Hydrological connectivity of soil pipes determined by ground-penetrating radar tracer detection

Soil pipes are common and important features of many catchments, particularly in semi-arid and humid areas, and can contribute a large proportion of runoff to river systems. They may also significantly influence catchment sediment and solute yield. However, there are often problems in finding and defining soil pipe networks which are located deep below the surface. Ground penetrating radar (GPR) has been used for non-destructive identification and mapping of soil pipes in blanket peat catchments. While GPR can identify subsurface cavities, it cannot alone determine hydrological connectivity between one cavity and another. This paper presents results from an experiment to test the ability of GPR to establish hydrological connectivity between pipes through use of a tracer solution. Sodium chloride was injected into pipe cavities previously detected by the radar. The GPR was placed downslope of the injection points and positioned on the ground directly above detected soil pipes. The resultant radargrams showed significant changes in reflectance from some cavities and no change from others. Pipe waters were sampled in order to check the radar results. Changes in electrical conductivity of the pipe water could be detected by the GPR, without data post-processing, when background levels were increased by greater than approximately twofold. It was thus possible to rapidly determine hydrological connectivity of soil pipes within dense pipe networks across hillslopes without ground disturbance. It was also possible to remotely measure travel times through pipe systems; the passing of the salt wave below the GPR produced an easily detectable signal on the radargram which required no post-processing. The technique should allow remote sensing of water sources and sinks for soil pipes below the surface. The improved understanding of flowpath connectivity will be important for understanding water delivery, solutional and particulate denudation, and hydrological and geomorphological model development

Altruism among relatives and non-relatives

The amount of their own monetary reward that undergraduate participants claimed they were willing to forgo, in order to give $75 to another person, decreased hyperbolically as social distance increased between the participant and the other person. Relatives tended to be ranked at closer social distances than were non-relatives. However, even at the same social distance, participants were willing to forgo significantly more money for the benefit of relatives than for the benefit of non-relatives. These results imply that altruism is determined by factors in addition to social distance

An investigation of key growth industry sectors in Wales using Multi-Sectoral Qualitative Analysis

This paper examines the problem of key sector identification in regional economies. Whilst the paper questions the desirability of policy focusing on the promotion of key sectors, it suggests that tools are generally underdeveloped to identify these sectors. The paper suggests that multi-sectoral qualitative analysis provides one means of forming conclusions on sector potentials.

Identifying Real Cost Saving in Lean Manufacturing

Lean manufacturing is well-known as an effective means toward cost savings, but to convince management to support a culture shift to implement a lean manufacturing program there must be confidence in understanding what real effective and measurable lean savings are. This case study analyzes data from one specific lean event and points out areas of deficiency and shows how misreporting cost savings can hurt the lean program and the creditability of the lean practitioners. Often, lean practitioners are so anxious to show what benefit their lean projects have attained, they cite everything they can think of to justify their lean project, some of which can be questionable cost savings and can negatively impact the long term credibility of the lean program. This case study from Boeing’s Ground-Based Missile Defense (GMD) program will evaluate and confirm what constitutes real cost savings as a result of a continuous improvement project to reduce the cycle time of interceptor integration. This evaluation includes professional perceptions of lean cost savings as part of the conclusion of what constitutes real cost savings in a lean program. This case study evaluates one particular event of many events done by companies every day. Another area of research could focus on instances of lean programs not capturing and reporting all the effective cost savings from a lean project which can have some of the same negative effects as reporting more costs saving than are truly being realized as this study addresses

A Markov Switching Model of Congressional Partisan Regimes

Studies of development and change in partisan fortunes in the US emphasize epochs of partisan stability, separated by critical events or turning points. A major empirical issue that has plagued the study of American political development is the estimation of the critical moments and durations of these partisan regimes. In this paper we introduce a fresh approach to the study of partisan regimes. Our method is based in the method of Markov switching, introduced by James Hamilton. We apply Hamilton’s approach to the size of party coalitions in the US House of Representatives from 1854 to the present. Our model assumes that the political system is either in a state of domination by one party or it is not (in which case the other party dominates). The Markov switching approach also yields estimated state probabilities that allow us to make inferences about periods of empirical party balance. Roughly speaking, when the Republicans constitute the dominant partisan coalition, they can expect to capture 60 percent of House seats in any given election. The Democrats can expect 59 percent when dominant. Our method also allows the estimation of critical transition points between Republican and Democratic partisan coalitions. The periods we identify as governed by a being Republican coalition are roughly 1860 through 1872, 1894 through 1906, and 1918 through 1928.

Citation and peer review of data: moving towards formal data publication

This paper discusses many of the issues associated with formally publishing data in academia, focusing primarily on the structures that need to be put in place for peer review and formal citation of datasets. Data publication is becoming increasingly important to the scientific community, as it will provide a mechanism for those who create data to receive academic credit for their work and will allow the conclusions arising from an analysis to be more readily verifiable, thus promoting transparency in the scientific process. Peer review of data will also provide a mechanism for ensuring the quality of datasets, and we provide suggestions on the types of activities one expects to see in the peer review of data. A simple taxonomy of data publication methodologies is presented and evaluated, and the paper concludes with a discussion of dataset granularity, transience and semantics, along with a recommended human-readable citation syntax

Smithkline v. Apotex: Broadening The Scope Of Inherent Anticipation And Its Impact On The Patentability Of Chemical Structures, 5 J. Marshall Rev. Intell. Prop. L. 456 (2006)

In SmithKline v. Apotex, the Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit invalidated the main patent on Paxil as inherently anticipated. In doing so, the court over-stepped the bounds of appellate review, and broadened the scope of the inherent anticipation doctrine to include chemical structures that are not measurably produced by strict practice of the prior art. This holding does not comport with well-settled precedent and could have dire consequences for the patentability of many chemical structures. A more equitable invalidity analysis would require a chemical structure to derive directly from a disclosed reaction in order to be anticipated; in all other cases, the chemical structure must be proven obvious