Identification and effectiveness of self-help groups in Cambodia

The CGIAR Research Program on Aquatic Agricultural Systems (AAS) seeks to reduce poverty and improve food security for the millions of small-scale fishers and farmers who depend on the world’s floodplains, deltas and coasts. AAS combines more conventional approaches for introducing and scaling technical innovations, such as applied research and training, with approaches that foster innovation and promote institutional and policy change. Specifically, AAS utilizes participatory action research with communities to identify technology and policy solutions that best meet community long-term needs. One of the themes identified under AAS is the role of self-help groups in increasing livelihood resilience of agriculture and fisheries communities. As AAS establishes a hub of operations in Cambodia, AAS and Oxfam America are cooperating to investigate the potential of community-based self-help groups as a strategy for AAS implementation. As part of this cooperation, Oxfam America undertook this consultancy to analyze and describe the role, efficiency and effectiveness of the various types of self-help groups in Cambodia. This report gives an overview of this program which aims to conduct a field-based study to identify the types, main characteristics and effectiveness of self-help groups, with a particular focus on livelihood resilience of agriculture and fisheries communities

IT Workforce Trends: Implications for Curriculum and Hiring

At the 2007 Americas Conference on Information Systems (AMCIS), panelists discussed a continuing research project about the current IT workforce and future trends, presenting the latest results of an international Web-based survey. The project is sponsored by the Society for Information Management (SIM) International Advocacy Program and consists of two phases. The initial phase was a study of workforce trends in IT client companies and was completed in 2006. IT executives from client firms say it is critical to own business and project management capabilities, and they especially value them in their mid-level hires. Technical capabilities are more likely to be externally sourced, but they are also sought in entry-level hires. The second phase is a study of trends in service provider companies and is ongoing. Our preliminary results indicate that provider firms also value project management and business domain capabilities over technical capabilities. In the panel, we compared the Phase 2 (provider) results to the Phase 1 results from client organizations and discussed the implications of the data for curriculum design, hiring and training practices

Earthquake networks based on similar activity patterns

Earthquakes are a complex spatiotemporal phenomenon, the underlying mechanism for which is still not fully understood despite decades of research and analysis. We propose and develop a network approach to earthquake events. In this network, a node represents a spatial location while a link between two nodes represents similar activity patterns in the two different locations. The strength of a link is proportional to the strength of the cross-correlation in activities of two nodes joined by the link. We apply our network approach to a Japanese earthquake catalog spanning the 14-year period 1985-1998. We find strong links representing large correlations between patterns in locations separated by more than 1000 km, corroborating prior observations that earthquake interactions have no characteristic length scale. We find network characteristics not attributable to chance alone, including a large number of network links, high node assortativity, and strong stability over time.Comment: 8 pages text, 9 figures. Updated from previous versio

Moderately elevated blood pressure during pregnancy and odds of hypertension later in life: the POUCHmoms longitudinal study

Peer Reviewedhttps://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/138364/1/bjo14556-sup-0010-ICMJE7.pdfhttps://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/138364/2/bjo14556-sup-0007-ICMJE4.pdfhttps://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/138364/3/bjo14556.pdfhttps://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/138364/4/bjo14556-sup-0008-ICMJE5.pdfhttps://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/138364/5/bjo14556-sup-0001-TableS1.pdfhttps://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/138364/6/bjo14556-sup-0002-TableS2.pdfhttps://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/138364/7/bjo14556-sup-0005-ICMJE2.pdfhttps://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/138364/8/bjo14556-sup-0003-TableS3.pdfhttps://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/138364/9/bjo14556-sup-0006-ICMJE3.pdfhttps://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/138364/10/bjo14556-sup-0009-ICMJE6.pdfhttps://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/138364/11/bjo14556_am.pdfhttps://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/138364/12/bjo14556-sup-0004-ICMJE1.pd

Use of Tracers and Isotopes to Evaluate Vulnerability of Water in Domestic Wells to Septic Waste

In Nebraska, a large number (\u3e200) of shallow sand-point and cased wells completed in coarse alluvial sediments along rivers and lakes still are used to obtain drinking water for human consumption, even though construction of sand-point wells for consumptive uses has been banned since 1987. The quality of water from shallow domestic wells potentially vulnerable to seepage from septic systems was evaluated by analyzing for the presence of tracers and multiple isotopes. Samples were collected from 26 sand-point and perforated, cased domestic wells and were analyzed for bacteria, coliphages, nitrogen species, nitrogen and boron isotopes, dissolved organic carbon (DOC), prescription and nonprescription drugs, or organic waste water contaminants. At least 13 of the 26 domestic well samples showed some evidence of septic system effects based on the results of several tracers including DOC, coliphages, NH4+, NO3–, N2, δ15N[NO3–] and boron isotopes, and antibiotics and other drugs. Sand-point wells within 30 m of a septic system and \u3c14 m deep in a shallow, thin aquifer had the most tracers detected and the highest values, indicating the greatest vulnerability to contamination from septic waste

Bridge distress caused by approach embankment settlement

Surtees Bridge, which carries the A66(T) over the River Tees near Thornaby-on-Tees in the UK, has been showing signs of distress that predate its opening in 1981. Subsequent investigations have shown that the bridge distress is related to unexpectedly large settlement of the eastern approach embankment. Recent ground investigations prompted by a proposed widening of the river crossing have produced many new data on the alluvial deposits underlying the site, and explain why embankment settlement was so much larger than originally anticipated. Comparison of the geotechnical parameters obtained from the original and more recent ground investigations suggests that the original investigation significantly underestimated the thickness of an alluvial clay layer underlying the site, and that its coefficient of consolidation was overestimated. Settlement analyses using geotechnical data from the original ground investigations predict moderate embankment settlements occurring principally during construction. Settlement analyses based on all the available data predict far larger embankment settlements occurring over extended time periods. The latter analyses predict an embankment settlement similar to that observed and of sufficient magnitude to cause the observed lateral displacement of the bridge due to lateral loading of its piled foundation