THE UNIVERSITY BELL: A RESEARCH INTO TRADITIONAL METHODS OF BELL FOUNDING

poster abstractBell manufacturing companies no longer exist in the United States that utilize traditional craft procedures or are able to tune bells to standards based on ‘true-harmonic’ formula. Most bells in the United States used in the many forms of Campanology, or bell ringing, are imported from European foundries. These European bells are made using sensibilities that have exist-ed for over 800 years. The few remaining foundries, John Taylor and Co. in England, Paccard of France, Petit Fritsen and The Royal Eijsbouts Bell Found-ry located in The Netherlands, all provided the opportunity to conduct inten-sive study into the craft of bell making. By incorporating these craft tradi-tions into a contemporary fine art practice, viewers and listeners are able to access an otherwise obsolete aspect of the history of our material culture. Following closely in the theory and manufacturing procedures of these European founders, a bell of 110 lbs. titled The University Bell was cast at the Herron School of Art and Design’s foundry. The metal for the project was sourced from a redundant bell of St. Michael’s Parish Church Cornhill, Lon-don that was originally made in 1728 by Thomas Lester, one of the original founders of our 1752 Liberty Bell. The University Bell is currently in the earliest stages of being tuned in Mooresville, Indiana for a final nominal tone of C#3 at A=440Hz. Assistance from Smith’s Bell and Clock Service Inc., Bell Expert Richard Strauss, and John Taylor and Co. are contributing to the effort. The University Bell will later be installed in a series of sight specific performances. The successful cast of The University Bell and the continuing efforts to oversee the professional creation of tuned bells in this country marks the re-turn of a historic trade whose product has long resounded the democratic overtones of liberty and freedom. Funding provided by the Indiana University-Purdue University Indianapolis Undergraduate Research Opportunities Program (UROP)

Designing multifunctional landscapes for forest conservation

A multifunctional landscape approach to forest protection has been advocated for tropical countries. Designing such landscapes necessitates that the role of different land uses in protecting forest be evaluated, along with the spatial interactions between land uses. However, such evaluations have been hindered by a lack of suitable analysis methodologies and data with fine spatial resolution over long time periods. We demonstrate the utility of a matching method with multiple categories to evaluate the role of alternative land uses in protecting forest. We also assessed the impact of land use change trajectories on the rate of deforestation. We employed data from Kalimantan (Indonesian Borneo) at three different time periods during 2000–2012 to illustrate our approach. Four single land uses (protected areas (PA), natural forest logging concessions (LC), timber plantation concessions (TC) and oil-palm plantation concessions (OC)) and two mixed land uses (mixed concessions and the overlap between concessions and PA) were assessed. The rate of deforestation was found to be lowest for PA, followed by LC. Deforestation rates for all land uses tended to be highest for locations that share the characteristics of areas in which TC or OC are located (e.g. degraded areas), suggesting that these areas are inherently more susceptible to deforestation due to foregone opportunities. Our approach provides important insights into how multifunctional landscapes can be designed to enhance the protection of biodiversity

How do practitioners characterize land tenure security?

Improving land tenure security (LTS) is a significant challenge for sustainable development. The Sustainable Development Goals and other recent global initiatives have renewed and increased the need to improve LTS to address climate change, biodiversity loss, food security, poverty reduction, and other challenges. At the same time, policymakers are increasingly interested in evidence- based policies and decisions, creating urgency for practitioners and researchers to work together. Yet, incongruent characterizations of LTS (identifying the key components of LTS) by practitioners and researchers can limit collaboration and information flows necessary for research and effective policymaking. While there are systematic reviews of how LTS is characterized in the academic literature, no prior study has assessed how practitioners characterize LTS. We address this gap using data from 54 interviews of land tenure practitioners working in 10 countries of global importance for biodiversity and climate change mitigation. Practitioners characterize LTS as complex and multifaceted, and a majority of practitioners refer to de jure terms (e.g., titling) when characterizing it. Notably, in our data just one practitioner characterized LTS in terms of perceptions of the landholder, contrasting the recent emphasis in the academic literature on landholder perceptions in LTS characterizations. Researchers should be aware of incongruence in how LTS is characterized in the academic literature when engaging practitioners.Peer Reviewedhttps://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/155485/1/csp2186.pdfhttps://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/155485/2/csp2186_am.pd

Assessing the value of seasonal climate forecasts for decision‐making

Seasonal climate forecasts (SCF) can support decision‐making and thus help society cope with and prepare for climate variability and change. The demand for understanding the value and benefits of using SCF in decision‐making processes can be associated with different logics. Two of these would be the need to justify public and private investment in the provision of SCF and demonstrating the gains and benefits of using SCF in specific decision‐making contexts. This paper reviews the main factors influencing how SCF is (or can be) valued in supporting decision‐making and the main methods and metrics currently used to perform such valuations. Our review results in four key findings: (a) there is a current emphasis on economic ex ante studies and the quantification of SCF value; (b) there are fundamental differences in how the value of SCF is defined and estimated across methods and approaches; (c) most valuation methods are unable to capture the differential benefits and risks of using SCF across spatiotemporal scales and groups; and (d) there is limited involvement of the decision‐makers in the valuation process. The paper concludes by providing some guiding principles towards more effective valuations of SCF, notably the need for a wider diversity and integration of methodological approaches. These should particularly embrace ex‐post, qualitative, and participatory approaches which allow co‐evaluation with decision‐makers so that more comprehensive and equitable SCF valuations can be developed in future

Balancing agricultural development and environmental objectives: assessing tradeoffs in the humid tropics.

This volume so far has presented numerous issues, opportunities, and concerns from specific national and thematic perspectives on tropical forests and deforestation. This chapter attempts to pull these together through analysis of tradeoffs across those various perspectives

Structure and morphology of hydroxylated nickel oxide (111) surfaces

We report an experimental and theoretical analysis of the sqrt(3)x sqrt(3)-R30 and 2x2 reconstructions on the NiO (111) surface combining transmission electron microscopy, x-ray photoelectron spectroscopy, and reasonably accurate density functional calculations using the meta-GGA hybrid functional TPSSh. While the main focus here is on the surface structure, we also observe an unusual step morphology with terraces containing only even numbers of unit cells during annealing of the surfaces. The experimental data clearly shows that the surfaces contain significant coverage of hydroxyl terminations, and the surface structures are essentially the same as those reported on the MgO (111) surface implying an identical kinetically-limited water-driven structural transition pathway. The octapole structure can therefore be all but ruled out for single crystals of NiO annealed in or transported through humid air. . The theoretical analysis indicates, as expected, that simple density functional theory methods for such strongly-correlated oxide surfaces are marginal, while better consideration of the metal d-electrons has a large effect although, it is still not perfect.Comment: Replaces previous submission with smaller PDF file size. 32 pages including 9 figures and 2 table

Will REDD+ safeguards mitigate corruption? Qualitative evidence from Southeast Asia

High levels of faith and finance are being invested in REDD+ as a promising global climate change mitigation policy. Since its inception in 2007, corruption has been viewed as a potential impediment to the achievement of REDD+ goals, partly motivating ‘safeguards’ rolled out as part of national REDD+ readiness activities. We compare corruption mitigation measures adopted as part of REDD+ safeguards, drawing on qualitative case evidence from three Southeast Asian countries that have recently piloted the scheme: Indonesia, the Philippines, and Vietnam. We find that while REDD+ safeguards adopt a conventional principal-agent approach to tackling corruption in the schemes, our case evidence confirms our theoretical expectation that REDD+ corruption risks are perceived to arise not only from principal-agent type problems: they are also linked to embedded pro-corruption social norms. This implies that REDD+ safeguards are likely to be at best partially effective against corruption, and at worst will not mitigate corruption at all

The economic case for prioritizing governance over financial incentives in REDD+

This article contributes to the ongoing debate on the role of public policies and financial incentives in Reducing Emissions from Deforestation and forest Degradation (REDD+). It argues that the subordination of policies to results-based payments for emission reductions causes severe economic inefficiencies affecting the opportunity cost, transaction cost and economic rent of the programme. Such problems can be addressed by establishing sound procedural, land and financial governance at the national level, before REDD+ economic incentives are delivered at scale. Consideration is given to each governance dimension, the entry points for policy intervention and the impact on costs. International support must consider the financial and political cost of governance reforms, and use a pay-for-results ethos based on output and outcome indicators. This can be done in the readiness process but only if the latter’s legal force, scope, magnitude and time horizon are adequately reconsidered. In sum, the paper provides ammunition for the institutionalist argument that UNFCCC Parties must prioritise governance reform between now and the entry into force of the new climate agreement in 2020, and specific recommendations about how this can be done: only by doing so will they create the basis for the programme’s financial sustainability

Household and community socioeconomic and environmental determinants of child nutritional status in Cameroon

BACKGROUND: Undernutrition is a leading cause of child mortality in developing countries, especially in sub-Saharan Africa. We examine the household and community level socioeconomic and environmental factors associated with child nutritional status in Cameroon, and changes in the effects of these factors during the 1990s economic crisis. We further consider age-specific effects of household economic status on child nutrition. METHODS: Child nutritional status was measured by weight-for-age (WAZ) and height-for-age (HAZ) z-scores. Data were from Demographic and Health Surveys conducted in 1991 and 1998. We used analysis of variance to assess the bivariate association between the explanatory factors and nutritional status. Multivariate, multilevel analyses were undertaken to estimate the net effects of both household and community factors. RESULTS: Average WAZ and HAZ declined respectively from -0.70 standard deviations (SD), i.e. 0.70 SD below the reference median, to -0.83 SD (p = 0.006) and from -1.03 SD to -1.14 SD (p = 0.026) between 1991 and 1998. These declines occurred mostly among boys, children over 12 months of age, and those of low socioeconomic status. Maternal education and maternal health seeking behavior were associated with better child nutrition. Household economic status had an overall positive effect that increased during the crisis, but it had little effect in children under 6 months of age. Improved household (water, sanitation and cooking fuel) and community environment had positive effects. Children living in the driest regions of the country were consistently worst off, and those in the largest cities were best off. CONCLUSION: Both household and community factors have significant impact on child health in Cameroon. Understanding these relationships can facilitate design of age- and community-specific intervention programs