179 research outputs found
Covert repertoires: ecotage in the UK
Ecological sabotage (ecotage) has been a feature of the more radical parts of the environmental movement in the Western world for several decades. While it may be perceived as being the preserve of underground cells of 'eco-terrorists', in the UK those who carry out small-scale acts of sabotage are also often engaged in relatively conventional political activity; view sabotage as a complement to other action, not as an end in itself; and are committed to avoiding physical harm to people. Drawing on ethnographic data from research with British activists, this article seeks to define ecotage and to explain its place in the repertoires of the environmental direct action movement in the UK. It is argued that the self-limiting form of ecotage in the UK has its roots in cross-movement debates that have developed over several decades and that national traditions remain important in understanding the development of social movement repertoires
Explaining the fuel protests
We describe and analyse the fuel protests in the UK in September and November 2000. We draw on theories of social movements to explain the success of the first of these protests and the failure of the second. We show how the loose, network forms of organisation contributed to the success in September, and the attempts to impose more formal organisations helped to cause the failure in November. We also show how the success of the protests depended on the articulation of the aims of the protestors with dominant social forces in British politics, in particular the oil companies, the police, and the mass media
Urban Growth Strategies in Rural Regions: Building The North Wales Growth Deal
This paper discusses the creation of a growth deal for North Wales (The North Wales Growth Deal – NWGD). North Wales is primarily a rural region within the UK, without a core-city or large metropolitan centre. The paper examines how this urban dynamic, fostered around a pushing of the agglomerative growth model out of the city-region, is being transferred largely across rural space and place in terms of how growth is envisioned and how policy is implemented. It contributes to regional studies knowledge by raising the importance of the non-metropolitan city-regional alternatives in the context of the (academic and policy) city-regional debate
Recommended from our members
Prenatal exposure to ambient air pollutants and early infant growth and adiposity in the Southern California Mother's Milk Study
Background
Prior epidemiological and animal work has linked in utero exposure to ambient air pollutants (AAP) with accelerated postnatal weight gain, which is predictive of increased cardiometabolic risk factors in childhood and adolescence. However, few studies have assessed changes in infant body composition or multiple pollutant exposures. Therefore, the objective of this study was to examine relationships between prenatal residential AAP exposure with infant growth and adiposity.
Methods
Residential exposure to AAP (particulate matter < 2.5 and 10 microns in aerodynamic diameter [PM2.5, PM10]; nitrogen dioxide [NO2]; ozone [O3]; oxidative capacity [Oxwt: redox-weighted oxidative potential of O3 and NO2]) was modeled by spatial interpolation of monitoring stations via an inverse distance-squared weighting (IDW2) algorithm for 123 participants from the longitudinal Mother’s Milk Study, an ongoing cohort of Hispanic mother-infant dyads from Southern California. Outcomes included changes in infant growth (weight, length), total subcutaneous fat (TSF; calculated via infant skinfold thickness measures) and fat distribution (umbilical circumference, central to total subcutaneous fat [CTSF]) and were calculated by subtracting 1-month measures from 6-month measures. Multivariable linear regression was performed to examine relationships between prenatal AAP exposure and infant outcomes. Models adjusted for maternal age, pre-pregnancy body mass index, socioeconomic status, infant age, sex, and breastfeeding frequency. Sex interactions were tested, and effects are reported for each standard deviation increase in exposure.
Results
NO2 was associated with greater infant weight gain (β = 0.14, p = 0.02) and TSF (β = 1.69, p = 0.02). PM10 and PM2.5 were associated with change in umbilical circumference (β = 0.73, p = 0.003) and TSF (β = 1.53, p = 0.04), respectively. Associations of Oxwt (pinteractions < 0.10) with infant length change, umbilical circumference, and CTSF were modified by infant sex. Oxwt was associated with attenuated infant length change among males (β = -0.60, p = 0.01), but not females (β = 0.16, p = 0.49); umbilical circumference among females (β = 0.92, p = 0.009), but not males (β = -0.00, p = 0.99); and CTSF among males (β = 0.01, p = 0.03), but not females (β = 0.00, p = 0.51).
Conclusion
Prenatal AAP exposure was associated with increased weight gain and anthropometric measures from 1-to-6 months of life among Hispanic infants. Sex-specific associations suggest differential consequences of in utero oxidative stress. These results indicate that prenatal AAP exposure may alter infant growth, which has potential to increase childhood obesity risk.
</p
Measurement of the Multi-Neutron Charged Current Differential Cross Section at Low Available Energy on Hydrocarbon
Neutron production in antineutrino interactions can lead to bias in energy
reconstruction in neutrino oscillation experiments, but these interactions have
rarely been studied. MINERvA previously studied neutron production at an
average antineutrino energy of ~3 GeV in 2016 and found deficiencies in leading
models. In this paper, the MINERvA 6 GeV average antineutrino energy data set
is shown to have similar disagreements. A measurement of the cross section for
an antineutrino to produce two or more neutrons and have low visible energy is
presented as an experiment-independent way to explore neutron production
modeling. This cross section disagrees with several leading models'
predictions. Neutron modeling techniques from nuclear physics are used to
quantify neutron detection uncertainties on this result.Comment: 25 pages, 11 figures; Added ancillary files with cross section values
as .csv Matches preprint accepted by publishe
Forensic DNA databases in European countries: is size linked to performance?
The political and financial investments in the implementation of forensic DNA databases and the ethical issues related to their use and expansion justify inquiries into their performance and general utility. The main function of a forensic DNA database is to produce matches between individuals and crime scene stains, which requires a constant input of individual profiles and crime scene stains. This is conditioned, among other factors, by the legislation, namely the criteria for inclusion of profiles and the periods of time and conditions for their retention and/or deletion. This article aims to provide an overview of the different legislative models for DNA databasing in Europe and ponder if wider inclusion criteria – and, consequently, database size – translates into more matches between profiles of crime scene stains and included individuals (performance ratio). The legislation governing forensic DNA databases in 22 countries in the European Union was analysed in order to propose a typology of two major groups of legislative criteria for inclusion/retention of profiles that can be classified as having either expansive effects or restrictive effects. We argue that expansive criteria for inclusion and retention of profiles do not necessarily translate into significant gains in output performance.MES -Ministry of Education and Science(SFRH/BPD/34143/2006)info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio
Simultaneous measurement of muon neutrino quasielastic-like cross sections on CH, C, water, Fe, and Pb as a function of muon kinematics at MINERvA
This paper presents the first simultaneous measurement of the
quasielastic-like neutrino-nucleus cross sections on C, water, Fe, Pb and
scintillator (hydrocarbon or CH) as a function of longitudinal and transverse
muon momentum. The ratio of cross sections per nucleon between Pb and CH is
always above unity and has a characteristic shape as a function of transverse
muon momentum that evolves slowly as a function of longitudinal muon momentum.
The ratio is constant versus longitudinal momentum within uncertainties above a
longitudinal momentum of 4.5GeV/c. The cross section ratios to CH for C, water,
and Fe remain roughly constant with increasing longitudinal momentum, and the
ratios between water or C to CH do not have any significant deviation from
unity. Both the overall cross section level and the shape for Pb and Fe as a
function of transverse muon momentum are not reproduced by current neutrino
event generators. These measurements provide a direct test of nuclear effects
in quasielastic-like interactions, which are major contributors to
long-baseline neutrino oscillation data samples.Comment: 9 pages, 8 flgures, including supplemental materia
Neutrino-induced coherent production in C, CH, Fe and Pb at GeV
MINERvA has measured the -induced coherent cross section
simultaneously in hydrocarbon (CH), graphite (C), iron (Fe) and lead (Pb)
targets using neutrinos from 2 to 20 GeV. The measurements exceed the
predictions of the Rein-Sehgal and Berger-Sehgal PCAC based models at multi-GeV
energies and at produced energies and angles,
GeV and . Measurements of the cross-section ratios of
Fe and Pb relative to CH reveal the effective -scaling to increase from an
approximate scaling at few GeV to an scaling for
GeV
Simultaneous measurement of muon neutrino charged-current single production in CH, C, HO, Fe, and Pb targets in MINERvA
Neutrino-induced charged-current single production in the
resonance region is of considerable interest to
accelerator-based neutrino oscillation experiments. In this work, high
statistics differential cross sections are reported for the semi-exclusive
reaction nucleon(s) on scintillator, carbon,
water, iron, and lead targets recorded by MINERvA using a wide-band
beam with \left \approx 6~GeV. Suppression of the cross
section at low and enhancement of low are observed in both light
and heavy nuclear targets compared to phenomenological models used in current
neutrino interaction generators. The cross-section ratios for iron and lead
compared to CH across the kinematic variables probed are 0.8 and 0.5
respectively, a scaling which is also not predicted by current generators.Comment: 6 pages, 6 figures, 117 pages of supplementary material; submitted to
Physical Review Letter
- …