MAUL: An OCLC Union List of Legal Periodicals

The Mid-America Law School Library Consortium is an incorporated association of eighteen academic law libraries formed in 1980 to promote cooperation among its members. The organization includes libraries in Arkansas, Illinois, Iowa, Kansas, Missouri, Nebraska, and Oklahoma. Within the framework of the organization\u27s by-laws, the group engages in such varied cooperative activities as telefacsimile document delivery, collection development, staff exchanges, and union listing. The union list of periodicals on OCLC was authorized by the Consortium directors in June 1982. (Two libraries opted not to participate in the OCLC union list project, leaving sixteen involved.) The four-letter symbol chosen to identify the union list online is MAUL. Off-line union listing was an early activity of the Mid-America Consortium that helped fulfill its resource-sharing goals. A printed union list of microforms and one of looseleaf services have been produced, and a Canadian/Australian list is under development. In early 1982, the library directors of the Consortium became interested in the possibility of using the OCLC union listing capability to create a union list of periodicals. In order to do this, the Consortium had to select a single network through which to join. Eileen Searls, Director of the Saint Louis University Law Library and President of the Consortium, investigated the packages offered by the networks to which the various libraries belonged. Four net-works were possible choices: Amigos, BCR, ILLINET, and MIDLNET. At the Consortium meeting in Detroit in June 1982, the Board of Directors voted to join through Amigos. The Consortium\u27s initial contract with Amigos included one-time costs of $1,500 for training agents at two sites and$34 per hour for profiling. These costs were prorated. The Consortium pays the annual membership fee, which was $739 for sixteen libraries in 1983/84. Each library is billed for the charges associated with local data records directly by its own network. This venture was the first cross-network OCLC union list

Effects of environmental factors on development of Pyrenopeziza brassicae (light leaf spot) apothecia on oilseed rape debris

Publication no. P-2001-0221-01R. This article is in the public domain and not copyrightable. It may be freely reprinted with customary crediting of the source. The American Phytopathological Society, 2001The development of Pyrenopeziza brassicae (light leaf spot) apothecia was studied on petiole debris from artificially infected oilseed rape leaves incubated at temperatures from 6 to 22 degreesC under different wetness regimes and in 16 h light/8 h dark or continuous darkness. There was no significant difference between light treatments in numbers of apothecia that developed. Mature apothecia developed at temperatures from 5 to 18 degreesC but not at 22 degreesC. The rate of apothecial development decreased as temperature decreased from 18 to 5 degreesC; mature apothecia were first observed after 5 days at 18 degreesC and after 15 days at 6 degreesC. Models were fitted to estimates of the time (days) for 50% of the maximum number of apothecia to develop (t(1); model 1, t(1) = 7.6 + 55.8(0.839)(T)) and the time for 50% of the maximum number of apothecia to decay (t(2); model 2, t(2) = 24.2 + 387(0.730)(T)) at temperatures (T) from 6 to 18 degreesC. An interruption in wetness of the petiole debris for 4 days after 4, 7, or 10 days of wetness delayed the time to observation of the first mature apothecia for approximate to4 days and decreased the number of apothecia produced (by comparison with continuous wetness). A relationship was found between water content of pod debris and electrical resistance measured by a debris-wetness sensor. The differences between values of tl predicted by model 1 and observed values of t(1) were 1 to 9 days. Model 2 did not predict t(2); apothecia decayed more quickly under natural conditions than predicted by model 2.Peer reviewe

Sequestration of quaternary ammonium compounds in soil and its relevance for the proliferation of antibiotic resistance in the environment

Quaternary ammonium compounds (QACs) are a group of surface-active, biocidal, high production volume chemicals. In the agricultural sector, their applications are especially broad and range from disinfectants and detergents in animal husbandry to their use as adjuvants in pesticide formulations. Inputs of QACs into agroecosystems are potentially high where manures, sewage sludge or wastewater are applied to the farmer’s fields for nutrient recycling. The presence of QACs in the environment has frequently been inflicted in the co-selection for antibiotic resistance genes (ARGs) with unforeseeable risks for environmental and human health [1]–[3]. The selection of ARGs depends on concentrations of QACs in bio-accessible form and the persistence of these compounds. However, a comprehensive overview on i) predicted & measured concentrations of QACs in soils including their analysis, ii) mechanisms of their sequestration in soils based on their physicochemical and structural properties, and iii) the implications of the concentrations and the fate of QACs in soils for the proliferation of ARGs in the environment is missing. Based on a review of these topics, we propose that QACs are sequestered in the interlayer regions of clay minerals in soils, which reduces their acute toxicity, but increases their persistence. The slow release of QACs from the interlayer regions may maintain concentrations levels in soil solution that are large enough to co-select for antibiotic resistant soil bacteria promoting the proliferation of ARGs in the environment

The New Instantaneity: How Social Media are Helping us Privilege the (Politically) Correct over the True

The recent sacking of the eminent scientist Tim Hunt from one of the UK’s leading research institutions is only the latest in a series of cases where public individuals have been derided for comments made in jest on social media, with serious consequences for their professional and personal lives. This article discusses the case of Tim Hunt as an example of the extent to which the privileging of the correct over the true which has long pervaded media discourse is taken to the extreme by the instant-response culture of social media. It points to the emergence of a new form of instantaneity enabled by these networked forms of communication that serves to reinforce systemic inaction rather than the change widely associated with these technologies. It draws on philosophy and Critical Theory as useful conceptual frameworks for highlighting the ways in which Twitter & co. increasingly call us to action but crowd out thought, thereby passing over opportunities for real social change

Detectable contributions of colloids to soil P and C content in arid and hyperarid region of the Atacama (Chile)

Atacama Desert is mainly known as the driest place on Earth where life has been developed under arid to hyper arid conditions since Oligocene-Miocene. Therefore, soils of Atacama contain fingerprints of past and present life which might be used as an analog to study the evolution of life under equivalent arid conditions, like Mars. In this study, we quantify the colloidal phosphorus and carbon distribution in the first 10 cm of soil profile along an altitudinal transect. Samples were taken along a transect in the region of Quebrada Aroma spanning from the arid Percordillera of the Andes (2720 m a.s.l.) towards the hyper arid core of the desert (1340 m a.s.l.). Water dispersible colloids (WDC) were separated and measured using the field-flow-field fractionation (FFF) method and subsequently their Corg and P content were characterized and quantified by detectors (DLS, ICP-MS, UV, OCD, fluorescence). Data was compared to total C, P and (available) Olsen-P also measured in the samples. The Olsen-P (available-P) varied within the Aroma transect from ca. 2 to 8 mg P kg-1, but was not related to either altitude or depth in the upper soil (0-10 cm). Colloidal P contents ranged from <0.1 to 4 mg P kg-1 soil, with increasing trend from low to higher elevations. Thereby, suggesting an increasing proportion of the available P potential being present in the WDC fraction. The Colloidal Corg content of the Aroma transect did range from 65 to 90 (for sites 2020 to 1340m) and 110 mg Corg kg-1 soil WDC (2720 m). Colloidal Corg content as a function of the altitude showed a similar trend to the Corg content of the soils: the highest colloidal Corg content was found at 2720 m. The proportion of soil Corg within the colloidal fraction was up to 6% of the bulk soil organic matter (OM) content, as the OM content was intensively enriched in the colloidal fraction. Further quantification of phosphorus and carbon content in WDC in deeper part of soil is required to obtain a more comprehensive view of role of colloidal inputs and dynamics in the Atacama Desert

System Test of the ATLAS Muon Spectrometer in the H8 Beam at the CERN SPS

An extensive system test of the ATLAS muon spectrometer has been performed in the H8 beam line at the CERN SPS during the last four years. This spectrometer will use pressurized Monitored Drift Tube (MDT) chambers and Cathode Strip Chambers (CSC) for precision tracking, Resistive Plate Chambers (RPCs) for triggering in the barrel and Thin Gap Chambers (TGCs) for triggering in the end-cap region. The test set-up emulates one projective tower of the barrel (six MDT chambers and six RPCs) and one end-cap octant (six MDT chambers, A CSC and three TGCs). The barrel and end-cap stands have also been equipped with optical alignment systems, aiming at a relative positioning of the precision chambers in each tower to 30-40 micrometers. In addition to the performance of the detectors and the alignment scheme, many other systems aspects of the ATLAS muon spectrometer have been tested and validated with this setup, such as the mechanical detector integration and installation, the detector control system, the data acquisition, high level trigger software and off-line event reconstruction. Measurements with muon energies ranging from 20 to 300 GeV have allowed measuring the trigger and tracking performance of this set-up, in a configuration very similar to the final spectrometer. A special bunched muon beam with 25 ns bunch spacing, emulating the LHC bunch structure, has been used to study the timing resolution and bunch identification performance of the trigger chambers. The ATLAS first-level trigger chain has been operated with muon trigger signals for the first time

The Optical Alignment System of the ATLAS Muon Spectrometer Endcaps

The muon spectrometer of the ATLAS detector at the Large Hadron Collider (LHC) at CERN consists of over a thousand muon precision chambers, arranged in three concentrical cylinders in the barrel region, and in four wheels in each of the two endcaps. The endcap wheels are located between 7m and 22m from the interaction point, and have diameters between 13m and 24m. Muon chambers are equipped with a complex on-line optical alignment system to monitor their positions and deformations during ATLAS data-taking. We describe the layout of the endcap part of the alignment system and the design and calibration of the optical sensors, as well as the various software components. About 1% of the system has been subjected to performance tests in the H8 beam line at CERN, and results of these tests are discussed. The installation and commissioning of the full system in the ATLAS cavern is well underway, and results from approximately half of the system indicate that we will reach the ambitious goal of a 40mu alignment accuracy, required for reconstructing final-state muons at the highest expected energies