AN ENERGY STRATEGY BASED ON ENERGY DEDICATED CROPS OR CORN: DIFFERENTIAL ECONOMIC AND REGIONAL IMPACTS

The growth of the role of agriculture as a source of energy feedstock has been primarily concentrated on increasing corn use for ethanol. Alternatively, refocusing this growth in the utilization of dedicated energy crops could prove more advantageous as producers of more crops in a wider geographic area could benefit.Resource /Energy Economics and Policy,

Nutritional care for the prevention of mineral deficiency in elite athletes

Trabajo fin de grado en EnfermeríaEl déficit de minerales es un problema de habitual aparición entre los deportistas de élite cuyo abordaje parte desde un enfoque meramente nutricional para evitar las importantes consecuencias que tal situación genera en el rendimiento del atleta. El objetivo del presente trabajo es analizar las necesidades de hierro, calcio, magnesio y zinc en las personas que practican deporte de alto nivel y el papel que la enfermera desempeña en la transmisión de recomendaciones nutricionales y ayudas ergogénicas que puedan prevenir y/o tratar dicho déficit. Se ha realizado una revisión narrativa consultando las bases de datos: Pubmed, Redalyc y Cinahl; así como la biblioteca electrónica Scielo y el buscador Google Académico. Como resultado, se ha confirmado la influencia de los minerales estudiados en el rendimiento atlético y el consecuente elevado consumo de suplementos alimentarios por quienes son deficitarios de alguno de ellos. Este consumo se da, en la mayoría de los casos, sin supervisión profesional, pese a la evidencia existente acerca de la mejora en el rendimiento que genera la educación nutricional.Mineral deficiency is a common condition within elite athletes which approach needs to be merely nutritional to prevent the important consequences that a deficiency may bring to the athlete´s performance. The aim of this paper is to analyse the need of iron, calcium, magnesium and zinc in people who practice high performance sports and the nurse´s role in the transmission of nutritional recommendations and ergogenic aids that can prevent or treat that deficiency. The databases reviewed were Pubmed, Redalyc and Cinahl; also, the electronic library Scielo and the searcher Google Scholar. As a result, it is possible to confirm the influence of the researched minerals over the athlete´s performance and therefore the high dietary supplement consumption from those who lack any mineral. This consumption mainly happens without any professional supervision, despite the evidence showing performance improvements under nutritional education

Gauge theory in dimension 77

We first review the notion of a $G_2$-manifold, defined in terms of a principal $G_2$ ("gauge") bundle over a $7$-dimensional manifold, before discussing their relation to supergravity. In a second thread, we focus on associative submanifolds and present their deformation theory. In particular, we elaborate on a deformation problem with coassociative boundary condition. Its space of infinitesimal deformations can be identified with the solution space of an elliptic equation whose index is given by a topological formula.Comment: 15 page

Sixty Billion Gallons by 2030: Economic and Agricultural Impacts of Ethanol and Biodiesel Expansion

Agriculture is well positioned as a feedstock source because the fuels can be utilized with current engine technologies and are compatible with the current distribution infrastructure. Commercialization of cellulosic to ethanol technology will enable fuels to be derived from a diverse portfolio of feedstocks from numerous regions of the country. The levels of ethanol production analyzed are 10, 30, and 60 billion gallons of ethanol annually by 2010, 2020 and 2030, respectively. Impacts of producing 1 billion gallons of biodiesel production by 2012 and 1.6 billion gallons by 2030 are also projected. Overall, for the period 2007 to 2030, the estimated accumulated gains in net farm income are over $210 billion; and the accumulated potential savings in government payments are estimated to be$150 billion. Due to the geographic decentralization of the production of feedstock, economic gains are projected to accrue to the majority of regions of the country. Significant expansion beyond 60 billion gallons per year would likely require expansion of the region suitable for the production of bioenergy crops, ability to convert other pastureland (beyond cropland in pasture) into energy crops; allowing CRP acreage to be used in feedstock production, increasing short-rotation wood crops in the Northeast and Northwest regions, increased yields above those assumed in the analysis, and/or increasing the efficiency of cellulosic conversion. Further research should examine the agricultural, environmental, and economic impacts of one or more these factors changing.Resource /Energy Economics and Policy,

The GRB 030328 host: another case of a blue starburst galaxy

We present for the first time the detection of the GRB 030328 host galaxy in four optical bands equivalent to UBRI. The host galaxy spectral energy distribution is consistent with a low extinction (E(B-V) < 0.21) starburst galaxy. The restframe B-band magnitude of the host is M_B ~ -20.4Comment: 4 pages, 2 figures, accepted for publication in Il nuovo cimento (4th Workshop Gamma-Ray Bursts in the Afterglow Era, Rome, 18-22 October 2004

Supersymmetry and Polytopes

We make an imaginative comparison between the Minimal Supersymmetric Standard Model and the 24-cell polytope in four dimensions, the Octacube.Comment: Presented to the Workshop on Geometry and Physics: Supersymmetry. Bilbao, Spain. May 200

SOCIAL WELFARE AND ENVIRONMENTAL DEGRADATION IN AGRICULTURE: THE CASE OF ECUADOR

A non-linear optimization model which maximizes total Ecuadorian social welfare, defined as the sum of consumers' and producers' surpluses for the four major crops (corn, bananas, rice and African palm) is developed to evaluate the tradeoff between welfare and environmental degradation in Ecuador. It was found that a total welfare loss of US$122 million (a 11 percent reduction - from US$ 1.112 billion to US$ 989.66 million) would be expected from a 30 percent reduction in the total pesticide load on the environment in the production of the four major crops. The distributional impacts of the welfare loss were found, however, to be significantly skewed toward the loss of consumers' surplus. Specifically, a 30 percent reduction of total pesticide load on the environment would result in a reduction of 3.86 percent of producers' total surplus while consumers would be expected to loose 19.46 percent of their total surplus.welfare tradeoff, environmental impacts, non-linear optimization, Environmental Economics and Policy,

A young stellar environment for the superluminous supernova PTF12dam

The progenitors of super luminous supernovae (SLSNe) are still a mystery. Hydrogen-poor SLSN hosts are often highly star-forming dwarf galaxies and the majority belongs to the class of extreme emission line galaxies hosting young and highly star-forming stellar populations. Here we present a resolved long-slit study of the host of the hydrogen-poor SLSN PTF12dam probing the kpc environment of the SN site to determine the age of the progenitor. The galaxy is a "tadpole" with uniform properties and the SN occurred in a star-forming region in the head of the tadpole. The galaxy experienced a recent star-burst superimposed on an underlying old stellar population. We measure a very young stellar population at the SN site with an age of ~3 Myr and a metallicity of 12+log(O/H)=8.0 at the SN site but do not observe any WR features. The progenitor of PTF12dam must have been a massive star of at least 60 M_solar and one of the first stars exploding as a SN in this extremely young starburst.Comment: submitted to MNRAS letters. 5 pages, 3 figures, supplementary material: 2 figures, 2 table

ESTIMATING PRICE VARIABILITY IN AGRICULTURE: IMPLICATIONS FOR DECISION MAKERS

Using a stochastic version of the POLYSYS modeling framework, an examination of projected variability in agricultural prices, supply, demand, stocks, and incomes is conducted for corn, wheat, soybeans, and cotton during the 1998-2006 period. Increased planting flexibility introduced in the 1996 farm bill results in projections of significantly higher planted acreage variability compared to recent historical levels. Variability of ending stocks and stock-to-use ratios is projected to be higher for corn and soybeans and lower for wheat and cotton compared to the 1986-96 period. Significantly higher variability is projected for corn prices, with wheat and soybean prices also being more variable. No significant change in cotton price variability is projected.POLYSYS model, Price variability, Stochastic simulation, Crop Production/Industries,