The Nasca and Palpa geoglyphs: geophysical and geochemical data

The Nasca geoglyphs in the stone desert in southern Peru are part of our world cultural heritage. These remarkable drawings have roused the interest of scientists from different disciplines. Here we report the results of integrated geophysical, petrophysical, mineralogical, and geochemical investigations of the geoglyphs at six test sites in the stone desert around Nasca and Palpa. The geomagnetic measurements revealed clear indications of subsurface structures that differ from the visible surface geoglyphs. The high-resolution geoelectrical images show unexpected resistivity anomalies underneath the geoglyphs down to a depth of about 2 m. Remarkable structures were revealed in both vertical and lateral directions. No evidence was found of geochemical or mineralogical alterations of the natural geogenic materials (desert pavement environment versus geoglyphs). Neither salts nor other mineral materials were used by the Nasca people to alter or prepare the surfaces of geoglyphs. This supports the hypothesis that the Nasca people simply removed stone material down to the natural hard pan horizon to create the geoglyphs.     

Large-scale direct shear testing of municipal solid waste

Large direct shear testing (300 mm × 300 mm box) of municipal solid waste (MSW) collected from a landfill located in the San Francisco Bay area was performed to gain insight on the shear response of MSW. The study investigated the effects of waste composition, confining stress, unit weight, and loading rate on the stress–displacement response and shear strength of MSW. The amount and orientation of the fibrous waste materials in the MSW were found to play a critical role. The fibrous material had little effect on the MSW’s strength when it was oriented parallel to the shear surface, as is typically the case when waste material is compressed vertically and then tested in a direct shear apparatus. Tests in which the fibrous material was oriented perpendicular to the horizontal shear surface produced significantly stronger MSW specimens. The test results indicate that confining stress and loading rate are also important factors. Based on 109 large-scale direct shear tests, the shear strength of MSW at low moisture contents is best characterized by cohesion = 15 kPa, friction angle = 36° at a normal stress of 1 atmosphere, and a decrease in the friction angle of 5° for every log-cycle increase in normal stress.     

Abundances and variability of tropospheric volatile organic compounds at the South Pole and other Antarctic locations

Multiyear (2000–2006) seasonal measurements of carbon monoxide, hydrocarbons, halogenated species, dimethyl sulfide, carbonyl sulfide and C₁–C₄ alkyl nitrates at the South Pole are presented for the first time. At the South Pole, short-lived species (such as the alkenes) typically were not observed above their limits of detection because of long transit times from source regions. Peak mixing ratios of the longer lived species with anthropogenic sources were measured in late winter (August and September) with decreasing mixing ratios throughout the spring. In comparison, compounds with a strong oceanic source, such as bromoform and methyl iodide, had peak mixing ratios earlier in the winter (June and July) because of decreased oceanic production during the winter months. Dimethyl sulfide (DMS), which is also oceanically emitted but has a short lifetime, was rarely measured above 5 pptv. This is in contrast to high DMS mixing ratios at coastal locations and shows the importance of photochemical removal during transport to the pole. Alkyl nitrate mixing ratios peaked during April and then decreased throughout the winter. The dominant source of the alkyl nitrates in the region is believed to be oceanic emissions rather than photochemical production due to low alkane levels.Sampling of other tropospheric environments via a Twin Otter aircraft included the west coast of the Ross Sea and large stretches of the Antarctic Plateau. In the coastal atmosphere, a vertical gradient was found with the highest mixing ratios of marine emitted compounds at low altitudes. Conversely, for anthropogenically produced species the highest mixing ratios were measured at the highest altitudes, suggesting long-range transport to the continent. Flights flown through the plume of Mount Erebus, an active volcano, revealed that both carbon monoxide and carbonyl sulfide are emitted with an OCS/CO molar ratio of 3.3 × 10^?3 consistent with direct observations by other investigators within the crater rim.     

Habitat-tree protection concepts over 200 years

The protection and sustainable management of habitat trees is an integral part of modern forest nature conservation concepts such as retention forestry. Bats, cavity-nesting birds, arboreal marsupials, and many different saproxylic species depend on habitat trees and their great variety of microhabitats and old-growth characteristics. With a focus on insights from temperate forests, we traced the development of habitat-tree protection over 200 years. The idea was first conceptualized by foresters and natural scientists in the early 19th century. At that time, utilitarian conservation aimed to protect cavity trees that provided roosts and nesting holes for insectivorous bats and birds. By the second half of the 19th century, habitat-tree protection was well known to foresters and was occasionally implemented. Knowledge of the protection of large old trees, a special kind of habitat tree, for sociocultural and aesthetic reasons developed similarly. But, many foresters of that time and in the following decades fundamentally rejected protection of habitat trees for economic reasons. Beginning in the 1970s, forest conservation and integrative forest management became increasingly important issues worldwide. Since then, the protection of habitat trees has been implemented on a large scale. Long-term views on the development of conservation concepts are important to inform the implementation of conservation today. In particular, historical analyses of conservation concepts allow the testing of long-term conservation outcomes and make it possible to study the resilience of conservation approaches to changing social or ecological conditions. We encourage all conservation ecologists to assess the practical and conceptual impact of the initial ideas that led to modern conservation concepts in terms of long-term biodiversity conservation.     

Test procedure for evaluating the human–machine interface of vehicles with automated driving systems

Abstract

Objective: The human–machine interface (HMI) is a crucial part of every automated driving system (ADS). In the near future, it is likely that—depending on the operational design domain (ODD)—different levels of automation will be available within the same vehicle. The capabilities of a given automation level as well as the operator’s responsibilities must be communicated in an appropriate way. To date, however, there are no agreed-upon evaluation methods that can be used by human factors practitioners as well as researchers to test this.

Methods: We developed an iterative test procedure that can be applied during the product development cycle of ADS. The test procedure is specifically designed to evaluate whether minimum requirements as proposed in NHTSA’s automated vehicle policy are met.

Results: The proposed evaluation protocol includes (a) a method to identify relevant use cases for testing on the basis of all theoretically possible steady states and mode transitions of a given ADS; (b) an expert-based heuristic assessment to evaluate whether the HMI complies with applicable norms, standards, and best practices; and (c) an empirical evaluation of ADS HMIs using a standardized design for user studies and performance metrics.

Conclusions: Each can be used as a stand-alone method or in combination to generate objective, reliable, and valid evaluations of HMIs, focusing on whether they meet minimum requirements. However, we also emphasize that other evaluation aspects such as controllability, misuse, and acceptance are not within the scope of the evaluation protocol.     

Energy demand of larval and juvenile Cape horse mackerels, Trachurus capensis, and indications of hypoxia tolerance as benefit in a changing environment

Trachurus capensis is an important fisheries resource in the degraded Namibian upwelling ecosystem. Food supply and shoaling of hypoxic zones are hypothesised to influence the species’ recruitment success. This paper is the first to quantify energy requirements and hypoxia tolerance of larval and juvenile stages of a Trachurus species. We measured normoxic respiration rates of T. capensis with a size range from 0.001 to 20.8 g wet mass (WM) collected off Cape Town (33.9°S, 18.5°E, 12/2009) and in the northern Benguela (17–24°S, 11–15°E, 02/2011). Routine metabolic rate (RMR) and standard routine rate (SRR) (mg O₂ h^?1) followed the allometric functions RMR = 0.418 WM^0.774 and SRR = 0.275 WM^0.855, respectively. Larvae and juveniles had comparatively high metabolic rates, and the energy demand of juveniles at the upper end of the size range appeared too high to be fuelled by a copepod diet alone. T. capensis’ early life stages showed a high tolerance to hypoxic conditions. RMR in larvae did not change until 30 % O₂sat at 18 °C. In juveniles, critical oxygen saturation levels were low (P_C for SRR = 11.2 ± 1.7 % O₂sat and P_C for RMR = 13.2 ± 1.6 % O₂sat at 20 °C) and oxy-regulation effective (regulation index = 0.78 ± 0.09). A high hypoxia tolerance may facilitate the retention of larvae in near-shore waters providing favourable feeding conditions and allowing juveniles to exploit food resources in the oxygen minimum zone. These mechanisms seem to well adapt T. capensis to a habitat affected by spreading hypoxic zones and probably enhance its recruitment success.     

Combining Flow Cytometry and Real-Time PCR Methodology to Demonstrate Consumption by Prymnesium parvum1

Bowers, Holly A., Andreas Brutemark, Wanderson F. Carvalho, and Edna Granéli, 2010. Combining Flow Cytometry and Real-Time PCR Methodology to Demonstrate Consumption by Prymnesium parvum. Journal of the American Water Resources Association (JAWRA) 46(1):133-143. DOI: 10.1111/j.1752-1688.2009.00397.x Abstract: Harmful algal bloom species can persist in the environment, impacting aquatic life and human health. One of the mechanisms by which some harmful algal bloom species are able to persist is by consumption of organic particles. Methods to demonstrate and measure consumption can yield insight into how populations thrive. Here, we combine flow cytometry and real-time PCR to demonstrate consumption of a cryptophyte species (Rhodomonas sp.) by a toxic mixotrophic haptophyte (Prymnesium parvum). Using flow cytometry, the feeding frequency of a population of P. parvum cells was calculated using the phycoerythrin (PE) fluorescence signal from Rhodomonas sp. and the fluorescence of an acidotropic probe labeling the food vacuoles. Feeding frequency increased in the beginning of the experiment and then began to decline, reaching a maximum of 47.5% of the whole P. parvum population after 212 min. The maximum number of consumed Rhodomonas sp. cells was 0.8 per P. parvum cell, and occurred after 114 min corresponding to an ingestion rate of 0.4 Rhodomonas sp. cells/P. parvum/h. Cells from the feeding P. parvum population were sorted, washed, and subjected to a real-time PCR assay targeting the cryptophyte 18S locus. There was a correlation between cycle threshold (Ct) values and number of consumed prey cells calculated by fluorescence. Overall, this study shows that flow cytometric analysis, of the acidotropic probe and prey pigments, is an efficient and rapid tool in enumerating food vacuoles and the number of prey cells consumed. Furthermore, we suggest that real-time PCR can be applied to cells sorted by flow cytometry, thus allowing for the detection and potential quantification of the targeted prey cells.     

Emergy Evaluation of a Village Ecosystem in Wolong Nature Reserve in China

Abstract

Due to historic reasons, there are several human settlements in nature reserves and national parks, which may constitute a threat to biodiversity. Establishment of nature reserves may however generate constraints for development of local communities residing in these reserves. The village ecosystem of Zhuanjinglou Village in Wolong Nature Reserve includes population, farming and livestock (domestic and alpine) and forest ecosystem. An emergy analysis of agro-ecosystem (including the farming and livestock ecosystem) and energy consumption in Zhuanjinglou Village indicates that livestock ecosystem plays an important role in village ecosystem, which may be the source of great pressure on the state of the local environment. The increasing ratio of electricity in energy consumption may play a positive role for environmental conservation. Despite some successful experiences, there are some remaining issues that need to be addressed in the ecological rehabilitation of the village ecosystem.     

Development of a total Ash Quality Index and an Ash Quality Label: Comparative analysis of slagging/fouling potential of solid biofuels

Environmental Science and Pollution Research - Biomass combustion generates considerable amounts of ash that are related to slagging/fouling problems in combustors. Numerous indices have been...     

Reduction of combustion by-products in WTE plants: O2 enrichment of underfire air in the MARTIN SYNCOM process

The SYNCOM process involves oxygen enrichment of underfire air, recirculation of flue gas and a combustion control system using infrared thermography of the waste layer on the grate. At the demonstration plant in Coburg, operational reliability and plant availability using SYNCOM could be proven under real disposal conditions with a waste throughput of 7 t/h. Oxygen enrichment of the underfire air promotes the destruction of pollutants due to the high oxygen partial pressures and temperatures. This is then reflected in very low residual amounts of organic combustion by-products in the bottom ash and flue gas from the SYNCOM unit. The flue gas concentrations of organic pollutants are reduced, as compared with conventional operation, by over 35% (for CO, total hydrocarbons and PCDD/F) at the boiler outlet. As the flue gas flow is reduced by oxygen enrichment and flue gas recirculation, the resulting reduction in terms of kg of pollutant per Mg of waste is even higher. In the bottom ash, the level of organic residues is reduced, by 45% in the case of loss on ignition and by 55% in the case of TOC and dioxins (I-TE of PCDD/F). This is due to the higher oxygen partial pressures and the fuel bed temperature which is increased by 135 to 1200 degrees C. Other important features of the process include more intense sintering and thus improved immobilization of the bottom ash, as well as reduced flue gas and fly ash flows.