Structural Comparisons of Four Plant Communities in the Great Dismal Swamp

Four plant communities in the Great Dismal Swamp, located on the coastal plain in southeastern Virginia, were sampled and estimates of density, basal area and aboveground standing crop biomass were determined, Biomass was estimated as 229,800 kg/ha in the Chamaecyparis thyoides community and as 344,500 kg/ha in the Taxodium distichum community. Biomass for the two hardwood communities, the Acer-Nyssa community and mixed hardwood (Quercus-Nyssa-Acer-Liriodendron-Liquidamber) community was estimated as 195,700 kg/ha and 194,600 kg/ha respectively and did not differ significantly (

This Grand Experiment: When Women Entered the Federal Workforce in Civil War-Era Washington, D.C.

This Grand Experiment is an eye-opening study which reveals the complicated the relationship between female civil servants and women engaged in the suffrage movement during the American Civil War. Ziparo reveals how female federal employees worked in critical jobs during the war but had to do so under a veil of subordination (page 3). In other words, female employees had to emphasize their dependence on men and downplay the value of their contributions to keeping the government running to secure and maintain these federal clerkships. As a result, very few of these female employees were engaged in the women\u27s rights movement or considered themselves suffragists. But Ziparo suggests that the efforts of these women to secure these positions in the first place and then lobby for equal pay once they were employed reveals how they did attempt to expand the traditional social and economic roles that women were expected to adhere to in the 19th century

Educated for Freedom: The Incredible Story of Two Fugitive Schoolboys Who Grew Up to Change a Nation

Duane traces the lives of James McCune Smith and Henry Highland Garnet, both born into slavery, and both graduates of the New York African Free School, to show that despite their common background, they both approached Black liberation in divergent ways

Metabolic effects of dialyzate glucose in chronic hemodialysis: results from a prospective, randomized crossover trial

Background. There is no agreement concerning dialyzate glucose concentration in hemodialysis (HD) and 100 and 200 mg/dL (G100 and G200) are frequently used. G200 may result in diffusive glucose flux into the patient, with consequent hyperglycemia and hyperinsulinism, and electrolyte alterations, in particular potassium (K) and phosphorus (P). This trial compared metabolic effects of G100 versus G200. Methods. Chronic HD patients participated in this randomized, single masked, controlled crossover trial (www.clinicaltrials.gov: #NCT00618033) consisting of two consecutive 3-week segments with G100 and G200, respectively. Intradialytic serum glucose (SG) and insulin concentrations (SI) were measured at 0, 30, 60, 120, 180, 240 min and immediately post-HD; P and K were measured at 0, 120, 180 min and post-HD. Hypoglycemia was defined as an SG <70 mg/dL. Mean SG and SI were computed as area under the curve divided by treatment time. Results. Fourteen diabetic and 15 non-diabetic subjects were studied. SG was significantly higher with G200 as compared to G100, both in diabetic {G200: 192.8 ± 48.1 mg/dL; G100: 154.0 ± 27.3 mg/dL; difference 38.8 [95% confidence interval (CI): 21.2-56.4] mg/dL; P < 0.001} and non-diabetic subjects [G200: 127.0 ± 11.2 mg/dL; G100 106.5 ± 10.8 mg/dL; difference 20.6 (95% CI: 15.3-25.9) mg/dL; P < 0.001]. SI was significantly higher with G200 in non-diabetic subjects. Frequency of hypoglycemia, P and K serum levels, interdialytic weight gain and adverse intradialytic events did not differ significantly between G100 and G200. Conclusion. G200 may exert unfavorable metabolic effects in chronic HD patients, in particular hyperglycemia and hyperinsulinism, the latter in non-diabetic subject

Public sector entities’ reporting objectives, users, and information contents : an exploration of preparers’ and standard setters’ perspectives : a thesis presented in partial fulfilment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy in Accountancy at Massey University, Manawatu Campus, New Zealand

This study examines the views of preparers and standard setters in New Zealand on the objectives, users, and information content of financial reports for public sector entities (PSEs). The study uses a mixed methodology of quantitative and qualitative data and employs the decoupling dimension of institutional theory to understand its findings. A survey was sent to 233 public sector entities. A total of 108 responses were received from preparers. Further, six in-depth interviews with standard setters were also conducted. The results show that preparers view compliance and accountability as the core objectives for financial reports, while standard setters see accountability as the main objective but also stress the need for decision-useful information. The preparers identified the Office of the Auditor-General, the Government/Crown, and the Auditor as important users, while standard setters see the general public as the main users. The results indicate that preparers focus on providing accountability information, with standard setters agreeing with this view but also highlighting the importance of decision-useful information. The study found no differences between central and local government PSEs in terms of objectives but observed differences in the importance of information content based on the entity type. Large PSEs were found to have different accountability objectives to those of small PSEs, but no difference in information content between large and small PSEs was observed. The study provides valuable insights into the views of New Zealand preparers and standard setters on PSE financial reporting

Intelligibility model optimisation approaches for speech pre-enhancement

The goal of improving the intelligibility of broadcast speech is being met by a recent new direction in speech enhancement: near-end intelligibility enhancement. In contrast to the conventional speech enhancement approach that processes the corrupted speech at the receiver-side of the communication chain, the near-end intelligibility enhancement approach pre-processes the clean speech at the transmitter-side, i.e. before it is played into the environmental noise. In this work, we describe an optimisation-based approach to near-end intelligibility enhancement using models of speech intelligibility to improve the intelligibility of speech in noise. This thesis first presents a survey of speech intelligibility models and how the adverse acoustic conditions affect the intelligibility of speech. The purpose of this survey is to identify models that we can adopt in the design of the pre-enhancement system. Then, we investigate the strategies humans use to increase speech intelligibility in noise. We then relate human strategies to existing algorithms for near-end intelligibility enhancement. A closed-loop feedback approach to near-end intelligibility enhancement is then introduced. In this framework, speech modifications are guided by a model of intelligibility. For the closed-loop system to work, we develop a simple spectral modification strategy that modifies the first few coefficients of an auditory cepstral representation such as to maximise an intelligibility measure. We experiment with two contrasting measures of objective intelligibility. The first, as a baseline, is an audibility measure named 'glimpse proportion' that is computed as the proportion of the spectro-temporal representation of the speech signal that is free from masking. We then propose a discriminative intelligibility model, building on the principles of missing data speech recognition, to model the likelihood of specific phonetic confusions that may occur when speech is presented in noise. The discriminative intelligibility measure is computed using a statistical model of speech from the speaker that is to be enhanced. Interim results showed that, unlike the glimpse proportion based system, the discriminative based system did not improve intelligibility. We investigated the reason behind that and we found that the discriminative based system was not able to target the phonetic confusion with the fixed spectral shaping. To address that, we introduce a time-varying spectral modification. We also propose to perform the optimisation on a segment-by-segment basis which enables a robust solution against the fluctuating noise. We further combine our system with a noise-independent enhancement technique, i.e. dynamic range compression. We found significant improvement in non-stationary noise condition, but no significant differences to the state-of-the art system (spectral shaping and dynamic range compression) where found in stationary noise condition

Especies en movimiento: la Convención sobre el Comercio Internacional de Especies Amenazadas de Fauna y Flora Silvestres como espacio de “encuentro” de discursos, actores y estrategias en el derecho ambiental trasnacional.

¿Cuáles son los criterios a través de los que se determina que una especie se encuentra extinta, amenazada, vulnerable? Estos tres conceptos, entre otros, aluden a categorías que suelen permear las diversas regulaciones en materia de protección de especies. Regulaciones que, a su vez, dialogan entre diferentes espacios de producción normativa y una heterogeneidad de actores, discursos y estrategias que “se encuentran” y traducen en términos regulatorios. Este artículo se propone focalizar en el último tema mencionado y mostrar la tendencia a la articulación del discurso jurídico con otros discursos provenientes de distintos organismos e instituciones que dejan huellas visibles en la configuración de normas referidas a algunos de los aspectos que integran la cuestión ecológica, en este caso, la protección de especies amenazadas. Allí se tornan observables insumos provenientes de discursos expertos pertenecientes al sistema científico u organizaciones no gubernamentales de naturaleza internacional, que se relacionan con el derecho y permean su contenido y puesta en funcionamiento. Ello, a su vez, genera que en los ámbitos nacionales, locales, regionales, se tomen en consideración estos criterios clasificatorios para la toma de decisiones sobre la protección de especies de flora o fauna mediante políticas de diferente tipo que pueden conducir a la implementación de pautas de comercialización como a la disposición de áreas protegidas o especies específicamente tuteladas, entre la diversidad de estrategias contemporáneas relativas a esta problemática

Viejas y nuevas utopías: estilos de desarrollo y buen vivir

El presente trabajo tiene la finalidad de ofrecer al lector una reseña sobre el libro “Estilos de desarrollo y buen vivir”, el cual fue escrito por el Grupo de Estudios sobre Historia y Discurso y publicado recientemente por Ediciones del Centro Cultural de la Cooperación Floreal Gorini. El mismo se compone por siete capítulos que abordan desde diferentes perspectivas el concepto de desarrollo mediante el estudio de las condiciones históricas, políticas y sociales que configuraron al paradigma del  buen vivir como una  alternativa al mismo.Para realizar este trabajo, tomamos en cuenta los ejes más destacados de cada capítulo con la finalidad dar al lector un pantallazo general de los contenidos que  componen el libro.</p

Effect of Trail Running Pack Weight on Lower Extremity Biomechanics

In the sport of ultrarunning there are a variety of ways runners carry the equipment and nutrition that is required. Many of the faster athletes will be seen with handheld bottles or minimal packs, however the size and weight of packs may vary based on the length of the race, nutritional needs, and pacing. PURPOSE: To date, no research has been conducted to understand what biomechanical adaptions occur with packs of varying weight. METHODS: Kinematic and kinetic data were collected using a 16 camera Vicon Nexus System (Vicon Inc. Denver, CO) and the Bertec instrumented treadmill (Bertec, Inc., Columbus, OH) system for 2 female, and 4 male runners averaging 10-30 miles a week. Reflective markers were placed on the lower extremities and chest. Condition 1 consisted of running at no pack weight and then three more conditions of 3, 6, and 9 percent body weight respectively. Participants would run for 5 minutes with a Salomon running vest at each weight. The study will focus on the changes in GRF and moments of the hip, knee, and ankle. RESULTS: The peak ground reaction force (GRF) had a slight increase in all weighted conditions in comparison to condition 1 (2-5%). Anterior and posterior GRF increased by about in 7% in condition 3 and 4 compared to conditions 1 and 2. Hip flexion and extension moments increased in condition 4 compared to all other conditions (13.3% and 11.5%). Knee extensions increased incrementally through conditions 1 and 4. The plantar flexion moment increased 9% in condition 3 and 4 compared to conditions 1 and 2. CONCLUSION: With the increase of weight added into the vest it was hypothesized that biomechanical variables would have incremental changes associated with the change in pack weight. However, each variable was affected differently. Through each variable there was a contrasting point that a significant change was observed. With this evidence, it can be explained that each joint excepted and balanced the weight differently. Evidently, the hips were affected more at the higher weights and the ankle was affected at the lower weight. Condition 2 had little to no effect on biomechanical variables and may not negatively affect performance