Interpreting amenities,envisioning the future: common ground and conflict in North Carolina’s rural coastal communities

This paper contributes to ongoing discussions about the implications of rural change and amenity migration for members of diverse rural communities. We engage with recent amenity migration and political ecology literature that focuses on social constructions of nature and landscapes, and how these constructions affect the attitudes and opinions of community members. We use our case study of a mail-based survey in Down East, North Carolina to suggest that the ways in which people conceptualize the particular ‘natures’ and landscapes of a place matters in terms of shaping people’s attitudes with respect to ongoing processes of change. We find that people’s opinions about environment, culture, and land use are often superficially similar but that when conflicts arise or particular actions are considered, substantial differences in people’s underlying conceptual frameworks are revealed. In particular we find that despite widespread shared appreciation of the environment and culture Down East, differing interpretations of these key terms lead to potential misunderstandings and land use planning challenges.     

Measurement of LNAPL flow using single-well tracer dilution techniques

This paper describes the use of single-well tracer dilution techniques to resolve the rate of light nonaqueous phase liquid (LNAPL) flow through wells and the adjacent geologic formation. Laboratory studies are presented in which a fluorescing tracer is added to LNAPL in wells. An in-well mixer keeps the tracer well mixed in the LNAPL. Tracer concentrations in LNAPL are measured through time using a fiber optic cable and a spectrometer. Results indicate that the rate of tracer depletion is proportional to the rate of LNAPL flow through the well and the adjacent formation. Tracer dilution methods are demonstrated for vertically averaged LNAPL Darcy velocities of 0.00048 to 0.11 m/d and LNAPL thicknesses of 9 to 24 cm. Over the range of conditions studied, results agree closely with steady-state LNAPL flow rates imposed by pumping. A key parameter for estimating LNAPL flow rates in the formation is the flow convergence factor alpha. Measured convergence factors for 0.030-inch wire wrap, 0.030-inch-slotted polyvinyl chloride (PVC), and 0.010-inch-slotted PVC are 1.7, 0.91, and 0.79, respectively. In addition, methods for using tracer dilution data to determine formation transmissivity to LNAPL are presented. Results suggest that single-well tracer dilution techniques are a viable approach for measuring in situ LNAPL flow and formation transmissivity to LNAPL.     

Glutamate dehydrogenase and Na+-K+ ATPase expression and growth response of Litopenaeus vannamei to different salinities and dietary protein levels

Improvement in the osmoregulation capacity via nutritional supplies is vitally important in shrimp aquaculture.The effects of dietary protein levels on the osmoregulation capacity of the Pacific white shrimp(L.vannamei) were investigated.This involved an examination of growth performance,glutamate dehydrogenase(GDH) and Na+-K+ ATPase mRNA expression,,and GDH activity in muscles and gills.Three experimental diets were formulated,containing 25%,40%,and 50% dietary protein,and fed to the shrimp at a salinity of 25.After 20 days,no significant difference was observed in weight gain,though GDH and Na+-K+ ATPase gene expression and GDH activity increased with higher dietary protein levels.Subsequently,shrimp fed diets with 25% and 50% dietary protein were transferred into tanks with salinities of 38 and 5,respectively,and sampled at weeks 1 and 2.Shrimp fed with 40% protein at 25 in salinity(optimal conditions) were used as a control.Regardless of the salinities,shrimp fed with 50% dietary protein had significantly higher growth performance than other diets;no significant differences were found in comparison with the control.Shrimp fed with 25% dietary protein and maintained at salinities of 38 and 5 had significantly lower weight gain values after 2 weeks.Ambient salinity change also stimulated the hepatosomatic index,which increased in the first week and then recovered to a relatively normal level,as in the control,after 2 weeks.These findings indicate that in white shrimp,the specific protein nutrient and energy demands related to ambient salinity change are associated with protein metabolism.Increased dietary protein level could improve the osmoregulation capacity of L.vannamei with more energy resources allocated to GDH activity and expression.     

The partitioning of attached and detached eddy motion in the atmospheric surface layer using Lorentz wavelet filtering

Townsend's attached eddy hypothesis states that the turbulent structure in the constant stress layer can be decomposed into attached and detached eddy motion. This paper proposes and tests a methodology for separating the attached and detached eddy motion from time series measurements of velocity and temperature. The proposed methodology is based on the time-frequency localization and filtering capabilities of the orthonormal wavelet transforms. Using a relative entropy statistical measure, the optimal wavelet basis is identified first. The turbulence time series measurements are then transformed into the wavelet domain where the contribution of specific events in the time-frequency domain is identified. The filtering scheme utilizes a recently constructed Lorentz thresholding methodology that successfully eliminates all wavelet coefficients associated with the detached eddy motion. While this filtering scheme lacks the compression efficiency of the classical Donoho and Johnstone's universal thresholding model, it conserves the higher-order statistics and important turbulence interactions related to the Reynolds stresses. Following the filtering scheme, the attached eddy motion time series is re-constructed by an inverse wavelet transform of the non-zero wavelet coefficients. The proposed partitioning methodology for attached and detached eddy motion is tested using 56 Hz triaxial sonic anemometer velocity and temperature measurements above a uniform dry lake bed in Owens valley, California, for a wide range of atmospheric stability conditions. Validation that the wavelet filtered time series represents the attached eddy motion is also discussed in the context of conservation of turbulence energy and surface fluxes.     

Relevance of thermal environment to human health: a case study of Ondo State, Nigeria

The interconnection between weather and climate and the performance, well-being, and human health cannot be overemphasized. The relationship between them is of both local and global significance. Information about weather, climate, and thermal environment is very important to human health and medical practitioners. The most crucial environmental information needed by medical practitioners and for maintaining human health, performance, and well-being are thermal conditions. The study used meteorological variables: air temperature, relative humidity, wind speed, solar radiation, and RayMan model as an analytical tool to compute physiologically equivalent temperature (PET) in order to assess thermo-physiological thresholds in Ondo State. The study revealed that there are marked spatial and seasonal variations in the environmental thermal conditions in the study area. The results of physiologically equivalent temperature for different grades of thermal sensation and physiological stress on human beings indicate that about 60 % of the total study period (1998–2008) fall under physiological stress level of moderate heat stress (PET 31–36 °C). In derived savannah, 32.6 % out of the total study period was under strong heat stress. In view of this, the study concluded that Ondo State may likely be prone to heat-related ailments and that some of the death recorded in the State, in recent times, may be heat-related mortality, but this is difficult to ascertain because there is no postmortem records in Nigeria where it could be confirmed. This type of study is relevant to help government to improve health care interventions and achieve Millennium Development Goals in health sector.     

http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1674987111001113

The Rheic Ocean was one of the most important oceans of the Paleozoic Era.It lay between Laurentia and Gondwana from the Early Ordovician and closed to produce the vast Ouachita-Alleghanian -Variscan orogen during the assembly of Pangea.Rifting began in the Cambrian as a continuation of Neoproterozoic orogenic activity and the ocean opened in the Early Ordovician with the separation of several Neoproterozoic arc terranes from the continental margin of northern Gondwana along the line of a former suture.The rapid rate of ocean opening suggests it was driven by slab pull in the outboard lapetus Ocean.The ocean reached its greatest width with the closure of lapetus and the accretion of the periGondwanan arc terranes to Laurentia in the Silurian.Ocean closure began in the Devonian and continued through the Mississippian as Gondwana sutured to Laurussia to form Pangea.The ocean consequently plays a dominant role in the Appalachian-Ouachita orogeny of North America,in the basement geology of southern Europe,and in the Paleozoic sedimentary,structural and tectonothermal record from Middle America to the Middle East.Its closure brought the Paleozoic Era to an end.     

Vertical deformation partitioning across a collapsing large and hot orogen

Featuring 3 000-km-long large and hot orogen, the Mantiqueira Province provides a rare opportunity to study the process of gravitational collapse at mid to deep crustal levels. Distinct but contemporary (~500 Ma) post-collisional intrusions show structures and anisotropy of magnetic susceptibility (AMS) fabrics related to their emplacements, recording different flow patterns. In southern deep-seated intrusions, ellipsoidal-shaped roots with gabbroic-to-hybrid cores surrounded by granitic rocks show concentric patterns of AMS fabrics that cut across the NE-trending regional foliation. In contrast, northern intrusions, exposed as the upper sections of batholith-size bodies of coarse-grained granite emplaced at the shallow to mid-crust, show general NS-trending magnetic fabrics roughly parallel to strike of the orogen and the regional foliation of host rocks. These contrasting magnetic patterns from shallow to deeper crust suggest vertical magma migration from the overthickened orogenic core to be emplaced across its thinner stretched flanks during the gravitational collapse of the orogenic edifice.