Dry matter yields and quality of organic lupin/cereal mixtures for wholecrop forage

In view of climate change predictions and the general desirability of increasing the amount of home grown protein, a case exists for the investigation of lupins and lupin/cereal bicrop combinations as wholecrop forage on organic farms. A replicated randomised block trial is described which took place at the Royal Agricultural College, Cirencester, in 2005. This involved spring sown blue, white and yellow lupins, millet, wheat and triticale and lupin/cereal bi-crops. Data for dry matter yields for wholecrop silage, crude protein, MAD fi bre content and estimated ME, are presented for a single harvest. It is concluded that white lupins and white lupin bi-crops with spring wheat or triticale offer the best prospects for a viable wholecrop forage crop in an organic situation

Plastic pre-compression and creep damage effects on the fracture toughness behaviour of Type 316H stainless steel

The influence of inelastic damage in the form of plastic pre-strain and creep damage, on fracture toughness of Type 316H stainless steel has been examined. Creep damage has been introduced into the 8% pre-compressed material by interrupting creep crack growth tests. Comparisons have been made between the fracture toughness test results from the as-received, pre-compressed and creep damaged materials. Furthermore, the effects of creep crack discontinuities on the crack tip strain fields have been examined by digital image correlation measurements. Inelastic damage was found to reduce the fracture toughness of the material, with creep damage having more severe effects than pre-strain

Liquid Ventilation

Research on using liquid ventilation to provide artificial respiration in mammals has been ongoing since the 1960s. The development of inert perfluorocarbon (PFC) liquids with high oxygen and carbon dioxide solubility has made gas exchange with liquid ventilation possible. In 1991 the technique of partial liquid ventilation was introduced where PFC are instilled into the lungs whilst continuing with conventional mechanical ventilation. Partial liquid ventilation has been shown to improve gas exchange and lung function with decreased secondary lung injury, in animal models of acute lung injury and surfactant deficiency. It has been used in uncontrolled trials in preterm neonates, and preliminary results are available from a randomized controlled trial of partial liquid ventilation in paediatric acute respiratory distress syndrome. Perfluorocarbons can also be used to deliver drugs to the lungs, to lavage inflammatory exudate and debris from the lungs, and as an intrapulmonary X-ray contrast medium. Many questions about partial liquid ventilation remain unanswered particularly with regard to the dose of PFC required, its ideal method of administration and the long-term effects. Partial liquid ventilation promises to be an exciting new therapy for infants and children with a variety of respiratory problems. The technique requires ongoing research and experimentation

Knowledge tree: Putting discourse into computer‐based learning

Most CBL materials currently in use model only the declarative aspects of the learning process. If such courseware is used without careful planning, this can be dangerous because one of the most fundamental aspects of education is the dialogue that occurs between teachers and the students. Traditionally, this has taken place in informal discussions as well as in formal small‐group learning sessions such as the conventional tutorial. However, as the student‐staff ratio increases, so does the opportunity for this type of personal dialogue decrease. Modern networking technology offers a huge potential to add discourse to CBL, but there are many pedagogical problems involved with the intrinsically ephemeral and anarchic nature both of the Internet and of most conferencing or bulletin‐board systems. In this paper we describe a software system called Knowledge Tree (KT) which we have developed to address some of these issues. KT combines a hierarchical concept‐oriented database functionality with that of a Usenet‐style bulletin board Using this, a knowledge garden may be developed for any subject area. These each contain a hypermedia database of frequently asked questions, together with answers provided by subject experts. There is provision for inter‐student discussions of problems and issues. When students ask new questions these are automatically emailed to a relevant subject expert (determined by a subject‐specific concept thesaurus). The answer is then placed in the database which eventually grows to become a valuable teaching resource. KT is discipline‐independent as the concept thesaurus can be changed to encapsulate any domain of knowledge. We have used it in support of conventional lecture courses, as an important component of a multimedia course, and for general IT support. These examples illustrate the role that this system can play both in basic information provision, and in facilitating the discussion of deep issues

A review of recent determinations of the composition and surface pressure of the atmos- phere of mars

Recent determinations of composition and surface pressure of Mars atmospher

The Index Theorem and Universality Properties of the Low-lying Eigenvalues of Improved Staggered Quarks

We study various improved staggered quark Dirac operators on quenched gluon backgrounds in lattice QCD generated using a Symanzik-improved gluon action. We find a clear separation of the spectrum into would-be zero modes and others. The number of would-be zero modes depends on the topological charge as expected from the Index Theorem, and their chirality expectation value is large (approximately 0.7). The remaining modes have low chirality and show clear signs of clustering into quartets and approaching the random matrix theory predictions for all topological charge sectors. We conclude that improvement of the fermionic and gauge actions moves the staggered quarks closer to the continuum limit where they respond correctly to QCD topology.Comment: 4 pages, 3 figure

Tuning gastropod locomotion: Modeling the influence of mucus rheology on the cost of crawling

Common gastropods such as snails crawl on a solid substrate by propagating muscular waves of shear stress on a viscoelastic mucus. Producing the mucus accounts for the largest component in the gastropod's energy budget, more than twenty times the amount of mechanical work used in crawling. Using a simple mechanical model, we show that the shear-thinning properties of the mucus favor a decrease in the amount of mucus necessary for crawling, thereby decreasing the overall energetic cost of locomotion.Comment: Corrected typo