68 research outputs found
Organic Farming Research Support and Research Priorities in the European Union
Support for Organic Farming focused research has increased significantly in successive EU research funding frameworks. This is in line with constantly increasing consumer demand for organic foods over the last 20 years, which has accelerated again over the last 2 years in many European countries, including new member states.
Under the 7th Framework Programme (FP7), the expected new increase of funds for organic farming could significantly decrease, even below the levels made available under the 5th Framework Programme (FP5). Most of the project topics listed focus on the development of methods for economic analyses of Organic Farming and/or follow a very “reductionist” one problem - one potential solution approach.
On the other side, as there is no clear instruments to establish priorities in research programmes at European level. The IFOAM EU Group has developed a consultation process to set organic farming sector priorities, which could be used as a model to set research priorities in the future.
This paper also presents a first assessment of the EU support to organic farming research, reviewing main achievements in organic food production systems research and proposing some changes in the current 7th Framework Programme
El proyecto Liveseeds, las semillas tradicionales y los huertos urbanos ecológi
La preservación, mejora y fomento del uso de semillas tradicionales en la agricultura ecológica, puede realizarse muy bien en los huertos urbanos, sobre todo en entornos donde se han perdido, si unimos a los multiplicadores de semillas en forma ecológica, con los usuarios de los huertos
Digital models of stone samples for didactical purposes
This paper presents a v irtual methodology based on the generation of virtual models of stones in the context of the virtual laboratories for the acquisition and evaluation of competences in stones identification. The generation of the models is carried out using a procedure based on close-range photogrammetry that allows to obtain a scaled mesh models with radiometric information and low file weight. The proposed methodology has been designed ad-hoc following the economy, quality and reality criteria to ensure a good adequacy, guaranteeing an adequate adaptation to the teaching-learning process and the integration of the models into working packages, which can be easily integrated in earning management system (LMS) platforms. The generated 3D models have a high level of detail and enable the interaction to take measurements, make cross sections and use specific tools that allow the student to perform a thorough analysis and identification of the stone using free/open source software.- (undefined
Fitomejoramoento participativo: Proyecto EU Liveseed
El proyecto europeo LIVESEED (Improve performance of organic agriculture by boosting organic seed and plant breeding efforts across Europe), coordinado por IFOAM EU, representa un consorcio integrado por 35 partners de 18 países UE y Suiza, con diferentes niveles del fitomejoramiento y desarrollo de semilla ecológicos. Incluye la implicación de centros de investigación, asociaciones, productores y distribuidores de semillas y materiales de reproducción ecológicos y productores y comercializadores de frutas y hortalizas ecológicas.
Por parte española participan la SEAE y la Universidad Politécnica de Valencia (UPV). El proyecto LIVESEED busca fortalecer la competitividad del sector ecológico de materiales de reproducción vegetal (fundamentalmente semilla) en la UE, mejorando la disponibilidad de materiales desarrollados y producidos bajo condiciones de cultivo ecológico. Con este fin, el proyecto plantea un conjunto de actividades con un enfoque participativo y multidisciplinar entre todos los socios implicados, así como diversos colaboradores (stakeholders) y grupos de trabajo presentes desde el inicio además de otros que se van incorporando gradualmente.
La principal actividad científica y divulgativa en la que está implicada la UPV como coordinadora, junto a la SEAE, es la mejora participativa de material vegetal adaptado a requerimientos agronómicos y comerciales del sector ecológico. Se presta espacial énfasis al tomate, pero también brásicas, manzanas y altramuces como cultivos representativos. Se están desarrollando grupos de trabajo europeos para analizar la situación específica de cada cultivo y sus principales retos. Asimismo, se desarrollarán actividades de selección y mejora participativa bajo condiciones de cultivo ecológico para los principales caracteres de interés agronómico desde la óptica del mercado ecológico. Centros de investigación, redes de semillas, compañías productoras, cooperativas, asociaciones de consumidores, distribuidores nacionales e internacionales están implicados en esta línea de trabajo
ORGANIC FARMING INTEGRITY IN MAIZE CULTIVATION IN SPAIN
Although now Genetically Modified Organism (GMO) maize varieties (Zea mays L. ) are legal in all EU Member States, Spain was the first European Union (EU) country where this type of varieties were cultivated, since 1998. Currently the Spanish Ministry of Agriculture, Fish and Food (MAPA), estimate ca. 12 % of the total conventional maize area was sown last year 2006 with these varieties. In the last five years 9 organic maize contamination cases have been report by 3 different EU organic certification bodies in Navarra, Aragón and Cataluña. But no actions to search sources of contamination, lessons to develop an improved coexistence regulation, were taken. Organic farmers never received any compensation for their losses. This paper analyse existing information, research studies and also interviews and visits to organic farms with maize, concluding that organic maize integrity is still not granted in Spain
Radio continuum observations of Class I protostellar disks in Taurus: constraining the greybody tail at centimetre wavelengths
We present deep 1.8 cm (16 GHz) radio continuum imaging of seven young
stellar objects in the Taurus molecular cloud. These objects have previously
been extensively studied in the sub-mm to NIR range and their SEDs modelled to
provide reliable physical and geometrical parametres.We use this new data to
constrain the properties of the long-wavelength tail of the greybody spectrum,
which is expected to be dominated by emission from large dust grains in the
protostellar disk. We find spectra consistent with the opacity indices expected
for such a population, with an average opacity index of beta = 0.26+/-0.22
indicating grain growth within the disks. We use spectra fitted jointly to
radio and sub-mm data to separate the contributions from thermal dust and radio
emission at 1.8 cm and derive disk masses directly from the cm-wave dust
contribution. We find that disk masses derived from these flux densities under
assumptions consistent with the literature are systematically higher than those
calculated from sub-mm data, and meet the criteria for giant planet formation
in a number of cases.Comment: submitted MNRA
A blind detection of a large, complex, Sunyaev--Zel'dovich structure
We present an interesting Sunyaev-Zel'dovich (SZ) detection in the first of
the Arcminute Microkelvin Imager (AMI) 'blind', degree-square fields to have
been observed down to our target sensitivity of 100{\mu}Jy/beam. In follow-up
deep pointed observations the SZ effect is detected with a maximum peak
decrement greater than 8 \times the thermal noise. No corresponding emission is
visible in the ROSAT all-sky X-ray survey and no cluster is evident in the
Palomar all-sky optical survey. Compared with existing SZ images of distant
clusters, the extent is large (\approx 10') and complex; our analysis favours a
model containing two clusters rather than a single cluster. Our Bayesian
analysis is currently limited to modelling each cluster with an ellipsoidal or
spherical beta-model, which do not do justice to this decrement. Fitting an
ellipsoid to the deeper candidate we find the following. (a) Assuming that the
Evrard et al. (2002) approximation to Press & Schechter (1974) correctly gives
the number density of clusters as a function of mass and redshift, then, in the
search area, the formal Bayesian probability ratio of the AMI detection of this
cluster is 7.9 \times 10^4:1; alternatively assuming Jenkins et al. (2001) as
the true prior, the formal Bayesian probability ratio of detection is 2.1
\times 10^5:1. (b) The cluster mass is MT,200 = 5.5+1.2\times 10^14h-1M\odot.
(c) Abandoning a physical model with num- -1.3 70 ber density prior and instead
simply modelling the SZ decrement using a phenomenological {\beta}-model of
temperature decrement as a function of angular distance, we find a central SZ
temperature decrement of -295+36 {\mu}K - this allows for CMB primary
anisotropies, receiver -15 noise and radio sources. We are unsure if the
cluster system we observe is a merging system or two separate clusters.Comment: accepted MNRAS. 12 pages, 9 figure
"Author! Author!" : Shakespeare and biography
Original article can be found at: http://www.informaworld.com/smpp/title~content=t714579626~db=all Copyright Informa / Taylor & Francis Group. DOI: 10.1080/17450910902764454Since 1996, not a year has passed without the publication of at least one Shakespeare biography. Yet for many years the place of the author in the practice of understanding literary works has been problematized, and even on occasions eliminated. Criticism reads the “works”, and may or may not refer to an author whose “life” contributed to their meaning. Biography seeks the author in the works, the personality that precedes the works and gives them their characteristic shape and meaning. But the form of literary biography addresses the unusual kind of “life” that puts itself into “works”, and this is particularly challenging where the “works” predominate massively over the salient facts of the “life”. This essay surveys the current terrain of Shakespeare biography, and considers the key questions raised by the medium: can we know anything of Shakespeare's “personality” from the facts of his life and the survival of his works? What is the status of the kind of speculation that inevitably plays a part in biographical reconstruction? Are biographers in the end telling us as much about themselves as they tell us about Shakespeare?Peer reviewe
Planck Intermediate Results II: Comparison of Sunyaev-Zeldovich measurements from Planck and from the Arcminute Microkelvin Imager for 11 galaxy clusters
A comparison is presented of Sunyaev-Zeldovich measurements for 11 galaxy
clusters as obtained by Planck and by the ground-based interferometer, the
Arcminute Microkelvin Imager. Assuming a universal spherically-symmetric
Generalised Navarro, Frenk & White (GNFW) model for the cluster gas pressure
profile, we jointly constrain the integrated Compton-Y parameter (Y_500) and
the scale radius (theta_500) of each cluster. Our resulting constraints in the
Y_500-theta_500 2D parameter space derived from the two instruments overlap
significantly for eight of the clusters, although, overall, there is a tendency
for AMI to find the Sunyaev-Zeldovich signal to be smaller in angular size and
fainter than Planck. Significant discrepancies exist for the three remaining
clusters in the sample, namely A1413, A1914, and the newly-discovered Planck
cluster PLCKESZ G139.59+24.18. The robustness of the analysis of both the
Planck and AMI data is demonstrated through the use of detailed simulations,
which also discount confusion from residual point (radio) sources and from
diffuse astrophysical foregrounds as possible explanations for the
discrepancies found. For a subset of our cluster sample, we have investigated
the dependence of our results on the assumed pressure profile by repeating the
analysis adopting the best-fitting GNFW profile shape which best matches X-ray
observations. Adopting the best-fitting profile shape from the X-ray data does
not, in general, resolve the discrepancies found in this subset of five
clusters. Though based on a small sample, our results suggest that the adopted
GNFW model may not be sufficiently flexible to describe clusters universally.Comment: update to metadata author list onl
AMI-LA radio continuum observations of Spitzer c2d small clouds and cores: Serpens region
We present deep radio continuum observations of the cores identified as
deeply embedded young stellar objects in the Serpens molecular cloud by the
Spitzer c2d programme at a wavelength of 1.8cm with the Arcminute Microkelvin
Imager Large Array (AMI-LA). These observations have a resolution of ~30arcsec
and an average sensitivity of 19microJy/beam. The targets are predominantly
Class I sources, and we find the detection rate for Class I objects in this
sample to be low (18%) compared to that of Class 0 objects (67%), consistent
with previous works. For detected objects we examine correlations of radio
luminosity with bolometric luminosity and envelope mass and find that these
data support correlations found by previous samples, but do not show any
indiction of the evolutionary divide hinted at by similar data from the Perseus
molecular cloud when comparing radio luminosity with envelope mass. We conclude
that envelope mass provides a better indicator for radio luminosity than
bolometric luminosity, based on the distribution of deviations from the two
correlations. Combining these new data with archival 3.6cm flux densities we
also examine the spectral indices of these objects and find an average spectral
index of 0.53+/-1.14, consistent with the canonical value for a partially
optically thick spherical or collimated stellar wind. However, we caution that
possible inter-epoch variability limits the usefulness of this value, and such
variability is supported by our identification of a possible flare in the radio
history of Serpens SMM 1.Comment: accepted MNRA
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