Global change and the intensification of agriculture in the tropics

Bridging understanding of local environmental change with regional and global patterns of land-use and land-cover change (LUCC) remains a key goal and challenge for our understanding of global environmental change. This meta-analysis attempts to bridge local and regional scales of LUCC by demonstrating the ways in which previously published case studies can be compared and used for a broader regional synthesis in the tropics. In addition to providing results from a meta-analysis, this paper suggests ways to make future case studies more widely comparable.     

ISLANDS AS NOVELTY SITES*

ABSTRACT. Being on the edge, being out of sight and so out of mind, exposes the weakness of mainstream ideas, orthodoxies, and paradigms and foments alternatives to the status quo. Islands are thus propelled as sites of innovative conceptualizations, whether of nature or human enterprise, whether virtual or real. They stand out as sites of novelty; they tend toward clairvoyance; they are disposed to act as advance indicators or extreme reproductions of what is present or future elsewhere. This article, which is essentially bibliographical, celebrates islands as the quintessential sites for experimentation, with reference to the physical sciences, the social sciences, and literature.     

Awkward geographies: Spatializing academic responsibility, encountering Sri Lanka

This paper responds to recent postcolonial geographical scholarship that sets forth transformative agendas in order to create more cosmopolitan theoretical projects within the discipline. For many geographers the challenges they face are located within not only their own disciplinary parameters, but also those of other specific research communities within which their work situates them. By bringing geography and area studies into productive conversation, this paper explores the tensions between negotiating one's academic voice, position and responsibility within geography as well as within a specific area studies community. More specifically, as a UK-based geographer I reflect on some of my own fairly unremarkable, yet extremely awkward, encounters during the course of scholarly praxis in Sri Lanka in order to raise questions over the spatialities of responsibility and political engagement in such academic praxis. I seek to theorize the chasms that open in such awkward encounters between notionally situated 'local' and 'foreign' scholars respectively and, in particular, develop ways of engaging and reorienting those chasms in ways that might enable the production of theoretically rich, yet richly contextualized postcolonial knowledges committed to the site of one's scholarly praxis – not just to the advancement of a more cosmopolitan theoretical project within geography.     

内力线定性描绘应力场方法及其在地质构造研究中的应用

为了简化地质构造力学分析，本文探讨了用内力线来描绘应力场的方法，仿照用磁力线描绘磁场的做法，约定以从外力作用点，支承点等处发出的一族主应力迹线为代表内力传递路径的“内力线”，根据弹性理论绘制了部分简单应力场的内力线图，阐述了以简单应力场内力线图为基础绘制复杂应力场内力线图并对之进行分析的方法，同时，文中还对这一方法在山字型构造体系和断裂等板内构造应力场分析，隐伏或未知构及地质的推测，地震预报等方面的应用做了尝试。     

Overview of US Minerals Management Service Activities in Deepwater Research

The US Minerals Management Service (MMS) is responsible for safe and environmentally sound management of offshore oil and gas resources. In recent years, there has been a tremendous increase in both activities and plans for deepwater development of these resources in the Gulf of Mexico (GOM). As the industry meets the enormous technical challenges involved, there is a concomitant effort to assure environmental protection of deep-ocean and coastal resources. This paper will outline the research planning and program currently underway to assess impacts, identify potential problems, and discover more about unknown resources of the deep ocean.     

Quantification of salt weathering in porous stones using an experimental continuous partial immersion method

In this study, an experimental salt weathering simulation and porous stone durability classification are proposed. There are many laboratory tests that quantify durability against salt crystallisation weathering action. These are usually based on the total immersion of samples into a saline solution, which is not representative of the salt weathering mechanism. An experimental test based on partial immersion is suggested. This is a comparable study of weight loss and degradation of visual appearance due to salt crystallisation using, on the one hand, a standard durability test (UNE), and, on the other, the proposed durability test. The weight loss and visual appearance in our test is comparable to the degradation of building stone. The differences between weight loss data in both tests depend on the petrophysical properties: porous media and degree of coherence.

From this testing, a new durability classification as a function of dry weight loss in the partial immersion test is proposed. Four divisions of different types of materials can be made in this classification, which quantifies salt weathering action mainly in environments and mild climatic conditions.     

Numerical algorithm for the dynamic analysis of base-isolated structures with dry friction

This paper deals with the techniques for solving ordinary differential equations with essential nonlinearity arising from the representation of frictional force by the sign function of the relative velocity. This problem is connected with dynamic behavior studies of base-isolated structures with dry friction devices.Mathematical evidence is presented concerning the inaccuracies of the solution which are connected with the representation of the frictional force by the sign function. An approximation of this sign model is made on the basis of the appropriate linearization of a small part of the frictional force function. A numerical algorithm for the dynamic analysis of base-isolated structures with dry friction is proposed. Numerical tests are carried out for establishing the exactness of the proposed techniques. The obtained results prove the accuracy of the techniques.     

Investigation on the geological and geotechnical factors leading to a major slope failure at a selected site on a Jordanian highway

During and after the very wet 1991/1992 winter experienced in Jordan, significant slope failures occurred along several sections of the new Irbid-Amman highway in Jordan. The topography over most of the route is hilly, and significant amounts of cut and fill were used to construct the highway. One such slope failure lies at 44+800 km on the highway south of Jerash City at a distance of about 5.0 km from Wadi Zerqa bridge. A landslide occurred downslope of the highway embankment resulting in a collapse of the most of the gabbion wall supporting the embankment. This paper deals with the overall stability of the slope at 44+800 km. It presents the geological and geotechnical studies carried out at this site, identifies the causes and mechanism of instability, and presents appropriate remedial measures. The study concluded that the landslide movement occurred within the colluvium material. It resulted primarily from excess piezometric pressures generated within the slope as a direct consequence of inadequate drainage. It is recommended to reconstruct the entire gabbion wall with its foundation seated on the sandstone that underlies the colluvium and to install a surface drainage system at the site.     

Natural hazards in British Columbia: an interdisciplinary and inter-institutional challenge

 Although British Columbia experiences many natural hazards, there is as yet no unified policy to promote natural hazard management in the province. The problem is not in the quantity and quality of geoscience assessment of natural hazards, but instead, it is suggested, in the isolation of that work from broader risk perspectives and in the lack of clarity of division of responsibilities between various levels of government. The example of recent changes in perception of the terrain stability problem illustrates how natural hazard problems are driven by social and political priorities rather than by geoscience priorities. Received: 22 November 1998 / Accepted: 22 November 1998     

Visual classification of very fine-grained sediments: Evaluation through univariate and multivariate statistics

Classifying very fine-grained rocks through fabric elements provides information about depositional environments, but is subject to the biases of visual taxonomy. To evaluate the statistical significance of an empirical classification of very fine-grained rocks, samples from Devonian shales in four cored wells in West Virginia and Virginia were measured for 15 variables: quartz, illite, pyrite and expandable clays determined by X-ray diffraction; total sulfur, organic content, inorganic carbon, matrix density, bulk density, porosity, silt, as well as density, sonic travel time, resistivity, and -ray response measured from well logs. The four lithologic types comprised: (1) sharply banded shale, (2) thinly laminated shale, (3) lenticularly laminated shale, and (4) nonbanded shale. Univariate and multivariate analyses of variance showed that the lithologic classification reflects significant differences for the variables measured, difference that can be detected independently of stratigraphic effects. Little-known statistical methods found useful in this work included: the multivariate analysis of variance with more than one effect, simultaneous plotting of samples and variables on canonical variates, and the use of parametric ANOVA and MANOVA on ranked data.