Climate Change and Eutrophication: A Short Review

Water resources are vital not only for human beings but essentially all ecosystems. Human health is at risk if clean drinking water becomes contaminated. Water is also essential for agriculture, manufacturing, energy production and other diverse uses. Therefore, a changing climate and its potential effects put more pressure on water resources. Climate change may cause increased water demand as a result of rising temperatures and evaporation while decreasing water availability. On the other hand, extreme events as a result of climate change can increase surface runoff and flooding, deteriorating water quality as well. One effect is water eutrophication, which occurs when high concentrations of nutrients, such as nitrogen and phosphorus, are present in the water. Nutrients come from different sources including agriculture, wastewater, stormwater, and fossil fuel combustion. Algal blooms can cause many problems, such as deoxygenation and water toxicity, ultimately disrupting normal ecosystem functioning. In this paper, we investigate the potential impacts of climatic factors affecting water eutrophication, how these factors are projected to change in the future, and what their projected potential impacts will be

Identification of Critical Source Areas (CSAs) and Evaluation of Best Management Practices (BMPs) in Controlling Eutrophication in the Dez River Basin

Best Management Practices (BMPs) are commonly used to control pollution in the river basins. Prioritization of BMPs helps improve the efficiency and effectiveness of pollution reduction, especially in Critical Source Areas (CSAs) that produce the highest pollution loads. Recently, the Dez River in Khuzestan, Iran, has become highly eutrophic from the overuse of fertilizers and pesticides. In this basin, dry and irrigated farming produce 77.34% and 6.3% of the Total Nitrogen (TN) load, and 83.56% and 4.3% of the Total Phosphorus (TP) load, respectively. In addition, residential, pasture, and forest land uses together account for 16.36% of the TN and 12.14% of the TP load in this area. The Soil and Water Assessment Tool (SWAT) was implemented to model the Dez River basin and evaluate the applicability of several BMPs, including point source elimination, filter strips, livestock grazing, and river channel management, in reducing the entry of pollution loads to the river. Sensitivity analysis and calibration/validation of the model was performed using the SUFI-2 algorithm in the SWAT Calibration Uncertainties Program (SWAT-CUP). The CSAs were identified using individual (sediment, TN, TP) and combined indices, based on the amount of pollution produced. Among the BMPs implemented, the 10 m filter strip was most effective in reducing TN load (42.61%), and TP load (39.57%)

Flow-Induced Stresses and Displacements in Jointed Concrete Pipes Installed by Pipe Jacking Method

Transient flows result in unbalanced forces and high pressure in pipelines. Under these conditions, the combined effects of flow-induced forces along with sudden pipe displacements can create cracks in the pipeline, especially at the junctions. This situation consequently results in water leakage and reduced operational efficiency of the pipeline. In this study, displacements and stresses in a buried pressurized water transmission pipe installed by pipe jacking method are investigated using numerical modeling and considering interactions between fluid, pipe, and soil. The analyses were performed consecutively under no-flow, steady flow, and transient flow conditions, in order to investigate the effects of flow conditions on displacements and stresses in the system. Analyses of the results show that displacements and stresses in the jointed concrete pipes are significant under transient flow conditions. Moreover, because of pressure transient effects, maximum tensile stresses exceed the tensile strength of concrete at the junctions, leading to cracks and consequent water leakage

One Big Happy Family? An Investigation into Students’ Perceptions of Group Dynamics on an MA TESOL Program

This study addresses the perceptions of a cohort of MA TESOL students regarding the evolution of group dynamics among them. Group dynamics refers here to the learner group’s internal characteristics and its evolution over time, which affect the learning and teaching process (Dörnyei and Murphy 2003). Two sets of open-ended questionnaires were administered to each member of the group (20 participants in total) to gather data, one at the beginning of the first term and one at the end. At the beginning of the term, the participants were asked to answer questions about some of the factors which potentially influence group dynamics. At the end of the term, they were invited to reflect and report on any changes in their views and any developments in the group dynamics of their cohort from their perspective. Using a grounded theory approach, the data from the two sets of the questionnaires were analyzed. The findings of the study contribute to observations and ideas within the academic field of language group dynamics and also importantly extend them in relation to the specific and unique MA TESOL context. Keywords: TESOL; TESOL classroom dynamics; student perceptions, intercultural dynamics; intercultural competenc

EFFECTS OF AN ARABIC ACCENT ON EFL LEARNERS' PRODUCTIVE INTELLIGIBILITY

This study aimed at investigating the effects of a foreign accent, namely the Iraqi Arabic accent, at the segmental level on the productive intelligibility of Iraqi EFL learners. Drawing on an intelligibility pronunciation principle, i.e. Gimsons (2001) Minimum General Intelligibility (MGI), the study applied a mixed-methods research approach to measure the extent to which features of this accent impede the productive intelligibility of these learners and to identify the communication strategies they use to overcome intelligibility failures. To achieve these aims, two data collection tools were used: a production intelligibility test and a speaking task. Although the overall quantitative findings revealed that Iraqi EFL learners foreign-accented English was intelligible at the segmental level, most intelligibility failures were ascribed to the mispronunciation of non-existent English phonemes. The qualitative aspect of the study aimed at identifying the communication strategies Iraqi EFL learners use to overcome these intelligibility failures. In this respect, several strategies were identified, namely the let-it-pass strategy, the replacement strategy, the repetition strategy and the time gaining strategy. The article concludes with the implications and applications of the findings.Corresponding author: Ahmad NazariDOI:: doi.org/10.24071/llt.2020.23020

Grammar Teaching Revisited: EFL Teachers between Grammar Abstinence and Formal Grammar Teaching

Abstract: The study of English language teachers’ cognitions and its relationship to teachers’ classroom practices have recently been the focus of language teaching and teacher education (Borg, 2006 & 2010). However, rarely have the studies delved into teachers’ knowledge about grammar (reviewed by Borg, 2001) or investigated the relationships between teachers’ knowledge about grammar and teachers’ actions (Borg, 2003; Sanchez, 2010). Moreover, these studies have been mostly conducted by English native speaker researchers who do not necessarily have the same cultural or linguistic background of the participants in the studies (Andrew, 2001 cited in Sanchez, 2010, p. 45). Also, they are largely confined to English native speaker teachers and few have addressed non-native speaker teachers in countries where English is a foreign language (Sanchez, 2010, p. 45). In response to these gaps in the area of second language teaching, this study investigates four English as a Foreign Language (EFL) teachers’ views about grammar teaching to give an aggregate picture of the way they teach grammar. The research database consists of audio-recordings of these teachers’ lessons and interviews in which they explain why they adopt a deductive or an inductive approach, how they teach grammar and how they respond to students’ errors. Implications for non-native EFL teacher education are also discussed

An empirical study on entrepreneurs' personal characteristics

The personality of an entrepreneur is one of the most important characteristics of reaching success by creating jobs and opportunities. In this paper, we demonstrate an empirical study on personal characteristics of students who are supposed to act as entrepreneur to create jobs in seven fields of accounting, computer science, mechanical engineering, civil engineering, metallurgy engineering, electrical engineering and drawing. There are seven aspects of accepting reasonable risk, locus of control, the need for success, mental health conditions, being pragmatic, tolerating ambiguity, dreaming and the sense of challenging in our study to measure the level of entrepreneurship. We uniformly distribute 133 questionnaires among undergraduate students in all seven groups and analyze the results based on t-student test. Our investigation indicates that all students accept reasonable amount of risk, they preserve sufficient locus of control and they are eager for success. In addition, our tests indicate that students believe they maintain sufficient level of mental health care with strong sense of being pragmatic and they could handle ambiguity and challenges

The Principle of Dominance and the Limitation of Changing the Use of Agricultural and Garden Lands

The purpose of the present study was to investigate the principle of dominance and limitations imposed on changing the use of agricultural and garden lands. The former and latter are considered as important subjects continuously debated and discussed. Changing the use of garden and agricultural lands is a theoretically argued subject and is followed by the principal question of: how in the face of the dominance principle, the legal limitations in changing the use of agricultural and garden lands are justifiable? In terms of the method of study.the present research falls into the category of descriptive-analytic researches, and library studies have been conducted to answer the mentioned question. The results of the present study indicate that illegal change of use of agricultural lands is an obvious instance of conflict between personal and societal rights. Because the owner of an agricultural land, due to his/her personal rights is allowed to use the land in any legitimate and legal way he/she desires; however, the rights of the society and the future humans forbids the owner to use the land in ways that would harm the public/society. Based on the stated content, it is concluded that the ownership right is absolutely preserved for the real owner based on the principle of dominance, but in cases where this right is conflictual with societal rights, the societal rights would be counted prioritized over the former, and therefore it would be necessary to control personal rights. This preference has a clear and obvious instance in the context of changing the use of agricultural and garden lands; and it is rational that the society’s right will be dominant over the rights of the owner of agricultural and garden lands