astronomy

Roberto Refinetti

Roberto Refinetti is a astronomy topic covered in the lgStudy science library. This page brings together a partial reference excerpt, illustrations, worked examples, real-world applications and a short study plan, so you can understand Roberto Refinetti rather than just read about it. In short: Roberto Refinetti (; born November 19, 1957) is a behavioral physiologist and higher-education administrator. He is best known for his book Circadian Physiology.

Key takeaways

Roberto Refinetti belongs to astronomy; place it in that map before memorising details.
Learn the definition first, then one example that makes the definition concrete.
Connect Roberto Refinetti to a quantity you can measure, compute or draw — that is where exam questions come from.
Reproduce the core statement of Roberto Refinetti from memory before moving on to harder problems.

Reference excerpt

Roberto Refinetti (; born November 19, 1957) is a behavioral physiologist and higher-education administrator. He is best known for his book Circadian Physiology.

Behavioral physiology Refinetti earned his doctoral degree in psychology from the University of California, Santa Barbara in 1987 and has been a researcher or university professor at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, the University of Virginia, the College of William and Mary, the University of South Carolina, Boise State University, and the University of New Orleans. In the late 1980s, he taught Introduction to Psychology at the University of São Paulo. He is the editor-in-chief of the interdisciplinary journals Chronobiology International and Sexuality & Culture, as well as section editor of BMC Physiology and editorial board member of the Journal of Thermal Biology, of Biological Rhythm Research, and of Acta Scientiae Veterinariae. He has served as consultant for numerous journalists and media producers on a variety of topics related to biological rhythms, as recorded in newspaper articles on seasonal affective disorder, on daylight-saving time, on the pervasiveness of circadian rhythms, and on myths about lunar cycles in human behavior.

Notable publications Refinetti is best known as the author of Circadian Physiology, a comprehensive book on circadian rhythms (first edition: 1999; second edition: 2006; third edition: 2016), that has received positive reviews. His research program has been funded by grants from the National Science Foundation and the National Institutes of Health. According to Google Scholar, his four most cited articles are:

Refinetti, Roberto; Menaker, Michael (March 1992). "The circadian rhythm of body temperature". Physiology & Behavior. 51 (3): 613–637. doi:10.1016/0031-9384(92)90188-8. PMID 1523238. S2CID 27734031. Refinetti, Roberto; Cornelissen, Germaine C.; Halberg, Franz (2007). "Procedures for numerical analysis of circadian rhythms". Biological Rhythm Research. 38 (4): 275–325. Bibcode:2007BioRR..38..275R. doi:10.1080/09291010600903692. PMC 3663600. PMID 23710111. Refinetti, Roberto (2004). "Non-stationary time series and the robustness of circadian rhythms". Journal of Theoretical Biology. 227 (4): 571–581. Bibcode:2004JThBi.227..571R. doi:10.1016/j.jtbi.2003.11.032. PMID 15038991. Refinetti, Roberto (1999). "Relationship between the daily rhythms of locomotor activity and body temperature in eight mammalian species". The American Journal of Physiology. 277 (5 Pt 2): R1493–R1500. doi:10.1152/ajpregu.1999.277.5.R1493. PMID 10564224.

Higher education administration After 20 years in academia administering his own research program as a faculty member and the research programs of others as a journal editor, ad hoc peer reviewer, and review panel member for funding agencies, Refinetti took on the position of academic dean at a satellite campus of the University of South Carolina in 2006. In 2014, he moved to Idaho as the chair of the department of psychology at Boise State University. In 2020, he moved to Louisiana as the chair of the department of psychology at the University of New Orleans.

Awards

Refinetti was named a Distinguished Professor by the South Carolina Commission on Higher Education in 2004, when he was a finalist in the annual process to identify and honor the South Carolina Governor's Professor of the Year. He was awarded a Carolina Trustee Professorship by the Board of Trustees of the University of South Carolina in 2006 because of his record of teaching excellence and of outstanding performance in research and in public service activities. In June 2019, he was elected Fellow of the American Physiological Society for his contributions to the physiological sciences.

References

Illustrations

Worked examples

Example 1 — a first encounter with Roberto Refinetti

Start with the simplest possible case. Write down what Roberto Refinetti claims or describes in one sentence, then invent the smallest concrete situation in which that sentence is true. In astronomy, the smallest case is usually a single object, a single equation or a single measurement. Check that every symbol or term in your sentence has a meaning in that case.

Example 2 — changing one variable

Take the situation from Example 1 and change exactly one quantity: double it, halve it, or set it to zero. Predict what should happen to Roberto Refinetti before you calculate. Comparing your prediction with the result is the fastest way to find out whether you understand the idea or only the words.

Example 3 — an exam-style question

Typical questions about Roberto Refinetti ask you to (a) state it precisely, (b) apply it to given data, and (c) explain a limitation. Practise writing all three answers in under five minutes; the third part is what separates a full-mark answer from an average one.

Applications of Roberto Refinetti

In research: Roberto Refinetti appears in astronomy research whenever the underlying quantities have to be modelled precisely. Papers usually cite it as a starting assumption and then explore where it breaks down.
In technology and industry: Engineering practice reuses Roberto Refinetti in design rules, simulations and safety margins. Knowing the idea lets you read a specification sheet and understand why the numbers look the way they do.
In the classroom: Roberto Refinetti is common in secondary-school and first-year university syllabi. It links to neighbouring topics 1957 births, 20th-century American psychologists, 21st-century American psychologists, so understanding it makes those chapters shorter.
In everyday life: Look for Roberto Refinetti outside the textbook — in sport, cooking, traffic, electronics or the sky above you. An example you found yourself is remembered far longer than one you were given.

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How to study Roberto Refinetti in 20 minutes

Read the reference excerpt below once, without taking notes.
Close the page and write down what Roberto Refinetti means in your own words.
Compare your version with the excerpt and mark what you missed.
Work through the three examples above with pen and paper.
Explain Roberto Refinetti out loud to somebody else — or to Teacher Smith in the lgStudy chat.

Frequently asked questions

What is Roberto Refinetti in simple terms?

Roberto Refinetti (; born November 19, 1957) is a behavioral physiologist and higher-education administrator. He is best known for his book Circadian Physiology.

Why does Roberto Refinetti matter?

Because it connects several astronomy ideas at once: it gives you a definition you can apply, a quantity you can calculate, and a way to check whether a result is plausible.

How should I study Roberto Refinetti?

Read the excerpt, restate it from memory, then work through the examples and applications listed on this page. The five-step study plan above takes about twenty minutes.

What does this page cover?

It gives you a compact reference excerpt plus original lgStudy explanations, examples, applications and study material on Roberto Refinetti.