The potential of smartphone apps to collect self-recorded data in agricultural households : a study on time-use in Zambia

Mobile information and communication technologies (ICTs) have spread across the developing world and are used increasingly by smallholder farmers. While the potential of ICTs, such as smartphone applications, to provide new opportunities for agricultural development is widely acknowledged, the potential to use them as research tools has not been explored. This thesis assesses the potential of smartphone applications for the collection of data from agricultural households in developing countries. Can smartphone applications that use visual tools be used for self-recording of data by the respondents themselves where literacy levels are low? Can such smartphone applications that allow for real-time data recording increase the accuracy of the collected data? Answering these questions is important as, so far, data from agricultural households are usually collected using surveys, which are prone to recall biases. This is a problem, as researchers, policymakers and development practitioners need reliable data for their work. Poor data can lead to misguided policy recommendations and actions with adverse effects on vulnerable population groups. This can lead to agricultural development trajectories that are socially unequal and unsustainable. To assess the potential of smartphone apps to collect self-recorded data, a smartphone application called Timetracker was developed as part of this thesis. The Timetracker allows study respondents to record data in real time with the help of illustrations. Recording data in real time reduces recall bias, and using pictures ensures that participants with low literacy can use the application. In its current form, the Timetracker can be used to collect data on time-use and nutrition. Collecting reliable data on time-use and nutrition is key for various strands of research. For example, time-use data are needed to calculate labor productivity and analyze how productivity is affected by new technologies. Time-use data can also help reveal gender-based power relations and asymmetries by pointing out unpaid domestic work. Similarly, nutritional data are crucial for various academic fields and debates. For example, nutritional data are needed to explore the factors determining food and nutrition security, to study how farm diversity affects consumption diversity and to monitor food and nutrition policies and programs. This study is based on three main chapters, which reflect the main objectives of the whole thesis: 1) to explore and test whether smartphone applications can be used to collect data from rural households in developing countries focusing on time-use and nutrition data, 2) to assess the accuracy of data collected with smartphone applications vis-à-vis recall-based data collection methods, and 3) to use the data to understand the effects of agricultural mechanization on the intrahousehold allocation of time-use within smallholder farming households in Zambia. The first two chapters have a primarily methodological focus. The last chapter is an empirical study. This thesis concludes that in addition to improving the accuracy of socioeconomic data collection, smartphone applications may open new research pathways, including through the opportunities provided by real-time data collection and by combining self-recorded data with sensor-recorded data, which may open interesting transdisciplinary research pathways. This thesis suggests that there is a large and still untapped potential for using smartphone applications to collect data on complex agricultural systems in the digital age.Mobile Informations- und Kommunikationstechnologien (IKT) werden zunehmend auch von Kleinbauern in Entwicklungsländern eingesetzt. Während das Potenzial von IKT, wie Smartphone-Anwendungen, neue Möglichkeiten für die landwirtschaftliche Entwicklung zu bieten, weithin anerkannt ist, wurde deren Potenzial als Forschungsinstrumente bislang kaum erforscht. Diese Dissertation untersucht das Potenzial von Smartphone-Anwendungen zur Erfassung sozioökonomischer Daten von landwirtschaftlichen Haushalten in Entwicklungsländern. Können Smartphone-Anwendungen, die visuelle Elemente verwenden, für die Selbstaufzeichnung von Daten durch Befragte verwendet werden, selbst wenn deren Alphabetisierung gering ist? Können solche Smartphone-Anwendungen, mit denen Daten in Echtzeit erfasst werden, die Genauigkeit der erfassten Daten erhöhen? Die Beantwortung dieser Fragen ist wichtig, da die Daten von landwirtschaftlichen Haushalten bisher üblicherweise durch Haushaltsbefragungen erhoben werden, die häufig durch Erinnerungsverzerrungen beinflusst sind. Dies ist ein Problem, da Forscher, politische Entscheidungsträger und Entwicklungsakteure verlässliche Daten für ihre Arbeit benötigen. Unzureichende Daten können zu falschen Politikempfehlungen und Politkmaßnahmen führen, die sich negativ auf bestimmte Bevölkerungsgruppen auswirken können. Dies kann zu landwirtschaftlichen Entwicklungspfaden führen, die sozial ungleich und nicht nachhaltig sind. Um das Potenzial von Smartphone-Apps zur Selbstaufzeichnung von Daten durch Befragte zu bewerten, wurde im Rahmen dieser Dissertation eine Smartphone-Anwendung namens Timetracker entwickelt. Der Timetracker ermöglicht es den Befragten, Daten anhand von Abbildungen in Echtzeit zu erfassen. Das Aufzeichnung von Daten in Echtzeit verringert Erinnerungsverzerrungen und die Verwendung von Bildern stellt sicher, dass Teilnehmer mit geringer Alphabetisierung die Anwendung verwenden können. In seiner jetzigen Form kann der Timetracker verwendet werden, um Daten zu Zeitnutzung und Ernährung zu sammeln. Zuverlässiger Daten zu Zeitnutzung und Ernährung sind essenziell für verschiedene Forschungsbereiche. Zum Beispiel werden Daten zur Zeitnutzung benötigt, um Arbeitsproduktivität zu berechnen und zu analysieren, wie die Produktivität durch neue Technologien beeinflusst wird. Daten zur Zeitnutzung können auch helfen, geschlechtsspezifische Machtverhältnisse und Asymmetrien aufzuzeigen, indem sie auf unbezahlte häusliche Arbeiten hinweisen. In ähnlicher Weise sind Ernährungsdaten für verschiedene akademische Bereiche von entscheidender Bedeutung. Ernährungsdaten sind beispielsweise erforderlich, um die Faktoren zu untersuchen, die die Ernährungssicherheit bestimmen; um zu untersuchen, wie die Diversität der landwirtschaftlichen Betriebe die Nahrungskonsumvielfalt beeinflusst; und um die Ernährungsstrategien und -programme zu überwachen. Die Studie basiert auf drei Hauptkapiteln, welche die Hauptfragen der gesamten Dissertation widerspiegeln: 1) zu untersuchen, ob Smartphone-Anwendungen verwendet werden können, um Daten wie Zeitnutzung und Ernährung von ländlichen Haushalten in Entwicklungsländern zu sammeln; 2) zu beurteilen wie genau die mit Smartphone-Anwendungen erfassten Daten im Vergleich zu auf Erinnerung basierenden Datenerhebungsmethoden sind; 3) unter Verwendung der gesammelten Daten zu analysieren, wie sich landwirtschaftliche Mechanisierung auf die Zeitaufteilung innerhalb von kleinbäuerlichen Haushalten in Sambia auswirkt. Die ersten beiden Kapitel sind primär methodisch ausgerichtet. Das letzte Kapitel ist dann eine empirische Studie. Die Dissertation kommt zu dem Schluss, dass Smartphone-Anwendungen nicht nur die Genauigkeit der Erfassung sozioökonomischer Daten verbessern, sondern auch neue Forschungspfade eröffnen. Die geschieht vor allem durch die Möglichkeiten der Echtzeit-Datenerfassung und durch die Kombination selbst erfasster Daten mit sensoraufgezeichneten Daten, was interessante transdisziplinäre Forschungsmöglichkeiten aufzeigt. Die Dissertation legt nahe, dass es ein großes und noch nicht ausgeschöpftes Potenzial gibt, Smartphone-Anwendungen zum Sammeln von Daten zu komplexen landwirtschaftlichen Systemen in Entwicklungsländern im digitalen Zeitalter zu nutzen

How to create conducive institutions to enable agricultural mechanization: A comparative historical study from the United States and Germany

Agricultural mechanization is now high on the policy agenda of many developing countries. History has shown that successful mechanization depends on an enabling environment providing various supporting functions, for example, knowledge and skills development and quality assurance. This paper analyses how this enabling environment was created during the mechanization history of two today’s mechanized countries, the United States and Germany, thereby distilling lessons for today’s mechanizing countries. The paper highlights the different roles played by government agencies (public sector), manufacturers of agricultural machinery (private sector) and farmers’ organizations (third sector) for the creation of this enabling environment. The study finds that both the United States and Germany witnessed the emergence of an institutional support landscape for mechanization. Yet, while mechanization benefitted from this support landscape in both countries, the organizations that created this support landscape differed largely. In Germany, the authors found more evidence of orchestrated public sector support and support from third-sector-actors to promote mechanization. In the United States, private actors played a larger role. For today’s mechanizing countries, the findings suggest that public, private and third sector can all contribute to create a conducive environment for mechanization. The results indicate that the appropriate role of public, private and third sector depends on the strengths of each of these sectors and the strength of the driving forces for mechanization. While the study suggests that the enabling environment can be created by different actors, the study also shows that dedication will be key as mechanization is unlikely to unfold without certain key functions being fulfilled

Human-machine systems vs. the unemployment spell: how IEFP embraced data-driven decision making with profiling

Data-driven decision making and well-developed analytical capabilities are generally perceived as fundamental for being a competitive organization nowadays. Nevertheless, especially publicly-led organizations show little agility towards technical advancement and face difficulties in developing necessary capabilities. The following case demonstrates how the Portuguese national body for employment and professional training, IEFP, engaged in a data-driven “profiling” model to combat long-term unemployment (LTU). The case walks the reader through the whole project-lifecycle, starting with IEFP´s previous touchpoints with data science over modeling and implementation of profiling, data curation, until managerial challenges which occurred along the way. The study reveals difficulties of a public organization linked to the usage of data-science and encourages students to look for ways on how to overcome those problems and push the progress forward

Gas phase lubrication study with an organic friction modifier

Friction modifier additives play a crucial role in controlling friction and wear of lubricated tribological systems. Model experiments in a controllable atmosphere performed by integrating a tribometer into a system of in situ surface analytical methods in vacuum can give insights into the additives functionality. In this work, thin, well-defined layers of an organic friction modifier (OFM) are adsorbed onto an iron oxide surface by means of an effusion cell immediately before measuring friction and wear. The results show that contrary to the assumption that homogeneous layers are formed, this OFM accumulates in droplets on the surface. Droplet number and radius increase with evaporation time. In friction tests, the smallest friction values are found for a low coverage of droplets. For larger droplets, friction increases due to a capillary neck of additive that forms between the sliding surfaces and is dragged along during the friction test

In Situ Studies on the Competitive Adsorption of Lubricant Additives

A key factor for improvement and innovation in lubricant development is a fundamental understanding of adsorption processes and competing adsorption mechanisms [1]. Many different base oils and additives, as well as various surfaces build a complex interaction space, which has been difficult to map with in-situ methods so far. Here we present a study on the adsorption of corrosion inhibitors, anti-wear additives and friction modifiers from a synthetic and a mineral base oil on metal (Fe2O3) surfaces. In order to obtain quantitative and spatial data during the adsorption process we set up a combined quartz crystal microbalance (QCM-D) and confocal scanning laser microscope (CLSM) [2]. In addition to QCM-D and CLSM, also a UHV-tribometer was used to study the performance of gas phase deposited additives films without environmental interferences. In combination with macroscopic performance tests using a “ball-on-three-plates-tribometer” and corrosion tests, the adsorption, the morphology and the mechanical properties of the additives were correlated with their performance. The multidisciplinary results provide exciting new insights into lubrication fundamentals and reveal so far undescribed phenomes and mechanisms of action. [1] J. Guegan et al. ,Friction Modifier Additives, Synergies and Antagonisms, Tribology Letters 67 (2019) [2] J. Honselmann et al., submitted, 201

In-situ studies of the competitive adsorption of lubricant additives

It is known that different types of surface-affine additives (i.e. antiwear/anti-corrosion/ anti-friction) can have very different adsorption behaviour on surfaces (e.g. [1–3]). The interactions can be synergistic or antagonistic in character and influences the near-surface chemistry of the sliding surfaces and therefore also the tribological performance of the system. For wear protection additives, it is for instance known that phosphor and sulfur containing layers are formed under tribological conditions (e.g. [4,5]). In this presentation we will give an overview on an ongoing study of the adsorption of selected additives using novel in-situ approaches. The found correlations are also compared to tribological experiments in order to answer the question whether synergistic effects in adsorption also lead to synergistic effects in wear reduction

Microfluidic cell transport with piezoelectric micro diaphragm pumps

The automated transport of cells can enable far-reaching cell culture research. However, to date, such automated transport has been achieved with large pump systems that often come with long fluidic connections and a large power consumption. Improvement is possible with space- and energy-efficient piezoelectric micro diaphragm pumps, though a precondition for a successful use is to enable transport with little to no mechanical stress on the cell suspension. This study evaluates the impact of the microfluidic transport of cells with the piezoelectric micro diaphragm pump developed by our group. It includes the investigation of different actuation signals. Therewith, we aim to achieve optimal fluidic performance while maximizing the cell viability. The investigation of fluidic properties proves a similar performance with a hybrid actuation signal that is a rectangular waveform with sinusoidal flanks, compared to the fluidically optimal rectangular actuation. The comparison of the cell transport with three actuation signals, sinusoidal, rectangular, and hybrid actuation shows that the hybrid actuation causes less damage than the rectangular actuation. With a 5% reduction of the cell viability it causes similar strain to the transport with sinusoidal actuation. Piezoelectric micro diaphragm pumps with the fluidically efficient hybrid signal actuation are therefore an interesting option for integrable microfluidic workflows

Single \pi^- production in np collisions for excess energies up to 90 MeV

The quasifree reaction np\to pp\pim was studied in a kinematically complete experiment by bombarding a liquid hydrogen target with a deuteron beam of momentum 1.85 GeV/c and analyzing the data along the lines of the spectator model. In addition to the three charged ejectiles the spectator proton was also detected in the large-acceptance time-of-flight spectrometer COSY-TOF. It was identified by its momentum and flight direction thus yielding access to the Fermi motion of the bound neutron and to the effective neutron 4-momentum vector $\mathbb{P}_n$ which differed from event to event. A range of almost 90 MeV excess energy above threshold was covered. Energy dependent angular distributions, invariant mass spectra as well as fully covered Dalitz plots were deduced. Sizeable $pp$ FSI effects were found as were contributions of $p$ and $d$ partial waves. The behavior of the elementary cross section $\sigma_{01}$ close to threshold is discussed in view of new cross section data. In comparison with existing literature data the results provide a sensitive test of the spectator model.Comment: 21 pages, 9 figures, 4 tables, submitted to EPJ

Shotgun metagenomic analysis of microbial communities from the Loxahatchee nature preserve in the Florida Everglades.

BackgroundCurrently, much is unknown about the taxonomic diversity and the mechanisms of methane metabolism in the Florida Everglades ecosystem. The Loxahatchee National Wildlife Refuge is a section of the Florida Everglades that is almost entirely unstudied in regard to taxonomic profiling. This short report analyzes the metagenome of soil samples from this Refuge to investigate the predominant taxa, as well as the abundance of genes involved in environmentally significant metabolic pathways related to methane production (nitrogen fixation and dissimilatory sulfite reduction).MethodsShotgun metagenomic sequencing using the Illumina platform was performed on 17 soil samples from four different sites within the Loxahatchee National Wildlife Refuge, and underwent quality control, assembly, and annotation. The soil from each sample was tested for water content and concentrations of organic carbon and nitrogen.ResultsThe three most common phyla of bacteria for every site were Actinobacteria, Acidobacteria, and Proteobacteria; however, there was variation in relative phylum composition. The most common phylum of Archaea was Euryarchaeota for all sites. Alpha and beta diversity analyses indicated significant congruity in taxonomic diversity in most samples from Sites 1, 3, and 4 and negligible congruity between Site 2 and the other sites. Shotgun metagenomic sequencing revealed the presence of biogeochemical biomarkers of particular interest (e.g., mrcA, nifH, and dsrB) within the samples. The normalized abundances of mcrA, nifH, and dsrB exhibited a positive correlation with nitrogen concentration and water content, and a negative correlation with organic carbon concentration.ConclusionThis Everglades soil metagenomic study allowed examination of wetlands biological processes and showed expected correlations between measured organic constituents and prokaryotic gene frequency. Additionally, the taxonomic profile generated gives a basis for the diversity of prokaryotic microbial life throughout the Everglades

Vibrational spectroscopic imaging and live cell video microscopy for studying differentiation of primary human alveolar epithelial cells.

Vukosavljevic B, Hittinger M, Hachmeister H, et al. Vibrational spectroscopic imaging and live cell video microscopy for studying differentiation of primary human alveolar epithelial cells. Journal of Biophotonics. 2019;12(6): e201800052