The Book of the People

This volume is an accessible commentary to the Torah, putting each of the books into its ancient Near Eastern context

Creation of the Stormwater Banking Program (SBP), a Voluntary, Market-Based Mechanism to Improve Water Quality

2010 S.C. Water Resources Conference - Science and Policy Challenges for a Sustainable Futur

Another Sumerian Literary Catalogue?

no abstrac

Interventions for Mitigating Drought-Related Livestock Mortality in Africa’s Pastoral Areas: A Review of Their Relevance and Effectiveness with Special Reference to Kenya

One of the key challenges facing pastoral livestock production in Africa’s drylands is the recurring drought which triggers shortage of grazing resources and massive losses of livestock. Though the pastoralists have traditional drought coping mechanisms, the changing land use, insecure land-tenure arrangements, and the declining natural resource base, have undermined the effectiveness of the mechanisms and worsen the drought impacts. Several interventions have hence been implemented over the years to mitigate the increasing drought impacts and to create more resilient pastoralist societies. Focusing on Kenyan pastoral areas, this study reviewed the relevance and effectiveness of various interventions in reducing the drought-related livestock mortalities. The results show that drought interventions such as destocking programs, supplementary feeding, provision of early warning information, water development, and veterinary services were commonly implemented, but often at the late stage of drought cycles with little emphasis on sustainability

Market Orientation in the Shanghai Automotive Industry: An Exploratory Study

This paper focuses on whether companies can develop market orientation (MO) to improve business performance (BP) in the Shanghai automotive industry, operating in an emerging economy, and finds that companies within the Shanghai automotive industry do adopt a MO at different levels, with most companies at or below the middle level. In order to measure BP, this research employs both subjective and objective measures, and the research findings indicate that MO is positively correlated with BP by a subjective measure, and that companies with a higher degree of MO are more likely to display higher levels of BP. However, if objective measures are used, the results are mixed. There is a significant positive association between MO and annual profit per employee and return on total assets, a weak positive association between MO and annual sales per employee, and no relationship between MO and return on equity

Studies of leaching, recovery and recycling of heavy metals

This thesis was submitted for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy and awarded by Brunel University, 04/02/2008.The leachability of cadmium, cobalt, copper, lead, nickel and zinc metals and their oxides, sulfides and carbonates by water, 0.5 mol dm-3 CH3COOH, 0.1 mol dm -3 HCl/NaCI (1: 1 mixture) and 2 mol dm -3 HNO3 is reported. The concentrations of the leached heavy metals are compared with the trigger levels set by World Health Organisation (WHO). Three leaching solutions (nitric, sulfuric and hydrochloric acids) were used to extract copper, zinc, cobalt, nickel, iron and lead from spent catalysts prior to the application of separation technologies. Leaching experiments were conducted using both traditional methods and a microwave-assisted extraction technique. Data are provided on the effects of leaching temperature, leaching time, solid to liquid ratio and acid concentration on the extraction of different metals. The use of 2 mol dm-3 sulfuric acid at 50°C for 60 minutes and at a solid/liquid (S/L) ratio of 1: 25 achieved more than 90% extraction for all the metals studied. A comparison of the results from traditional and microwave extraction techniques demonstrates that microwave heating reduced the time required to obtain maximum metal extraction. The kinetics for the traditional extraction procedure showed that diffusion was the ratecontrolling process, but it was not possible to conclusively establish the rate controlling process for the microwave leaching. The feasibility of using an electrodialysis process to separate metal ions, such as copper from zinc, was examined. A laboratory-scale three compartments membrane system was designed, constructed, used and optimised for the separation process. The separation of copper from zinc in the electrodialysis process exploited the greater stability of the Cu-EDTA complex compared with the Zn-EDTA complex. It was observed that Zn 2+ ions migrated through the cation-exchange membrane from central compartment to catholyte and, simultaneously, the negative Cu-EDTA complex transferred to the analyte compartment crossing the anion exchange membrane. The technique was successfully used to separate mixtures of Cu: Cd and Zn: Ni. The technique could not, however, be used for the separation of Zn from Cd. An adsorption process was used to prepare copper, iron, nickel and zinc oxides catalysts on y-A1203 as support. The materials prepared were used in a fixed bed reactor to assess the catalytic oxidation of volatile organic compounds (methane and ethane) in air. Cu/y- A1203 was found to be the most promising catalyst for the complete oxidation of methane and ethane at temperatures of 575°C and 525°C, respectively. Increasing the calcination temperature in the drying and pre-treatment of the catalysts resulted in a decrease in the catalytic activity

Penetration and cratering experiments of graphite by 0.5-mm diameter steel spheres at various impact velocities

Cratering experiments have been conducted with 0.5-mm diameter AISI 52100 steel spherical projectiles and 30-mm diameter, 15-mm long graphite targets. The latter were made of a commercial grade of polycrystalline and porous graphite named EDM3 whose behavior is known as macroscopically isotropic. A two-stage light-gas gun launched the steel projectiles at velocities between 1.1 and 4.5 km s 1. In most cases, post-mortem tomographies revealed that the projectile was trapped, fragmented or not, inside the target. It showed that the apparent crater size and depth increase with the impact velocity. This is also the case of the crater volume which appears to follow a power law significantly different from those constructed in previous works for similar impact conditions and materials. Meanwhile, the projectile depth of penetration starts to decrease at velocities beyond 2.2 km s 1. This is firstly because of its plastic deformation and then, beyond 3.2 km s 1, because of its fragmentation. In addition to these three regimes of penetration behavior already described by a few authors, we suggest a fourth regime in which the projectile melting plays a significant role at velocities above 4.1 km s 1. A discussion of these four regimes is provided and indicates that each phenomenon may account for the local evolution of the depth of penetration