A proposed groundwater management framework for municipalities in South Africa

Groundwater is not being perceived as an important water resource and therefore has been given limited attention in South Africa. This is reflected in general statistics showing that only 13% of the nation’s total water supply originates from groundwater. In contrast, most towns in arid areas depend on groundwater either as a sole supply or as an essential supply for drought management. The perception remains that groundwater is not a sustainable resource for bulk domestic supply and cannot be managed properly. Despite this, a growing number of municipalities utilise groundwater on a regular basis, and provide examples of successful management of this resource. Various guidelines for groundwater management in South Africa have been developed. These are valuable sources of information in terms of requirements and steps to protect and manage aquifers. However, an overarching groundwater management framework was still lacking. Hence, the Water Research Commission (WRC) has commissioned a project to develop a Groundwater Management Framework that incorporates all aspects of groundwater management at municipal level. The proposed Groundwater Management Framework aims to improve on the management of groundwater resources by equipping the responsible authorities with the required tools and capacity. This goes beyond data collection and monitoring, and requires human and capital resources. The framework includes a detailed description of the different functions and the relevant responsibilities, the required skills, the optimal position within the municipal structure and required communication lines. Hence, the assigned responsibilities and available tools to achieve sustainable groundwater management reflect the local level of water institutions, i.e. Water Services Authority (WSA), Water Services Provider (WSP) and Water User Associations (WUAs). However, the principles of the framework can be applied at all levels and all scales. It is recommended that this framework be rolled out and promoted at the local government level, in combination with requisite skills development at operational level, and training of municipal officials, as well as providing incentives for successful implementation and integration of groundwater management in municipal planning

Reconstructing a Z' Lagrangian using the LHC and low-energy data

We study the potential of the LHC and future low-energy experiments to precisely measure the underlying model parameters of a new Z' boson. We emphasize the complimentary information obtained from both on- and off-peak LHC dilepton data, from the future Q-weak measurement of the weak charge of the proton, and from a proposed measurement of parity violation in low-energy Moller scattering. We demonstrate the importance of off-peak LHC data and Q-weak for removing sign degeneracies between Z' couplings that occur if only on-peak LHC data is studied. A future precision measurement of low-energy Moller scattering can resolve a scaling degeneracy between quark and lepton couplings that remains after analyzing LHC dilepton data, permitting an extraction of the individual Z' couplings rather than combinations of them. We study how precisely Z' properties can be extracted for LHC integrated luminosities ranging from a few inverse femtobarns to super-LHC values of an inverse attobarn. For the several example cases studied with M_Z'=1.5 TeV, we find that coupling combinations can be determined with relative uncertainties reaching 30% with 30 fb^-1 of integrated luminosity, while 50% is possible with 10 fb^-1. With SLHC luminosities of 1 ab^-1, we find that products of quark and lepton couplings can be probed to 10%.Comment: 36 pages, 17 figure

Interface relaxation in electrophoretic deposition of polymer chains: Effects of segmental dynamics, molecular weight, and field

Using different segmental dynamics and relaxation, characteristics of the interface growth is examined in an electrophoretic deposition of polymer chains on a three (2+1) dimensional discrete lattice with a Monte Carlo simulation. Incorporation of faster modes such as crankshaft and reptation movements along with the relatively slow kink-jump dynamics seems crucial in relaxing the interface width. As the continuously released polymer chains are driven (via segmental movements) and deposited, the interface width $W$ grows with the number of time steps $t$, $W \propto t^{\beta},$ ($\beta \sim 0.4$--$0.8)$, which is followed by its saturation to a steady-state value $W_s$. Stopping the release of additional chains after saturation while continuing the segmental movements relaxes the saturated width to an equilibrium value ($W_s \to W_r$). Scaling of the relaxed interface width $W_r$ with the driving field $E$, $W_r \propto E^{-1/2}$ remains similar to that of the steady-state $W_s$ width. In contrast to monotonic increase of the steady-state width $W_s$, the relaxed interface width $W_r$ is found to decay (possibly as a stretched exponential) with the molecular weight.Comment: 5 pages, 7 figure

Formation of correlations in strongly coupled plasmas

The formation of binary correlations in plasma is studied from the quantum kinetic equation. It is shown that this formation is much faster than dissipation due to collisions. In a hot (dense) plasma the correlations are formed on the scale of inverse plasma frequency (Fermi energy). We derive analytical formulae for the time dependency of the potential energy which measures the extent of correlations. We discuss the dynamical formation of screening and compare with the statical screened result. Comparisons are made with molecular dynamic simulations.Comment: Proceedings of the 8th International Workshop on Atomic Physics for Ion-Driven Fusion, Heidelberg 1997, appear in Laser and Particle Beam

Ensuring water supply for all towns and villages in the Eastern Cape and Western Cape Provinces of South Africa

The Department of Water Affairs (DWA) has embarked on a nationwide programme to develop water-reconciliation strategies for all towns across the country. Reconciliation strategies for the major metropolitan areas and systems (e.g. Johannesburg/Pretoria, East London, Cape Town and Durban) were developed next. The implementation of these strategies is monitored by strategy steering committees. The approach has now been extended to all other metropolitan areas as well as all towns and villages or clusters of villages. In order to prepare the actual strategies, regardless of the size of the town, thorough documentation, research and analysis of the available information was required, as well as evaluation of projected growth scenarios to assess water requirements over the next 25 years and identification of potential additional sources to meet this growing requirement. It has emerged that the poor operation and maintenance of water supply, treatment and reticulation infrastructure are resulting in significant losses, which, if corrected, can reverse the current water shortages being experienced. Similarly, the generally poor management of effluent remains a threat to surface water and groundwater quality downstream. It appears that many municipalities perceive groundwater as an unreliable resource; however, in general, the issue of staff and skills shortages to manage the resource effectively is the actual problem. This is an operational issue rather than a groundwater-resource-specific issue. This aspect requires special attention for existing groundwater schemes and proposed groundwater development. In most instances water conservation and water-demand management and the development of local surface and groundwater resources are the most feasible options to meet any current or projected future water-supply shortfalls. Any intervention must be combined with a skills-development programme at the operational level to ensure the sustainability of the proposed supply options. This paper is based on the experience gained in the development of reconciliation strategies for the towns and villages in the DWA Southern Planning Region (i.e. surface water drainage areas in the Eastern Cape and Western Cape Provinces), which was carried out by Umvoto Africa in association with engineering consulting practice Aurecon

Developmental pathways towards mood disorders in adult life: Is there a role for sleep disturbances?

Introduction: Mood disorders are among the most prevalent and serious mental disorders and rank high among to the leading global burdens of disease. The developmental psychopathology framework can offer a life course perspective on them thus providing a basis for early prevention and intervention. Sleep disturbances, are considered risk factors for mood disorders across childhood, adolescence and adulthood. Assuming that sleep disturbances may play a pivotal role in the pathogenesis of mood disorders from a life course point of view, we reviewed the data on developmental pathways towards mood disorders in adult life in relation to sleep disturbances. Method: From February 2017, a systematic search was conducted in PubMed, PsycINFO and Embase electronic databases for literature on developmental pathways to mood disorders in adult life in relation to sleep disturbances and to 1) pre-natal stress, 2) early brain developmental processes, and 3) temperaments, character and attachment style. Results: Eleven, 54 and 15 articles were respectively selected. Conclusions: Experimental and clinical studies revealed that exposure to prenatal/early life stress results in sleep disturbances such as poor sleep and altered circadian regulation phases and may predict or even precipitate mood disorders in adulthood. Chronic sleep disruption may interfere with neuronal plasticity, connectivity and the developing brain thus contributing to the development of mood disorders. In addition sleep and circadian dysregulations have been shown to be related to those temperaments, character and attachment styles which are considered precursors of mood disorders. Sleep and circadian behaviours may serve as early targets regarding mood disorders

Differential equations and massive two-loop Bhabha scattering: the B5l2m3 case

The two-loop box contributions to massive Bhabha scattering may be reduced to two-loop box master integrals (MIs) with five, six, and seven internal lines, plus vertices and self energies. The self-energy and vertex MIs may be solved analytically by the differential equations (DE) method. This is true for only few of the box masters. Here we describe some details of the analytical determination, including constant terms in ep=(4-d)/2, of the complicated topology B5l2m3 (with 5 lines, 2 of them being massive). With the DE approach, three of the four coupled masters have been solved in terms of (generalized) standard Harmonic Polylogarithms.Comment: 5 pages, 2 figures, contribution to RADCOR 2005, Oct 2-7, 2005, Shonan Village, Japan, to appear in Nucl. B (Proc. Suppl.

Quantum Spin Chains and Riemann Zeta Function with Odd Arguments

Riemann zeta function is an important object of number theory. It was also used for description of disordered systems in statistical mechanics. We show that Riemann zeta function is also useful for the description of integrable model. We study XXX Heisenberg spin 1/2 anti-ferromagnet. We evaluate a probability of formation of a ferromagnetic string in the anti-ferromagnetic ground state in thermodynamics limit. We prove that for short strings the probability can be expressed in terms of Riemann zeta function with odd arguments.Comment: LaTeX, 7 page