“All modern conveniences”: multi-family housing choice, the apartment, and the modernization of Raleigh, North Carolina, 1918-1929

This dissertation argues that city planners and boosters in 1920's Raleigh, North Carolina, advocated that she was to be a "residence city" based on single-family homes in exclusive suburbs for the white middle-class. However, both realtor-developers and private homeowners chipped away at the symbol of the "residence city." Raleigh was to be modern, but it was a modernity based not just on the rhetoric of city leaders who emphasized the single-family home. It was a modernity based on the actions and desires of realtor-developers who were anxious to exploit the new architectural form of the apartment house. It was also a modernity based on the decisions of individual, private, homeowners to incorporate non-family members into their households to earn additional income and contribute to their family's economic prosperity. Homeowners in some ways rejected the "residence city" because they rented out portions of their homes to non-family members. In other ways, they embraced the symbols of the white, affluent, suburb by insisting on architectural solutions, such as porches and private entrances, which emphasized the value of privacy and by complying with restrictive housing covenants which barred sale or rental of properties to African Americans in perpetuity. Realtor-developers also rejected the "residence city" because they chose to invest money in multi-family apartment houses in addition to single-family home developments like Boylan Heights, Cameron Park, Glenwood-Brooklyn, and Oakwood. The "residence city" was a philosophy put forth by city boosters in which the single-family home became the symbol of progress and refinement--a modern philosophy for a modern place. It was the way in which Raleigh business leaders expressed the concept of the "suburban ideal" locally. In the eyes of these city boosters, Raleigh would not be a city of transients and renters instead, it would become a bastion of southern success through an army of white, affluent, suburban homeowners. The "residence city" was newly constructed in the 1920s to help control the socio-economic composition of Raleigh's suburbs as they competed for land space with already established communities that did not conform to the vision of racially and economically sorted neighborhoods. The popularity of multi-family housing solutions in the form of boarding houses, apartments within single-family houses, and new apartment houses contradicted the vision of the "residence city" made up of single-family, suburban homes. This study contributes to the fields of urban history, suburban history, southern history, and architectural history because it examines Raleigh's transition from a town to a modern, southern city filled with new technologies and experimental housing forms. Most importantly, this dissertation contributes to the history of the New urban South and vernacular architecture history in terms of examining traditional multi-family housing patterns, the introduction of newer, more modern multi-family housing options, and to suburban history by using an analysis of housing records (including city directories, newspaper classifieds, historic property registration and nomination forms, and suburban promotional brochures) coupled with modern fieldwork photographs. The tension between how Raleigh boosters, realtor-developers, and residents in the early decades of the twentieth century defined the "residence city," in symbolic terms, and the actual practices of middle-class homeowners and realtor-developers alters our understanding of the history of the American suburb

TRY plant trait database - enhanced coverage and open access

Plant traits-the morphological, anatomical, physiological, biochemical and phenological characteristics of plants-determine how plants respond to environmental factors, affect other trophic levels, and influence ecosystem properties and their benefits and detriments to people. Plant trait data thus represent the basis for a vast area of research spanning from evolutionary biology, community and functional ecology, to biodiversity conservation, ecosystem and landscape management, restoration, biogeography and earth system modelling. Since its foundation in 2007, the TRY database of plant traits has grown continuously. It now provides unprecedented data coverage under an open access data policy and is the main plant trait database used by the research community worldwide. Increasingly, the TRY database also supports new frontiers of trait-based plant research, including the identification of data gaps and the subsequent mobilization or measurement of new data. To support this development, in this article we evaluate the extent of the trait data compiled in TRY and analyse emerging patterns of data coverage and representativeness. Best species coverage is achieved for categorical traits-almost complete coverage for 'plant growth form'. However, most traits relevant for ecology and vegetation modelling are characterized by continuous intraspecific variation and trait-environmental relationships. These traits have to be measured on individual plants in their respective environment. Despite unprecedented data coverage, we observe a humbling lack of completeness and representativeness of these continuous traits in many aspects. We, therefore, conclude that reducing data gaps and biases in the TRY database remains a key challenge and requires a coordinated approach to data mobilization and trait measurements. This can only be achieved in collaboration with other initiatives

High-energy Neutrino Astronomy: The Cosmic Ray Connection

This is a review of neutrino astronomy anchored to the observational fact that Nature accelerates protons and photons to energies in excess of $10^{20}$ and $10^{13}$ eV, respectively. Although the discovery of cosmic rays dates back close to a century, we do not know how and where they are accelerated. Basic elementary-particle physics dictates a universal upper limit on their energy of $5\times10^{19}$ eV, the so-called Greisen-Kuzmin-Zatsepin cutoff; however, particles in excess of this energy have been observed by all experiments, adding one more puzzle to the cosmic ray mystery. Mystery is fertile ground for progress: we will review the facts as well as the speculations about the sources including gamma ray bursts, blazars and top-down scenarios. The important conclusion is that, independently of the specific blueprint of the source, it takes a kilometer-scale neutrino observatory to detect the neutrino beam associated with the highest energy cosmic rays and gamma rays. We also briefly review the ongoing efforts to commission such instrumentation.Comment: 83 pages, 18 figures, submitted to Reports on Progress in Physic

TRY plant trait database - enhanced coverage and open access

Plant traits—the morphological, anatomical, physiological, biochemical and phenological characteristics of plants—determine how plants respond to environmental factors, affect other trophic levels, and influence ecosystem properties and their benefits and detriments to people. Plant trait data thus represent the basis for a vast area of research spanning from evolutionary biology, community and functional ecology, to biodiversity conservation, ecosystem and landscape management, restoration, biogeography and earth system modelling. Since its foundation in 2007, the TRY database of plant traits has grown continuously. It now provides unprecedented data coverage under an open access data policy and is the main plant trait database used by the research community worldwide. Increasingly, the TRY database also supports new frontiers of trait‐based plant research, including the identification of data gaps and the subsequent mobilization or measurement of new data. To support this development, in this article we evaluate the extent of the trait data compiled in TRY and analyse emerging patterns of data coverage and representativeness. Best species coverage is achieved for categorical traits—almost complete coverage for ‘plant growth form’. However, most traits relevant for ecology and vegetation modelling are characterized by continuous intraspecific variation and trait–environmental relationships. These traits have to be measured on individual plants in their respective environment. Despite unprecedented data coverage, we observe a humbling lack of completeness and representativeness of these continuous traits in many aspects. We, therefore, conclude that reducing data gaps and biases in the TRY database remains a key challenge and requires a coordinated approach to data mobilization and trait measurements. This can only be achieved in collaboration with other initiatives

Is there an omission effect in prosocial behavior? A laboratory experiment on passive vs. active generosity

We investigate whether individuals are more prone to act selfishly if they can passively allow for an outcome to be implemented (omission) rather than having to make an active choice (commission). In most settings, active and passive choice alternatives differ in terms of factors such as the presence of a suggested option, costs of taking an action, and awareness. We isolate the omission effect from confounding factors in three experiments, and find no evidence that the distinction between active and passive choices has an independent effect on the propensity to implement selfish outcomes. This suggests that increased selfishness through omission, as observed in various economic choice situations, is driven by other factors than a preference for selfish omissions.Funding Agencies|Jan Wallander and Tom Hedelius Foundation [P2012-0002:1]; Ragnar Soderberg Foundation</p

The Swift gamma-ray burst mission

The Swift mission, scheduled for launch in 2004, is a multiwavelength observatory for gamma-ray burst (GRB) astronomy. It is a first-of-its-kind autonomous rapid-slewing satellite for transient astronomy and pioneers the way for future rapid-reaction and multiwavelength missions. It will be far more powerful than any previous GRB mission, observing more than 100 bursts yr(-1) and performing detailed X-ray and UV/optical afterglow observations spanning timescales from 1 minute to several days after the burst. The objectives are to (1) determine the origin of GRBs, (2) classify GRBs and search for new types, (3) study the interaction of the ultrarelativistic outflows of GRBs with their surrounding medium, and (4) use GRBs to study the early universe out to z>10. The mission is being developed by a NASA-led international collaboration. It will carry three instruments: a new-generation wide-field gamma-ray (15-150 keV) detector that will detect bursts, calculate 1'-4' positions, and trigger autonomous spacecraft slews; a narrow-field X-ray telescope that will give 5" positions and perform spectroscopy in the 0.2-10 keV band; and a narrow-field UV/optical telescope that will operate in the 170-600 nm band and provide 0".3 positions and optical finding charts. Redshift determinations will be made for most bursts. In addition to the primary GRB science, the mission will perform a hard X-ray survey to a sensitivity of similar to1 mcrab (similar to2x10(-11) ergs cm(-2) s(-1) in the 15-150 keV band), more than an order of magnitude better than HEAO 1 A-4. A flexible data and operations system will allow rapid follow-up observations of all types of high-energy transients, with rapid data downlink and uplink available through the NASA TDRSS system. Swift transient data will be rapidly distributed to the astronomical community, and all interested observers are encouraged to participate in follow-up measurements. A Guest Investigator program for the mission will provide funding for community involvement. Innovations from the Swift program applicable to the future include (1) a large-area gamma-ray detector using the new CdZnTe detectors, (2) an autonomous rapid-slewing spacecraft, (3) a multiwavelength payload combining optical, X-ray, and gamma-ray instruments, (4) an observing program coordinated with other ground-based and space-based observatories, and (5) immediate multiwavelength data flow to the community. The mission is currently funded for 2 yr of operations, and the spacecraft will have a lifetime to orbital decay of similar to8 yr