SIMONA D'AGOSTINO

PhD Graduate

PhD program:: XXXV


Thesis title: Occupational exposure to electromagnetic fields: risk assessment of operators performing Transcranial Magnetic Stimulation (TMS) treatments

The assessment of the risk from occupational exposure to electromagnetic fields (EMF) has attracted the attention of those involved in safety in the workplace, in particular after the updating of European legislation, with the publication for EMFs, of Directive 2013/35/EU1 of the European Parliament and of the Council, which made the risk assessment mandatory for this type of physical agents. The issue is made even more relevant by the proliferation of industrial and health applications using EMF even of considerable intensity. However, the rapid technological development has not always been accompanied by adequate growth in the culture of prevention and safety. Many devices expose both operators and persons of the general public to significant risks, but often, these risks are not adequately reported by the manufacturer, nor mentioned in the instruction manual, as would be expressly required by the harmonized standards. In this general framework is placed this Ph.D. research project, whose aim is to analyze possible conditions of risk in the workplace, considering only the environment where the EMF sources potentially expose the operator to risk. The research project involves a joint collaboration between two Institutions: the National Institute for Insurance against Accidents at Work - INAIL and of course Sapienza University of Rome. The project is developed in a multidisciplinary manner, providing experimental and numerical investigations to achieve the required goals, also considering the literature review and comparison for a more realistic analysis of the risk, in terms of human exposure to EMF. The work is based on a multiphysics approach to obtain a complete evaluation of the risk in the workplace, with the prospective to improve the current approach in the assessment of the risk and eventually suggest some indications to the operator for better use of the device under test. Therefore, the starting point has been a review of the workplaces to identify any gaps and critical issues in relation to the risk assessment and therefore for which it is considered necessary to deepen the protectionist issues. A literature analysis of the state of the art on the risk in the workplace is first carried out. This has been followed by numerical and accurate modeling of the device under test as well as the workers in a real reproduced work condition of exposure. Of paramount importance is the understanding of all the parameters that can affect the distribution of the induced EM quantities, which are essential for the risk assessment and the verification of compliance with the regulations system. To do this, it was necessary to study human exposure in-depth, also using different human body models available for dosimetric analysis on dedicated software. All the research has traveled on two parallel tracks, on the one hand, the need to fill the scientific gaps in the research area of exposure assessment of workers and on the other one to take into account the regulatory aspects, essential for a correct evaluation of professional exposure. Therefore, as a final step of the overall work, a possible new protocol of risk assessment analysis is proposed to move forward on the improvement of safety and security in the workplace.

Research products

11573/1698247 - 2023 - Advanced Computational Modelling of Female Breast and 2.45 GHz Exposure
Dolciotti, Noemi; Colella, Micol; D’Agostino, Simona; Apollonio, Francesca; Liberti, Micaela - 04b Atto di convegno in volume
conference: IEEE Conference on Antenna Measurements and Applications (CAMA) (Genoa, Italy)
book: 2023 IEEE Conference on Antenna Measurements and Applications (CAMA) - (979-8-3503-2304-7)

11573/1702286 - 2023 - The Challenge of 5G technology: Cooperative Research, Innovative Techniques and Microscopic Models in Bioelectromagnetics
Liberti, Micaela; Apollonio, Francesca; Caramazza, Laura; Colella, Micol; D'agostino, Simona; Dolciotti, Noemi; Fontana, Sara; Paffi, Alessandra; Pisano, Carmen - 04b Atto di convegno in volume
conference: 2023 IEEE MTT-S International Microwave Biomedical Conference (IMBioC) (Leuven, Belgium)
book: 2023 IEEE MTT-S International Microwave Biomedical Conference (IMBioC) - (978-1-6654-9217-1)

11573/1624076 - 2022 - Systematic numerical assessment of occupational exposure to electromagnetic fields of transcranial magnetic stimulation
D'agostino, S.; Colella, M.; Liberti, M.; Falsaperla, R.; Apollonio, F. - 01a Articolo in rivista
paper: MEDICAL PHYSICS (Hoboken NJ: John Wiley & Sons New York: Published for the American Association of Physicists in Medicine by the American Institute of Physics) pp. - - issn: 0094-2405 - wos: WOS:000767944100001 (0) - scopus: 2-s2.0-85126183341 (1)

11573/1683422 - 2022 - Improved anatomical female breast Model. 3D Realization and its application to numerical plane wave exposure
Dolciotti, N; Colella, M; D'agostino, S; Apollonio, F; Liberti, M - 04b Atto di convegno in volume
conference: 21st IEEE Mediterranean Electrotechnical Conference, MELECON 2022 (Palermo; Italy)
book: MELECON 2022 - IEEE Mediterranean Electrotechnical Conference, Proceedings - (978-1-6654-4280-0)

11573/1683428 - 2022 - Improvement of breast shape in a female whole-body model. A numerical evaluation of the exposure to 2.45 GHz plane wave
Dolciotti, N; Colella, M; D'agostino, S; Apollonio, F; Liberti, M - 04b Atto di convegno in volume
conference: 52nd European Microwave Conference, EuMC 2022 (Milan; Italy)
book: 2022 52nd European Microwave Conference, EuMC 2022 - (978-2-8748-7069-9)

11573/1618954 - 2021 - Stimolatori muscolari ad uso estetico come sorgenti rilevanti di campo magnetico: aspetti protezionistici
Bogi, Andrea; Pinto, Iole; Stacchini, Nicola; Pozzi, Roberta; D'agostino, Simona; Polichetti, Alessandro; Giliberti, Claudia; Comelli, Moreno; Zoppetti, Nicola - 04d Abstract in atti di convegno
conference: del rischio con particolare riguardo all'esposizione ai campi magnetici degli operatori. Convegno Nazionale Airp, Roma, (Rome,Italy)
book: Contributo in atti di convegno - ()

11573/1580512 - 2021 - Issues in the implementation of directive 2013/35/eu regarding the protection of workers against electromagnetic fields
Contessa, G. M.; D'agostino, S.; Falsaperla, R.; Grandi, C.; Polichetti, A. - 01a Articolo in rivista
paper: INTERNATIONAL JOURNAL OF ENVIRONMENTAL RESEARCH AND PUBLIC HEALTH (Basel: MDPI 2003-) pp. - - issn: 1660-4601 - wos: WOS:000715412900001 (0) - scopus: 2-s2.0-85116724814 (1)

11573/1580527 - 2021 - Dosimetric assessment of clinical staff exposed to magnetic field produced by a transcranial magnetic stimulation circular coil
D'agostino, S.; Colella, M.; Liberti, M.; Falsaperla, R.; Apollonio, F. - 04b Atto di convegno in volume
conference: 2021 XXXIVth General Assembly and Scientific Symposium of the International Union of Radio Science (URSI GASS). (Rome,Italy)
book: 2021 XXXIVth General Assembly and Scientific Symposium of the International Union of Radio Science (URSI GASS) - (978-9-4639-6-8027)

11573/1618963 - 2021 - Numerical assessment of the exposure to Transcranial MagneticStimulation coil male and female anatomical model comparison
D'agostino, Simona; Colella, Micol; Liberti, Micaela; Falsaperla, Rosaria; Apollonio, Francesca - 04d Abstract in atti di convegno
conference: BioEM 2021 I nternational conference in the area of bioelectromagnetics (Ghent, Belgium)
book: Proceedings BioEM2021 - ()

11573/1440133 - 2020 - Uncertainty in determining respect distance for electromagnetic fields byspatial interpolation of exposure indices
Zoppetti, N.; Andreuccetti, D.; Ceccherini, S.; Comelli, M.; D'agostino, S.; Falsaperla, R. - 04d Abstract in atti di convegno
conference: 33rd URSI GASS (Rome,Italy)
book: URSI GASS 2020 Proceedings - ()

11573/1131777 - 2018 - Extremely high frequency electromagnetic fields facilitate electrical signal propagation by increasing transmembrane potassium efflux in an artificial axon model
D'agostino, Simona; Della Monica, Chiara; Palizzi, Eleonora; Di Pietrantonio, Fabio; Benetti, Massimiliano; Cannatà, Domenico; Cavagnaro, Marta; Sardari, Dariush; Stano, Pasquale; Ramundo-Orlando, Alfonsina - 01a Articolo in rivista
paper: SCIENTIFIC REPORTS (London: Springer Nature London: Nature Publishing Group) pp. 1-10 - issn: 2045-2322 - wos: WOS:000435448300042 (9) - scopus: 2-s2.0-85048746688 (13)

11573/946596 - 2016 - Small-size wire phantom to study the effect of MMW on nerve fibre
D'agostino, S.; Di Pietrantonio, F.; Benetti, M.; Cannata, D.; Cavagnaro, Marta; Sardari, D.; Stano, P.; Ramundo Orlando, A. - 04c Atto di convegno in rivista
paper: INTERNATIONAL CONFERENCE ON INFRARED, MILLIMETER, AND TERAHERTZ WAVES (Piscataway, NJ : Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers) pp. 1-2 - issn: 2162-2027 - wos: WOS:000391406200117 (0) - scopus: 2-s2.0-85006085545 (0)
conference: 41st International Conference on Infrared, Millimeter and Terahertz Waves, IRMMW-THz 2016 (Copenhagen; Denmark)

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