Student perceptions of environmental management : profiling the future environmental manager

Large growth is expected in the environment industry in coming decades; especially in Australia where the government\u27s new price on carbon began in July 2012. This growth inevitably raises the question of who will fill new environmental management roles. This article presents the perceptions and expectations of students who are beginning to think about a possible career in this sector; what influences their decision-making and how do they view a career as an environmental manager? Without this information the environment sector will be under prepared for the expectations of incoming recruits and may lose valued students, graduates and employees. We found that prospective environmental managers are passionate and committed individuals who express a desire to help create a better world. They fail, however, to adequately articulate what environmental management entails, and have a poor understanding of the industry. They appear to be worried about financial security in what they see as a growing, but not yet fully mature, industry. The environment sector must therefore take the opportunity to engage these future environmental managers, and to communicate where the field will lead and how it can help this next generation achieve their aspirations to ‘save the planet’

Imperfections in a two-dimensional hierarchical structure

Hierarchical and fractal designs have been shown to yield high mechanical efficiency under a variety of loading conditions. Here a fractal frame is optimized for compressive loading in a two-dimensional space. We obtain the dependence of volume required for stability against loading for which the structure is optimized and a set of scaling relationships is found. We evaluate the dependence of the Hausdorff dimension of the optimal structure on the applied loading and establish the limit to which it tends under gentle loading. We then investigate the effect of a single imperfection in the structure through both analytical and simulational techniques. We find that a single asymmetric perturbation of beam thickness, increasing or decreasing the failure load of the individual beam, causes the same decrease in overall stability of the structure. A scaling relationship between imperfection magnitude and decrease in failure loading is obtained. We calculate theoretically the limit to which the single perturbation can effect the overall stability of higher generation frames

Eu-Social Science: The Role of Internet Social Networks in the Collection of Bee Biodiversity Data

Background Monitoring change in species diversity, community composition and phenology is vital to assess the impacts of anthropogenic activity and natural change. However, monitoring by trained scientists is time consuming and expensive. Methodology/Principal Findings Using social networks, we assess whether it is possible to obtain accurate data on bee distribution across the UK from photographic records submitted by untrained members of the public, and if these data are in sufficient quantity for ecological studies. We used Flickr and Facebook as social networks and Flickr for the storage of photographs and associated data on date, time and location linked to them. Within six weeks, the number of pictures uploaded to the Flickr BeeID group exceeded 200. Geographic coverage was excellent; the distribution of photographs covered most of the British Isles, from the south coast of England to the Highlands of Scotland. However, only 59% of photographs were properly uploaded according to instructions, with vital information such as ‘tags’ or location information missing from the remainder. Nevertheless, this incorporation of information on location of photographs was much higher than general usage on Flickr (∼13%), indicating the need for dedicated projects to collect spatial ecological data. Furthermore, we found identification of bees is not possible from all photographs, especially those excluding lower abdomen detail. This suggests that giving details regarding specific anatomical features to include on photographs would be useful to maximise success. Conclusions/Significance The study demonstrates the power of social network sites to generate public interest in a project and details the advantages of using a group within an existing popular social network site over a traditional (specifically-designed) web-based or paper-based submission process. Some advantages include the ability to network with other individuals or groups with similar interests, and thus increasing the size of the dataset and participation in the project

Vibration analysis of polar orthotropic discs using the transfer matrix method

The well known transfer matrix scheme of Ehrich for calculating the vibration characteristics of uniform and varying thickness discs is extended to include polar orthotropic material behaviour. The exact deflection equations for an annular element of material are used in the solution. Comparisons with alternative solutions in the literature show excellent agreement for both annular and complete discs of uniform and varying thickness profile

Vibroacoustic response of a honeycomb panel in the IAR space chamber

NRC publication: Ye

Improving the fuel efficiency of road freight operations

Available from British Library Document Supply Centre-DSC:9349.436(32) / BLDSC - British Library Document Supply CentreSIGLEGBUnited Kingdo