to correct the polarization images for off-axis instrumental polarization. Total intensity images at an angular resolution of 2.9 arcmin were obtained for the tailed radio galaxy 3C 129 and for 13 more sources in the field, including 3C 129.1 at the galaxy cluster center. These data were used, in combination with literature data at lower frequencies, to derive the variation of the synchrotron spectrum of 3C 129 along the tail of the radio source. If the magnetic field is at the equipartition value, we showed that the lifetimes of radiating electrons result in a radiative age for 3C 129 of t_syn = 267 +/- 26 Myrs. Assuming a linear projected length of 488 kpc for the tail, we deduced that 3C 129 is moving supersonically with a Mach number of M=v_gal/c_s=1.47. Linearly polarized emission was clearly detected for both 3C 129 and 3C 129.1. The linear polarization measured for 3C 129 reaches levels as high as 70% in the faintest region of the source where the magnetic field is aligned with the direction of the tail.Comment: 19 pages, 17 figures, accepted for publication in MNRA

The characterization of the distant blazar GB6 J1239+0443 from flaring and low activity periods

In 2008 AGILE and Fermi detected gamma-ray flaring activity from the unidentified EGRET source 3EG J1236+0457, recently associated with a flat spectrum radio quasar GB6 J1239+0443 at z=1.762. The optical counterpart of the gamma-ray source underwent a flux enhancement of a factor 15-30 in 6 years, and of ~10 in six months. We interpret this flare-up in terms of a transition from an accretion-disk dominated emission to a synchrotron-jet dominated one. We analysed a Sloan Digital Sky Survey (SDSS) archival optical spectrum taken during a period of low radio and optical activity of the source. We estimated the mass of the central black hole using the width of the CIV emission line. In our work, we have also investigated SDSS archival optical photometric data and UV GALEX observations to estimate the thermal-disk emission contribution of GB6 J1239+0443. Our analysis of the gamma-ray data taken during the flaring episodes indicates a flat gamma-ray spectrum, with an extension of up to 15 GeV, with no statistically-relevant sign of absorption from the broad line region, suggesting that the blazar-zone is located beyond the broad line region. This result is confirmed by the modeling of the broad-band spectral energy distribution (well constrained by the available multiwavelength data) of the flaring activity periods and by the accretion disk luminosity and black hole mass estimated by us using archival data.Comment: 30 pages, 7 figures, 4 tables MNRAS Accepted on 2012 June 1