The Impacts of GM Seed Technology on Cotton: Cost of Production in Mississippi, 1996 - 2005

Genetically modified (GM) cotton varieties have changed many aspects of cotton production in the United States. The rapid adoption of GM cotton varieties in Mississippi has allowed producers to alter certain production practices because of added benefits gained from GM varieties. This study analyses some of the effects of certain changes in some of the most relevant components of cotton production on yield that stem from the adoption of GM varieties in Mississippi by comparing production functions from 1996 and 2005.Mississippi cotton production, Genetically Modified cotton varieties, structural change, production function., Crop Production/Industries,

The Effects of Changing Technology: The Impacts of a Changing Cost Structure on Land Tenure Arrangements in the Mississippi Delta, 1996 - 2004

Genetically modified (GM) cotton varieties have changed many aspects of cotton production in the United States. The advent of GM varieties has fueled the ongoing trend of increasing farm size and fewer farmers. Mississippi is no exception to this trend. The rapid adoption of GM cotton varieties in Mississippi has allowed some producers to increase the acreage of their farming operation. This study analyses the impact of GM varieties on relative profitability over certain types of land tenure arrangements. The type of land tenure arrangement and the cost associated with the arrangement are compared to determine relative probabilities of breaking even for different farm sizes in the Mississippi cotton industry.Mississippi cotton production, Genetically Modified cotton varieties, land tenure, structural change, Land Economics/Use,

The Spitzer c2d Survey of Nearby Dense Cores: I: First Direct Detection of the Embedded Source in IRAM 04191+1522

We report the first detections of the Class 0 protostellar source IRAM 04191+1522 at wavelengths shortward of 60 microns with the Spitzer Space Telescope. We see extended emission in the Spitzer images that suggests the presence of an outflow cavity in the circumstellar envelope. We combine the Spitzer observations with existing data to form a complete dataset ranging from 3.6 to 1300 microns and use these data to construct radiative transfer models of the source. We conclude that the internal luminosity of IRAM 04191+1522, defined to be the sum of the luminosity from the internal sources (a star and a disk), is L_int = 0.08 +/- 0.04 L_sun, placing it among the lowest luminosity protostars known. Though it was discovered before the launch of the Spitzer Space Telescope, IRAM 04191+1522 falls within a new class of Very Low Luminosity Objects being discovered by Spitzer. Unlike the two other well-studied objects in this class, which are associated either with weak, compact outflows or no outflows at all, IRAM 04191+1522 has a well-defined molecular outflow with properties consistent with those expected based on relations derived from higher luminosity (L_int > 1 L_sun) protostars. We discuss the difficulties in understanding IRAM 04191+1522 in the context of the standard model of star formation, and suggest a possible explanation for the very low luminosity of this source.Comment: Accepted for publication in the Astrophysical Journal. 39 pages, 9 figures. See http://peggysue.as.utexas.edu/SIRTF/ for high-resolution figure

1974

History of Golf (1) The Nine Toughest Holes in the World (2) Stockie Madness (3) Bartender, One More Round for Pythium (3) Panel: 1973 Turf Problems in Review - 1974 Possible Remedies (A1-A12) Movement of Water to a Holding Pond (A13) Maintenance of Low Budget, Short Season Golf Courses (A16) Turfgrass Fertilization (A18) Determining Turfgrass Fertilizer Needs (A25) Shortage of Plant Food and How to Adjust to Supply and Cost (A29) Panel: Tricalcium Arsenate - Use and Abuse (A33-A46) Operating and Maintaining Municipal Golf Courses (A48) Maintenance of a High Budget Golf Course (A51) Trends in Agricultural Education and Where Are the Emphases (A58) Maintenance of Municipal Parks and Recreation Areas (A60) Maintenance of Grass Tennis Courts (A63) Transition from Natural to Artificial Turf (A67) Plant materials for Outlying Areas (A71) Care of University Grounds (A76) Maintenance of Industrial Sites (A79) Turfgrass Diseases and Systemic Fungicides (A81) A Look at the Future (A 84) Watering of Golf Course Turf (A92

Toward a theory of repeat purchase drivers for consumer services

The marketing discipline’s knowledge about the drivers of service customers’ repeat purchase behavior is highly fragmented. This research attempts to overcome that fragmented state of knowledge by making major advances toward a theory of repeat purchase drivers for consumer services. Drawing on means–end theory, the authors develop a hierarchical classification scheme that organizes repeat purchase drivers into an integrative and comprehensive framework. They then identify drivers on the basis of 188 face-to-face laddering interviews in two countries (USA and Germany) and assess the drivers’ importance and interrelations through a national probability sample survey of 618 service customers. In addition to presenting an exhaustive and coherent set of hierarchical repeat-purchase drivers, the authors provide theoretical explanations for how and why drivers relate to one another and to repeat purchase behavior. This research also tests the boundary conditions of the proposed framework by accounting for different service types. In addition to its theoretical contribution, the framework provides companies with specific information about how to manage long-term customer relationships successfully

Finishing the euchromatic sequence of the human genome

The sequence of the human genome encodes the genetic instructions for human physiology, as well as rich information about human evolution. In 2001, the International Human Genome Sequencing Consortium reported a draft sequence of the euchromatic portion of the human genome. Since then, the international collaboration has worked to convert this draft into a genome sequence with high accuracy and nearly complete coverage. Here, we report the result of this finishing process. The current genome sequence (Build 35) contains 2.85 billion nucleotides interrupted by only 341 gaps. It covers ∼99% of the euchromatic genome and is accurate to an error rate of ∼1 event per 100,000 bases. Many of the remaining euchromatic gaps are associated with segmental duplications and will require focused work with new methods. The near-complete sequence, the first for a vertebrate, greatly improves the precision of biological analyses of the human genome including studies of gene number, birth and death. Notably, the human enome seems to encode only 20,000-25,000 protein-coding genes. The genome sequence reported here should serve as a firm foundation for biomedical research in the decades ahead

Iron Behaving Badly: Inappropriate Iron Chelation as a Major Contributor to the Aetiology of Vascular and Other Progressive Inflammatory and Degenerative Diseases

The production of peroxide and superoxide is an inevitable consequence of aerobic metabolism, and while these particular "reactive oxygen species" (ROSs) can exhibit a number of biological effects, they are not of themselves excessively reactive and thus they are not especially damaging at physiological concentrations. However, their reactions with poorly liganded iron species can lead to the catalytic production of the very reactive and dangerous hydroxyl radical, which is exceptionally damaging, and a major cause of chronic inflammation. We review the considerable and wide-ranging evidence for the involvement of this combination of (su)peroxide and poorly liganded iron in a large number of physiological and indeed pathological processes and inflammatory disorders, especially those involving the progressive degradation of cellular and organismal performance. These diseases share a great many similarities and thus might be considered to have a common cause (i.e. iron-catalysed free radical and especially hydroxyl radical generation). The studies reviewed include those focused on a series of cardiovascular, metabolic and neurological diseases, where iron can be found at the sites of plaques and lesions, as well as studies showing the significance of iron to aging and longevity. The effective chelation of iron by natural or synthetic ligands is thus of major physiological (and potentially therapeutic) importance. As systems properties, we need to recognise that physiological observables have multiple molecular causes, and studying them in isolation leads to inconsistent patterns of apparent causality when it is the simultaneous combination of multiple factors that is responsible. This explains, for instance, the decidedly mixed effects of antioxidants that have been observed, etc...Comment: 159 pages, including 9 Figs and 2184 reference

The Impacts of GM Seed Technology on Cotton: Cost of Production in Mississippi, 1996 - 2005

Genetically modified (GM) cotton varieties have changed many aspects of cotton production in the United States. The rapid adoption of GM cotton varieties in Mississippi has allowed producers to alter certain production practices because of added benefits gained from GM varieties. This study analyses some of the effects of certain changes in some of the most relevant components of cotton production on yield that stem from the adoption of GM varieties in Mississippi by comparing production functions from 1996 and 2005