244 research outputs found
Security Legislation in Namibia: Memorandum of the South West Africa (Namibian) Bar Council
In January, 1983, the Namibian Bar Council1 wrote a letter to the Namibian Administrator-General, the head of South Africa\u27s occupation regime in Namibia, urging him to create a judicial commission of inquiry. The purpose of such a commission was to investigate the security legislation in effect in the Territory and the alleged abuses in the application of that legislation.2 Given the political situation in Namibia, the request was daring and unprecedented. In South Africa, a call for a commission of inquiry is not ordinarily a party-political gesture. Rather, such a call indicates serious dissatisfaction with some aspect of the state\u27s financial, administrative, or judicial affairs. By its request, the Namibian Bar Council was questioning not just the territorial administration, but the South African regime that ruled Namibia against the will of its inhabitants and in defiance of international law.3 It was seeking, furthermore, a probe of the elements by which the South African government maintained its control
PHYSIOLOGICAL CHANGES IN WHITE-ROT FUNGI IN RESPONSE TO SIMULATED NITROGEN DEPOSITION ARE NOT READILY REVERSED THROUGH EXPERIMENTAL EVOLUTION
Increases in nitrogen (N) deposition have been shown to slow decomposition of organic material including lignin, particularly in forests with high lignin content. Since basidiomycete fungi are the primary decomposers of lignin, their response to increases in available N are of interest. The Chronic Nitrogen Amendment Study at the Harvard Forest Long-Term Ecological Research (CNAS HF-LTER) site is an experimental N gradient in Petersham, MA. Since 1988, three megaplots have received varying levels of NH4NO3: ambient-only deposition (control), 50 kg N ha-1 yr-1 (N50), or 150 kg N ha-1 yr-1 (N150). In order to examine how species of lignin-degrading basidiomycetes might evolve in response to increases in available N, isolates of Stereum complicatum, Irpex lacteus, and Panellus stipticus were reciprocally transplanted from the megaplots at CNAS HF-LTER onto a laboratory-simulated N gradient. These isolates were tested for their ability to decompose oak leaf litter, and were also subjected to an experimental evolution to test whether changes in litter decay capacity are inducible or reversible over shorter time periods. The short-term experimental evolution failed to change litter decay rates or enzyme activity profiles. However, for two of the three species, exposure to 25+ years of N addition significantly changed their decay capacities. S. complicatum isolated from the N150 plot exhibited increased decomposition capacity and N150 isolates of I. lacteus exhibited decreased decomposition capacity compared to control isolates of the same species. These finding suggest that N deposition may have long-lasting effects on the decay capacities of fungi that may help to explain suppression of decomposition which occurs with increases in N deposition
UAS Literary & Arts Journal
Proof copy provided by Tidal Echoes.Featuring the work of students, faculty, and staff of the University of Alaska Southeast and members of the community.A Note from Emily Wall -- Editor’s Note -- Mask -- Image of Nora, Rendering Seal Oil -- Based of course on hearsay -- Bowl with Spoon -- Gathering Indigo -- Shed -- Decay -- At the Core -- After Summer Time -- Sitka Fishing Boat -- Pericles at the Beach -- Funny Face Fido (detail) -- The Answer Dog -- Direction of the Wind -- Eagle -- An Interview with Nathan Jackson -- Water Becoming Land -- An Interview with John Straley -- Halibut Point View -- Night Monsters -- Sea Lion -- Trophy -- Humpback Flukes -- Homecoming -- Spinning Tires -- Hiking the Salt Chuck Trail -- Sitka Rose -- Columbine -- Chocolate Lily -- Bleeding Hearts -- Salmon Egg Puller—$2.15 an hour -- Granddaughters Dancing -- Sitka Sentinel -- Kootznoowoo -- Ode to Wildlife -- Dinner Party -- Floating Islands (detail) -- To My Departed Kishka -- Wisteria -- Untitled -- Fairweather Laundry -- Struggling with My Language -- “Culture” in the Juneau Museum -- Thane -- Juneau Goldbelt & 9th -- Pink Blue Leaves -- Slow Fall -- Tango -- Pacific Coast Mask with Copper Luster -- Against Confessional -- Sunday Afternoon 3:30 to 3:31 -- Downtown -- Tony, Six Flags Great Adventure, Jackson, New Jersey -- Land and Water Series -- On the Day They Buried Gus Hall -- Solju Sapnu -- Nattie -- The First Half of the Last Century -- A Church Remains -- Mexican Wall -- Eagle Reflections -- The Saving Son -- Axh Leelk’w -- Sinister Place -- Blue Halibuts -- Fishing Again -- The Masai -- Wanting to Know Water -- For Women Like Me -- Mountain Bleu -- Untitled -- Single Word Title -- Charms (detail) -- e.e isn’t Cummings back -- Mocha Gal -- Poppies -- Ideal Woman Blues -- Near the End -- Poet at Work -- Stills -- Serenity -- Lupine Bugs -- Spring Fiddleheads -- What a Piece of Work! -- Biographie
The effects of the coastal environment on the atmospheric mercury cycle
Peer Reviewedhttp://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/95186/1/jgrd10304.pd
UAS Literary & Arts Journal
Proof copy provided by Tidal Echoes.Featuring the work of students, faculty, and staff of the University of Alaska Southeast and members of the community.A Note from Loren, Sometimes Known as Senior Editor -- A Letter from Josh, Affectionately Known as “Sugah” (say it with a southern accent) -- A Note from Emily Wall -- On the Move -- Dangly Jangly Things -- Taco Surf -- Midwestern Trash -- On the Distaff Side -- Christmas Joy -- The Three Little McCormicks -- Trollin’ Ray’s Brain: An Interview with Ray Troll -- His Long Coat Turning -- First Autumn -- Pinta Cove Birthday Gifts -- September Wings -- When in Rome -- Early Morning Conspiracy Theory -- Flesh Wound -- Two Ravens, Five Ways -- Shades of Brown: The Question -- Hayfield-Clarke Psychiatric Center -- Hardscrabble -- Smoked Meat Sandwiches -- Slime Squishing Through Gold: An Interview with Nora Marks Dauenhauer -- Berries -- Buds -- Grandpa Jakwteen in Eclipse -- Cross Talk -- Voices -- Trouble -- Flying Home -- Snorkeling at Hanauma Bay -- Genocide -- Raven, Saving It for Later -- Mama Abel’s -- Settling In -- Blue -- Dad at 27 -- Dad photographs mother -- Backyard theatre & Oz -- Love-in, Easter Day, 1968 -- Topanga Corral -- Swallowing Senora -- Keeping Time on the Kee Nax Trail -- Ode to Ching -- Beneath the Surface (chapter title) -- A Visit from the Wild -- Teacher’s Pets -- Centennial -- See Spot Rot -- With Salsa -- Moonbaby -- The Fine Art of Raising a Tarpaulin -- Prologue -- Epiphany 2008 -- View of Auke Lake -- Shark Fins -- Translating Pasternak -- Raven Boys -- Institutional Back Door -- Uneasy Disguise -- Christmas Wind -- The Life and Times of the Orlando Bloom Fan Club -- Writer & Artist Biographie
Arctic Tundra Vegetation Functional Types Based on Photosynthetic Physiology and Optical Properties
Climate change in tundra regions may alter vegetation species composition and ecosystem carbon balance. Remote sensing provides critical tools for monitoring these changes as optical signals provide a way to scale from plot measurements to regional patterns. Gas exchange measurements of pure patches of key vegetation functional types (lichens, mosses, and vascular plants) in sedge tundra at Barrow AK, show three significantly different values of light use efficiency (LUE) with values of 0.013+/-0.001, 0.0018+/-0.0002, and 0.0012 0.0001 mol C/mol absorbed quanta for vascular plants, mosses and lichens, respectively. Further, discriminant analysis of patch reflectance identifies five spectral bands that can separate each vegetation functional type as well as nongreen material (bare soil, standing water, and dead leaves). These results were tested along a 100 m transect where midsummer spectral reflectance and vegetation coverage were measured at one meter intervals. Area-averaged canopy LUE estimated from coverage fractions of the three functional types varied widely, even over short distances. Patch-level statistical discriminant functions applied to in situ hyperspectral reflectance successfully unmixed cover fractions of the vegetation functional types. These functions, developed from the tram data, were applied to 30 m spatial resolution Earth Observing-1 Hyperion imaging spectrometer data to examine regional variability in distribution of the vegetation functional types and from those distributions, the variability of LUE. Across the landscape, there was a fivefold variation in tundra LUE that was correlated to a spectral vegetation index developed to detect vegetation chlorophyll content
Measuring hidden phenotype:Quantifying the shape of barley seeds using the Euler characteristic transform
Shape plays a fundamental role in biology. Traditional phenotypic analysis methods measure some features but fail to measure the information embedded in shape comprehensively. To extract, compare and analyse this information embedded in a robust and concise way, we turn to topological data analysis (TDA), specifically the Euler characteristic transform. TDA measures shape comprehensively using mathematical representations based on algebraic topology features. To study its use, we compute both traditional and topological shape descriptors to quantify the morphology of 3121 barley seeds scanned with X-ray computed tomography (CT) technology at 127 ÎĽm resolution. The Euler characteristic transform measures shape by analysing topological features of an object at thresholds across a number of directional axes. A Kruskal-Wallis analysis of the information encoded by the topological signature reveals that the Euler characteristic transform picks up successfully the shape of the crease and bottom of the seeds. Moreover, while traditional shape descriptors can cluster the seeds based on their accession, topological shape descriptors can cluster them further based on their panicle. We then successfully train a support vector machine to classify 28 different accessions of barley based exclusively on the shape of their grains. We observe that combining both traditional and topological descriptors classifies barley seeds better than using just traditional descriptors alone. This improvement suggests that TDA is thus a powerful complement to traditional morphometrics to comprehensively describe a multitude of 'hidden' shape nuances which are otherwise not detected.</p
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