Installation Tools for Hydraulically Fitted Coupling Hubs - Precautions and Design Requirements

Special PaperPg. 159-166The tools used to install hydraulically fitted hubs need to be as carefully designed and manufactured as the couplings themselves. The authors describe an installation of coupling hubs on upgraded machines where tools that were designed to be used on a coupling for a 6.0 in diameter shaft were adapted to mount a coupling on an 8.0 in shaft. The larger forces involved caused a threaded rod to fracture and the coupling hub to be expelled from the shaft end with considerable force and velocity. An after-the-fact analysis of these "design alpha" tools is presented, along with a technical description of the forces acting upon a newly mounted hub and the velocity with which such a hub could be expelled from a shaft end. The 8.0 in hub was successfully installed on the shaft using modified "design alpha" tooling for expediency, but this modification was considered to be only a stopgap solution. The authors designed new "design beta" tools to accomplish the installation of the coupling hubs safely. The analysis of the "design beta" tools is described along with the important criteria to be considered for coupling hub installation tools

Technical assistance to strengthen national agricultural research organizations’ capacity to use digital sequence information. A submission from CGIAR

CGIAR submitted this report in response to an open request from the Plant Treaty Secretary, for submissions regarding, a) contracting parties’ and stakeholders’ capacity building needs for accessing and using digital sequence information (DSI)/genomic sequence data (GSD) and b) ‘technical assistance’ and ‘actions taken’ by stakeholders (including CGIAR) ‘to reduce the existing gap on capacity regarding DSI/GSD’. The primary objective of this paper is to respond to the second part of the request by sharing information about how CGIAR Centers and Initiatives have been assisting organizations outside CGIAR to access, generate, share, analyse, and use DSI for the conservation of plant genetic resources for food and agriculture (PRGFA) and for the use of PGRFA in pre-breeding and breeding. This paper does not provide an exhaustive account of all of the Centers’ relevant activities, but it does provide a general overview of the kinds of activities in which the Centers have been engaged. CGIAR very much appreciates the Governing Body’s initiative, as expressed in Resolution 16/2022, to ask the Plant Treaty Secretariat to gather and synthesize information about both demand for, and supply of, capacity strengthening related to DSI linked to plant genetic resources for food and agriculture, with the overall objective of working to close the capacity gap between developed and developing countries. It is our hope that, based on the outcomes of this exercise, CGIAR will be able to further adapt and improve its own approach to capacity sharing in response to needs prioritized by the Governing Body

Tools for measuring, modelling, and valuing ecosystem services: guidance for Key Biodiversity Areas, natural World Heritage Sites, and protected areas

Increasing interest in measuring, modelling and valuing ecosystem services (ES), the benefits that ecosystems provide to people, has resulted in the development of an array of ES assessment tools in recent years. Selecting an appropriate tool for measuring and modelling ES can be challenging. This document provides guidance for practitioners on existing tools that can be applied to measure or model ES provided by important sites for biodiversity and nature conservation, including Key Biodiversity Areas (KBAs), natural World Heritage sites (WHS), and protected areas (PAs). Selecting an appropriate tool requires identifying the specific question being addressed, what sorts of results or outputs are required, and consideration of practical factors such as the level of expertise, time and data required for applying any given tool. This guide builds on existing reviews of ES assessment tools, but has an explicit focus on assessing ES for sites of importance for biodiversity and nature conservation