Music Beyond Your World

As the world becomes more globalized in upcoming generations, people should have access to music beyond their own culture to form a more worldly view of life. As music in America is widely spread to countries around the world, the same cannot be said for foreign music entering America. This project aims to help remedy this situation so people can experience the sounds and culture of Asia, through the form of music

Woodland caribou population decline in Alberta: fact or fiction?

We re-assessed the view of a major woodland caribou (Rangifer tarandus caribou) population decline in Alberta. Several historical publications and provincial documents refer to this drastic decline as the major premise for the designation of Alberta's woodland caribou an endangered species. In the past, wildlife management and inventory techniques were speculative and limited by a lack of technology, access and funding. The accepted trend of the decline is based on many speculations, opinions and misinterpretation of data and is unsubstantiated. Many aerial surveys failed to reduce variance and did not estimate sightability. Most surveys have underestimated numbers and contributed unreliable data to support a decline. Through forest fire protection and the presence of extensive wetlands, the majority of potential caribou habitat still exists. Recreational and aboriginal subsistence hunting does not appear to have contributed greatly to mortality, although data are insufficient for reliable conclusions. Wolf (Canis lupus), population fluctuations are inconclusive and do not provide adequate information on which to base prey population trends. The incidence of documented infection by parasites in Alberta is low and likely unimportant as a cause of the proposed decline

Low-cost, high-volume imaging for entomological digitization

Large-scale digitization of natural history collections requires the automation of image acquisition and processing. Reflecting this fact, various approaches, some highly sophisticated, have been developed to support the imaging of museum specimens. However, most of these systems are complex and expensive, restricting their deployment. Here we describe a simple, inexpensive technique for imaging arthropods larger than 5 mm. By mounting a digital SLR camera on a CNC (computer numerical control) motor-drive rig, we created a system that captures high-resolution z-axis stacked images (6960 x 4640 pixels) of 95 specimens in 30 minutes. This system is inexpensive ($1000 USD without camera), easy to set up, and to maintain. By coupling low cost with high production capacity, it represents a solution for the digitization of any natural history collection