Geographical distribution and aspects of the ecology of the hemiparasitic angiosperm Striga asiatica (L) Kuntze: A herbarium study

Striga asiatica (Scrophulariaceae) is an obligate root hemiparasite of mainly C-4 grasses (including cereals). It is the most widespread of the 42 Striga species occurring in many semi-tropical, semi-arid regions of mainly the Old World. Examination of herbaria specimens revealed that S. asiatica has a wider geographical distribution, is present at higher altitudes and occurs in a more diverse range of habitats than previously reported. The host range is also larger than previously reported and is likely to include a large number of C-3 plants. Morphology of examined specimens revealed variation in size and corolla colour suggesting the existence of ecotypes. Climate may exert a significant influence on the distribution of S. asiatica given the diversity of potential host plants and their distribution beyond the current recorded range of S. asiatica

Doubly Spinning Black Rings

We study a method to solve stationary axisymmetric vacuum Einstein equations numerically. As an illustration, the five-dimensional doubly spinning black rings that have two independent angular momenta are formulated in a way suitable for fully nonlinear numerical method. Expanding for small second angular velocity, the formulation is solved perturbatively upto second order involving the backreaction from the second spin. The obtained solutions are regular without conical singularity, and the physical properties are discussed with the phase diagram of the reduced entropy vs the reduced angular momenta. Possible extensions of the present approach to constructing the higher dimensional version of black ring and the ring with the cosmological constant are also discussed.Comment: 20 pages, 6 figure

The Good, the Bad and the Press

Review of: Suing the Press. By Rodney A. Smolla. Oxford University Press, New York, N.Y., 1986

The Law and the Press

This chapter offers a broad survey of the relationships between the law and the press (primarily the newspaper press) during the nineteenth century. It traces the transition from early decades of vigorous state hostility of the first third of the century, through the gradual relaxation of fiscal and regulatory controls from the 1830s to the 1860s, to the brief period of completely unregulated press production in the 1870s. It examines the main legal engagements of the press in this period: the various forms of libel, political (seditious, blasphemous and obscene), civil and criminal, as well as copyright and contempt of court. In doing so it explores the limits of the ‘free press’ of British constitutional myth, and the complex and mutually constitutive relationship between the press and the law as interests

Survival probability of surface excitations in a 2d lattice: non-Markovian effects and Survival Collapse

The evolution of a surface excitation in a two dimentional model is analyzed. I) It starts quadratically up to a spreading time t_{S}. II) It follows an exponential behavior governed by a self-consistent Fermi Golden Rule. III) At longer times, the exponential is overrun by an inverse power law describing return processes governed by quantum diffusion. At this last transition time t_{R} a survival collapse becomes possible, bringing the survival probability down by several orders of magnitude. We identify this strongly destructive interference as an antiresonance in the time domain.Comment: 4 pages, 3 figures. Braz. Journ. of Phys., in press. Braz. Journ. of Phys., in press. Braz. Journ. of Phys., in press. Braz. Journ. of Phys., in press. Braz. Journ. of Phys., in press. Braz. Journ. of Phys., in press. Braz. Journ. of Phys., in pres

Book Review Essay: The Mature Phase: Four Generations of Scholarship on Colonial Mesoamerica and New Spain

This essay reviews the following works: Native Wills from the Colonial Americas: Dead Giveaways in a New World. Edited by Mark Christensen and Jonathan Truitt. Salt Lake City: University of Utah Press, 2016. Pp. vii + 276. $55.00 cloth. ISBN: 9781607814160. Strange Lands and Different Peoples: Spaniards and Indians in Colonial Guatemala. By W. George Lovell, Christopher H. Lutz, with Wendy Kramer and William R. Swezey. Norman: University of Oklahoma Press, 2013. Pp. ix + 339.$34.95 cloth. ISBN: 9780806143903. Indians and the Political Economy of Colonial Central America, 1670–1810. By Robert W. Patch. Norman: University of Oklahoma Press, 2013. Pp. ix + 284. $36.95 cloth. ISBN: 9780806144009. The Mixtecs of Oaxaca: Ancient Times to the Present. By Ronald Spores and Andrew K. Balkansky. Norman: University of Oklahoma Press, 2013. Pp. xvi + 328.$45.00 cloth. ISBN: 9780806143811. Emotions and Daily Life in Colonial Mexico. Edited by Javier Villa-Flores and Sonya Lipsett-Rivera. Albuquerque: University of New Mexico Press, 2014. Pp. ix + 257. $29.95 paper. ISBN: 9780826354624

Constructing a Social Problem: The Press and the Environment

The U. S. daily press might seem to be in a strategic position to function as a claims-maker in the early construction of a social problem. But in the case of the manufacture of environmentalism as a social reality in the 1960\u27s and 70\u27s, the press was fairly slow to adopt a holistic environmental lexicon. Its reporting of environmental news even now only partially reflects concepts promoted by positive environmental claims-makers, such as planet-wide interdependence, and the threats to it by destructive technologies. The movement of environmental claims seems to have started with interest-group entrepreneurship using interpersonal communication and independent publication, gone on to attention in government, then finally--and incompletely--been put on the agenda of the daily press. Once on the press agenda, coverage of environmental issues may have improved. But there are some constraints, possibly inherent in the press as an institution, that limit its role in the incipient construction of some social problems