Seeking river restoration appraisal best practice: supporting wider national and international

With growing investment in river restoration, we increasingly need to justify costs by demonstrating success and wider benefits of measures. To aid practitioners, the UK River Restoration Centre (RRC) has worked with experts to develop a practical monitoring guidance (PRAGMO) that links objectives to specific monitoring to demonstrate achievable outcomes. Feedback, however, via an on‐line questionnaire highlighted the need to rationalise the guidance contents for a new growing audience, taking advantage of new developments and incorporating the evaluation of social and economic aspects of river restoration. With these potential improvements, it is hoped that practitioners will follow this guidance, improve the quality of monitoring undertaken and share evidence of success and lessons learnt. This paper outlines how this guidance has been adopted as best practice. We discuss why we need to embed this guidance into wider monitoring protocols that can feed into national and international environmental policy and targets

Coronal Magnetic Field Evolution from 1996 to 2012: Continuous Non-potential Simulations

Coupled flux transport and magneto-frictional simulations are extended to simulate the continuous magnetic-field evolution in the global solar corona for over 15 years, from the start of Solar Cycle 23 in 1996. By simplifying the dynamics, our model follows the build-up and transport of electric currents and free magnetic energy in the corona, offering an insight into the magnetic structure and topology that extrapolation-based models cannot. To enable these extended simulations, we have implemented a more efficient numerical grid, and have carefully calibrated the surface flux-transport model to reproduce the observed large-scale photospheric radial magnetic field, using emerging active regions determined from observed line-of-sight magnetograms. This calibration is described in some detail. In agreement with previous authors, we find that the standard flux-transport model is insufficient to simultaneously reproduce the observed polar fields and butterfly diagram during Cycle 23, and that additional effects must be added. For the best-fit model, we use automated techniques to detect the latitude–time profile of flux ropes and their ejections over the full solar cycle. Overall, flux ropes are more prevalent outside of active latitudes but those at active latitudes are more frequently ejected. Future possibilities for space-weather prediction with this approach are briefly assessed

The Origin, Early Evolution and Predictability of Solar Eruptions

Coronal mass ejections (CMEs) were discovered in the early 1970s when space-borne coronagraphs revealed that eruptions of plasma are ejected from the Sun. Today, it is known that the Sun produces eruptive flares, filament eruptions, coronal mass ejections and failed eruptions; all thought to be due to a release of energy stored in the coronal magnetic field during its drastic reconfiguration. This review discusses the observations and physical mechanisms behind this eruptive activity, with a view to making an assessment of the current capability of forecasting these events for space weather risk and impact mitigation. Whilst a wealth of observations exist, and detailed models have been developed, there still exists a need to draw these approaches together. In particular more realistic models are encouraged in order to asses the full range of complexity of the solar atmosphere and the criteria for which an eruption is formed. From the observational side, a more detailed understanding of the role of photospheric flows and reconnection is needed in order to identify the evolutionary path that ultimately means a magnetic structure will erupt

Public vs. Private Market Arbitrage: Can Growth REITs Benefit from their High Valuation?

This paper examines the impact of the ratio of price-to-fundamental value on the stock market performance of real estate securities following seasoned equity offerings and senior debt issuances. Using a global sample of real estate securities, we distinguish between growth stocks, i.e. those with the highest stock prices relative to the private market value of their properties, and value stocks, which tend to trade at substantial discounts to their net asset value (NAV). Consistent with the notion that newly issued equity is ultimately priced similar to pre-SEO levels, we find that growth stocks perform significantly better than value stocks in the 36 months following the SOE. We also examine the long run performance following senior debt issuances and document a substantial outperformance (underperformance) for growth (value) real estate securities in the 36 months following the offering. Overall, our findings are consistent with the hypothesis that growth REITs can benefit from “public vs. private market arbitrage”

Contact Between Birth and Adoptive Families During the First Year Post-Placement: Perspectives of Lesbian, Gay, and Heterosexual Parents

Despite growing visibility of lesbian- and gay-parent adoption, only one qualitative study has examined birth family contact among adoptive families with lesbian and gay parents (Goldberg, Kinkler, Richardson, & Downing, 2011). We studied adoptive parents’ (34 lesbian, 32 gay, and 37 heterosexual; N = 103 families) perspectives of birth family contact across the first year post-placement. Using questionnaire and interview data, we found few differences in openness dynamics by parental sexual orientation. Most reported some birth mother contact, most had legally finalized their adoption, and few described plans to withhold information from children. We discuss implications for clinical practice, policy, and research