A continuously updated, geospatially rectified database of utility-scale wind turbines in the United States.

Over 60,000 utility-scale wind turbines are installed in the United States as of October, 2019, representing over 97 gigawatts of electric power capacity; US wind turbine installations continue to grow at a rapid pace. Yet, until April 2018, no publicly-available, regularly updated data source existed to describe those turbines and their locations. Under a cooperative research and development agreement, analysts from three organizations collaborated to develop and release the United States Wind Turbine Database (USWTDB) - a publicly available, continuously updated, spatially rectified data source of locations and attributes of utility-scale wind turbines in the United States. Technical specifications and wind facility data, incorporated from five sources, undergo rigorous quality control. The location of each turbine is visually verified using high-resolution aerial imagery. The quarterly-updated data are available in a variety of formats, including an interactive web application, comma-separated values (CSV), shapefile, and application programming interface (API). The data are used widely by academic researchers, engineers and developers from wind energy companies, government agencies, planners, educators, and the general public

Data from: Onshore industrial wind turbine locations for the United States up to March 2014

Wind energy is a rapidly growing form of renewable energy in the United States. While summary information on the total amounts of installed capacity are available by state, a free, centralized, national, turbine-level, geospatial dataset useful for scientific research, land and resource management, and other uses did not exist. Available in multiple formats and in a web application, these public domain data provide industrial-scale onshore wind turbine locations in the United States up to March 2014, corresponding facility information, and turbine technical specifications. Wind turbine records have been collected and compiled from various public sources, digitized or position verified from aerial imagery, and quality assured and quality controlled. Technical specifications for turbines were assigned based on the wind turbine make and model as described in public literature. In some cases, turbines were not seen in imagery or turbine information did not exist or was difficult to obtain. Uncertainty associated with these is recorded in a confidence rating

A continuously updated, geospatially rectified database of utility-scale wind turbines in the United States.

Over 60,000 utility-scale wind turbines are installed in the United States as of October, 2019, representing over 97 gigawatts of electric power capacity; US wind turbine installations continue to grow at a rapid pace. Yet, until April 2018, no publicly-available, regularly updated data source existed to describe those turbines and their locations. Under a cooperative research and development agreement, analysts from three organizations collaborated to develop and release the United States Wind Turbine Database (USWTDB) - a publicly available, continuously updated, spatially rectified data source of locations and attributes of utility-scale wind turbines in the United States. Technical specifications and wind facility data, incorporated from five sources, undergo rigorous quality control. The location of each turbine is visually verified using high-resolution aerial imagery. The quarterly-updated data are available in a variety of formats, including an interactive web application, comma-separated values (CSV), shapefile, and application programming interface (API). The data are used widely by academic researchers, engineers and developers from wind energy companies, government agencies, planners, educators, and the general public

Objective and subjective outcomes of strabismus surgery in Graves' orbitopathy: a prospective multicentre study

To assess the change and interrelationship of the field of binocular single vision (BSV) and the quality of life (QoL), tested with two different tools, after one or two strabismus surgeries in patients with Graves' orbitopathy (GO). Prospectively, consecutive patients with GO who were scheduled for their first strabismus surgery were recruited from five centres specialized in the treatment of GO. One week preoperatively and 3 months after the last operation, a full ophthalmic and orthoptic examination was performed. Change in field of BSV, GO-QoL and thyroid eye disease-QoL (TED-QoL) was recorded. A total of 59 met all the eligibility criteria of whom 15 underwent two strabismus operations. The median (interquartile range) preoperative score of the field of BSV was 0 (0-0), which improved to 73 (53-85) after the correction(s) (p < 0.001). After the first surgery, a significant higher score of the field of BSV was found in the patients who underwent one operation (76; 60-86) compared with those who underwent two 0 (0-63) operations (p < 0.001). After the second surgery, this score increased to 62 (40-76; p = 0.05). A moderate correlation was found between the score of the field of BSV and the GO-QoL visual functioning (VF) questionnaires (r = 0.485; p < 0.001). Both the GO-QoL and TED-QoL for VF and appearance (AP) showed significantly higher scores after the treatment (p < 0.001). After strabismus surgery in GO patients, both the field of BSV and quality of life questionnaires increase. In approximately 30% of the patients, an additional strabismus surgery is performed. This second surgery significantly expands the field of BSV and the quality of lif

The pastoral farming system: Balancing between tradition and transition

The African pastoral farming system consists of livestock and drylands crop-based production that supports an agricultural population of 38 million people of whom 13.4 million in sub-Saharan Africa are extremely poor. Human population growth has resulted in low per capita livestock and land resources, and while the farming system has options to develop agriculture, further demographic expansion will exacerbate degradation and inequality. While there is potential for agricultural development, e.g. through intensification and greater market orientation, such development needs to take into account pastoral peoples’ access rights to resources and minimize trade-offs with current land and water users. Effective drought management, a key to the success of pastoralism, relies on multiple resource management strategies and community interactions. Therefore, there is a need for policies that strengthen the resilience of agriculture and pastoralists livelihoods through, e.g. support to livestock mobility, agricultural insurance, sustainable land and water management as well as monetary and legal support for effective implementation. Interventions that strengthen opportunities for a future outside agriculture, such as education and job creation, are needed for those living in chronic poverty

Traits and selection strategies to improve root systems and water uptake in water-limited wheat crops

Wheat yields globally will depend increasingly on good management to conserve rainfall and new varieties that use water efficiently for grain production. Here we propose an approach for developing new varieties to make better use of deep stored water. We focus on water-limited wheat production in the summer-dominant rainfall regions of India and Australia, but the approach is generally applicable to other environments and root-based constraints. Use of stored deep water is valuable because it is more predictable than variable in-season rainfall and can be measured prior to sowing. Further, this moisture is converted into grain with twice the efficiently of in-season rainfall since it is taken up later in crop growth during the grain-filling period when the roots reach deeper layers. We propose that wheat varieties with a deeper root system, a redistribution of branch root density from the surface to depth, and with greater radial hydraulic conductivity at depth would have higher yields in rainfed systems where crops rely on deep water for grain fill. Developing selection systems for mature root system traits is challenging as there are limited high-throughput phenotyping methods for roots in the field, and there is a risk that traits selected in the lab on young plants will not translate into mature root system traits in the field. We give an example of a breeding programme that combines laboratory and field phenotyping with proof of concept evaluation of the trait at the beginning of the selection programme. This would greatly enhance confidence in a high-throughput laboratory or field screen, and avoid investment in screens without yield value. This approach requires careful selection of field sites and years that allow expression of deep roots and increased yield. It also requires careful selection and crossing of germplasm to allow comparison of root expression among genotypes that are similar for other traits, especially flowering time and disease and toxicity resistances. Such a programme with field and laboratory evaluation at the outset will speed up delivery of varieties with improved root systems for higher yield

Architecture of the outbred brown fat proteome defines regulators of metabolic physiology.

Brown adipose tissue (BAT) regulates metabolic physiology. However, nearly all mechanistic studies of BAT protein function occur in a single inbred mouse strain, which has limited the understanding of generalizable mechanisms of BAT regulation over physiology. Here, we perform deep quantitative proteomics of BAT across a cohort of 163 genetically defined diversity outbred mice, a model that parallels the genetic and phenotypic variation found in humans. We leverage this diversity to define the functional architecture of the outbred BAT proteome, comprising 10,479 proteins. We assign co-operative functions to 2,578 proteins, enabling systematic discovery of regulators of BAT. We also identify 638 proteins that correlate with protection from, or sensitivity to, at least one parameter of metabolic disease. We use these findings to uncover SFXN5, LETMD1, and ATP1A2 as modulators of BAT thermogenesis or adiposity, and provide OPABAT as a resource for understanding the conserved mechanisms of BAT regulation over metabolic physiology