419 research outputs found
The SADC Groundwater Data and Information Archive, Knowledge Sharing and Co-operation Project. Final report
The Southern African Development Community (SADC) Groundwater Data and Information
Archive, Knowledge Sharing and Co-operation Project, funded by the German Development
Cooperation (GIZ) and Department for International Development, UK (DFID), was initiated in
September 2009 to identify, catalogue and subsequently promote access to the large collection of
reports held in the UK by the British Geological Survey (BGS). The work has focused on a
wealth of unpublished so-called âgreyâ data and information which describes groundwater
occurrence and development in Southern Africa and was gathered by the BGS over its many
decades of involvement in the region.
The project has four main aims:
To catalogue and describe the "grey data" documents on SADC groundwater held by the
BGS within a digital metadatabase.
To identify a sub-set of scanned documents to be made freely available to groundwater
practitioners and managers in the SADC region by electronic distribution.
To link the metadatabase and digital sub-set of documents via a web portal hosted by the
BGS, to enable download of documents by SADC groundwater workers.
To strengthen links between BGS hydrogeologists with counterparts in SADC, and
provide an example of groundwater data sharing which could be emulated by other
European Geological Surveys with substantial data holdings on SADC groundwater.
The project has successfully met these aims. The assessment of BGS archived material produced
an electronic meta-database describing 1735 items held in hard copy. Of these, 1041 have been
scanned digitally to searchable Portable Document Format (PDF) format. A subset of 655 PDFs
including partial documents related to groundwater development from the colonial and post
independence period as well as BGS internal project reports and reports approved for web
dissemination by host countries are now available to download (free of charge) at
http://www.SADCgroundwaterarchive.com . Initial results indicate a good deal of interest both
from within SADC and elsewhere, accessed by directly addressing the website and via a search
engine such as Google. The information presented has already been used by in-region projects
such as the SADC Hydrogeological Mapping project and the Malawi Water Assessment Project.
This is essentially a pilot project providing an example of how Web delivery of the archive is an
important step forward for the well-being of the SADC region. It permits access to documents
few even new existed and will, it is hoped, provide a valuable dataset that should inhibit the
temptation to waste scarce resources by âre-inventing the wheelâ
Mapping groundwater denitrification potential : methodology report
An understanding of the fate of nitrate in groundwater is vital for managing risks associated with nitrate pollution, and to safeguard groundwater supplies and groundwater-dependent surface waters. One of the main mechanisms to control nitrate is the designation of nitrate vulnerable zones (NVZs). Recent review of the designation process in England has highlighted that in some locations measured groundwater nitrate concentrations are not as high as might be expected from knowledge of the surface loads of nitrate applied at the ground surface. A possible reason for this is that the nitrate is being transformed through denitrification. The aim of this work was to develop a weight of evidence approach to allow the assessment of denitrification potential across groundwater in England using literature and existing groundwater and other relevant data
Switching model with two habitats and a predator involving group defence
Switching model with one predator and two prey species is considered. The
prey species have the ability of group defence. Therefore, the predator will be
attracted towards that habitat where prey are less in number. The stability
analysis is carried out for two equilibrium values. The theoretical results are
compared with the numerical results for a set of values. The Hopf bifuracation
analysis is done to support the stability results
Simple heuristics for the assembly line worker assignment and balancing problem
We propose simple heuristics for the assembly line worker assignment and
balancing problem. This problem typically occurs in assembly lines in sheltered
work centers for the disabled. Different from the classical simple assembly
line balancing problem, the task execution times vary according to the assigned
worker. We develop a constructive heuristic framework based on task and worker
priority rules defining the order in which the tasks and workers should be
assigned to the workstations. We present a number of such rules and compare
their performance across three possible uses: as a stand-alone method, as an
initial solution generator for meta-heuristics, and as a decoder for a hybrid
genetic algorithm. Our results show that the heuristics are fast, they obtain
good results as a stand-alone method and are efficient when used as a initial
solution generator or as a solution decoder within more elaborate approaches.Comment: 18 pages, 1 figur
Phenomenological glass model for vibratory granular compaction
A model for weakly excited granular media is derived by combining the free
volume argument of Nowak et al. [Phys. Rev. E 57, 1971 (1998)] and the
phenomenological model for supercooled liquids of Adam and Gibbs [J. Chem.
Phys. 43, 139 (1965)]. This is made possible by relating the granular
excitation parameter \Gamma, defined as the peak acceleration of the driving
pulse scaled by gravity, to a temperature-like parameter \eta(\Gamma). The
resulting master equation is formally identical to that of Bouchaud's trap
model for glasses [J. Phys. I 2, 1705 (1992)]. Analytic and simulation results
are shown to compare favourably with a range of known experimental behaviour.
This includes the logarithmic densification and power spectrum of fluctuations
under constant \eta, the annealing curve when \eta is varied cyclically in
time, and memory effects observed for a discontinuous shift in \eta. Finally,
we discuss the physical interpretation of the model parameters and suggest
further experiments for this class of systems.Comment: 2 references added; some figure labels tweaked. To appear in PR
A robust spectral method for solving Hestonâs model
In this paper, we consider the Hestonâs volatility model (Heston in Rev.
Financ. Stud. 6: 327â343, 1993]. We simulate this model using a combination of the
spectral collocation method and the Laplace transforms method. To approximate the
two dimensional PDE, we construct a grid which is the tensor product of the two
grids, each of which is based on the Chebyshev points in the two spacial directions.
The resulting semi-discrete problem is then solved by applying the Laplace transform
method based on Talbotâs idea of deformation of the contour integral (Talbot in IMA
J. Appl. Math. 23(1): 97â120, 1979)
A measurement of the tau mass and the first CPT test with tau leptons
We measure the mass of the tau lepton to be 1775.1+-1.6(stat)+-1.0(syst.) MeV
using tau pairs from Z0 decays. To test CPT invariance we compare the masses of
the positively and negatively charged tau leptons. The relative mass difference
is found to be smaller than 3.0 10^-3 at the 90% confidence level.Comment: 10 pages, 4 figures, Submitted to Phys. Letts.
- âŠ