Transitional geometries between gently plunging and steeply plunging folds: an example from the Lower Palaeozoic Brabant Massif, Anglo-Brabant deformation belt, Belgium

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The impact of including animals in the constitution– Lessons learned from the German animal welfare state objective

In July 2002, Germany became the first country in the European Union to introduce an animal welfare state objective into the constitution. Almost twenty years later, it is time to analyze the impact of the German animal welfare state objective. As other countries, such as Belgium and the Netherlands, are considering following the German example, the implementation of animal welfare in a constitution is more topical than ever. This article will explore whether Article 20a of the German Constitution created a significant improvement for animal welfare in Germany. To this end, extensive research was conducted by an in-depth case law analysis

The Quest for Citations: Drivers of Article Impact

Why do some articles become building blocks for future scholars, while many others remain unnoticed? We aim to answer this question by contrasting, synthesizing and simultaneously testing three scientometric perspectives – universalism, social constructivism and presentation – on the influence of article and author characteristics on article citations. To do so, we study all articles published in a sample of five major journals in marketing from 1990 to 2002 that are central to the discipline. We count the number of citations each of these articles has received and regress this count on an extensive set of characteristics of the article (i.e. article quality, article domain, title length, the use of attention grabbers and expositional clarity), and the author (i.e. author visibility and author personal promotion). We find that the number of citations an article in the marketing discipline receives, depends upon “what one says†(quality and domain), on “who says it†(author visibility and personal promotion) and not so much on “how one says it†(title length, the use of attention grabbers, and expositional clarity). Our insights contribute to the marketing literature and are relevant to scientific stakeholders, such as the management of scientific journals and individual academic scholars, as they strive to maximize citations. They are also relevant to marketing practitioners. They inform practitioners on characteristics of the academic journals in marketing and their relevance to decisions they face. On the other hand, they also raise challenges towards making our journals accessible and relevant to marketing practitioners: (1) authors visible to academics are not necessarily visible to practitioners; (2) the readability of an article may hurt academic credibility and impact, while it may be instrumental in influencing practitioners; (3) it remains questionable whether articles that academics assess to be of high quality are also managerially relevant.Impact;Citation Analysis;Referencing;Scientometrics;Cite

Animal Constitutionalism: Paving the Way for Animal Inclusion in the Belgian Constitution

An increasing number of countries decide to include animals in their Constitution. This animal constitutionalism movement is not unimportant since the Constitution is the pinnacle of the law, as a result of which the mere inclusion of a particular value in the Constitution indicates that society attaches considerable importance to this value. Belgian legislators have also considered the inclusion of animals in the Constitution for quite some time, and bills were introduced in the previous (2014-2019) and in the current (2019-2024) parliamentary term. This contribution will examine whether and how the inclusion of a provision on animal welfare in the Constitution would actually improve the position of animal welfare in Belgium. To this end, research was conducted into the animal welfare provision in the German Constitution (Article 20a) on the one hand and into the current legal framework governing animal welfare in Belgium on the other hand, with a particular emphasis on the case law from the Belgian Constitutional Court regarding animal welfare. Not only are the existing proposals (i.e. a Belgian animal welfare state objective and a socio-economic animal welfare right) to revise the Belgian Constitution examined, but two new avenues (i.e. a classic animal welfare right and fundamental animal rights) are also explored. All these results will be taken into account to make concrete recommendations for Belgian legislators

Establishment of Stalagmite 232Th as a Novel Proxy for Dust Flux and the Reconstruction of the Asian Monsoon System during the Late Pleistocene

Aerosols are minute particles that are suspended in the Earth’s atmosphere. The variation in composition and size control the impact they have on global climate. This study focuses on mineral dust as a subspecies of aerosols and the reconstruction of its flux in Asia during the late Pleistocene. Stalagmites are upwards growing speleothems (the combined term for stalactites, stalagmites and other cave deposits) composed of calcite or aragonite. Their global distribution, semi-continuous growth and 234U/230Th datable laminae make them valuable climate archives. This study establishes a correlation between atmospheric aerosols and stalagmite 232Th concentrations to take advantage of the absolutely dated stalagmite aliquots and establish a proxy for paleo-dust flux. This proxy is applied to a reconstruction methodology for Asian dust flux during the late Pleistocene. East Asian dust flux and monsoon intensity are critical systems to understand when modelling the effects of future climate change on the region. 194 Asian stalagmite 232Th records are interpolated and compiled to produce a median Asian 232Th curve. A high degree of correlation (r2 =0.32, p <0.00001, n =213) between this median 232Th curve and a global sea level curve (taken from Siddal et al., 2003) establishes a climatic control on the 232Th curve. This curve is evaluated against a Northern Hemisphere (65°) summer insolation model, a compiled East Asian stalagmite d18O record (taken from Cheng et al., 2016), NGRIP d18O (taken from North Greenland Ice-Core Project Members, 2004) and a Westerlies d18O record (taken from Cheng et al., 2016). During a period of low insolation variability (40-20 ka), and subsequent constant monsoon intensity, the correlation between the stalagmite 232Th and d18O records decreases noticeably. During this period, stalagmite 232Th continues tracking regional dust fluxes, but no longer matches the EA stalagmite d18O record. This period coincides with the occurrence of North Atlantic Dansgaard-Oeschger (D-O) and Heinrich Events, which have been shown to affect Asian moisture transport and Indian Ocean surface temperatures. Due to the large amount of moisture the EAM sources from the Indian Ocean, these surface temperatures changes are recognizable in the EA stalagmite d18O record. Because overall monsoon intensity does not change, stalagmite 232Th does not record D-O events, while stalagmite d18O does. This creates the decoupling of the two records observed between 40 and 20 ka. The application of 232Th as a proxy for Asian dust flux in this study demonstrates its validity as a climate proxy. The potential generation of an absolutely dated dust-flux record reaching back 500kyrs creates the opportunity to use this methodology in future studies of dust flux reconstruction for all regions of the globe

Opinion of Advocate General Hogan in Case C-336/19 Centraal Israëlitisch Consistorie van België and Others, ECLI:EU:C:2020:695

Advocate General (AG) Hogan advised the Court of Justice (ECJ) on 10 September 2020 that the Flemish legislation prohibiting the slaughter of animals without stunning, including animals slaughtered using special methods required for religious rites, is contrary to EU law

Opinion of Advocate General Hogan in case C-336/19 Centraal Israëlitisch Consistorie van België and others, ECLI:EU:C:2020:695

Advocate General (AG) Hogan advised the Court of Justice (ECJ) on 10 September 2020 that the Flemish legislation prohibiting the slaughter of animals without stunning, including animals slaughtered using special methods required for religious rites, is contrary to EU law