U.S. COTTON SUPPLY RESPONSE UNDER THE 2002 FARM ACT

Agricultural and Food Policy, Crop Production/Industries,

A Study of the Words of Jesus: Let a Man Deny Himself and Follow Me--The Relationship of Renunciation to Discipleship in the Synoptics

This research paper is the outgrowth of a personal struggle. The problem posed has in the past very sincerely disturbed the writer; this research has helped him personally in arriving at an answer. The writer\u27s early background gave rise to the problem. His father had at an early age impressed him with the fact that scripture cannot but confront its reader. It is God\u27s message. His mother was reared in a rather legalistic pietism, and this tended to influence him in a pietistic Way. The passages which caused the most mental anguish were those concerning renunciation, passages which, upon first appearance, tended toward asceticism. The temptation was to apply these legalistically. Hence no insurance, savings and the like without a questioning conscience

Inhibition of gap junction and adherens junction assembly by connexin and A-CAM antibodies

We examined the roles of the extracellular domains of a gap junction protein and a cell adhesion molecule in gap junction and adherens junction formation by altering cell interactions with antibody Fab fragments. Using immunoblotting and immunocytochemistry we demonstrated that Novikoff cells contained the gap junction protein, connexin43 (Cx43), and the cell adhesion molecule, A-CAM (N-cadherin). Cells were dissociated in EDTA, allowed to recover, and reaggregated for 60 min in media containing Fab fragments prepared from a number of antibodies. We observed no cell-cell dye transfer 4 min after microinjection in 90% of the cell pairs treated with Fab fragments of antibodies for the first or second extracellular domain of Cx43, the second extracellular domain of connexin32 (Cx32) or A-CAM. Cell-cell dye transfer was detected within 30 s in cell pairs treated with control Fab fragments (pre-immune serum, antibodies to the rat major histocompatibility complex or the amino or carboxyl termii of Cx43). We observed no gap junctions by freeze-fracture EM and no adherens junctions by thin section EM between cells treated with the Fab fragments that blocked cell-cell dye transfer. Gap junctions were found on approximately 50% of the cells in control samples using freeze-fracture EM. We demonstrated with reaggregated Novikoff cells that: (a) functional interactions of the extracellular domains of the connexins were necessary for the formation of gap junction channels; (b) cell interactions mediated by A-CAM were required for gap junction assembly; and (c) Fab fragments of antibodies for A-CAM or connexin extracellular domains blocked adherens junction formation

Remote Sensing of Urban Land Cover/Land Use Change, Surface Thermal Responses, and Potential Meteorological and Climate Change Impacts

City growth influences the development of the urban heat island (UHI), but the effect that local meteorology has on the UHI is less well known. This paper presents some preliminary findings from a study that uses multitemporal Landsat TM and ASTER data to evaluate land cover/land use change (LULCC) over the NASA Marshall Space Flight Center (MFSC) and its Huntsville, AL metropolitan area. Landsat NLCD data for 1992 and 2001 have been used to evaluate LULCC for MSFC and the surrounding urban area. Land surface temperature (LST) and emissivity derived from NLCD data have also been analyzed to assess changes in these parameters in relation to LULCC. Additionally, LULCC, LST, and emissivity have been identified from ASTER data from 2001 and 2011 to provide a comparison with the 2001 NLCD and as a measure of current conditions within the study area. As anticipated, the multi-temporal NLCD and ASTER data show that significant changes have occurred in land covers, LST, and emissivity within and around MSFC. The patterns and arrangement of these changes, however, is significant because the juxtaposition of urban land covers within and outside of MSFC provides insight on what impacts at a local to regional scale, the inter-linkage of these changes potentially have on meteorology. To further analyze these interactions between LULCC, LST, and emissivity with the lower atmosphere, a network of eleven weather stations has been established across the MSFC property. These weather stations provide data at a 10 minute interval, and these data are uplinked for use by MSFC facilities operations and the National Weather Service. The weather data are also integrated within a larger network of meteorological stations across north Alabama. Given that the MSFC weather stations will operate for an extended period of time, they can be used to evaluate how the building of new structures, and changes in roadways, and green spaces as identified in the MSFC master plan for the future, will potentially affect land cover LSTs across the Center. Moreover, the weather stations will also provide baseline data for developing a better understanding of how localized weather factors, such as extreme rainfall and heat events, affect micrometeorology. These data can also be used to model the interrelationships between LSTs and meteorology on a longer term basis to help evaluate how changes in these parameters can be quantified from satellite data collected in the future. In turn, the overall integration of multi-temporal meteorological information with LULCC, and LST data for MSFC proper and the surrounding Huntsville urbanized area can provide a perspective on how urban land surface types affect the meteorology in the boundary layer and ultimately, the UHI. Additionally, data such as this can be used as a foundation for modeling how climate change will potentially impact local and regional meteorology and conversely, how urban LULCC can or will influence changes on climate over the north Alabama area

Static Rouse Modes and Related Quantities: Corrections to Chain Ideality in Polymer Melts

Following the Flory ideality hypothesis intrachain and interchain excluded volume interactions are supposed to compensate each other in dense polymer systems. Multi-chain effects should thus be neglected and polymer conformations may be understood from simple phantom chain models. Here we provide evidence against this phantom chain, mean-field picture. We analyze numerically and theoretically the static correlation function of the Rouse modes. Our numerical results are obtained from computer simulations of two coarse-grained polymer models for which the strength of the monomer repulsion can be varied, from full excluded volume (`hard monomers') to no excluded volume (`phantom chains'). For nonvanishing excluded volume we find the simulated correlation function of the Rouse modes to deviate markedly from the predictions of phantom chain models. This demonstrates that there are nonnegligible correlations along the chains in a melt. These correlations can be taken into account by perturbation theory. Our simulation results are in good agreement with these new theoretical predictions.Comment: 9 pages, 7 figures, accepted for publication in EPJ