Raising the packing density of computerized oceanographic data records

In this paper the peculiarities of compiled oceanographic data sets, which consist primarily in the presence of some characteristic information as well as in the planned incomplete filling of the files with observations, are discussed. A number of special ways are suggested which essentially improve the packing density of computerized data without applying special archiving algorithms. The effectiveness of these methods has been tested by treating thein situ hydrological/chemical data file compiled in the Black Sea in 1988.Translated by Vladimir A. Puchkin.     

The American whale oil industry: A look back to the future of the American petroleum industry?

The American whaling industry rose from humble beginnings off Long island to become an international giant. In its peak year, 1846, 735 ships and 70,000 people served the industry. As whale stocks and reserves decreased, whalers were forced to go farther and farther from their New England home ports. Voyages became longer, and risks on required return-on-investment became higher. The easy money of Atlantic and Pacific whaling was no more: the only remaining profitable ventures were to Arctic and Antarctic waters. Many ships returned empty, if at all. in 1871, most of the Arctic whaling fleet was crushed by early winter ice and lost. This calamity, in conjunction with the long-term diminishing whale stocks, the diversion of investment capital to more profitable ventures, and the discovery, development, and refinement of abundant petroleum crude oil, struck the death blow to the American whaling industry. By 1890, only 200 whaling vessels were at work, and by 1971, no American commercial whaling ship sailed the world's oceans.It is apparent that no single event caused the final, rapid decline. However, a single calamity, in an already stressed industry, that was self-insured and commercially interlinked, precipitated the end. Today's American petroleum industry, although adopting some principles of the American whaling industry, also has embraced other activities such as work process reengineering and customer alliances, which may preempt, or postpone, a similar catastrophic demise.     

Thinking of England and taking care: family building strategies and infant mortality in England and Wales, 1891-1911

"Debates concerning the origins and development of the late nineteenth- to early twentieth-century declines in marital fertility and infant mortality in England and Wales have been centred largely on the material provided by answers to the ?special' questions in the 1911 census. In their published form these figures have restricted researchers to an examination of large scale geographic and social class differences in the levels and rates of decline of the two phenomena. This paper outlines research conducted on a sample of individual census returns from the 1911 census. From this data it becomes clear that for Victorian and Edwardian England ?where one lived' was rather more important than ?who one was' in determining both family building strategies and the survival of those children born."     

The equatorial photospheric rotation rate

The equatorial photospheric rotation rate has been observed on 14 days in 1978–1980. The resulting rotation rate, = 14.14±0.04°/day, is 2% slower than the rate as observed for long-lived sunspots.Stationed at Kitt Peak National Observatory.Operated by the Association of Universities for Research in Astronomy, Inc. under contract with the National Science Foundation.     

Mudrocks from the Siberian Hypostratotype of the Riphean and Vendian: Chemistry,Sm–Nd Isotope Systematics of Sources,and Formation Stages

Lithology and Mineral Resources - The chemical composition and Nd isotope systematics were obtained for mudrocks (mudstones) from sections of the Siberian hypostratotype of the Riphean and Vendian...