Africa’s middle class: building houses and constructing identities in the small town of Buea,Cameroon

Across Africa households are commissioning new domestic buildings for their own use or to rent out rather than waiting for governments to supply urban shelter. We conceptualize this as two interwoven processes: building houses for a new middle class and the building of a new middle class identity. We draw particular attention to the impact of international migration on these processes. The paper uses quantitative data from building permits and qualitative data from 29 interviews and walk-round tours with homeowners and government officials in Buea, Cameroon. Despite some significant caveats (related to housing the urban poor, regulating building standards, and lost local government revenue), we argue that these individually initiated building projects do a reasonable job of meeting local demand for shelter. However, from the perspective of identity-building these buildings are less successful. Whilst homeowners take considerable pride in their building projects, the statements that these structures make about their identities are not always “read” by their neighbours in the way owners hope. New housing is the lens through which Buea’s residents interpret growing levels of inequality and its associated social tensions.     

基于百度贴吧数据的长江中游城市群城市网络联系分析

以百度城市吧主题帖的累积截面数据为基础数据,采用优势流分析法等,定量分析流空间视角下长江中游城市群城市网络联系特征。结果表明：① 长江中游城市群城市贴吧网络联系密度为77.74%,大部分城市间存在比较普遍的网络联系。② 长江中游城市群31个城市可划分为全域、普遍、较多、一般、较少伙伴型城市等5种类型,环鄱阳湖城市群缺少全域和较多伙伴型城市,城市网络联系不如武汉城市圈和环长株潭城市群活跃。③ 长江中游城市群尺度上尚未形成绝对意义上的主导型和次级主导型城市,仅有武汉与长沙表现出了主导型城市的雏形,整体城市网络联系层级结构不是十分明晰。④ 按照主导性、控制力的强弱,长江中游城市群已基本呈现“一主两副三中心五节点”金字塔型的城市网络联系格局,武汉为大区中心城市,长沙和南昌为大区副中心城市,株洲、九江、宜昌可认为是各子城市群的中心城市,岳阳、黄石、襄阳、衡阳和景德镇应定性为各子城市群的控制节点城市。     

Rhaxellid sponge microscleres from the Portlandian of Dorset,UK

Three previously described species and two new species of rhaxellid microscleres, Rhaxella winspitensis sp. nov. and R. elongata sp. nov., are described from cherts collected from the Cherty Series of the Portlandian of Dorset. The classification of Rhaxella is reviewed, retaining the genus within the family Geodiidae Gray. The results of this study suggest that three time-dependent rhaxellid assemblages can be recognized which, despite being restricted to certain depositional environments, may have biostratigraphic applications. A Portlandian assemblage described here is species-rich in comparison with known Oxfordian-Kimmeridgian assemblages. Bajocian-Callovian assemblages contain only R. sorbyana. The increased faunal diversity with time is speculatively described by an evolving Rhaxella lineage.     

长江中游荆江河段同流量-水位演化特征及驱动成因

水库运行改变了坝下游水沙输移条件,在河道冲刷的同时,引起水位过程出现适应性调整.本文以长江中游荆江河段为对象,采用多项式拟合法,对比分析1991-2016年间分级流量一水位变化特征,采用基于河流动力学原理的分离变量法,识别河道冲淤、下游控制水位及河床综合糙率等变化对分级流量-水位变化的影响程度.研究表明:1991-20...     

南海中部海域地震速度分析

从南海中部海域多次地球物理调查获得的速度资料中,挑选3 000多个速度谱点,经过解释直接或间接地获得该区200多条剖面上各点的叠加速度、均方根速度、层速度等多种速度资料,并计算出该区的时深转换和砂岩百分含量。综合各剖面上的速度变化和Ps值(砂岩百分含量)特征,编制了晚始新世以来地层速度和Ps值平面图,分析各时代层速度和Ps值的纵向和横向变化规律。得出南海中部海域物源早期来自西北方向,中期西南方向,最后远离物源的变化过程,海水进侵方向为东南方向。进而说明该区经历了初期冲积平原、中期滨海—浅海和晚期浅海—半深海的充填演化过程。为研究该区的地层沉积特征和沉积模式提供依据。     

论中部地区产业集聚与城市化之互动

中部地区在全国区域发展格局中地位重要,但发展相对滞后,与资源、区位、基础等优势形成较大反差,面临着塌陷之挑战,症结在于工业化与城市化不发达。作者认为,要实现中部崛起的宏伟目标,中部地区就必须借鉴东部沿海发达地区的经验,探寻其成功之路径,研究和把握产业集聚与城市化之互动规律,依托产业优势大力发展产业集群,以城市群为主导不断加快城市化进程,进而以创新的思维和务实的举措,扬长避短,加快中部地区的发展步伐。     

南水北调中线工程环境影响与河南生态经济发展

南水北调工程是解决我国北方地区资源性缺水问题的战略措施,是关系国家经济布局的重点工程。文章概述了南水北调中线工程建设情况及其意义,并对中线工程实施后对主要水源区和受水区河南省生态环境与社会经济发展的影响进行了综合评估分析。在此基础上,应用生态经济学理论,提出基于可持续发展的生态农业、生态林业、生态工业、生态旅游业、生态产业及循环经济的河南生态经济发展对策。     

柴达木盆地北缘侏罗纪古生态特征及其古地理意义

根据多门类化石古生态和岩相、沉积构造等资料,分析了柴达木盆地北缘侏罗纪的古气候和沉积环境。介形类、轮藻、叶肢介、双壳类和植物等化石在地层中的产出特征反映了当时以湖沼及滨浅湖为主的沉积环境,广泛分布的植物及孢粉化石组合面貌的变化揭示出盆地北缘早、中侏罗世为热带－亚热带温湿气候,早侏罗世晚期和中侏罗世晚期古气候两度明显干热化。陆生植物与湖沼相动物化石的交替出现,反映了盆地北缘侏罗纪湖泊、沼泽与低山相间分布的古地理面貌。早侏罗世湖泊多期发育但规模较小,中侏罗世中晚期湖泊规模最大。     

Processes of magma/wet sediment interaction in a large-scale Jurassic andesitic peperite complex, northern Sierra Nevada, California

 The Middle Jurassic Tuttle Lake Formation in the northern Sierra Nevada, California, comprises a thick volcaniclastic sequence deposited in a submarine island-arc setting and penetrated by numerous related hypabyssal intrusions. A composite andesite-diorite intrusive complex ≥4.5 km long and ≥1.5 km thick was emplaced while the host Tuttle Lake sediments were still wet and unconsolidated. Large parts of the intrusive complex consist of peperite formed where andesitic magma intruded and intermixed with tuff, lapilli-tuff and tuff-breccia. The southern half of the complex consists of augite-phyric andesite containing peperite in numerous small, isolated pockets and in more extensive, laterally continuous zones. The peperites comprise three main types recognized previously in other peperite studies. Fluidal peperite consists of small (≤30 cm), closely spaced, at least partly interconnected, globular to amoeboid andesite bodies enclosed by tuff. This peperite type developed during intrusion of magma into fine-grained wet sediment along unstable interfaces, and fluidization of the sediment facilitated development of complex intrusive geometries. Blocky peperite and mixed blocky and fluidal peperite formed where magma intruded coarser sediment and underwent variable degrees of brittle fragmentation by quenching and dynamic stressing of rigid margins, possibly aided by small steam explosions. The northern half of the intrusive complex consists predominantly of a different type of peperite, in which decimetre-scale plagioclase-phyric andesite clasts with ellipsoidal, elongate, or angular, polyhedral shapes are closely packed to widely dispersed within disrupted host sediment. Textural features suggest the andesite clasts were derived from conduits through which magma was flowing, and preserved remnants of the conduits are represented by elongate, sinuous bodies up to 30 m or more in length. Disruption and dispersal of the andesite clasts are inferred to have occurred at least partly by steam explosions that ripped apart a network of interconnected feeder conduits penetrating the host sediments. Closely packed peperite is present adjacent to mappable intrusions of coherent andesite, and along the margin of a large mass of coarse-grained diorite. These coherent intrusions are considered to be major feeders for this part of the complex. Examples of magma/wet sediment interaction similar in scale to the extensive peperites described here occur elsewhere in ancient island-arc strata in the northern Sierra Nevada. Based on these and other published examples, large-scale peperites probably are more common than generally realized and are likely to be important in settings where thick sediment sequences accumulate during active volcanism. Careful mapping in well-exposed terrains may be required to recognize large-scale peperite complexes of this type. Received: 8 June 1998 / Accepted: 4 December 1998     

Non-magnetic aspect sensitive auroral echoes from the lower E region observed at 50 MHz

Backscatter from E-region irregularities was observed at aspect angles close to 90° (almost parallel to the direction of the magnetic field) using the ALOMAR SOUSY radar at Andoya/Norway. Strong electric fields and increased E-region electron temperatures simultaneously measured with the incoherent scatter facility EISCAT proved that the Farley-Buneman plasma instability was excited. In addition, strong particle precipitation was present as inferred from EISCAT electron densities indicating that the gradient drift instability may have been active, too. Backscatter at such large aspect angles was not expected and has not been observed before. The characteristics of the observed echoes, however, are in many aspects completely different from usual auroral radar results: the Doppler velocities are only of the order of 10 m/s, the half-width of the spectra is around 5 m/s, the echoes originate at altitudes well below 100 km, and they seem to be not aspect-sensitive with respect to the magnetic field direction. We, therefore, conclude that the corresponding irregularities are not caused by the mentioned instabilities and that other mechanism have to be invoked.