Disciplining the sustainable city: Moving beyond science, technology or society?

Is interdisciplinary research possible? Over the past decade three UK research councils, the Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council (EPSRC), the Natural Environment Research Council (NERC) and the Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC), have collectively put over £30 million into a key interdisciplinary research site – the ‘sustainable city’. This paper examines how the Research Councils framed the problem of the sustainable city and, in so doing, put interdisciplinarity into practice. In each case, the Councils recognised that the problems of the sustainable city transcended conventional disciplinary boundaries but the collective outcome of their research has remained resolutely disciplinary in focus, something that has been particularly frustrating for policymakers and other potential users. The tension between recognising the complexity of the research problem and formulating realistic research questions is most apparent in the research programmes through which Research Council mapped the original interdisciplinary problem on to the more narrow set of disciplinary paradigms they represent. Thus EPSRC sees the ‘sustainable city’ mainly in terms of technological systems and fixes; NERC sees it in terms of the flows and stocks of natural resources; ESRC sees it a distinctive form of social organisation. Unfortunately, in setting the problem up in this way, what was originally a complex combination of science AND technology AND society has been reduced to science OR technology OR society. In other words, to the extent that interdisciplinary research occurred, then it was within research councils not between research councils. The critical question is whether this outcome could or should have been avoided. As Science and Technology Studies (STS) shows, moving between scientific disciplines, particularly non-cognate ones, raises problems of incommensurability in both language and purpose. Yet interdisciplinarity requires this and more. The perspectives are supposed to add up the single, integrated view that policy-makers and other users can use to inform decisions and take action. Given what we now know about the risk and uncertainty within even the narrow boundaries of disciplinary science, this paper argues that seeking certainty in interdisciplinarity is to search for the Holy Grail. Policy-makers and others will need to find other ways to act

Diffusion of Atomic Oxygen on the Si(100) Surface

The processes of etching and diffusion of atomic oxygen on the reconstructed Si(100)-2 × 1 surface are investigated using an embedded cluster QM/MM (Quantum Mechanics/Molecular Mechanics) method, called SIMOMM (Surface Integrated Molecular Orbital Molecular Mechanics). Hopping of an oxygen atom along the silicon dimer rows on a Si15H16 cluster embedded in an Si136H92 MM cluster model is studied using the SIMOMM/UB3LYP (unrestricted density functional theory (UDFT) with the Becke three-parameter Lee−Yang−Parr (B3LYP) hybrid functional) approach, the Hay−Wadt effective core potential, and its associated double-ζ plus polarization basis set. The relative energies at stationary points on the diffusion potential energy surface were also obtained with three coupled-cluster (CC) methods, including the canonical CC approach with singles, doubles, and noniterative quasi-perturbative triples (CCSD(T)), the canonical left-eigenstate completely renormalized (CR) analogue of CCSD(T), termed CR-CC(2,3), and the linear scaling variant of CR-CC(2,3) employing the cluster-in-molecule (CIM) local correlation ansatz, abbreviated as CIM-CR-CC(2,3). The pathway and energetics for the diffusion of oxygen from one dimer to another are presented, with the activation energy estimated to be 71.9 and 74.4 kcal/mol at the canonical CR-CC(2,3)/6-31G(d) and extrapolated, CIM-based, canonical CR-CC(2,3)/6-311G(d) levels of theory, respectively. The canonical and CIM CR-CC(2,3)/6-31G(d) barrier heights (excluding zero point vibrational energy contributions) for the etching process are both 87.3 kcal/mol

The beginnings of geography teaching and research in the University of Glasgow: the impact of J.W. Gregory

J.W. Gregory arrived in Glasgow from Melbourne in 1904 to take up the post of foundation Professor of Geology in the University of Glasgow. Soon after his arrival in Glasgow he began to push for the setting up of teaching in Geography in Glasgow, which came to pass in 1909 with the appointment of a Lecturer in Geography. This lecturer was based in the Department of Geology in the University's East Quad. Gregory's active promotion of Geography in the University was matched by his extensive writing in the area, in textbooks, journal articles and popular books. His prodigious output across a wide range of subject areas is variably accepted today, with much of his geomorphological work being judged as misguided to varying degrees. His 'social science' publications - in the areas of race, migration, colonisation and economic development of Africa and Australia - espouse a viewpoint that is unacceptable in the twenty-first century. Nonetheless, that viewpoint sits squarely within the social and economic traditions of Gregory's era, and he was clearly a key 'Establishment' figure in natural and social sciences research in the first half of the twentieth century. The establishment of Geography in the University of Glasgow remains enduring testimony of J.W. Gregory's energy, dedication and foresight

Clustering approaches to improve the performance of low cost air pollution sensors

Low cost air pollution sensors have substantial potential for atmospheric research and for the applied control of pollution in the urban environment, including more localized warnings to the public. The current generation of single-chemical gas sensors experience degrees of interference from other co-pollutants and have sensitivity to environmental factors such as temperature, wind speed and supply voltage. There are uncertainties introduced also because of sensor-to-sensor response variability, although this is less well reported. The sensitivity of Metal Oxide Sensors (MOS) to volatile organic compounds (VOCs) changed with relative humidity (RH) by up to a factor of five over the range 19-90%RH and with an uncertainty in the correction of a factor two at any given RH. The short-term (second to minute) stabilities of MOS and electrochemical CO sensor responses were reasonable. During more extended use inter-sensor quantitative comparability was degraded due to unpredictable variability in individual sensor responses (to either measurand or interference or both) drifting over timescales of several hours to days. For timescales longer than a week identical sensors showed slow, often downwards, drifts in their responses which diverged across six CO sensors by up to 30% after two weeks. The measurement derived from the median sensor within clusters of 6, 8 and up to 21 sensors was evaluated against individual sensor performance and external reference values. The clustered approach maintained the cost competitiveness of a sensor device, but the median concentration from the ensemble of sensor signals largely eliminated the randomised hour-to-day response drift seen in individual sensors and excluded the effects of small numbers of poorly performing sensors that drifted significantly over longer time periods. The results demonstrate that for individual sensors to be optimally comparable to one another, and to reference instruments, they would likely require frequent calibration. The use of a cluster median value eliminates unpredictable medium term response changes, and other longer term outlier behaviours, extending the likely period needed between calibration and making a linear interpolation between calibrations more appropriate. Through the use of sensor clusters rather than individual sensors existing low cost technologies could deliver significantly improved quality of observations

Insights into the molecular control of cross‑incompatibility in Zea mays

Gametophytic cross-incompatibility systems in corn have been the subject of genetic studies for more than a century. They have tremendous economic potential as a genetic mechanism for controlling fertilization without controlling pollination. Three major genetically distinct and functionally equivalent cross-incompatibility systems exist in Zea mays: Ga1, Tcb1, and Ga2. All three confer reproductive isolation between maize or teosinte varieties with different haplotypes at any one locus. These loci confer genetically separable functions to the silk and pollen: a female function that allows the silk to block fertilization by non-self-type pollen and a male function that overcomes the block of the female function from the same locus. Identification of some of these genes has shed light on the reproductive isolation they confer. The identification of both male and female factors as pectin methylesterases reveals the importance of pectin methylesterase activity in controlling the decision between pollen acceptance versus rejection, possibly by regulating the degree of methylesterification of the pollen tube cell wall. The appropriate level and spatial distribution of pectin methylesterification is critical for pollen tube growth and is affected by both pectin methylesterases and pectin methylesterase inhibitors. We present a molecular model that explains how cross-incompatibility systems may function that can be tested in Zea and uncharacterized cross-incompatibility systems. Molecular characterization of these loci in conjunction with further refinement of the underlying molecular and cellular mechanisms will allow researchers to bring new and powerful tools to bear on understanding reproductive isolation in Zea mays and related species

Global public policy, transnational policy communities, and their networks

Public policy has been a prisoner of the word "state." Yet, the state is reconfigured by globalization. Through "global public–private partnerships" and "transnational executive networks," new forms of authority are emerging through global and regional policy processes that coexist alongside nation-state policy processes. Accordingly, this article asks what is "global public policy"? The first part of the article identifies new public spaces where global policies occur. These spaces are multiple in character and variety and will be collectively referred to as the "global agora." The second section adapts the conventional policy cycle heuristic by conceptually stretching it to the global and regional levels to reveal the higher degree of pluralization of actors and multiple-authority structures than is the case at national levels. The third section asks: who is involved in the delivery of global public policy? The focus is on transnational policy communities. The global agora is a public space of policymaking and administration, although it is one where authority is more diffuse, decision making is dispersed and sovereignty muddled. Trapped by methodological nationalism and an intellectual agoraphobia of globalization, public policy scholars have yet to examine fully global policy processes and new managerial modes of transnational public administration