Characterizing land surface processes: A quantitative analysis using air-ground thermal orbits

A quantitative analysis of thermal orbits is developed and applied to modeled air and ground temperatures. Thermal orbits are phase-space representations of air and ground temperature relationships that are generated by plotting daily or monthly ground temperatures against air temperatures. Thermal orbits are useful descriptive tools that provide straightforward illustrations of air and ground temperature relationships in the presence of land surface processes related to snow cover, soil freezing, and vegetation effects. The utility of thermal orbits has been limited, however, by the lack of quantitative analyses that describe changes in orbits across different environments or in time. This shortcoming is overcome in the present study by developing a linear regression analysis of thermal orbits that allows changes to be tracked in time and space and as a function of depth within the subsurface. The theory that underlies the thermal orbit regression analysis is developed herein, and the utility of the application is demonstrated using controlled model experiments

Goat Yoga: Preliminary Implications for Health, Agriculture, and 4-H

Goat yoga, an event that combines yoga and interactions with goats, may serve as a cross-initiative program that can promote both health and agriculture. This article describes the potential impact of goat yoga and the results of a pilot program. Adult attendees of the pilot event completed a questionnaire assessing knowledge of and intentions to be involved with yoga, goats, and 4-H. Participants increased their knowledge of each area and indicated intentions to use goat products and to visit the goat barn at the county fair. Future work is needed to establish effects of goat yoga within Extension, and, if successful, embed these practices at a large scale

Patient-Centered Medicine and Prevention of Munchausen Syndrome by Proxy

Munchausen syndrome by proxy (MSbP) is known by many names and is considered the deadliest form of child abuse. Although the condition was named in 1976 and there is now a substantial body of scientific literature about this type of abuse, to date, patient‐centered approaches to early identification, intervention, and prevention have been absent from this literature. The purpose of this chapter is to recommend patient‐centered approaches to identifying MSbP in the clinical setting to facilitate prevention and early intervention. It also recommends patient‐centered practices that can be implemented to reduce the MSbP‐related morbidity and mortality contributed by the healthcare system. The evolving nomenclature and definition of MSbP abuse has been an obstacle to achieving scientific consensus on the topic. Yet, the body of scientific literature on the subject is large. This literature is reviewed to enumerate the healthcare system\u27s contribution to MSbP abuse. The Haddon matrix, a public health framework, is applied to MSbP abuse in order to guide the development of recommendations of patient‐centered approaches that should be implemented to reduce the healthcare system\u27s contribution to the morbidity and mortality that MSbP victims face

Casimir Force between a Dielectric Sphere and a Wall: A Model for Amplification of Vacuum Fluctuations

The interaction between a polarizable particle and a reflecting wall is examined. A macroscopic approach is adopted in which the averaged force is computed from the Maxwell stress tensor. The particular case of a perfectly reflecting wall and a sphere with a dielectric function given by the Drude model is examined in detail. It is found that the force can be expressed as the sum of a monotonically decaying function of position and of an oscillatory piece. At large separations, the oscillatory piece is the dominant contribution, and is much larger than the Casimir-Polder interaction that arises in the limit that the sphere is a perfect conductor. It is argued that this enhancement of the force can be interpreted in terms of the frequency spectrum of vacuum fluctuations. In the limit of a perfectly conducting sphere, there are cancellations between different parts of the spectrum which no longer occur as completely in the case of a sphere with frequency dependent polarizability. Estimates of the magnitude of the oscillatory component of the force suggest that it may be large enough to be observable.Comment: 18pp, LaTex, 7 figures, uses epsf. Several minor errors corrected, additional comments added in the final two sections, and references update

Move More, Sit Less: Applying the Physical Activity Guidelines for Americans to Extension Programs

Extension enhances the lives of Americans by translating research-based information related to existing needs into programming that is practical and accessible to the general public. Evidence clearly indicates that physical activity is correlated to positive health outcomes, but despite this conclusion, the majority of Americans do not meet the recommendations for physical activity. The 2nd Edition of the Physical Activity Guidelines for Americans provides guidance for Extension professionals to implement physical activity interventions. We recommend training and technical assistance strategies based on the Interactive Systems Framework to integrate physical activity promotion into all Extension areas

The HITRAN 2008 molecular spectroscopic database

This paper describes the status of the 2008 edition of the HITRAN molecular spectroscopic database. The new edition is the first official public release since the 2004 edition, although a number of crucial updates had been made available online since 2004. The HITRAN compilation consists of several components that serve as input for radiative-transfer calculation codes: individual line parameters for the microwave through visible spectra of molecules in the gas phase; absorption cross-sections for molecules having dense spectral features, i.e. spectra in which the individual lines are not resolved; individual line parameters and absorption cross-sections for bands in the ultraviolet; refractive indices of aerosols, tables and files of general properties associated with the database; and database management software. The line-by-line portion of the database contains spectroscopic parameters for 42 molecules including many of their isotopologues. (c) 2009 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved

Microbial transport as affected by residue cover and manure application rate

Manure is applied to cropland areas with varying surface cover to meet single- or multiple-year crop nutrient requirements. The objectives of this field study were to (1) examine microbial transport following land application of manure to sites with and without wheat residue, (2) compare microbial loads following land application to meet the 0, 1, 2, 4, and 8-year P-based requirements for corn, and (3) evaluate the effects of rainfall simulation run on microbial transport. Manure was added and incorporated by disking plots that were 0.75 m wide by 2.0 m long. Three 30 min simulated rainfall events, separated by 24 h intervals, were then applied at an intensity of 70 mm h-1. Plots containing wheat residue had a total coliform load of 12.6 log CFU ha-1, which was significantly greater than the 12.4 log CFU ha-1 measured on the plots without wheat residue. The plots with and without wheat residue had transport rates of E. coli and enterococci that were not significantly different. The plots on which manure was added at rates varying from 5.4 to 42.8 Mg ha-1 had counts of total coliforms and enterococci that were not significantly different. Rainfall simulation run did not significantly affect measurements of phages, total coliforms, or enterococci. Transport of selected microbes was found to be significantly affected by residue cover, manure application rate, and rainfall simulation run

How do graduate civil engineers working in London learn global responsibility and support UN Sustainable Development Goals?

In this paper, we report what topics the participating engineers associated with global responsibility and how they learned about the topic over time. We then compare the findings with the UN’s SDGs and with recommendations by PwC regarding where engineers can make the most difference related to the SDGs

Unusual Low-frequency Magnetic Perturbations in TFTR

Low-frequency magnetic perturbations (less than or equal to 30 kHz) observed in the Tokamak Fusion Test Reactor (TFTR) tokamak do not always conform to expectations from Magneto-Hydro-Dynamic (MHD) modes. The discrepancy between observations and expectations arises from the existence of three classes of magnetic perturbations in TFTR: (1) 'Edge Originated Magnetic Perturbations' (EOMP's), (2) 'Kink-like Modes' (KLM's), and (3) Tearing Modes (TM's). The EOMP class has unusual magnetic phenomenon including up/down asymmetry in poloidal intensity variation that MHD modes alone cannot generate. The contributions of MHD modes in plasma edge regions are too small to explain the magnitude of observed EOMP perturbations. At least two-thirds, possibly nearly all, of magnetic perturbations in a typical EOMP originate from sources other than MHD modes. An EOMP has a unity toroidal harmonic number and a poloidal harmonic number close to a discharge's edge q-value. It produces little temperature fluctuations, except possibly in edge regions. The KLM class produces temperature fluctuations, mostly confined within the q=1 surface with an ideal-mode-like structure, but generates little external magnetic perturbations. The TM class conforms generally to expectations from MHD modes. We propose that current flowing in the Scrape-off-layer (SOL) plasma is a possible origin of EOMP's