3,123 research outputs found
The Benefits and Beneficiaries of "Public" Investment in Herbicide Use Research and Development
The allocation of benefits from research and development of new herbicide uses is dependent on patent status. The agricultural chemical industry will preferentially invest in herbicide R&D that increases the use of on-patent herbicides from which a company can capture a price premium. The distribution of benefits from increased use of on-patent herbicide will alter over time, with grain growers benefiting at the expense of agrichemical companies once the patent expires. Public sector investment in herbicide R&D may also benefit the agrichemical industry. The size and allocation of the benefits from R&D into on-patent herbicides is analyzed using economic surplus techniques. Two case studies are examined. One involves research into the choice and application of herbicide for new wheat varieties. The second case study involves returns from R&D investment in research into an alternative for the commonly used off-patent herbicide trifluralin. The results from the case studies show that herbicide patent status may not have important implications for "public" R&D investment decisions.Research and Development/Tech Change/Emerging Technologies, Q16, Q18, Q28,
Effective information and the influence of an extension event on perceptions and adoption
Perceptions are known to play an important role in the innovation adoption decision. Once influential perceptions have been identified, there is the potential for information to influence adoption by changing these perceptions. In this paper, the influence of an extension workshop targeting grain growers’ perceptions known to be associated with the adoption of integrated weed management and herbicide resistance management has been measured using regression analysis. Consistent with a Bayesian learning framework, the greatest influence on grower perceptions and intended adoption behaviour was observed where information could be delivered with a high degree of certainty and validity.Crop Production/Industries, Farm Management,
Evidence for Rapid Iron K_alpha Line Flux Variability in MCG--6-30-15
This paper employs direct spectral fitting of individual orbital data in
order to measure rapid X-ray iron K_alpha line and continuum spectral slope
variations in Seyfert 1 galaxies with unprecedented temporal resolution.
Application of this technique to a long RXTE observation of MCG--6-30-15
indicates that the line flux does vary on short (~1d) timescales, but that
these variations are not correlated with changes in the continuum flux or
slope. These rapid variations indicate that the line does indeed originate
close to the black hole, confirming predictions based on its very broad
profile. However, the lack of a correlation with the continuum presents
problems for models in which the line variations are driven by those in the
continuum, modified only by light-travel time effects. Instead, it may be that
the line responds according to a physical process with a different time scale,
such as ionization instabilities in the disk, or perhaps that the geometry and
physical picture is more complex than implied by the simplest disk-corona
models.
These data also indicate that the slope of the underlying power-law continuum
(Gamma) shows strong variability and is tightly correlated with the continuum
flux in the sense that the spectrum steepens as the source brightens. All of
these results have been checked with extensive simulations, which also
indicated that a spurious correlation between Gamma and Compton reflection
fraction (R) will result if these quantities are measured from the same
spectra. This casts serious doubts on previous claims of such a Gamma-R
correlation.Comment: Accepted for publication in Ap
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