SUPPLY AND DEMAND ISSUES FOR A CONVENIENCE LEARNING COURSE

This paper explores and analyzes supply and demand of university-level convenience learning courses. Procedures involve use of microeconomic theory to conceptually analyze supply, demand, benefits and costs and a case study comparison of a traditional course to a convenience learning course that has been offered for three years.Teaching/Communication/Extension/Profession,

Agricultural Health and Safety: A Research Agenda for Agricultural Economists

Replaced with revised version of paper 01/26/06.Health Economics and Policy, Teaching/Communication/Extension/Profession,

Do Men and Women Perform Differently on Different Types of Test Questions?

Men, Women, Tests, Questions, Gender, Teaching/Communication/Extension/Profession,

USE OF ALTERNATIVE DEPRECIATION METHODS TO ESTIMATE FARM TRACTOR VALUES

Six depreciation methods were used to simulate the value of farm tractors with indexed and expected prices. Accuracy of simulated values was evaluated using paired t-tests of mean absolute percentage errors and forecast accuracy regression models. Results varied with age and use. Some depreciation methods were more accurate than others.Farm Management, Financial Economics,

WHAT CAN A KANSAS FARMER AFFORD TO PAY TO RENT CROPLAND?

Five years of continuous annual data are used to measure the marginal value product of cropland (return to land) on approximately 100 Kansas farms. Determinants of the marginal value product are investigated using regression.Land Economics/Use,

Use of a Crop Simulation Model to Provide Long-Term Data for Economic Analysis: the Case of Early Maturing Soybeans

A target MOTAD model is used to investigate incorporation of early maturing soybeans by a crop farm in southeastern Kansas. Weather (WGEN) and crop simulation (SOYGRO) models are used to generate a long-term series of soybean yields. Results indicate that early maturing soybeans offer a risk-reducing diversification strategy.Crop Production/Industries, Farm Management,

Farm Land Ownership as a Source of Retirement Income

Land Economics/Use,

A Computational Investigation on the Connection between Dynamics Properties of Ribosomal Proteins and Ribosome Assembly

Assembly of the ribosome from its protein and RNA constituents has been studied extensively over the past 50 years, and experimental evidence suggests that prokaryotic ribosomal proteins undergo conformational changes during assembly. However, to date, no studies have attempted to elucidate these conformational changes. The present work utilizes computational methods to analyze protein dynamics and to investigate the linkage between dynamics and binding of these proteins during the assembly of the ribosome. Ribosomal proteins are known to be positively charged and we find the percentage of positive residues in r-proteins to be about twice that of the average protein: Lys+Arg is 18.7% for E. coli and 21.2% for T. thermophilus. Also, positive residues constitute a large proportion of RNA contacting residues: 39% for E. coli and 46% for T. thermophilus. This affirms the known importance of charge-charge interactions in the assembly of the ribosome. We studied the dynamics of three primary proteins from E. coli and T. thermophilus 30S subunits that bind early in the assembly (S15, S17, and S20) with atomic molecular dynamic simulations, followed by a study of all r-proteins using elastic network models. Molecular dynamics simulations show that solvent-exposed proteins (S15 and S17) tend to adopt more stable solution conformations than an RNA-embedded protein (S20). We also find protein residues that contact the 16S rRNA are generally more mobile in comparison with the other residues. This is because there is a larger proportion of contacting residues located in flexible loop regions. By the use of elastic network models, which are computationally more efficient, we show that this trend holds for most of the 30S r-proteins

Observation of charge-dependent azimuthal correlations and possible local strong parity violation in heavy ion collisions

Parity-odd domains, corresponding to non-trivial topological solutions of the QCD vacuum, might be created during relativistic heavy-ion collisions. These domains are predicted to lead to charge separation of quarks along the orbital momentum of the system created in non-central collisions. To study this effect, we investigate a three particle mixed harmonics azimuthal correlator which is a \P-even observable, but directly sensitive to the charge separation effect. We report measurements of this observable using the STAR detector in Au+Au and Cu+Cu collisions at $\sqrt{s_{NN}}$=200 and 62~GeV. The results are presented as a function of collision centrality, particle separation in rapidity, and particle transverse momentum. A signal consistent with several of the theoretical expectations is detected in all four data sets. We compare our results to the predictions of existing event generators, and discuss in detail possible contributions from other effects that are not related to parity violation.Comment: 17 pages, 14 figures, as accepted for publication in Physical Review C