The State of Sustainable Transportation at Union College: A Transportation Audit of Union College Students and Faculty

Union College has established a Climate Action Plan with the goal of carbon neutrality by 2060 as part of its commitment to sustainability. A significant component of Union’s carbon footprint, however, is student and faculty transportation. The purpose of this research was to analyze the transportation behavior of students and faculty to determine the carbon emissions that result from the use of various transportation methods. Two campus‐wide surveys were conducted; one was distributed to students and the other targeted faculty. For comparison purposes, survey questions were designed to be compatible with, but more focused than, those of a survey conducted in 2007‐08 by the students taking an Introduction to Environmental Science course. The surveys asked students and faculty about the modes of transportation utilized, and parking and travel habits. Using standard formulas, transportation carbon emission analysis determined that a typical faculty member emitted 824 and 1020 kg of carbon in 2011 and 2007, respectively. Similar calculations showed that a typical student emitted 998 and 784 kg of carbon in 2011 and 2007, respectively. By compiling the data related to the type of cars students drive, as well as carpool and trolley participation habits, the study proposes recommendations to improve the transportation culture on campus to make it more sustainable

The Changing Values of Learning: Comprehensive Planning in White Plains and Westchester County, NY

Municipalities create comprehensive plans to provide a long‐term vision for growth and development and to determine the strengths and opportunities that will assist them in instituting ordinances and make future planning decisions. The New York Department of State indicates that comprehensive planning at the municipal level should provide a variety of goals and objectives that include both the intermediate and long­‐range time period. Scholars believed that comprehensive planning “would have little effect on American cities unless their goal premises can be established in sufficiently compelling fashion (both politically and intellectually) to make politicians take notice” (1965). New York State law requires local zoning to be “in accordance with comprehensive plans” but does not mandate their implementation. The State legislature’s encouragement to prepare and adopt comprehensive plans has been effective; 70% of municipalities with planning board in New York State have adopted a plan. County governments and non-­for-­profits are also developing comprehensive regional plans that are designed to guide decisions at both the municipal and regional levels. With so many plans and policies guiding an area, do the values of a local municipality match those at the county and regional levels? The methodology for approaching this question is a qualitative review of comprehensive plans created during the second half of the twentieth century. The City of White Plains provides an opportunity to evaluate how the values of a small suburban city that has undertaken multiple comprehensive plan initiatives relate to the planning values of Westchester County. Through an investigation of the past three comprehensive plans by the City of White Plains and the Westchester County Planning Board, this thesis will determine how values and initiatives are represented between the corresponding plans and whether comprehensive planning successfully addresses perennial planning initiatives and concerns

BIOMARKERS FOR RESISTANCE TO PORCINE CIRCOVIRUS 2 ASSOCIATED DISEASE

The present disclosure provides compositions and methods for increasing resistance to PCV2 infection in pigs. The increased resistance may be the result of siRNA or genetic modification through CRISPR or a vectored virus targeting SNPs that are resistant to PCV2 infection

Operator Spin Foam Models

The goal of this paper is to introduce a systematic approach to spin foams. We define operator spin foams, that is foams labelled by group representations and operators, as the main tool. An equivalence relation we impose in the set of the operator spin foams allows to split the faces and the edges of the foams. The consistency with that relation requires introduction of the (familiar for the BF theory) face amplitude. The operator spin foam models are defined quite generally. Imposing a maximal symmetry leads to a family we call natural operator spin foam models. This symmetry, combined with demanding consistency with splitting the edges, determines a complete characterization of a general natural model. It can be obtained by applying arbitrary (quantum) constraints on an arbitrary BF spin foam model. In particular, imposing suitable constraints on Spin(4) BF spin foam model is exactly the way we tend to view 4d quantum gravity, starting with the BC model and continuing with the EPRL or FK models. That makes our framework directly applicable to those models. Specifically, our operator spin foam framework can be translated into the language of spin foams and partition functions. We discuss the examples: BF spin foam model, the BC model, and the model obtained by application of our framework to the EPRL intertwiners.Comment: 19 pages, 11 figures, RevTex4.

Author Correction: A consensus-based transparency checklist.

An amendment to this paper has been published and can be accessed via a link at the top of the paper

Stereotypes and Madrassas: Experimental evidence from Pakistan

Little is known about the behavior of Madrassa (Islamic religious seminaries) students, and how other groups in their communities interact with them. To investigate this, we use data from economic decision-making experiments embedded in a survey that we collected from students pursuing bachelors-equivalent degrees in Madrassas and other educational institutions of distinct religious tendencies and socioeconomic background in Pakistan. First, we do not find that Madrassa students are less trusting of others; in fact, they exhibit the highest level of other-regarding behavior, and expect others to be the most trustworthy. Second, there is a high level of trust among all groups. Third, within each institution group, we fail to find evidence of in-group bias or systematic out-group bias either in trust or tastes. Fourth, we find that students from certain backgrounds under-estimate the trustworthiness of Madrassa students

A steric tethering approach enables palladium-catalysed C-H activation of primary amino alcohols.

Aliphatic primary amines are a class of chemical feedstock essential to the synthesis of higher-order nitrogen-containing molecules, commonly found in biologically active compounds and pharmaceutical agents. New methods for the construction of complex amines remain a continuous challenge to synthetic chemists. Here, we outline a general palladium-catalysed strategy for the functionalization of aliphatic C-H bonds within amino alcohols, an important class of small molecule. Central to this strategy is the temporary conversion of catalytically incompatible primary amino alcohols into hindered secondary amines that are capable of undergoing a sterically promoted palladium-catalysed C-H activation. Furthermore, a hydrogen bond between amine and catalyst intensifies interactions around the palladium and orients the aliphatic amine substituents in an ideal geometry for C-H activation. This catalytic method directly transforms simple, easily accessible amines into highly substituted, functionally concentrated and structurally diverse products, and can streamline the synthesis of biologically important amine-containing molecules.We are grateful to the Marie Curie Foundation (D.P. & J.C.), EPSRC (T.W.G.), the ERC (V.D.), and the ERC and EPSRC for Fellowships (M.J.G.). We are grateful to Adam Smalley for DFT calculations and Yohei Shimidzu for assistance with optimization of the C–H acetoxylation reaction. Mass spectrometry data was acquired at the EPSRC UK National Mass Spectrometry Facility at Swansea University. The authors declare no competing financial interests.This is the author accepted manuscript. The final version is available from NPG via http://dx.doi.org/10.1038/nchem.236

A consensus-based transparency checklist

We present a consensus-based checklist to improve and document the transparency of research reports in social and behavioural research. An accompanying online application allows users to complete the form and generate a report that they can submit with their manuscript or post to a public repository

Transfer of Learning Transformed

Peer Reviewedhttp://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/96651/1/j.1467-9922.2012.00740.x.pd