Climate Change, Agriculture, and Water Quality in the Chesapeake Bay Region

Research on climate change and agriculture has largely focused on production, food prices, and producer incomes. However, societal interest in agriculture is much broader than these issues. The objective of this paper is to analyze the potential impacts of climate change on an important negative externality from agriculture, water quality. We construct a simulation model of maize production in twelve watersheds within the U.S. Chesapeake Bay Region that has economic and watershed components linking climate to productivity, production decisions by maize farmers, and nitrogen loadings delivered to the Chesapeake Bay. Maize is an important crop to study because of its importance to the region's agriculture and because it is a major source of nutrient pollution. The model is run under alternative scenarios regarding the future climate, future baseline (without any climate change), whether farmers respond to climate change, whether there are carbon dioxide (CO₂) enrichment effects on maize production, and whether agricultural prices facing the region change due to climate change impacts on global agricultural commodity markets. The simulation results differ from one scenario to another on the magnitude and direction of change in nitrogen deliveries to the Chesapeake Bay. The results are highly sensitive to the choice of future baseline scenario and to whether there are CO₂ enrichment effects. The results are also highly sensitive to assumptions about the impact of climate change on commodity prices facing farmers in the Chesapeake Bay region. The results indicate that economic responses by farmers to climate change definitely matter. Assuming that farmers do not respond to changes in temperature, precipitation, and atmosphericCO₂ levels could lead to mistaken conclusions about the magnitude and direction of environmental impacts.     

Velocity analysis after migration

The double‐square‐root (DSR) equation used in pre‐stack migration is formulated in terms of velocity‐dependent and velocity‐independent terms. The velocity‐dependent term is shown to be the hyperbolic normal moveout (NMO) correction, whereas the velocity‐independent term is related to the recording geometry only. This separation of the velocity‐dependent term offers a means of applying vertical corrections to an initial migration velocity field. Using this concept, procedures are described both for velocity determination and for achieving improved structural imaging.
This decoupling is accurate both for constant‐velocity media and for media whose velocity varies as a function of depth. In media whose velocity varies as a function of both space and depth, a procedure is described for building velocity models through common‐image gather (CIG) stacking following prestack depth migration (PSDM) and time conversion (TC). This so‐called PSDM‐TC stack procedure provides a means of (a) incorporating both vertical and lateral velocity updates into an initial velocity model, (b) obtaining improved structural imaging by using a non‐optimal velocity model for the prestack depth migration, and (c) updating velocity by flattening CIGs and maximizing stack energy. The procedure can be applied to both P‐P wave and P‐SV wave migration.     

Reflections on Nigel Thrift's optimism: political strategies to implement his vision

This response to Nigel Thrift's recent paper (2002, Geoforum 33, 291–298) develops two of his points: the need for geography to remain buoyant within school curricula and a potential split of physical from human geography within the universities. I argue that political strategies are necessary for both if geography is to remain the large, intellectually vibrant discipline that Thrift identifies.     

Ethnic Residential Segregation Across an Urban System: The Maori in New Zealand, 1991–2001

In New Zealand there are substantial variations across the urban system in the degree of residential segregation of those claiming Maori ethnicity. Analyses of those variations, using measures particularly relevant to comparative study, show that Maori segregation was greatest in both 1991 and 2001 in larger urban areas and, especially, in those with relatively large Maori populations. A major deviation from this general pattern was in Auckland; further analysis suggests that this was because of considerable sharing of residential space involving Maori and Pacific Islanders. If the total population claiming a Polynesian identity is studied, the relationships between segregation and both size and Polynesian population share are clarified.     

X线和CT对原发支气管癌的诊断价值

本文利用Ｘ线、ＣＴ扫描技术，对原发支气管瘤的各种组织类型在Ｘ线及ＣＴ中的表现进行了观察，分析了其位置、大小、边缘、钙化、空洞和转移情况，阐明了胸部ＣＴ是肺癌时诊断肺门和纵隔侵犯的更佳方法，较Ｘ线有很大优越性。Ｘ线和ＣＴ相结合对原发支气管癌的定性诊断具有重要价值。     

Modern and post-modern cities and ethnic residential segregation: Is Los Angeles different?

Dear and others associated with the ‘Los Angeles School of Urbanism’ have presented a series of challenging ideas regarding changes in urban form as a consequence of the shift from modernism to post-modernism. Some of those challenges relate to a city’s ethnic diversity and residential segregation, with Los Angeles presented as a paradigm exemplar of an emerging new urban form. This paper evaluates the arguments that Los Angeles in particular, and Californian metropolitan areas more generally, differ from metropolitan areas elsewhere in the United States in the nature of ethnic residential segregation there. Regression analyses provide little support for the argument, but graphical analyses show that although Los Angeles does not differ from the general, US-wide trends, its almost unique nature in terms of its ethnic diversity means that it clearly stands out as a place with a different pattern shared by very few others.     

Short Note: On the Relativistic Doppler Effect for Precise Velocity Determination using GPS

The Doppler effect is the apparent shift in frequency of an electromagnetic signal that is received by an observer moving relative to the source of the signal. The Doppler frequency shift relates directly to the relative speed between the receiver and the transmitter, and has thus been widely used in velocity determination. A GPS receiver-satellite pair is in the Earth’s gravity field and GPS signals travel at the speed of light, hence both Einstein’s special and general relativity theories apply. This paper establishes the relationship between a Doppler shift and a user’s ground velocity by taking both the special and general relativistic effects into consideration. A unified Doppler shift model is developed, which accommodates both the classical Doppler effect and the relativistic Doppler effect under special and general relativities. By identifying the relativistic correction terms in the model, a highly accurate GPS Doppler shift observation equation is presented. It is demonstrated that in the GPS “frequency” or “velocity” domain, the relativistic effect from satellite motion changes the receiver-satellite line-of-sight direction, and the measured Doppler shift has correction terms due to the relativistic effects of the receiver potential difference from the geoid, the orbit eccentricity, and the rotation of the Earth.     

Differential developmental toxicity of naphthoic acid isomers in medaka (Oryzias latipes) embryos

Polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs) are widespread persistent pollutants that readily undergo biotic and abiotic conversion to numerous transformation products in rivers, lakes and estuarine sediments. Here we characterize the developmental toxicity of four PAH transformation products each structural isomers of hydroxynaphthoic acid: 1H2NA, 2H1NA, 2H3NA, and 6H2NA. Medaka fish (Oryzias latipes) embryos and eleutheroembryos were used to determine toxicity. A 96-well micro-plate format was used to establish a robust, statistically significant platform for assessment of early life stages. Individual naphthoic acid isomers demonstrated a rank order of toxicity with 1H2NA>2H1NA>2H3NA>6H2NA being more toxic. Abnormalities of circulatory system were most pronounced including pericardial edema and tube heart. To determine if HNA isomers were AhR ligands, spatial-temporal expression and activity of CYP1A was measured via in vivo EROD assessments. qPCR measurement of CYP1A induction proved different between isomers dosed at respective concentrations affecting 50% of exposed individuals (EC50s). In vitro, all ANH isomers transactivated mouse AhR using a medaka CYP1A promoter specific reporter assay. Circulatory abnormalities followed P450 induction and response was consistent with PAH toxicity. A 96-well micro-plates proved suitable as exposure chambers and provided statistically sound evaluations as well as efficient toxicity screens. Our results demonstrate the use of medaka embryos for toxicity analysis thereby achieving REACH objectives for the reduction of adult animal testing in toxicity evaluations.