168 research outputs found
An Economic Comparison of Composted Manure and Commercial Nitrogen with Imperfect Information
The economic feasibility of fertilizing irrigated grain sorghum with compos ted manure is evaluated using net return budgeting and production function analysis. Although the use of compost is technically feasible, the economic analysis indicates that compost does not comprise a large percentage of the nitrogen source in the profit-maximizing combination with commercial fertilizer.Composted manure, commercial nitrogen, net returns budgeting, production function analysis, irrigated grain sorghum, Crop Production/Industries,
A Risk Analysis of Converting CRP Acres to a Wheat-Sorghum-Fallow Rotation
This study examines the economic potential of producing a wheat (Triticum aesitivum) and grain sorghum (Sorghum bicolor (L.) Moench) rotation with three different tillage strategies compared to the Conservation Reserve Program (CRP) in a semi-arid region. This research uses stochastic efficiency with respect to a function (SERF) to determine the preferred management strategies under various risk preferences and utility-weighted certainty equivalent risk premiums. Yields, input rates, and field operations from an experimental field in western Kansas are used to calculate net returns for each tillage strategy. Although current net returns to crop production using reduced tillage and no-tillage strategies are higher than CRP, risk analysis indicates CRP would be the preferred strategy for some risk-averse managers.Conservation Reserve Program, conservation tillage, simulation, sorghum, wheat, risk, Agricultural and Food Policy, Crop Production/Industries, Farm Management, Land Economics/Use, Risk and Uncertainty,
A Method to Evaluate Seeder Performance
Evaluating in field seeder performance is challenging and sometimes requires destructive methods. An alternative method for evaluating seeder performance based on nonlinear regression was developed. This method yields parameters that describe seeder performance, such as emergence rate, initial emergence data, and emergence percent. These parameters are easy to explain to the practitioner. The proposed method was compared to a widely used method to assess emergence rate. Results assessing emergence percent were comparable between the two methods. There were differences between the emergence rate index and emergence rate determined from the proposed method. These differences were expected since the emergence rate index encompasses more information than simply the rate of emergence
Using livestock wastewater with SDI: a status report after three seasons
Presented at the Central Plains irrigation short course and exposition on February 5-6, 2001 at the Holiday Inn in Kearney, Nebraska.Using subsurface drip irrigation (SDI) with lagoon wastewater has many potential advantages. The challenge is to design and manage the SDI system to prevent emitter clogging. A study was initiated in 1998 to test the performance of five types of driplines (with emitter flow rates of 0.15, 0.24, 0.40, 0.60, and 0.92 gal/hr-emitter) with lagoon wastewater. A disk filter (200 mesh, with openings of 0.003 inches) was used and shock treatments of chlorine and acid were injected periodically. Over the course of three seasons (1998-2000) a total of approximately 52 inches of irrigation water has been applied through the SDI system. The flow rates of the two smallest emitter sizes, 0.15 gal/hr-emitter and 0.24 gal/hr-emitter have decreased approximately 30% during the three seasons, indicating some emitter clogging. The three largest driplines (0.40, 0.60, and 0.92 gal/hr-emitters) have had less than 5% reduction in flow rate. The disk filter and automatic backflush controller have performed adequately with the beef livestock wastewater in all three years. Based on these results, the use of SDI with beef lagoon wastewater shows promise. However, the smaller emitter sizes normally used with groundwater sources in western Kansas may be risky for use with lagoon wastewater and the long-term (> 3 growing seasons) effects are untested
ConXsense - Automated Context Classification for Context-Aware Access Control
We present ConXsense, the first framework for context-aware access control on
mobile devices based on context classification. Previous context-aware access
control systems often require users to laboriously specify detailed policies or
they rely on pre-defined policies not adequately reflecting the true
preferences of users. We present the design and implementation of a
context-aware framework that uses a probabilistic approach to overcome these
deficiencies. The framework utilizes context sensing and machine learning to
automatically classify contexts according to their security and privacy-related
properties. We apply the framework to two important smartphone-related use
cases: protection against device misuse using a dynamic device lock and
protection against sensory malware. We ground our analysis on a sociological
survey examining the perceptions and concerns of users related to contextual
smartphone security and analyze the effectiveness of our approach with
real-world context data. We also demonstrate the integration of our framework
with the FlaskDroid architecture for fine-grained access control enforcement on
the Android platform.Comment: Recipient of the Best Paper Awar
Proceedings of the 24th annual Central Plains irrigation conference
Presented at Proceedings of the 24th annual Central Plains irrigation conference held on February 21-22 in Colby, Kansas.Includes bibliographical references
The Origin of the Mass--Metallicity Relation: Insights from 53,000 Star-Forming Galaxies in the SDSS
We utilize Sloan Digital Sky Survey imaging and spectroscopy of ~53,000
star-forming galaxies at z~0.1 to study the relation between stellar mass and
gas-phase metallicity. We derive gas-phase oxygen abundances and stellar masses
using new techniques which make use of the latest stellar evolutionary
synthesis and photoionization models. We find a tight (+/-0.1 dex) correlation
between stellar mass and metallicity spanning over 3 orders of magnitude in
stellar mass and a factor of 10 in metallicity. The relation is relatively
steep from 10^{8.5} - 10^{10.5} M_sun, in good accord with known trends between
luminosity and metallicity, but flattens above 10^{10.5} M_sun. We use indirect
estimates of the gas mass based on the H-alpha luminosity to compare our data
to predictions from simple closed box chemical evolution models. We show that
metal loss is strongly anti-correlated with baryonic mass, with low mass dwarf
galaxies being 5 times more metal-depleted than L* galaxies at z~0.1. Evidence
for metal depletion is not confined to dwarf galaxies, but is found in galaxies
with masses as high as 10^{10} M_sun. We interpret this as strong evidence both
of the ubiquity of galactic winds and of their effectiveness in removing metals
from galaxy potential wells.Comment: ApJ accepted, 15 pages, 9 figures, emulateapj.st
The photometric properties of a vast stellar substructure in the outskirts of M33
We have surveyed sq.degrees surrounding M33 with CFHT MegaCam in the
g and i filters, as part of the Pan-Andromeda Archaeological Survey. Our
observations are deep enough to resolve the top 4mags of the red giant branch
population in this galaxy. We have previously shown that the disk of M33 is
surrounded by a large, irregular, low-surface brightness substructure. Here, we
quantify the stellar populations and structure of this feature using the PAndAS
data. We show that the stellar populations of this feature are consistent with
an old population with dex and an interquartile range in
metallicity of dex. We construct a surface brightness map of M33 that
traces this feature to mags\,arcsec. At these low surface
brightness levels, the structure extends to projected radii of kpc from
the center of M33 in both the north-west and south-east quadrants of the
galaxy. Overall, the structure has an "S-shaped" appearance that broadly aligns
with the orientation of the HI disk warp. We calculate a lower limit to the
integrated luminosity of the structure of mags, comparable to a
bright dwarf galaxy such as Fornax or AndII and slightly less than $1\$ of the
total luminosity of M33. Further, we show that there is tentative evidence for
a distortion in the distribution of young stars near the edge of the HI disk
that occurs at similar azimuth to the warp in HI. The data also hint at a
low-level, extended stellar component at larger radius that may be a M33 halo
component. We revisit studies of M33 and its stellar populations in light of
these new results, and we discuss possible formation scenarios for the vast
stellar structure. Our favored model is that of the tidal disruption of M33 in
its orbit around M31.Comment: Accepted for publication in ApJ. 17 figures. ApJ preprint forma
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MELK is an oncogenic kinase essential for mitotic progression in basal-like breast cancer cells
Despite marked advances in breast cancer therapy, basal-like breast cancer (BBC), an aggressive subtype of breast cancer usually lacking estrogen and progesterone receptors, remains difficult to treat. In this study, we report the identification of MELK as a novel oncogenic kinase from an in vivo tumorigenesis screen using a kinome-wide open reading frames (ORFs) library. Analysis of clinical data reveals a high level of MELK overexpression in BBC, a feature that is largely dependent on FoxM1, a master mitotic transcription factor that is also found to be highly overexpressed in BBC. Ablation of MELK selectively impairs proliferation of basal-like, but not luminal breast cancer cells both in vitro and in vivo. Mechanistically, depletion of MELK in BBC cells induces caspase-dependent cell death, preceded by defective mitosis. Finally, we find that Melk is not required for mouse development and physiology. Together, these data indicate that MELK is a normally non-essential kinase, but is critical for BBC and thus represents a promising selective therapeutic target for the most aggressive subtype of breast cancer. DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.7554/eLife.01763.00
RR Lyrae variables in M32 and the disk of M31
We observed two fields near M32 with the Advanced Camera for Surveys/High
Resolution Channel (ACS/HRC) on board the Hubble Space Telescope (HST). The
main field, F1, is 1.8 arcmin from the center of M32; the second field, F2,
constrains the M31 background, and is 5.4 arcmin distant. Each field was
observed for 16-orbits in each of the F435W (narrow B) and F555W (narrow V)
filters. The duration of the observations allowed RR Lyrae stars and other
short-period variables to be detected. A population of RR Lyrae stars
determined to belong to M32 would prove the existence of an ancient population
in that galaxy, a subject of some debate. We detected 17 RR Lyrae variables in
F1 and 14 in F2. A 1-sigma upper limit of 6 RR Lyrae variables belonging to M32
is inferred from these two fields alone. Use of our two ACS/WFC parallel fields
provides better constraints on the M31 background, however, and implies that
(68 % confidence interval) RR Lyrae variables in F1 belong to
M32. We have therefore found evidence for an ancient population in M32. It
seems to be nearly indistinguishable from the ancient population of M31. The RR
Lyrae stars in the F1 and F2 fields have indistinguishable mean V-band
magnitudes, mean periods, distributions in the Bailey diagram and ratios of RRc
to RR(tot) types. However, the color distributions in the two fields are
different, with a population of red RRab variables in F1 not seen in F2. We
suggest that these might be identified with the detected M32 RR Lyrae
population, but the small number of stars rules out a definitive claim.Comment: 19 pages, 18 figures, accepted Ap
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