Microbial Community Structure and Litter Decomposition in Stratified Soils of a Long Term Reduced Tillage Experiment

The aim of the present study was to examine decomposition of plant material (maize straw, green and rooibos tea) in stratified soils of the long-term tillage experiment, established in 1999 and shifted from conventional to organic farming system in 2015. The plowing in conventional tillage (CT) has been done by moldboard plow 20 cm deep, while in minimum tillage (MT), soil disturbance has been up to 10 cm deep by a Special disc harrow. More than 15 years of long term Minimum tillage, with reduced soil disturbances and improved residue management, resulted in stratification of soil organic carbon and nutrients with highest concentrations in the very topsoil

The role of emojis and emoticons in social engineering

The purpose of this paper is to place the use of emojis and emoticons in communication, e.g., on social networks and with SMSs, to the field of social engineering. With a systematic literature survey in academic databases Web of Science and Scopus, and opportunistic search, 40 scientific papers about emojis and emoticons in social engineering were identified. The use of emojis and emoticons in communication is a form of direct communication as the sender directly influences the recipient. Emojis and emoticons are a universal tool that is understood by all communication technology users regardless of their demographics. Most of the analyzed studies employ a quantitative approach and span different research areas, such as marketing, psychology, sociology, etc. This paper represents one of the first systematic literature reviews that deal with emojis and emoticons in the context of social engineering. The findings of this paper may serve as a basis for further, especially qualitative research

Two-to-one Auger decay of a double L vacancy in argon

We have observed L223−M3 Auger decay in argon where a double vacancy is filled by two valence electrons and a single electron is ejected from the atom. A well-resolved spectrum of these two-to-one electron transitions is compared to the result of the second-order perturbation theory and its decay branching ratio is determined

Near-threshold photoelectron angular distributions from two-photon resonant photoionization of He

Two-photon resonant photoionization of helium is investigated both experimentally and theoretically. Ground state helium atoms are excited to the 1s4p, 1s5p and 1s6p 1P states by synchrotron radiation and ionized by a synchronized infrared pulsed picosecond laser. The photoelectron angular distributions of the emitted electrons are measured using a velocity map imaging (VMI) spectrometer. The measured asymmetry parameters of the angular distribution allow the phase differences and the ratios of the dipole matrix elements of the 1sϵs and 1sϵd channels to be determined. The experimental results agree with the calculated values obtained in a configuration–interaction calculation with a Coulomb–Sturmian basis set. The effects of the radiative decay of the intermediate state and the static electric field of the VMI spectrometer on the measurements are discussed

Potential Energy Surface Reconstruction and Lifetime Determination of Molecular Double-Core-Hole States in the Hard X-Ray Regime

A combination of resonant inelastic x-ray scattering and resonant Auger spectroscopy provides complementary information on the dynamic response of resonantly excited molecules. This is exemplified for CH3I, for which we reconstruct the potential energy surface of the dissociative I 3d−2 double- core-hole state and determine its lifetime. The proposed method holds a strong potential for monitoring the hard x-ray induced electron and nuclear dynamic response of core-excited molecules containing heavy elements, where ab initio calculations of potential energy surfaces and lifetimes remain challenging

FERTILISATION STRATEGIES ACROSS EUROPE: CURRENT SITUATION, POTENTIAL AND LIMITS FOR A HARMONISED APPROACH

Peer reviewe

Influence of soil amended with zeolite and/or mineral N on agronomic performance and soil mineral N dynamics in a soybean–winter triticale crop rotation field experiment

Although there are numerous studies describing the positive infuence of legumes as cereal pre-crops, little information exists on the specifc crop rotation soybean–triticale. Besides that, fertilization of soybean is very complex due to its symbiosis with rhizobia where mineral nitrogen could have negative efect, therefore new soil conditioners, e.g. zeolite, need to be examined. An investigation in growing seasons 2017 and 2017/2018 was established to study these knowledge gaps in a combined feld experiment, where soil mineral nitrogen (SMN) was also monitored. Firstly, the infuence of soybean seed bacterial inoculation (inoculated and non-inoculated seeds) as factor 1, and four fertilization treatments (1—no fertilizer, 2—600 kg zeolite/ha, 3—30 kg mineral N/ha (at sowing)+additional 70–90 kg/ha of mineral N, and 4—combination of treatments 2 and 3) as factor 2 on soybean yield performance and nutritional composition was evaluated. Neither factor infuenced soybean seed yield (average 3128 kg/ha). However, zeolite had favourable efect on root nodulation where the number of nodules and nodule dry mass per plant were signifcantly increased. Secondly, winter triticale was sown after soybean harvest on the same plots. Only 40 kg N was applied at BBCH 30 (beginning of stem elongation) to the whole experiment. Interaction of soybean experimental factors signifcantly infuenced the triticale grain yield. Finally, regression analysis revealed that triticale grain yield (average 5537 kg/ha) was highly dependent (R2=0.927) on initial SMN content, left after soybean harvest

Logging residue chipping options for short rotation poplar plantations

Short rotation poplar plantations grow on flat and even terrain, and the interrow spacing is wide enough for easy machine access. If the terrain is firm enough, one may consider moving the classic roadside chipping operation directly into the field (i.e., terrain chipping), thus saving on wood extraction cost. This study compared the efficiency and cost of roadside and terrain chipping conducted with exactly the same equipment, to assess the benefits offered by the versatile deployment of a standard chipping operation, whereby the operation can be moved inside the stand whenever terrain conditions are suitable. The study was conducted at 12 sample plots, containing about one truck load of chips each (i.e., approximately 11 bone-dry tons or BDT). Plots were arranged as alternate windrows on a 8.5 ha field. Data was collected for the whole supply chain, from field to factory. The factory was located 14 km from the field. Delivered cost was 53 € BDT-1 and 70 € BDT-1 for roadside and terrain chipping, respectively, i.e., terrain chipping was 1/3 more expensive than roadside chipping, even if the latter included the additional cost of forwarding the residues to the roadside. The chipper-truck used for the test could not cope with small scattered residue piles (32 BDT ha-1), and the cumbersome reposition maneuver became the main hurdle to efficient operation. Further improvements might be achieved by pre-bunching the residues, introducing a dedicated terrain chipper or bundling the residues and taking the bundles to the factory for centralized chipping