Forest planning utilizing high spatial resolution data

This thesis presents planning approaches adapted for high spatial resolution data from remote sensing and evaluate whether such approaches can enhance the provision of ecosystem services from forests. The presented methods are compared with conventional, stand-level methods. The main focus lies on the planning concept of dynamic treatment units (DTU), where treatments in small units for modelling ecosystem processes and forest management are clustered spatiotemporally to form treatment units realistic in practical forestry. The methodological foundation of the thesis is mainly airborne laser scanning data (raster cells 12.5x12.5 m2), different optimization methods and the forest decision support system Heureka. Paper I demonstrates a mixed-integer programming model for DTU planning, and the results highlight the economic advances of clustering harvests. Paper II and III presents an addition to a DTU heuristic from the literature and further evaluates its performance. Results show that direct modelling of fixed costs for harvest operations can improve plans and that DTU planning enhances the economic outcome of forestry. The higher spatial resolution of data in the DTU approach enables the planning model to assign management with higher precision than if stand-based planning is applied. Paper IV evaluates whether this phenomenon is also valid for ecological values. Here, an approach adapted for cell-level data is compared to a schematic approach, dealing with stand-level data, for the purpose of allocating retention patches. The evaluation of economic and ecological values indicate that high spatial resolution data and an adapted planning approach increased the ecological values, while differences in economy were small. In conclusion, the studies in this thesis demonstrate how forest planning can utilize high spatial resolution data from remote sensing, and the results suggest that there is a potential to increase the overall provision of ecosystem services if such methods are applied

Applications of Finite Element Modeling for Mechanical and Mechatronic Systems

Modern engineering practice requires advanced numerical modeling because, among other things, it reduces the costs associated with prototyping or predicting the occurrence of potentially dangerous situations during operation in certain defined conditions. Thus far, different methods have been used to implement the real structure into the numerical version. The most popular uses have been variations of the finite element method (FEM). The aim of this Special Issue has been to familiarize the reader with the latest applications of the FEM for the modeling and analysis of diverse mechanical problems. Authors are encouraged to provide a concise description of the specific application or a potential application of the Special Issue

Recent Advances in Social Data and Artificial Intelligence 2019

The importance and usefulness of subjects and topics involving social data and artificial intelligence are becoming widely recognized. This book contains invited review, expository, and original research articles dealing with, and presenting state-of-the-art accounts pf, the recent advances in the subjects of social data and artificial intelligence, and potentially their links to Cyberspace

Exploring Classical and Contemporary Conception of Ethos Applied Case-The Rhetorical Ethos of President George W. Bush

By exploring classical and contemporary conceptions of rhetorical ethos, this thesis assembles theories of analysis and then applies them in the form of rhetorical analysis of the rhetorical ethos exhibited by President George W. Bush in his presidential speeches. The theoretical investigation reveals the extensive use of the ethical appeal in all manner of rhetorical situations in the contemporary world but especially focuses on how political rhetoric has come to rely predominantly on this persuasive appeal. The study examines several speeches given by President Bush and concludes that his success as president is attributed largely to the sophisticated rhetorical strategies executed by his administration, especially its construction of a presidential ethos. However, the inquiry also reveals a disconcerting degree of misleading and deceptive rhetoric, which the author argues has resulted in a serious decline in public support for President Bush as he approaches his sixth year in office

Radio evolution: conference proceedings

Fundação para a Ciência e a Tecnologia (FCT

Sociomaterial struggles at the frontline of strategy : a postphenomenological view of practice and power.

An important line of inquiry aligned with the ‘strategy as practice’ domain considers how strategy work is an exercise in power. Applying a lens influenced by—among others—Foucault, such work shows how actors shape their identities through and in relation to strategic discourses. Upper echelon managers discursively construct themselves as strategists, holding power over the subjectivities of those involved in implementing strategy. These discourses thus also work to shape the roles, identities and actions of these lower echelon actors to align with strategic intent. In turn, these same actors then construct their own identities in relation to these dominant discourses. Some studies build upon this position by attending to the role of technologies (e.g., accounting systems) in these flows of power, highlighting how such systems impose ways of working and thinking, and so define identities. However, such studies tend to dichotomise control and resistance, and tacitly view technology as an embodiment of pre-existing managerial intent. This under-emphasises the relational, co-productive nature of power and of technology’s role therein. This thesis aims to develop such an emphasis. I adopt a strong view of sociomateriality which sees the social and material as ontologically entangled. This is informed by Heideggerian conceptualisations, and also by ideas from ‘postphenomenology’, a school which further develops Heideggerian thought while also considering Foucauldian power in relation to technology use. Working with these ideas allows me to conceptualise human and technology as co-constitutive of (and within) the struggles that take shape as power flows through an organisation. Adopting this position, I examine ‘sociomaterial struggles’ in a study of frontline practitioners in a subsidiary company of a multinational health technology firm. Over 10-months, I collected their self-reported accounts of working with a new software suite as part of a ‘digital customer engagement strategy’. Analysing these accounts as ‘narratives of practices’, I show how the sense of self of each practitioner was first threatened and then (re)claimed through their individual, idiosyncratic relations with the technology—specifically, relations that set up struggles over subjectivities through a play of technology mediated objectivities, technology mediated intersubjectivities, and technology mediated subjectivities. Their stories weave together to reveal how the praxis that unfolded through these struggles shaped the local work of strategy. Overall, my thesis extends our understanding of how strategy is accomplished, attending to workers’ involvements with novel managerial ‘technologies of control’. It also contributes to theory, specifically to theorising power/resistance in strategy on the basis of a strong sociomaterial ontology