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We report the use of a new patented polypyrrole derivatives synthesized at Technobiochip for the development of novel series of nano-gravimetric sensors showing a high affinity for many classes of volatile organic and inorganic compounds (VOCs). 20 MHz AT-cut resonant quartzes were coated with the polypyrrole derivatives, applied to the Technobiochip Libra Nose 2.1 and used to distinguish different Italian cheeses. The different types of cheese aromas were evaluated by inspecting the headspace. Finally, we used Principal Component Analysis (PCA) to discriminate samples on the basis of the VOCs released.

The Compact Muon Solenoid is one of two general purpose detectors currently being constructed for the Large Hadron Collider at CERN foreseen to begin data taking in 2007. Avalanche Photo Diodes (APDs) have been chosen to detect the scintillation light of the 61 200 lead tungstate crystals in the barrel part of the electromagnetic calorimeter of CMS. After a 8 years long R&D work Hamamatsu Photonics produces now APDs with a structure that is basically radiation resistant. Since a reliability of 99.9% is required, a method to detect weak APDs before they are built into the detector had to be developed. The described screening method is a combination of an irradiation with 60Co and annealing under bias of all APDs and on a sampling basis only an irradiation with hadrons.