Multi-method geophysical measurements for soil science investigations in the vadose zone

International audienceWe studied the changes of geophysical parameters on a soil wall of the testfield Grenzhof (University of Heidelberg). The unsaturated materials investigated range from coarse-grain gravel to sandy loam. Ground-penetrating radar, ultrasound transmission and complex conductivity measurements were applied as geophysical methods. The measured parameters were used to calculate soil parameters such as porosity, water content, density and grain surface area necessary to obtain geohydraulic parameters such as hydraulic conductivity, field capacity and retention parameters. Soil samples were taken and analysed regarding porosity, apparent density, true density and internal surface. The comparison between petrophysical data from the laboratory and from geophysical measurements showed good correlations for the majority of the data

User-modelled ambient feedback for self-regulated learning

A fundamental objective of human-computer interaction research is to make systems that are seamlessly integrated into daily life activities. Hence, the challenge is not only to make information available to people at any time, at any place, and in any form, but specifically to say the right thing at the right time in the right way. On the other hand, the proliferation of sensor technology is facilitating the scaffolding and customization of smart learning environments. This manuscript presents an ecology of resources comprising NFC, BLE and Arduino technology, orchestrated in the context of a learning environment to provide smoothly integrated feedback via ambient displays. This ecology is proposed as a suitable solution for self-regulated learning, providing support for setting goals, setting aside time to learn, tracking study time and monitoring the progress. Hereby, the ecology is described and intriguing research questions are introduced

Constraint Satisfaction with Counting Quantifiers

We initiate the study of constraint satisfaction problems (CSPs) in the presence of counting quantifiers, which may be seen as variants of CSPs in the mould of quantified CSPs (QCSPs). We show that a single counting quantifier strictly between exists^1:=exists and exists^n:=forall (the domain being of size n) already affords the maximal possible complexity of QCSPs (which have both exists and forall), being Pspace-complete for a suitably chosen template. Next, we focus on the complexity of subsets of counting quantifiers on clique and cycle templates. For cycles we give a full trichotomy -- all such problems are in L, NP-complete or Pspace-complete. For cliques we come close to a similar trichotomy, but one case remains outstanding. Afterwards, we consider the generalisation of CSPs in which we augment the extant quantifier exists^1:=exists with the quantifier exists^j (j not 1). Such a CSP is already NP-hard on non-bipartite graph templates. We explore the situation of this generalised CSP on bipartite templates, giving various conditions for both tractability and hardness -- culminating in a classification theorem for general graphs. Finally, we use counting quantifiers to solve the complexity of a concrete QCSP whose complexity was previously open

Priority areas for watershed service conservation in the Guapi-Macacu region of Rio de Janeiro, Atlantic Forest, Brazil.

Introduction: Land use intensification and urbanisation processes are degrading hydrological ecosystem services in the Guapi-Macacu watershed of Rio de Janeiro. A proposal to pay farmers to restore natural watershed services might be an alternative to securing the water supply in the long-term for the around 2.5 million urban water users in the study region. This study quantifies the costs of changing current land use patterns to enhance watershed services and compares these costs to the avoided costs associated with water treatment for public supply. Methods: We use farm-household data to estimate the opportunity costs of abandoning current land uses for the recovery of natural vegetation; a process that is very likely to improve water quality in terms of turbidity due to reduced inputs from erosion. Opportunity cost estimates are extrapolated to the watershed scale based on remote sensing land use classifications and vulnerability analysis to identify priority zones for watershed management interventions. To assess the potential demand for watershed services, we analyse water quality and treatment cost data from the main local water treatment plant. Results: Changing agricultural land uses for watershed services provision generally comes at high opportunity costs in our study area near to the metropolis of Rio de Janeiro. Alternative low cost watershed conservation options do exist in the livestock production sector. These options have the potential to directly reduce the amount of sediments and nutrients reaching the water bodies, and in turn decrease the costs of treatment needed for drinking water. Land cover changes at the scale needed to improve water quality will, nonetheless, likely exceed the cost of additional investments in water treatment. Conclusions: The state water utility company?s willingness to pay for watershed services alone will not be enough to induce provision of additional watershed services. We conclude that monetary incentives conditioned on specific adjustments to existing production systems could still have a complementary role to play in improving watershed services. However, we note that our willingness to pay analysis focusses on only one of the potentially wide range of ecosystem services provided by natural vegetation in the Guapi-Macacu watershed. Factoring these ecosystem services into the willingness to pay equation is likely to change our assessment in favour of additional conservation action, be it through PES or other policy instruments

Lippen-Kiefer-Gaumen-Spalten: Individuelle Analyse der Lippenspalte durch 3-D-Lasertopometrie

Zusammenfassung: Hintergrund: Mit Gipsmodellen und Fotografien ist die dreidimensionale Analyse einer Lippen-Kiefer-Gaumen-Spalte meist nur unzureichend möglich. Ziel der vorliegenden Studie war es daher, die 3-D-Lasertopometrie auf ihre Anwendbarkeit zur dreidimensionalen Weichgewebserfassung bei Patienten mit Lippen-Kiefer-Gaumen-Spalten zu testen. Patienten und Methode: Bei 20 Patienten (3-35 Jahre), die eine einseitige, nicht operierte Lippen-, Lippen-Kiefer- oder Lippen-Kiefer-Gaumen-Spalte aufwiesen, wurde mit einem 3-D-Laserscanner die Gesichtsoberfläche prä- und postoperativ dreidimensional erfasst. Die dabei erzeugten digitalen Datensätze wurden in einer virtuellen Umgebung metrisch analysiert und anhand von Quotienten größenunabhängig wiedergegeben. Sie dienten der Auswahl der Operationstechnik und der Beurteilung des Operationsergebnisses. Ergebnisse: Mit dem 3-D-Laserscanner wurden 3-D-Oberflächen guter Qualität erstellt, die sich im Millimeterbereich ausmessen ließen. Die dreidimensionale Spaltmorphologie konnte in den Datensätzen reproduzierbar mit Landmarks versehen und vermessen werden. Auch die postoperative Symmetrie ließ sich so kontrollieren und objektivieren. Als nachteilig erwiesen sich die relativ lange Messzeit und die Notwendigkeit zur Kombination mehrerer Ansichten. Schlussfolgerung: Das vorgestellte 3-D-Laserverfahren ermöglicht eine präzise dreidimensionale Weichteilanalyse der Lippen- und Nasenregion bei Spaltpatienten. Es eignet sich jedoch nur bedingt für lebhafte Säuglinge und unkooperative Patiente

Age of the Universe: Influence of the Inhomogeneities on the global Expansion-Factor

For the first time we calculate quantitatively the influence of inhomogeneities on the global expansion factor by averaging the Friedmann equation. In the framework of the relativistic second-order Zel'dovich-approximation scheme for irrotational dust we use observational results in form of the normalisation constant fixed by the COBE results and we check different power spectra, namely for adiabatic CDM, isocurvature CDM, HDM, WDM, Strings and Textures. We find that the influence of the inhomogeneities on the global expansion factor is very small. So the error in determining the age of the universe using the Hubble constant in the usual way is negligible. This does not imply that the effect is negligible for local astronomical measurements of the Hubble constant. Locally the determination of the redshift-distance relation can be strongly influenced by the peculiar velocity fields due to inhomogeneities. Our calculation does not consider such effects, but is contrained to comparing globally homogeneous and averaged inhomogeneous matter distributions. In addition we relate our work to previous treatments.Comment: 10 pages, version accepted by Phys. Rev.

Interfaces for science: Conceptualizing an interactive graphical interface

6,849.32 new research journal articles are published every day. The exponential growth of Scientific Knowledge Objects (SKOs) on the Web, makes searches time-consuming. Access to the right and relevant SKOs is vital for research, which calls for several topics, including the visualization of science dynamics. We present an interface model aimed to represent of the relations that emerge in the science social space dynamics, namely through the visualization and navigation of the relational structures between researchers, SKOs, knowledge domains, subdomains, and topics. This interface considers the relationship between the researcher who reads and shares the relevant articles and the researcher who wants to find the most relevant SKOs within a subject matter. This article presents the first iteration of the conceptualization process of the interface layout, its interactivity and visualization structures. It is essential to consider the hierarchical and relational structures/algorithms to represent the science social space dynamics. These structures are not being used as analysis tools, because it is not objective to show the linkage properties of these relationships. Instead, they are used as a means of representing, navigating and exploring these relationships. To sum up, this article provides a framework and fundamental guidelines for an interface layout that explores the social science space dynamics between the researcher who seeks relevant SKOs and the researchers who read and share them.This work has been supported by COMPETE: POCI-01-0145-FEDER- 007043 and FCT - Fundação para a Ciência e Tecnologia within the Project Scope: (UID/CEC/00319/2013) and the Project IViSSEM: ref: POCI-010145-FEDER-28284