Effects of EPTC and Acifluorfen on Sunflower

Sunflowers (Helianthus annuus L.) rank third in acreage among the world\u27s oil crops. Approximately 185, 000 ha of sunflowers are grown in South Dakota each year. Despite sunflower\u27s economic importance, few herbicides are available for use in the crop and many of the herbicides commonly used on soybeans (Glycine Max (L.) Merr.) and corn (Zea mays L.) will harm sunflowers. Therefore, weed infestations are a major factor confronting the sunflower grower. Wild mustard (Brassica kaber (DC.) Wheeler) and green foxtail (Setaria viridis (L.) Beauv) commonly infest sunflower fields in North and South Dakota. According to a survey in North Dakota, 94% of the sunflower fields contained green foxtail and 75% contained wild mustard. Wild mustard is very competitive and one wild mustard plant/m of crop row reduces yield. EPTC (S-ethyl dipropylthiocarbamate), trifluralin (a, a,a-trifluoro-2, 6-dinitro-N-N-dipropyl-p-toluidine), and chloramben (3-amino-2, 5-dichlorobenzoic acid) are labeled for control of annual grasses and certain broadleaf weeds in sunflower fields. Although herbicides are available for grass control, more effective ones are needed to control broadleaf weeds in sunflower fields. A postemergence herbicide would significantly aid weed control and could be used in conservation tillage

Cluster, Classify, Regress: A General Method For Learning Discountinous Functions

This paper presents a method for solving the supervised learning problem in which the output is highly nonlinear and discontinuous. It is proposed to solve this problem in three stages: (i) cluster the pairs of input-output data points, resulting in a label for each point; (ii) classify the data, where the corresponding label is the output; and finally (iii) perform one separate regression for each class, where the training data corresponds to the subset of the original input-output pairs which have that label according to the classifier. It has not yet been proposed to combine these 3 fundamental building blocks of machine learning in this simple and powerful fashion. This can be viewed as a form of deep learning, where any of the intermediate layers can itself be deep. The utility and robustness of the methodology is illustrated on some toy problems, including one example problem arising from simulation of plasma fusion in a tokamak.Comment: 12 files,6 figure

A Trust for Whom?: Managing Colorado\u27s 3 Million Acres of State Land

14 pages. Includes biographical information for John M. Evans, Reeves Brown, and Mark A. E. Burget. State Land Board Commissioner Maxine Stewart was also a speaker for this program, but did not submit any written materials. Contents: A trust for whom? managing Colorado\u27s 3 million acres of state land : a critique of the constitutional amendment / prepared by John Evans -- A cattlemen\u27s [sic] perspective of state land management / presented by Reeves Brown -- Remarks outline / Mark A. E. Burget Program was presented on Monday, February 5, 1996 at the offices of Holland & Hart in Denver, Colo. Historically, state trust lands have been managed for public schools revenue. Now there is pressure to protect some state lands as open space. Should trust lands be managed for broader public values? Is this consistent with existing legal mandates? Speakers: State Land Board Commissioner Maxine Stewart; John Evans, Colorado Board of Education; Reeves Brown, Colorado Cattlemen\u27s Association; The Nature Conservancy\u27s Colorado State Director Mark Burget. Special focus on the recently implemented Multiple Use Program and also on how The Nature Conservancy is working with the State Land Board to preserve resources. Center Director Elizabeth Rieke will moderate

A Trust for Whom?: Managing Colorado\u27s 3 Million Acres of State Land

14 pages. Includes biographical information for John M. Evans, Reeves Brown, and Mark A. E. Burget. State Land Board Commissioner Maxine Stewart was also a speaker for this program, but did not submit any written materials. Contents: A trust for whom? managing Colorado\u27s 3 million acres of state land : a critique of the constitutional amendment / prepared by John Evans -- A cattlemen\u27s [sic] perspective of state land management / presented by Reeves Brown -- Remarks outline / Mark A. E. Burget Program was presented on Monday, February 5, 1996 at the offices of Holland & Hart in Denver, Colo. Historically, state trust lands have been managed for public schools revenue. Now there is pressure to protect some state lands as open space. Should trust lands be managed for broader public values? Is this consistent with existing legal mandates? Speakers: State Land Board Commissioner Maxine Stewart; John Evans, Colorado Board of Education; Reeves Brown, Colorado Cattlemen\u27s Association; The Nature Conservancy\u27s Colorado State Director Mark Burget. Special focus on the recently implemented Multiple Use Program and also on how The Nature Conservancy is working with the State Land Board to preserve resources. Center Director Elizabeth Rieke will moderate

A Neutron Star with a Massive Progenitor in Westerlund 1

We report the discovery of an X-ray pulsar in the young, massive Galactic star cluster Westerlund 1. We detected a coherent signal from the brightest X-ray source in the cluster, CXO J164710.2-455216, during two Chandra observations on 2005 May 22 and June 18. The period of the pulsar is 10.6107(1) s. We place an upper limit to the period derivative of Pdot<2e-10 s/s, which implies that the spin-down luminosity is Edot<3e33 erg/s. The X-ray luminosity of the pulsar is L_X = 3(+10,-2)e33 (D/5 kpc)^2 erg/s, and the spectrum can be described by a kT = 0.61+/-0.02 keV blackbody with a radius of R_bb = 0.27+/-0.03 (D/5 kpc}) km. Deep infrared observations reveal no counterpart with K1 Msun. Taken together, the properties of the pulsar indicate that it is a magnetar. The rarity of slow X-ray pulsars and the position of CXO J164710.2-455216 only 1.6' from the core of Westerlund 1 indicates that it is a member of the cluster with >99.97% confidence. Westerlund 1 contains 07V stars with initial masses M_i=35 Msun and >50 post-main-sequence stars that indicate the cluster is 4+/-1 Myr old. Therefore, the progenitor to this pulsar had an initial mass M_i>40 Msun. This is the most secure result among a handful of observational limits to the masses of the progenitors to neutron stars.Comment: 4 pages, 5 figures. Final version to match ApJL (added one figure since v2

Does wage rank affect employees' well-being?

How do workers make wage comparisons? Both an experimental study and an analysis of 16,000 British employees are reported. Satisfaction and well-being levels are shown to depend on more than simple relative pay. They depend upon the ordinal rank of an individual's wage within a comparison group. “Rank” itself thus seems to matter to human beings. Moreover, consistent with psychological theory, quits in a workplace are correlated with pay distribution skewness

Understanding Parents' Roles in Children's Learning and Engagement in Informal Science Learning Sites.

Informal science learning sites (ISLS) create opportunities for children to learn about science outside of the classroom. This study analyzed children's learning behaviors in ISLS using video recordings of family visits to a zoo, children's museum, or aquarium. Furthermore, parent behaviors, features of the exhibits and the presence of an educator were also examined in relation to children's behaviors. Participants included 63 children (60.3% female) and 44 parents in 31 family groups. Results showed that parents' science questions and explanations were positively related to children observing the exhibit. Parents' science explanations were also negatively related to children's science explanations. Furthermore, children were more likely to provide science explanations when the exhibit was not interactive. Lastly there were no differences in children's behaviors based on whether an educator was present at the exhibit. This study provides further evidence that children's interactions with others and their environment are important for children's learning behaviors

SN2010jp (PTF10aaxi): A Jet-Driven Type II Supernova

We present photometry and spectroscopy of the peculiar TypeII supernova (SN) 2010jp, also named PTF10aaxi. The light curve exhibits a linear decline with a relatively low peak absolute magnitude of only -15.9, and a low radioactive decay luminosity at late times that suggests a nickel mass below 0.003 $M_{\odot}$. Spectra of SN2010jp display an unprecedented triple-peaked H$\alpha$ line profile, showing: (1) a narrow (800 km/s) central component that suggests shock interaction with dense CSM; (2) high-velocity blue and red emission features centered at -12600 and +15400 km/s; and (3) broad wings extending from -22000 to +25000 km/s. These features persist during 100 days after explosion. We propose that this line profile indicates a bipolar jet-driven explosion, with the central component produced by normal SN ejecta and CSM interaction at mid latitudes, while the high-velocity bumps and broad line wings arise in a nonrelativistic bipolar jet. Two variations of the jet interpretation seem plausible: (1) A fast jet mixes 56Ni to high velocities in polar zones of the H-rich envelope, or (2) the reverse shock in the jet produces blue and red bumps in Balmer lines when a jet interacts with dense CSM. Jet-driven SNeII are predicted for collapsars resulting from a wide range of initial masses above 25 $M_{\odot}$ at sub-solar metallicity. This seems consistent with the SN host environment, which is either an extremely low-luminosity dwarf galaxy or very remote parts of an interacting pair of star-forming galaxies. It also seems consistent with the low 56Ni mass that may accompany black hole formation. We speculate that the jet survives to produce observable signatures because the star's H envelope was mostly stripped away by previous eruptive mass loss.Comment: 11 pages, 9 figures, submitted to MNRA

Early Radio and X-Ray Observations of the Youngest Nearby Type Ia Supernova PTF 11kly (SN 2011fe)

On 2011 August 24 (UT) the Palomar Transient Factory (PTF) discovered PTF11kly (SN 2011fe), the youngest and most nearby Type Ia supernova (SN Ia) in decades. We followed this event up in the radio (centimeter and millimeter bands) and X-ray bands, starting about a day after the estimated explosion time.We present our analysis of the radio and X-ray observations, yielding the tightest constraints yet placed on the pre-explosion mass-loss rate from the progenitor system of this supernova. We find a robust limit of Ṁ ≾ 10^(−8)(w/100 km s^(−1))M_☉ yr^(−1) from sensitive X-ray non-detections, as well as a similar limit from radio data, which depends, however, on assumptions about microphysical parameters. We discuss our results in the context of single-degenerate models for SNe Ia and find that our observations modestly disfavor symbiotic progenitor models involving a red giant donor, but cannot constrain systems accreting from main-sequence or sub-giant stars, including the popular supersoft channel. In view of the proximity of PTF11kly and the sensitivity of our prompt observations, we would have to wait for a long time (a decade or longer) in order to more meaningfully probe the circumstellar matter of SNe Ia