Inventory of water storage types in the Blue Nile and Volta River Basins

Water storage / River basins / Reservoirs / Ponds / Tanks / Groundwater / Soil moisture / Wetlands

New views of the distant stellar halo

Currently, only a small number of Milky Way (MW) stars are known to exist beyond 100 kpc from the Galactic Centre. Though the distribution of these stars in the outer halo is believed to be sparse, they can provide evidence of more recent accretion events than in the inner halo and help map out the MW's dark matter halo to its virial radius. We have re-examined the outermost regions of 11 existing stellar halo models with two synthetic surveys: one mimicking present-day searches for distant M giants and another mimicking RR Lyra (RRL) projections for the Large Synoptic Survey Telescope (LSST). Our models suggest that colour and proper motion cuts currently used to select M giant candidates for follow-up successfully remove nearly all self-contamination from foreground halo dwarf stars and are useful for focusing observations on distant M giants, of which there are thousands to tens of thousands beyond 100 kpc in our models. We likewise expect that LSST will identify comparable numbers of RRLe at these distances. We demonstrate that several observable properties of both tracers, such as proximity of neighbouring stars, proper motions and distances (for RRLe), could help us separate different accreted dwarf galaxies from one another in the distant MW halo. We also discuss prospects for using ratios of M giants to RRLe as a proxy for accretion time, which in the future could provide new constraints on the recent accretion history of our Galaxy

Scoping study on natural resources and climate change in Southeast Asia with a focus on agriculture. Final report

Climate change / Natural resources / Environmental effects / Agroecology / Agricultural production / Crops / Cropping systems / Farming systems / Livestock / Fisheries / Food security / Water management / Economic aspects / Rural poverty / Policy / Nutrient management / South East Asia / Cambodia / Laos / Thailand / Vietnam / Myanmar / China / Greater Mekong Subregion / Tonle Sap / Yunnan

Climate change, water and agriculture in the Greater Mekong subregion

Climate change / Adaptation / Indicators / Water resource management / River basins / Water availability / Water quality / Groundwater / Fisheries / Ecosystems / Water power / Population growth / Land use / Biofuels / Sea level / South East Asia / Cambodia / Laos / Myanmar / Thailand / Vietnam / China / Greater Mekong Subregion / Yunnan Province

Maternal Health-Seeking Behaviour: A Qualitative Research Project

University of Technology Sydney. Faculty of Health.Aim: This study explored the health-seeking behaviours contained in the stories of 14 first-time mothers during the first twelve months of their infant’s life when they were concerned for their child’s health. The aim of this study was to understand how first-time mothers learn to seek help or advice and how, through this learning, increase their knowledge and health literacy. It is anticipated that the results of the study will assist health professionals to develop strategies to support mothers, especially first-time mothers, to increase their knowledge and enable them to make informed decisions regarding health-seeking for their baby. Method: A qualitative design was chosen to allow an exploration of the mothers’ health-seeking experiences using the Critical Incident Technique method to inform the data collection. This method allowed the mothers to be observers of their actions through the diarising of times when they had concerns about their child’s health. The mothers’ stories were then explored using semi-structured interviews, when the babies were around eight weeks of age and again at approximately six to eleven months of age. An inductive thematic analysis method was then used in the analysis of the mothers’ stories to ensure their stories were respected and their use maximised. Results: Analysis of the 124 health-seeking occurrences identified in the mothers’ stories resulted in the development of four themes and associated subthemes. These themes were: asking other parents, connecting with health professionals, e-searching and learning, and state of knowing. This research project demonstrated that mothers seek help or advice within their environment in what could be described as a health literacy pathway. The mothers were able to increase their health literacy through a reciprocal interaction with their environment that included health services where the presence of a collaborative relationship enabled the co-production of knowledge. A key feature of the study findings was the role of mothers’ groups in providing opportunity for knowledge generation through the observation of modelled behaviour, especially from other mothers with children of a similar age. Conclusion: This study demonstrated that mothers who participated in this study did not ignore health concerns but are motivated learners actively seeking help or advice through a number of different avenues, often soon after birth. In addition, mothers access several different sources for the one issue and when provided with information will critique it before accepting or actioning. Importantly, the study demonstrated also that over time where and how mothers seek help or advice changes as they become connected with their community and their self-efficacy increases

Process evaluation of a school- and home-based sun safety education intervention

Effective interventions that reduce children\u27s sun exposure are likely to reduce melanoma incidence in the longer term. However, for such interventions to have an impact they must be adequately implemented. School-based sun protection programs have been evaluated to determine their effectiveness in changing behaviours, however, few studies have assessed the implementation of such programs, or the effect of their implementation on outcomes. Kidskin was a five-year intervention trial designed to assess the effectiveness of a multicomponent intervention in reducing sun exposure in children in Perth, Western Australia. This thesis describes the process evaluation of the school- and home-based educational components of Kidskin\u27s intervention. This process evaluation incorporated data from 873 students, their parents and teachers in Years 1 to 4 at the 19 intervention schools involved in the larger Kidskin study

You get better with age : wellbeing and health status assessment in older people.

People aged 65 years and older are the fastest growing age group in New Zealand. By the mid-2070s, there are predictions that this age group is likely to comprise approximately one third of the population. Older people are encouraged to stay in their own homes within their community for as long as possible with support to encourage the extension of ageing in place. Currently around 14% of those aged 75 years or older, make the move into retirement villages. This is expected to increase. Little is known by retirement villages about the wellbeing and health of those who decide to live independently in these facilities. Predicting the need for a continuum of care is challenging. This research measured the wellbeing and health of older adults. It was situated in a critical realist paradigm, overlaid with an empathetic axiology. A focused literature review considered the impact on wellbeing from the aspects of living place, age, gender, health status and the 2010/2011 Canterbury earthquakes. Longitudinal studies used the Enlightenment Scale and the interRAI Community Health Assessment (CHA) to measure the wellbeing and health of one group of residents (n=120) living independently in one retirement village in Canterbury, New Zealand. The research was extended to incorporate two cross-section studies when initial results for wellbeing were found to be higher than anticipated. These additional studies included participants living independently from other retirement villages (n=115) and those living independently within the community (n=354). A total of 589 participants, aged 65 – 97 years old, completed the Enlightenment Scale across the four studies. Across the living places, wellbeing continued to significantly improve with age. The Enlightenment Scale was a useful measure of wellbeing with older adults. Participants in the longitudinal studies largely maintained a relatively good health status, showing little change over the study period of 15 months. Predictions for the need for a move to supportive care were not able to be made using the CHA. The health status of participants did not influence their level of wellbeing. The key finding of note is that the wellbeing score of older adults increases by 1.27 points per year, using the Enlightenment Scale, irrespective of where they live

A Geografia Mais Íntima: O Corpo

El cuerpo como lugar, se centra en la geografía del cuerpo como un lugar colonizado, moldeado por el poder pero, que a su vez, ofrece resistencia. Es un espacio socialmente construido donde se toma al cuer-po como lugar, como primer territorio a ser defendido, sobre todo en el contexto brasileño, según Joseli Maria Silva, Marcio Jose Ornat y Alides Baptista Chimin Junior, en el cual se analizan las Expedições sobre corpos na geografia brasileira: trilhas equivocadas e rumos encontrados. También, seguido por el entramado de relaciones de poder que operan en diferentes escalas, ello es planteado por los autores Lynda Johnston y Robyn Longhurst, en su texto A Geografia mais íntima: o corpo. El cuerpo como lugar, focuses on the geography of the body as a colonised place, shaped by power, but which in turn offers resistance. It is a socially constructed space where the body is taken as a place, as the first territory to be defended, especially in the Brazilian context, according to Joseli Maria Silva, Marcio Jose Ornat and Alides Baptista Chimin Junior, in which the Expeditions on bodies in Brazilian geography are analysed: mistaken trails and directions found. Also, followed by the entanglement of power relations that operate at different scales, this is put forward by the authors Lynda Johnston and Robyn Longhurst, in their text The most intimate geography: the body - Translated with DeepL