Site, artefacts and landscape: Prehistoric Borg in-Nadur, Malta

Two major excavation campaigns took place at the site of Borġ in-Nadur in the twentieth century, one by Margaret Murray and another by David Trump. This paper highlights the discoveries and interpretations put forth by archaeologists. Archival material is used to throw light on the published stratigraphic sequence from the Bronze Age huts at the site.peer-reviewe

Exposing knowledge: providing a real-time view of the domain under study for students

With the amount of information that exists online, it is impossible for a student to find relevant information or stay focused on the domain under study. Research showed that search engines have deficiencies that might prevent students from finding relevant information. To this end, this research proposes a technical solution that takes the personal search history of a student into consideration and provides a holistic view of the domain under study. Based on algorithmic approaches to assert semantic similarity, the proposed framework makes use of a user interface to dynamically assist students through aggregated results and wordcloud visualizations. The effectiveness of our approach is finally evaluated through the use of commonly used datasets and compared in line with existing research

Reducing the dependency of having prior domain knowledge for effective online information retrieval

Sometimes Internet users struggle to find what they are looking for on the Internet due to information overload. Search engines intend to identify documents related to a given keyphrase on the Internet and provide suggestions. Having some background knowledge about a topic or a domain will help in building effective search keyphrases that will lead to accurate results in information retrieval. This is further pronounced among students that rely on the internet to learn about a new topic. Students might not have the required background knowledge to build effective keyphrases and find what they are looking for. In this research, we are addressing this problem, and aim to help students find relevant information online. This research furthers existing literature by enhancing information retrieval frameworks through keyphrase assignment, aiming to expose students to new terminologies, therefore reducing the dependency of having background knowledge about the domain under study. We evaluated this framework and identified how it can be enhanced to suggest more effective search keyphrases. Our proposed suggestion is to introduce a keyphrase Ranking Mechanism that will improve the keyphrase assignment part of the framework by taking into consideration the part-of-speech of the generated keyphrases. To evaluate the proposed approach, various data sets were downloaded and processed. The results obtained showed that our proposed approach produces more effective keyphrases than the existing framework

Comparing bias correction methods in downscaling meteorological variables for a hydrologic impact study in an arid area in China

Water resources are essential to the ecosystem and social economy in the desert and oasis of the arid Tarim River basin, northwestern China, and expected to be vulnerable to climate change. It has been demonstrated that regional climate models (RCMs) provide more reliable results for a regional impact study of climate change (e.g., on water resources) than general circulation models (GCMs). However, due to their considerable bias it is still necessary to apply bias correction before they are used for water resources research. In this paper, after a sensitivity analysis on input meteorological variables based on the Sobol' method, we compared five precipitation correction methods and three temperature correction methods in downscaling RCM simulations applied over the Kaidu River basin, one of the headwaters of the Tarim River basin. Precipitation correction methods applied include linear scaling (LS), local intensity scaling (LOCI), power transformation (PT), distribution mapping (DM) and quantile mapping (QM), while temperature correction methods are LS, variance scaling (VARI) and DM. The corrected precipitation and temperature were compared to the observed meteorological data, prior to being used as meteorological inputs of a distributed hydrologic model to study their impacts on streamflow. The results show (1) streamflows are sensitive to precipitation, temperature and solar radiation but not to relative humidity and wind speed; (2) raw RCM simulations are heavily biased from observed meteorological data, and its use for streamflow simulations results in large biases from observed streamflow, and all bias correction methods effectively improved these simulations; (3) for precipitation, PT and QM methods performed equally best in correcting the frequency-based indices (e.g., standard deviation, percentile values) while the LOCI method performed best in terms of the time-series-based indices (e.g., Nash-Sutcliffe coefficient, R-2); (4) for temperature, all correction methods performed equally well in correcting raw temperature; and (5) for simulated streamflow, precipitation correction methods have more significant influence than temperature correction methods and the performances of streamflow simulations are consistent with those of corrected precipitation; i.e., the PT and QM methods performed equally best in correcting flow duration curve and peak flow while the LOCI method performed best in terms of the time-series-based indices. The case study is for an arid area in China based on a specific RCM and hydrologic model, but the methodology and some results can be applied to other areas and models

The environmental stewardship program: lessons on creating long-term agri-environment schemes

The conservation of biodiversity on private land is both a high priority and a considerable challenge. An effective response to this challenge requires a combination of legislative and incentive mechanisms, coupled with preparedness by government to review and revise administrative arrangements. Preliminary results from the Environmental Stewardship Program, established by the Australian Government, highlight that there is a role for market-based approaches. However, implementation of this program through a Commonwealth bureaucracy was not without its challenges. Here we provide an overview of the program’s implementation from 2007 to 2012, followed by discussion of some key lessons learned

Comparison between PI and PR Current Controllers in Grid Connected PV Inverters

This paper presents a comparison between Proportional Integral (PI) and Proportional Resonant (PR) current controllers used in Grid Connected Photovoltaic (PV) Inverters. Both simulation and experimental results will be presented. A 3kW Grid-Connected PV Inverter was designed and constructed for this research

Ghajn Klieb, (Rabat, Malta)

Between October and December 1999 a team of local and foreign undergraduates from the University of Malta carried out a survey of the site at Ghajn Klieb outside Rabat. The exercise constituted the practical part of a unit on the Principles of Archaeological Surveying directed by Dr Nicholas Vella of the Department of Classics & Archaeology. For the survey the team was joined by Hanna Stager, a graduate of the same department, who also researched some of the references used in this article. Initial reconnaissance of the site was carried out on 15 October 1999 with Nathaniel Cutajar and Michelle B uhagiar, Curator and Assistant Curator respectively at the National Museum of Archaeology. The scatter of surface ceramics and the existence of previously known and unknown features revealed the extent and potential of the site. It was decided that the locality of Ghajn Klieb warranted systematic study that could be carried out in various stages, with the longterm aim being an assessment of human activity and cultural behaviour at the site. The Museums Department gave the go-ahead for this project, and permission to collect the surface ceramics was granted. This short report is intended to give an outline of the work undertaken to date. Emphasis is placed on the field methods adopted and on the presentation of what we believe to be worth talking about at this stage. An effort is here made by the senior author to unravel the collaborative nature of the exercise by lending weight to individual thoughts and interpretations that arose while work progressed in the field.peer-reviewe

Robust adaptation decision-making under uncertainty: Real Options Analysis for water storage

Planning for climate change adaptation is challenging due to the inherent uncertainty associated with future climate changes. Although we have a range of climate projections, even these cannot provide a definitive picture of the future, with little certainty regarding the timing, magnitude and location of change. As a result there is increasing interest in approaches that can accommodate uncertainty better. A range of approaches exist and are being developed across several disciplines. Each has advantages and disadvantages and is suited for different types of decisions. In this study we focus on one of these approaches, Real Options Analysis (ROA), and chose water storage for irrigation as an example to demonstrate its use in uncertain futures