Selective Factors in Human Survival

Author Institution: Miami University, Oxford, Ohi

Controlled traffic farming increased crop yield, root growth, and nitrogen supply at two organic vegetable farms

Increased farm machinery weight in agricultural production results in soil compaction. Controlled traffic farming (CTF) restricts traffic to permanent lanes, thereby creating traffic free beds for crop production. Field experiments were conducted at two organic vegetable farms in Denmark, on a sandy loam (2013–2016) and on coarse sand (2013–2015) to investigate CTF effects compared with random traffic farming (RTF) on vegetable yield, root growth, and soil mineral nitrogen (N). Root growth was measured using minirhizotrons. White cabbage, potato, and beetroot yield increased by 27%, 70% and 42%, respectively, in CTF compared with RTF in 2015 and winter squash indicated a yield increase of 43% on sandy loam in 2016. White cabbage (2015) and potato, beetroot and winter squash (2016) grew 2–25 times more roots and beetroot grew deeper roots under CTF compared with RTF on sandy loam in 2016. On coarse sandy soil, beetroot root frequency was 1.4 times greater under CTF than under RTF and beetroot roots grew deeper than 1.5 m under both treatments in 2015. Soil mineral N and potential net N mineralization were equal between treatments or higher in CTF by 2–41 kg ha−1 and 11 mg kg−1 35 days−1, respectively, indicating N supply was maintained or increased in this system. Despite the variability in crop and root growth responses to traffic between years and crops, the effects were always equal or positive for CTF following treatment implementation. Therefore, our results encourage the use of CTF for organic vegetable production under temperate conditions

THERMAL RADIATIVE HEAT TRANSFER TO SPACE FROM A BODY ENCLOSED BY A SEMITRANSPARENT BODY

Bumpers were proposed for protecting space radiator systems from penetration by meteoroids. The development of equations to determine the thermal energy dissipation to space by a hot body completely enclosed by a second body is presented. The particular case of heat dissipation from space radiators enclosed within the bumpers is considered, and the criteria for selection of bumper materials for a minimum weight radiator system are discussed. (auth

Controlled traffic farming increases root growth, crop and soil nitrogen in vegetable cropping systems

Results from field trials on sandy and sandy loam of controlled traffic farmin

On the acoustic diffraction by the edges of benthic shells

Author Posting. © Acoustical Society of America, 2004. This article is posted here by permission of Acoustical Society of America for personal use, not for redistribution. The definitive version was published in Journal of the Acoustical Society of America 116 (2004): 239-244, doi:10.1121/1.1675813.Recent laboratory measurements of acoustic backscattering by individual benthic shells have isolated the edge-diffracted echo from echoes due to the surface of the main body of the shell. The data indicate that the echo near broadside incidence is generally the strongest for all orientations and is due principally to the surface of the main body. At angles well away from broadside, the echo levels are lower and are due primarily to the diffraction from the edge of the shell. The decrease in echo levels from broadside incidence to well off broadside is shown to be reasonably consistent with the decrease in acoustic backscattering from normal incidence to well off normal incidence by a shell-covered seafloor. The results suggest the importance of the edge of the shell in off-normal-incidence backscattering by a shell-covered seafloor. Furthermore, when considering bistatic diffraction by edges, there are implications that the edge of the shell (lying on the seafloor) can cause significant scattering in many directions, including at subcritical angles.This research was supported by the U.S. Office of Naval Research (Grant No. N00014-02-1-0095) and the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution (WHOI), Woods Hole, MA

Increasing Capacity for Evaluation of Community-Based Organizations: Lessons from the Ohio Equity Institute

Background: Community-based organizations (CBOs) play an important role delivering disease prevention and health promotion activities to address community health needs and improve the health of individuals living in their communities. While CBOs play this important role, evaluation of the services they deliver is hampered by limited infrastructure to systematically collect data from these organizations. To address this gap, we report on a case study of the development of the Ohio Equity Institute (OEI) Data Portal. The OEI is a statewide initiative that supports 65 CBOs across Ohio to deliver 3 evidence-based interventions (ie, CenteringPregnancy, Community Health Workers, and Home Visiting) to address infant mortality in underserved populations. Methods: Employing principles of community-engaged stakeholder research and user-centered design, we conducted Plan-Do-Study-Act cycles, including semistructured interviews with 43 key informants, to improve the development, implementation, and use of the OEI Data Portal. Results: This process identified both technical and implementation challenges, and offered opportunities to make improvements to the data collection system itself as well as to the integration of this system with CBO workflows. These improvements yielded significant gains in terms of the quantity and quality of data submission, ultimately contributing to ongoing outcome evaluation efforts. Conclusion: Our findings provide important insight into the challenges experienced by CBOs when participating in a statewide CBO data evaluation infrastructure development and implementation. As Ohio and other states push to expand collaborations between CBOs and health care organizations, leaders should leverage existing data collection to facilitate a more comprehensive and effective process

Pseudomonas Wilt of Cotton.

8 p