Feasibility of groundwater abstraction and treatment for urban water supply

Water is one of Earth's most valuable resources and one of Earth's most threatened resources. Continuously increasing population growth coupled with changing climate has resulted in the depletion of water sources. As a result, investigations into alternative water sources are being conducted worldwide. One such alternative water source is groundwater abstraction. Groundwater abstraction involves the abstraction of water from an underground source. The volume of water that can be sustainably abstracted is governed by legislation. Groundwater typically requires treatment before it can be distributed to the general population for use, and thus the implementation of large-scale groundwater abstraction projects involves large capital outlays, as well as monthly operational outlays. The feasibility into the implementation of large-scale groundwater abstraction projects is therefore of interest to stakeholders involved in the water supply industry. The lifecycle of a recently implemented large-scale groundwater abstraction project was analysed in order to determine its feasibility. The project was implemented by Drakenstein Municipality in the Western Cape in 2017. The project involved identifying groundwater abstraction points that could provide sustainable volumes of water. The water quality of each groundwater abstraction point was then investigated for any outlying parameters according to SANS 241-1:2015 guidelines for potable water. Groundwater abstraction water treatment plants were then designed in order to treat the combined sustainable flow rates of water at their specific water qualities. The treated water from each groundwater abstraction water treatment plant was then analysed in order to confirm compliance with the SANS 241- 1:2015 guidelines, before the booster pumps were commissioned and commenced with their continuous supply of potable water into the network. The capital expenditure associated with each of the groundwater abstraction water treatment plants was obtained from the Engineer, Aurecon. In addition, the estimated monthly operational expenditure was computed. These expenditures were used to determine the feasibility of the large-scale groundwater abstraction project by computing the payback period and comparing this period to the design life of each of the groundwater abstraction water treatment plants. In addition, the monthly savings applicable to the municipality as a result of the project's implementation was computed. Finally, the feasibility into varying flow rates of groundwater abstraction water treatment plants, and varying water quality of groundwater abstraction points was investigated. Two sites were identified within the municipal area, each with four groundwater abstraction points capable of delivering a combined 5.18 ML/day and 1.62 ML/day. These sites were identified as Boy Louw Sportsgrounds and Parys Sportsgrounds respectively. Although the sites were only 2.60 kilometres apart, the water quality of the combined flow rates indicated that the groundwater abstraction points were accessing two different water sources. The combined sustainable flow rate at Boy Louw Sportsgrounds required turbidity, iron and manganese removal, as well as disinfection. The combined sustainable flow rate at Parys Sportsgrounds required turbidity removal and disinfection. Groundwater abstraction water treatment plants were then designed to treat the water at Boy Louw Sportsgrounds and Parys Sportsgrounds. Boy Louw Sportsgrounds involved the distribution of equipment across seven shipping containers, whilst Parys Sportsgrounds involved the distribution of equipment across three shipping containers. It was found that the groundwater abstraction project was feasible with a payback period of three years. This payback period fell well within the 10-year design life of each groundwater abstraction water treatment plant. In addition, it was found that the municipality would be subject to a 72% monthly saving in water costs as a result of utilising the groundwater abstraction water treatment plants, as opposed to purchasing water in bulk from the City of Cape Town. It was found that the payback periods of Boy Louw Sportsgrounds and Parys Sportsgrounds were two and five years respectively. Although Boy Louw Sportsgrounds delivered almost three times the potable water flow rate than that of Parys Sportsgrounds, its payback period was three years sooner. In addition, it was found that the municipal savings as a result of Boy Louw Sportsgrounds was 8% more than that of Parys Sportsgrounds. It was therefore concluded that the larger the flow rate of water to be treated, the more financially feasible the project. In addition, it was determined that the more water quality parameters lying above the upper limits of SANS 241-1:2015 guidelines for potable water, the more treatment processes would need to be implemented resulting in additional capital and operational expenditure. It was therefore concluded that the more water quality parameters requiring treatment, the less financially feasible the project. Finally, it was determined that the feasibility of the large-scale groundwater abstraction project is limited by the rate at which the municipality purchases water in bulk from the City of Cape Town. As long as the bulk water purchase tariff remains above R 2.85/m³, the project will remain feasible. Should the bulk water purchase tariff fall below this value, the project no longer remains feasible as the payback period of the project exceeds the design life of the groundwater abstraction water treatment plants

The Effects of Descriptive and Injunctive Peer Norms on Young Adult Alcohol Use

Descriptive peer norms refer to one’s perception of their peer’s alcohol use, while injunctive peer norms refer to one’s perception of their peer’s approval of alcohol use. Current literature has found that both norms are positively associated with alcohol use among young adults, but it remains unknown whether one norm has a greater influence on alcohol use than the other. The purpose of the current study was to explore this gap in the literature and examine the relative influence of both descriptive and injunctive norms on alcohol consumption. One hundred Caucasian, moderate-heavy drinking young adults completed a baseline questionnaire assessing peer norms and alcohol use over the past 90 days before participating in three, 10-minute taste test sessions; both self-reported alcohol use over the past 90 days and measured amount of alcohol consumed by the participant in the experimental session were used as alcohol outcomes. In general, both descriptive and injunctive peer norms were significantly associated with greater alcohol use, with injunctive norms influencing a wider range of drinking behaviors than descriptive norms. Furthermore, contrary to study hypotheses, descriptive and injunctive peer norms appeared to have overlapping influences on alcohol use. These findings provide insight into the social factors that motivate alcohol use among young adults. Future studies are needed to examine the impacts of both descriptive and injunctive peer norms on subsequent alcohol use

Physical Activity Informational Websites: Accuracy, Language Ease, and Fear Appeal

Introduction. Health information is one of the most common searches on the Internet. Literature supports that, in general, health information readily available to Internet consumers is not accurate, lacks plain language for ease of understanding, and does not incorporate behavior-change theoretical frameworks. The purpose of this study was to evaluate each of these components. Method. Three keywords, physical activity, exercise, and fitness, were entered into four popular search engines: Google, Bing, and Yahoo. The first 5 result pages were considered, totaling a sample of 493 websites. After exclusionary criteria, 102 websites were reviewed and analyzed with guidance from ACSM recommendations, federal government plain language criteria guided by President Obama\u27s Plain Writing Act of 2010, and Extended Parallel Process variables. Results. Accuracy was poor, plain language adherence was moderate, and only EPPM variable self-efficacy was well represented. Accuracy varied by keyword, as exercise resulted in more accurate websites. Adherence to clear and concise language criteria, also referred to as language ease, varied by keyword. Choosing physical activity yielded less websites with low adherence, and fitness yielded less websites with moderate/high adherence. Also, language ease varied by website type. Commercial websites yielded more websites with low adherence. Finally, websites with moderate/high accuracy were more likely to yield websites incorporating efficacy and language ease criteria. Discussion. It is encouraging that the majority of accurate websites were able to incorporate both efficacy and plain language criteria, specifically those representing clear and concise language as language ease. However, a great deal of attention should be paid to the inaccuracy of physical activity recommendations, moderate plain language levels, and incomplete inclusion of behavior change theoretical frameworks that are readily available to Internet consumers

Color vision variation, feeding behavior, and reproductive output in a group of wild Ateles belzebuth

Color vision among primates is remarkably diverse. Catarrhines and howler monkeys have independently acquired routine trichromacy through duplication of the middle-to-long wavelength-sensitive (M/LWS) opsin gene on the X chromosome. Most platyrrhines and some strepsirrhines, however, possess polymorphic color vision due to allelic variation at a single M/LWS locus; heterozygous females are trichromats, while males and homozygous females are dichromats. Four mechanisms – heterozygote (trichromat) advantage, frequency-dependent selection, mutual benefit of association, and niche divergence – have been proposed to explain the maintenance of the opsin polymorphism, yet the selective advantages of individual phenotypes remain unclear. I reviewed the diversity in platyrrhine color vision as well as the studies that have evaluated each hypothesis. Next, I tested two of these hypotheses in one social group of white-bellied spider monkeys (Ateles belzebuth) that has been monitored at Tiputini Biodiversity Station since 2005. Spider monkeys – a genus of large-bodied frugivorous platyrrhines – have two possible opsin alleles determined by a SNP in exon 5 of the M/LWS locus; in reconstituted pigments they have absorption spectra with peaks at 538 and 553 nm, respectively. Using fecal-extracted DNA, I sequenced exon 5 for 44 group members, identifying 14 male dichromats (seven P538, seven P553), 10 female dichromats (two P538, eight P553), and 20 female trichromats (P538/P553). Then, to investigate the possibility of heterozygote advantage, I compared the interbirth intervals and number of offspring produced for dichromat versus trichromat females. There were no differences in these measures of reproductive output, suggesting that the conditional advantages of trichromacy may not translate to higher fitness. To assess niche divergence, I examined the proportion of total feeding time spent by dichromat versus trichromat adult and subadult males and females on each of three major food types – fruits, new leaves, and flowers – plus all three substrates combined. Additionally, I tested for niche divergence within dichromats by comparing the foraging behavior of P538 versus P553 individuals. Analyses revealed no difference in foraging activity budgets between groups in either case. Future work may consider other aspects of fitness and finer-scale niche differentiation to better understand how multiple visual phenotypes have been maintained in this population.Anthropolog

A psycholinguistic investigation of orthographic neighbourhood effects in reading and spelling in isiXhosa

Despite increased research interest in recent years in the metalinguistic skills underpinning reading in the Southern Bantu languages, little work has been done on the underlying microlinguistic layer. This refers to the actual mechanical underpinnings of linguistic skills; zooming in on micro-language structures so as to explicate our understanding of how reading works. One such microlinguistic phenomenon is the effect of orthographic neighbours on reading and writing. Research has found predominantly faciliatory neighbourhood effects for English word reading (Andrews, 1997; Siakaluk, Sears & Lupker, 2002; Yarkoni, Balota & Yap, 2008). Specifically, words with more orthographic neighbours have faster response times in lexical decision and naming tasks. However, in languages such as Spanish and French, inhibitory neighbourhood effects are reported (Grainger & Jacobs, 1996; Carreiras, Perea & Grainger, 1997). These findings highlight the language-specific nature of orthographic neighbourhood effects (Andrews, 1997), and the necessity for language- specific investigations of these effects. This thesis investigates the linguistic properties of orthographic neighbours in isiXhosa, thereby developing a database of orthographic neighbourhoods in isiXhosa. Further, this research explores the interaction between orthographic neighbourhood density and neighbourhood frequency with three literacy skills: lexical decision response time, word reading accuracy, and spelling accuracy. Data were collected from 97 isiXhosa grade three learners from five schools in KwaNobuhle Township in the Eastern Cape. A corpus of 170 000 tokens of isiXhosa words (Rees & Randera, 2017) was used to compile a database of orthographic neighbourhoods for 30 real, and 30 pseudowords which ranged in orthographic neighbourhood density and neighbourhood frequency, whilst controlling for word length and word frequency. Using this database, lexical decision, word reading, and spelling tasks were designed and administered to the participants. Findings indicate a significant inhibitory effect of orthographic neighbourhood frequency on spelling accuracy. Words with high neighbourhood frequencies are more likely to be spelt incorrectly. There was no observed effect of orthographic neighbourhoods on lexical decision response time and word reading accuracy. These results are interpreted within connectionist and search models of orthographic processing. Specifically, the findings indicate a partial reliance on lexical processing strategies when spelling. That is, orthographic neighbours compete for lexical access when spelling. Education practitioners may wish to present learners with lists of orthographic neighbours when introducing novel words so as to make explicit the fine grain differences between words in the language. This also means that future research will need to develop a larger repository of orthographic neighbours in isiXhosa that can be made available for pedagogical purposes.Thesis (MA) -- Faculty of Humanities, Linguistics and Applied Language Studies, 202

Flora and Fauna in East Asian Art

Flora and Fauna in East Asian Art is the fourth annual exhibition curated by students enrolled in the Art History Methods course. This exhibition highlights the academic achievements of six student curators: Samantha Frisoli ’18, Daniella Snyder ’18, Gabriella Bucci ’19, Melissa Casale ’19, Keira Koch ’19, and Paige Deschapelles ’20. The selection of artworks in this exhibition considers how East Asian artists portrayed similar subjects of flora and fauna in different media including painting, prints, embroidery, jade, and porcelain. This exhibition intends to reveal the hidden meanings behind various representations of flora and fauna in East Asian art by examining the iconography, cultural context, aesthetic and function of each object.https://cupola.gettysburg.edu/artcatalogs/1025/thumbnail.jp

Physiological health parameters among college students to promote chronic disease prevention and health promotion

This study aimed to provide physiologic health risk parameters by gender and age among college students enrolled in a U.S. Midwestern University to promote chronic disease prevention and ameliorate health. A total of 2615 college students between 18 and 25 years old were recruited annually using a series of cross-sectional designs during the spring semester over an 8-year period. Physiologic parameters measured included body mass index (BMI), percentage body fat (%BF), blood serum cholesterol (BSC), and systolic (SBP) and diastolic (DBP) blood pressure. These measures were compared to data from NHANES to identify differences in physiologic parameters among 18-25 year olds in the general versus college-enrolled population. A quantitative instrument assessed health behaviors related to physical activity, diet, and licit drug use. Results suggest that average physiologic parameters from18 to 25 year olds enrolled in college were significantly different from parameters of 18-25 year olds in the general population. Generally, men reported higher percentiles for BMI, SBP, and DBP than women, but lower %BF and BSC percentiles than women at each age. SBP and DBP significantly increased with age and alcohol use. Students in the lowest (5th) and highest percentiles (95th and 75th), for most age groups, demonstrated DBP, BMI, and %BF levels potentially problematic for health and future development of chronic disease based on percentiles generated for their peer group. Newly identified physiologic parameters may be useful to practitioners serving college students 18–25 years old from similar institutions in determining whether behavior change or treatment interventions are appropriate

Traumatic Brain Injuries and Substance Use in Rhode Island Young Adults

Background: Traumatic brain injury (TBI) is a major public health concern in the U.S. and Rhode Island. The relationship between TBI and substance use is likely bidirectional. There is limited information on the relationship between TBI and substance use in young adults. This study aims to: 1) examine any sociodemographic disparities in TBI, and 2) understand the relationship between TBI and various types of substance use among young adults in Rhode Island. Methods: A cross-sectional analysis was conducted with data from the web-based Rhode Island Young Adult Survey (RIYAS) from May through August 2022. The survey resulted in N = 1,022 young adults aged 18-25 years who lived in Rhode Island for at least part of the year, all of whom are included in this study. Results: Among this sample of Rhode Island young adults, those having experienced a brain injury were more likely to engage in hazardous alcohol use (p = 0.003), hazardous marijuana use (p \u3c 0.001), and illicit drug use (p = 0.003).but not OTC nor prescription drug misuse. Black young adults, Asian young adults, and Hispanic young adults had 77% (95%CI: 26%, 93%), 79% (95%CI: 32%, 94%), and 58% (95%CI: 31%, 75%) lower odds of brain injury, respectively, compared to White, non-Hispanic young adults. Conclusion: While small-scale, single-program initiatives exist, there is a need for larger-scale, multidisciplinary programs to address TBI and SUD in various medical settings for behavioral health and emergency care

The Perceived Availability of Online Social Support: Exploring the Contributions of Illness and Rural Identities in Adults with Chronic Respiratory Illness

Joining an online social support group may increase perceived membership to a community, but it does not guarantee that the community will be available when it is needed. This is especially relevant for adults with Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease (COPD), many of whom reside in rural regions and continually negotiate their illness identity. Drawing from social support literature and communication theory of identity, this cross-sectional study explored how COPD illness and geographic identities interact to influence patients’ perceived availability of online social support. In April 2018, 575 adults with a history of respiratory symptoms completed an online survey. Patients with a COPD diagnosis reported greater availability of online support. This was partially mediated by a positive degree of COPD illness identity (i.e., being diagnosed with COPD, a history of tobacco use, severe respiratory symptoms, high disease knowledge, and low income but high education). The relationship between COPD illness identity and the availability of online support was strongest among those with low rural identity; however, at lower levels of COPD illness identity, participants with high rural identity reported the greatest degree of available online support. Results have important implications for tailored education approaches across the COPD care continuum by illness and geographic identities

Proposing a Transactional Model of eHealth Literacy: Concept Analysis

Background: Electronic health (eHealth) literacy was conceptualized in 2006 as the ability of internet users to locate, evaluate, and act upon web-based health information. Now, advances in eHealth technology have cultivated transactional opportunities for patients to access, share, and monitor health information. However, empirical evidence shows that existing models and measures of eHealth literacy have limited theoretical underpinnings that reflect the transactional capabilities of eHealth. This paper describes a conceptual model based on the Transactional Model of Communication (TMC), in which eHealth literacy is described as an intrapersonal skillset hypothesized as being dynamic; reciprocal; and shaped by social, relational, and cultural contexts. Objective: The objective of our study was to systematically examine eHealth literacy definitions, models, and measures to propose a refined conceptual and operational definition based on the TMC. Methods: Walker and Avant's concept analysis method was used to guide the systematic review of eHealth literacy definitions (n=10), rating scales (n=6), models (n=4), and peer-reviewed model applications (n=16). Subsequent cluster analyses showed salient themes across definitions. Dimensions, antecedents, and consequences reflected in models and measures were extracted and deductively analyzed based on codes consistent with the TMC. Results: Systematic review evidence revealed incongruity between operational eHealth literacy included in definitions compared with literacies included within models and measures. Theoretical underpinnings of eHealth literacy also remain dismal. Despite the transactional capabilities of eHealth, the role of "communication" in eHealth literacy remains underdeveloped and does not account for physical and cognitive processing abilities necessary for multiway transactions. Conclusions: The Transactional Model of eHealth Literacy and a corresponding definition are proposed. In this novel model, eHealth literacy comprises a hierarchical intrapersonal skillset that mediates the reciprocal effect of contextual factors (ie, user oriented and task oriented) on patient engagement in health care. More specifically, the intrapersonal skillset counteracts the negative effect of "noise" (or impediments) produced by social and relational contexts. Cutting across health and technology literacies, the intrapersonal skillset of eHealth literacy is operationalized through four literacies that correspond with discrete operative skills: (1) functional (ie, locate and understand); (2) communicative (ie, exchange); (3) critical (ie, evaluate); and (4) translational (ie, apply)