Remote sensing of land use and water quality relationships - Wisconsin shore, Lake Michigan

This investigation assessed the utility of remote sensing techniques in the study of land use-water quality relationships in an east central Wisconsin test area. The following types of aerial imagery were evaluated: high altitude (60,000 ft) color, color infrared, multispectral black and white, and thermal; low altitude (less than 5000 ft) color infrared, multispectral black and white, thermal, and passive microwave. A non-imaging hand-held four-band radiometer was evaluated for utility in providing data on suspended sediment concentrations. Land use analysis includes the development of mapping and quantification methods to obtain baseline data for comparison to water quality variables. Suspended sediment loads in streams, determined from water samples, were related to land use differences and soil types in three major watersheds. A multiple correlation coefficient R of 0.85 was obtained for the relationship between the 0.6-0.7 micrometer incident and reflected radiation data from the hand-held radiometer and concurrent ground measurements of suspended solids in streams. Applications of the methods and baseline data developed in this investigation include: mapping and quantification of land use; input to watershed runoff models; estimation of effects of land use changes on stream sedimentation; and remote sensing of suspended sediment content of streams. High altitude color infrared imagery was found to be the most acceptable remote sensing technique for the mapping and measurement of land use types

Bifurcations and Hysteresis in the Dynamics of Small Populations of Spherical Magnets

If you heat up some kinds of metals and then cool them down next to a magnet, they will be a magnet when they cool, but if they cool down away from a magnet, they will just be a lump of metal. This is an example of hysteresis and it’s very important for lots of technology. Another example of hysteresis might be a water tower pump that turns on when the tower is nearly empty and keeps going until the tower is nearly full. Whether or not the pump is on when the tower is half full depends on what the condition of the tower was recently. Hysteresis more generally can be thought of as when somethings present condition depends very strongly on what it’s history was. A counter example would be for a gas, when you know it’s temperature and pressure and volume, that’s all that matters. Many systems with hysteresis are complicated, but this research has found that some very simple arrangements of the simplest magnets can have still have hysteresis. I show this primarily by looking at how the systems move around their resting position. This research was funded by an NSF grant

Empathic Accuracy and Adolescent Romantic Relationships

This dissertation describes a study that seeks to understand the role of empathic accuracy in adolescent romantic relationships. Such relationships are important in their own right and play a central role in shaping the general course of development in adolescence. Five specific questions are examined in this project. First, is there a gender difference in empathic accuracy? Second, does empathic accuracy improve over the course of a relationship? Third, does empathic accuracy improve with age? Fourth, is empathic accuracy related to relationship satisfaction? Fifth, is an individual’s hiding something when discussing disagreements related to a decrease in the partner’s empathic accuracy? To explore these questions, we use data collected from 101 middle adolescent and 105 late adolescent dating couples. We use observational coded data gathered from recorded conversations whereby couples discuss an issue of disagreement in their relationship as well as survey data. To accomplish these analyses in a way that controlled for non-independence of partner-members’ responses (which violate the assumptions of techniques such as multiple regression, and thus artificially inflates error terms), data were examined with hierarchical linear modeling. Although the ability of an individual to correctly infer the thoughts and feelings of their partner was very similar for males and females, we found that, overall, females were slightly more empathically accurate than their male partners. Relationship length was unrelated to empathic accuracy and age was only loosely associated. Controlling for age, we found that relationship satisfaction was significantly associated with empathic accuracy for males with a significant trend for females. Finally, females’ reports of hiding something was negatively associated with males’ empathic accuracy. These results using a global measure of empathic accuracy are complimented by findings with four component dimensions: connection, conflict, uncomfortable, and being persuaded. We found complex, gender-linked differences in empathic accuracy and its relation to relationship satisfaction and a partner’s report of hiding something. Specifically, when females reported higher relationship satisfaction, they were more likely to accurately perceive their partners’ negative feelings and behaviors (conflict, persuading, and discomfort) with a significant trend in perceiving their partners’ feelings of connection. However, for males, higher relationship satisfaction was negatively associated with the accurate perception of feelings of connection and positively associated with accuracy in perceiving conflict. We also found that males were less accurate at perceiving conflict when their partner reported hiding something. Findings and implications are discussed within the frameworks of a number of different paradigms, including developmental and social psychology, and feminism. Recommendations are made for discussing results in relation to the demands of interaction protocols and for more nuanced measurement systems

Land use and pollution patterns on the Great Lakes

The author has identified the following significant results. The final mapping of the large watersheds of the Manitowoc and the Oconto was done using the 25% sampling approach. Comparisons were made with earlier strip mapping efforts of the Oconto and Manitowoc watersheds. Regional differences were noted. Strip mapping of the Oconto resulted in overestimation of the amount of agricultural land compared to the random sampling method. For the Manitowoc, the strip mapping approach produced a slight underestimate of agricultural land, and an overestimate of the forest category

A sensetive zonagenetic assay for rapid in vivo assessment of estrogenic potency of xenobiotics and mycotoxins

Mounting evidence confirms that hepatic biosynthetic processes are essential for female sexual maturation in fish, which is directly controlled by estrogens. These oogenetic events (zonagenesis and vitellogenesis) are induced in both sexes by estrogens. In this paper, we report the induction of zona radiata (zr) proteins and vitellogenin in primary hepatocytes from Atlantic salmon (Salmo salar L.) exposed to xenoestrogens and mycotoxins. Cells were treated with doses of 1, 5, and 10 microM 4-nonylphenol (4-NP), o, p'-DDT, lindane ([gamma]-HCH), and bisphenol A (BPA), which all induced zr proteins and vitellogenin in an approximate dose-dependent manner. Hepatocytes were also treated with combinations of xenoestrogens at 1 or 2 microM, resulting in elevated levels of both zr proteins and vitellogenin, compared to single treatment. The estrogenic activity of the mycotoxin zearalenone (ZEA) and its metabolites [alpha]-ZEA) and ss-zearalenol (ss-ZEA)], with regard to zonagenesis and vitellogenesis, was assessed in this assay system. Mycotoxins were used at concentrations of 10, 100, or 1,000 nM. All induced zr proteins and vitellogenin, with [alpha]-ZEA being the strongest inducer. When cells were treated with xenoestrogens or mycotoxins in combination with an estrogen receptor inhibitor (ICI 182,780), the induction of both zr proteins and vitellogenin was inhibited in all cases. Thus, the reported estrogen effects are bonafide estrogen responses. Zona radiata proteins were more responsive than vitellogenin to both xenoestrogens and mycotoxins. The versatility and sensitivity of the hepatocyte assay demonstrates that biosynthesis of zr proteins provides a new supplementary method for estimating xenoestrogenicity and mycotoxin action.publishedVersio

The Multi-Player Performance-Enhancing Drug Game

This paper extends classical work on economics of doping into a multi-player game setting. Apart from being among the first papers formally formulating and analysing a multi-player doping situation, we find interesting results related to different types of Nash-equilibria (NE). Based mainly on analytic results, we claim at least two different NE structures linked to the choice of prize functions. Linear prize functions provide NEs characterised by either everyone or nobody taking drugs, while non-linear prize functions lead to qualitatively different NEs with significantly more complex predictive characteristics

Vibrionaceae core, shell and cloud genes are non-randomly distributed on Chr 1: An hypothesis that links the genomic location of genes with their intracellular placement.

BackgroundThe genome of Vibrionaceae bacteria, which consists of two circular chromosomes, is replicated in a highly ordered fashion. In fast-growing bacteria, multifork replication results in higher gene copy numbers and increased expression of genes located close to the origin of replication of Chr 1 (ori1). This is believed to be a growth optimization strategy to satisfy the high demand of essential growth factors during fast growth. The relationship between ori1-proximate growth-related genes and gene expression during fast growth has been investigated by many researchers. However, it remains unclear which other gene categories that are present close to ori1 and if expression of all ori1-proximate genes is increased during fast growth, or if expression is selectively elevated for certain gene categories.ResultsWe calculated the pangenome of all complete genomes from the Vibrionaceae family and mapped the four pangene categories, core, softcore, shell and cloud, to their chromosomal positions. This revealed that core and softcore genes were found heavily biased towards ori1, while shell genes were overrepresented at the opposite part of Chr 1 (i.e., close to ter1). RNA-seq of Aliivibrio salmonicida and Vibrio natriegens showed global gene expression patterns that consistently correlated with chromosomal distance to ori1. Despite a biased gene distribution pattern, all pangene categories contributed to a skewed expression pattern at fast-growing conditions, whereas at slow-growing conditions, softcore, shell and cloud genes were responsible for elevated expression.ConclusionThe pangene categories were non-randomly organized on Chr 1, with an overrepresentation of core and softcore genes around ori1, and overrepresentation of shell and cloud genes around ter1. Furthermore, we mapped our gene distribution data on to the intracellular positioning of chromatin described for V. cholerae, and found that core/softcore and shell/cloud genes appear enriched at two spatially separated intracellular regions. Based on these observations, we hypothesize that there is a link between the genomic location of genes and their cellular placement