Vulnerability Assessment On Water Management For Climate Change Adaptation : Case Study To Gochang County In South Korea

Currently, 1.6 billion people live in countries and regions with absolute water scarcity and the number is expected to rise to 2.8 billion people by 2025(World Bank). Climate change will make water security more difficult and costly to achieve. Smart Water Management of water resources using an integrated approach with IT (Information Technology) will play a critical role in adapting climate change and mitigate social, economic and environmental impacts. Gochang County in Jeonbuk Province (South Korea) is one of the vulnerable areas to climate change, because it is a particularly high dependency to agricultural industry, increasing proportion of elderly people, and coastal areas where vulnerable to increases in the intensity of storm surge and heavy precipitation. The study mainly utilized the vulnerability definition adopted by IPCC that is a function of exposure, sensitivity and adaptive capacity. This study seeks to investigate the current (2000-2010) risks and vulnerability to flood and drought and those in the future (2046~2055) due to climate change. This study employs proxy indicators to measure the exposure, sensitivity and adaptive capacity. The RCP(Representative Concentration Pathways) 8.5 climate change scenario from KMA (Korea Meteorological Administration) was used and a detailed climate change scenario was compiled with administrative district-level and watershed level for spatial analysis. The climate exposure for the flood vulnerability showed that East Gochang area was more vulnerable than West in the current period. However, in the future period, South Gochang area is potentially most vulnerable than others to climate exposure. The climate exposure for the drought vulnerability showed that North Gochang area was most vulnerable than others in the future period. The results of the vulnerability assessment could be used for the taking measures for climate change adaptation and determining the priority area

Effects of fictive reward on rat’s choice behavior

Choices of humans and non-human primates are influenced by both actually experienced and fictive outcomes. To test whether this is also the case in rodents, we examined rat’s choice behavior in a binary choice task in which variable magnitudes of actual and fictive rewards were delivered. We found that the animal’s choice was significantly influenced by the magnitudes of both actual and fictive rewards in the previous trial. A model-based analysis revealed, however, that the effect of fictive reward was more transient and influenced mostly the choice in the next trial, whereas the effect of actual reward was more sustained, consistent with incremental learning of action values. Our results suggest that the capacity to modify future choices based on fictive outcomes might be shared by many different animal species, but fictive outcomes are less effective than actual outcomes in the incremental value learning system.4411Nsciescopu

Steady-state modeling of bio-fouling potentials with respect to the biological kinetics in the submerged membrane bioreactor (SMBR)

A mathematical model was developed for predicting the membrane bio-fouling potential as the operation conditions in the submerged membrane bioreactor (SMBR). Mass balance equations were computed, in terms of biological kinetics, for the production and degradation of extracellular polymeric substances (EPS) and soluble microbial products (SMP). The modified fouling index (MFI) was used for the prediction of bio-fouling potentials divided by soluble materials (MFISol) and suspended solids (MFISS) at the steady-state. The effect of changes in the solids retention time (SRT) on the bio-fouling potentials was more sensitive than that of the hydraulic retention time (HRT). The MFISol and MFISS were found to increase and decrease, respectively, with increases in the SRT. The simulation results showed that an increased sludge age could decrease the microbial activity in the MBR. The MFISol was slightly decreased with increase in the HRT, which was due to the reduction of the concentrations of SMP. Generally, the contribution of MFISS to bio-fouling was relatively low compared to that of MFISol under given conditions. The simulation results were calculated using the given assumptions and limited conditions only. It was suggested that consideration of the parameter changes caused by the properties of biological flocs, influent, membrane and microorganism community would be required to better predict the bio-fouling potentials in the SMBR. (c) 2006 Elsevier B.V. All rights reservedclose363

Characteristics of soluble microbial products and extracellular polymeric substances in the membrane bioreactor for water reuse

In biological treatment processes, the effluent contains some portion of organic material originating from soluble microbial products (SMP) that is closely related with extracellular polymeric substances (EPS), although the biological activity is maximized. These SMP should be considered important target materials if additional processes are necessary to satisfy the required water quality for the intended reuse. In this study, the characteristic of SMP and EPS were investigated using a submerged membrane bioreactor, which is one of the most promising water reuse process. Most protein SNIP in the reactor existed at a molecular weight (MW) above 10 kDa. Over 86% of the carbohydrate SMP contained in the permeate had a MW below 1 kDa. The protein and carbohydrate SMP in the permeate account for 83-91% of the COD. The MW of the protein and carbohydrate SMP in the reactor, when converted to COD showed a bimodal pattern (less than I kDa or greater than 10 kDa), but over 81 % of those in the permeate existed below I kDa due to the membrane rejection. The relative hydrophobicity of the protein and carbohydrate SMP was affected by the influent characteristics, and the hydrophobicity was decreased after the membrane filtration. The total EPS concentrations increased with increases in the food to microorganism ratio in this study. The modified fouling index (MFI) was used to investigate the biofouling characteristics, in terms of soluble and suspended solid parts closely related with the SMP and EPS, respectivelyclose657

Direct observation of kink evolution due to Hund's coupling on approach to metal-insulator transition in NiS2-xSex

Understanding characteristic energy scales is a fundamentally important issue in the study of strongly correlated systems. In multiband systems, an energy scale is affected not only by the effective Coulomb interaction but also by the Hund's coupling. Direct observation of such energy scale has been elusive so far in spite of extensive studies. Here, we report the observation of a kink structure in the low energy dispersion of NiS2-xSex and its characteristic evolution with x, by using angle resolved photoemission spectroscopy. Dynamical mean field theory calculation combined with density functional theory confirms that this kink originates from Hund's coupling. We find that the abrupt deviation from the Fermi liquid behavior in the electron self-energy results in the kink feature at low energy scale and that the kink is directly related to the coherence-incoherence crossover temperature scale. Our results mark the direct observation of the evolution of the characteristic temperature scale via kink features in the spectral function, which is the hallmark of Hund's physics in the multiorbital system. A decisive spectroscopic evidence of the Hund's coupling energy scale in multi-orbital correlated systems has been lacking. Here, the authors identify a kink feature due to Hund ' s coupling in the spectral function of NiS2xSex as they track its evolution across the Mott-insulator transition.11Nsciescopu