A systematic review of almost three decades of Value Sensitive Design (VSD): What happened to the technical investigations?

Data extraction and search historie

Covid-19 UK government, winter 2020, Tiered restrictions data

During the COVID-19 pandemic, several countries took the approach of tiered restrictions. The UK Government’s Winter 2020 Plan looked to take a data driven approach to decision making. They proposed a set of factors (criteria) that would be used to determine what level of restrictions of movement (Tier) should be imposed on different geographical areas in England. Restrictions were tiered from Tier-1 to Tier-4, with Tier-1 being the most relaxed set of restrictions and Tier-4 representing the most constrained level of restrictions. The set of criteria, to determine which Tier from 1 to 4 an area should be placed in were, (1) case detection rate in all age groups, (2) case detection in people aged 60 or above, (3) how quickly case rates were rising or falling, (4) ratio of positive cases in the general population, (5) pressure on the healthcare service. England is geographically made up of 9 Regions which each contains a set of Lower Tier Local Authority (LTLA) areas. Each observation in the dataset denotes information for an LTLA and date pair. For each observation, there is data relating to the values of the set of 5 criteria, for that LTLA, on that day, along with the accompanying Tier value the LTLA was in on that day. Data relating to the set of 5 criteria represent 7-day rolling averages, as a common practice, to alleviate discrepancies in the reporting velocity at different days of the week. For example, it is the case that the number of reported cases around weekends were invariably lower than the cases on other days

Measuring plot scale woodland structure using terrestrial laser scanning

Terrestrial laser scanning (TLS) can be used to characterize a woodland site by measuring structural attributes of the vegetation community. In Australia, government funded programs monitor vegetation structure using manual field surveys to assess change and ecological condition. In this study, we examined whether structural attributes commonly assessed in woodland ecology surveys can be extracted from a single TLS scan. Attributes of the ground, shrub and overstory vegetation layers were evaluated at nine open woodland sites in central Western Queensland. We used 0.1\ua0m voxels to aggregate returns. Our results show that, compared with field assessment by highly experienced ecologists, TLS can rapidly characterize structural attributes for tree canopy cover, maximum tree height, average tree height (R\ua0>\ua00.9) and average diameter at breast height (R\ua0=\ua00.77). However, we could not accurately determine shrub height, shrub canopy cover, shrub average height, ground cover (grass, litter and coarse woody debris) or the number of trees per hectare (R\ua

Information Policymaking in the United Kingdom: The Role of the Information Professional

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 License: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/Should a state have a single overarching national information policy? Currently for the United Kingdom, Buckley Owen, Cooke, and Matthews say no, and suggest that their analysis may be relevant elsewhere. Their conclusion is based on primary and secondary research including interviews with policymakers/implementers at the highest level. In their investigation into UK government policy on citizens’ access to Public Sector Information, they map responsibility for eighteen different information policy issues across nine government departments, noting the diversity of the issues. Instead of a single rule, they offer a “framework” of elements, often representing cross-cutting issues, and offer suggestions for managing their coordination. They note the influence of experts and lobbyists on this process, and see a potential role for “information professionals” who know both technology and policy, with the relevant professional body playing a leading role. The authors conclude with ten recommendations for operationalizing their approach

Changes in the surface water chemistry at low tide in drainage channels at East Trinity coastal wetland, Cairns (August 2013)

In this study surface water monitoring was undertaken at a number of locations at the East Trinity wetland site in August 2013 to gain an understanding of the flux of constituents from the drainage system. The monitoring period was set to co-inside with the extreme low-tide cycle to allow the best opportunity to measure flux

Invasiveness of agronomic weed species in wheat in Western Australia

Weed seeds are introduced to agronomic systems naturally or through human-mediated seed dispersal, and introduced seeds have a high chance of being resistant to selective, in-crop herbicides. However, colonisation (invasion) rates for a weed species are usually much lower than rates of seed dispersal. The current research investigated colonisation of a winter annual wheat cropping system in Western Australia by a range of winter or summer annual weed species. The weed seeds were sown (at 100 seeds/m2) directly before seeding the crop in 2016 and allowed to grow in the following 3 years of wheat. Selective herbicides were not applied, to simulate growth of weed populations if the initial seed had been resistant to herbicide. Bromus diandrus, Hordeum leporinum, Rumex hypogaeus, Sonchus oleraceus, Polygonum aviculare, Lolium rigidum, Citrullus amarus and Tribulus terrestris colonised the crop, while Dactyloctenium radulans, Chloris truncata and Salsola australis failed to establish over 3 years. The most successful weed was B. diandrus, with a plant density of 1,170/m2 by the third year and seed production of 67,740/m2. The high density of B. diandrus reduced wheat density by 76% in the third year and reduced average yield by 36%. Lolium rigidum reduced average yield by 11%, and the other weed species did not affect crop yield. Further research is required on the invasiveness of these species in other regions, but it is clear that the spread of B. diandrus to new areas or the introduction of resistant B. diandrus seeds via contaminated grain should be avoided