Satellite triangulation in Europe from WEST and ISAGEX data

Observational data that was acquired during the West European Satellite Triangulation (WEST) program and the International Satellite Geodesy Experiment (ISAGEX) campaign was obtained for the purpose of performing a geometric solution to improve the present values of coordinates of the European stations in the OSU WN14 solutions, adding some new stations and assessing the quality of the WN14 solution with the help of the additional data available. The status of the data as received, the preprocessing required and the preliminary tests carried out for the initial screening of the data are described. The adjustment computations carried out and the results of the adjustments are discussed

NASTRAN implementation of an isoparametric doubly-curved quadrilateral shell element

A quadrilateral shell element, CQUAD4, was added to level 15.5 and subsequently to level 16.0 of NASTRAN. The element exhibited doubly curved surfaces and used biquadratic interpolation functions. Reduced integration techniques were used to improve the performance of the element in thin shell problems. The creation of several new bulk data items is discussed, along with a special module, GPNORM, to process SHLNORM bulk data cards. In addition to the theoretical basis for the element stiffness matrix, consistent mass and load matrices are presented. Several potential sources of degenerate behavior of the element were investigated. Guidelines for proper use of the element were suggested. Performance of the element on several widely published classical examples was demonstrated. The results showed a significant improvement over presently available NASTRAN shell elements for even the coarsest meshes. Potential applications to two classes of practical problems are discussed

Democracy and Bolivian Sovereignty in the Morales Era

In late 2019, Evo Morales was forced out of office as the President of Bolivia and charged with sedition and terrorism. Morales had spent more than two decades as an indigenous and cocalero activist, then served as President for nearly fourteen years. During this time, he and the Bolivian Movement Toward Socialism party, the MAS, oversaw a new constitution with the goals of supporting Bolivian sovereignty and democratic ideals. Morales’s version of democracy,though, is intertwined with sovereignty, and centered on increasing the rights of the indigenous peoples who brought him to notoriety. This paper seeks to determine the extent to which Morales succeeded based on a sampling of policies put into place during his tenure. These evaluations will demonstrate that while Bolivian systems have moved toward democracy and national sovereignty under Morales, his own actions undermined that progress. Morales’s commitment to his indigenous identity and vision of himself as an indigenous leader caused him to work against his own stated aims of democracy and sovereignty

Use of High-Resolution Aerial Imagery to Improve a GIS Habitat Model (Poster)

For many species, land cover is the most important input variable for a GIS habitat model. Yet, coarse-resolution satellite imagery provides the foundation of many available land cover datasets. With low-resolution imagery, habitats such as shrublands and narrow or small riparian elements typically remain invisible to digital image analysis software and to the naked eye. Habitat misclassification often occurs and land cover accuracy rates may range from only 60% to 80%. We ran a sharp-tailed grouse (Tympanuchus phasianellus) habitat model, originally developed by Montana FWP, using a current land cover layer based on 30-meter resolution satellite imagery. From the results, we chose a subset of areas with high potential to contain the most suitable habitat. We then updated each area’s land cover by “ground-truthing” it against high resolution imagery (NAIP, 1 meter and Esri, 6 inch). We corrected misclassified habitats of interest and then reran the model. Although time consuming, we believe this manual “ground-truthing” process greatly improved the accuracy of the model and made the on-ground habitat surveys more efficient. We also believe this approach would improve habitat modeling efforts for other species

Earth orientation from lunar laser range-differencing

For the optimal use of high precision lunar laser ranging (LLR), an investigation regarding a clear definition of the underlying coordinate systems, identification of estimable quantities, favorable station geometry and optimal observation schedule is given

Acoustic Monitoring of Nocturnal Migrants in the Bitterroot Valley, Montana (Poster)

Many avian species migrate under the cover of darkness, limiting our ability to study migration phenomena. Some migrants emit nocturnal flight calls (NFCs) to presumably echolocate and maintain communication with other birds. NFC monitoring provides a reliable, passive, and unbiased way to document species composition and spatial and temporal components of nocturnal migration. During spring and fall migration of 2013 and 2014, we installed autonomous recording units (ARUs) at low-, mid-, and high-elevation sites. ARUs record NFCs and allow spectrogram generation, followed by species-level identification. From the recordings, we extracted and analyzed over 6000 NFCs from sparrows, warblers, and thrush-like species. Our data show that we can track annual, seasonal, weekly, and nightly trends as well as patterns between monitoring sites. We found more NFCs in 2014 compared to 2013, substantially more NFCs in fall than in spring, and saw differences in nightly detections times between different bird groups. Across the three monitoring sites, the mid-elevation site continued to record the most NFCs during fall migration. In 2015, we plan to finish the species-level classification and compare the results to other survey methods (e.g., bird banding and visual surveys). We also plan to monitor NFCs for a third year to confirm these patterns persist. An additional year of monitoring will provide a good baseline to monitor future population trends and migration pathways

Entrepreneurship and ageing: Exploring an economic geography perspective : CRED Research Paper No. 22

This paper is forthcoming as a chapter in the «Handbook of Research on Entrepreneurship and Aging» edited by Charlie Karlsson, Mikaela Backman and Orsa Kekezi (to be published in July 2019 with Edward Elgar Publishing Inc.).The traditional understanding of entrepreneurship is biased towards certain population groups and specific locations. Yet the literature points to a much more diverse perspective on entrepreneurship and regional development. In this paper, we argue that regional characteristics such as the extent to which a region faces demographic change (population growth or decline, population ageing, emigration of youth, etc.) may exert a strong influence both on the individual propensity to start a business and the aggregate numbers of entrepreneurial activities. In addition, demographic change also influences the types of businesses or business models found in different regional contexts. With this idea in mind, we argue that the opportunities and challenges that are associated with old age entrepreneurship depend strongly on the regional context. We place old age entrepreneurship into a regional context and illustrate the ways in which opportunities and constraints arise from such a context and, in particular, from demographic change occurring in different regional types.publishedVersio