bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025 huggingface dataset:
Future Disasters
Authors: Smith Robert B. , Siegel Lee J.
Published: November 2020

In 1870, the fall before Ferdinand Hayden’s celebrated exploration of Yellowstone, an Army lieutenant named Gustavus C. Doane guided a small troop into the mysterious high country. Unlike Hayden, Doane did not conduct extensive scientific studies. However, Doane was observant. He said of Yellowstone: . . . As a country for sight seers, it is without parallel. As a field for scientific research it promises great results, in the branches of Geology, Mineralogy, Botany, Zoology, and Ornithology. It is probably the greatest laboratory that nature furnishes on the surface of the globe. . . . Yellowstone’s value as a unique ecological region soon gained recognition when in 1872, it was designated as the first national park in the United States—and in the world. The complex relationships among Yellowstone’s fauna, flora, and geology helped inspire America’s budding conservation ethic, which came to fruition only a century later with widespread recognition of the tenuous interdependence of living organisms and the Earth they occupy. The idea of a greater Yellowstone ecosystem recognized that its living and geological wonders extended beyond the park’s boundaries and into a broader area. The greater Yellowstone ecosystem is defined by the subterranean yet dominant presence of the Yellowstone hotspot, the engine that ultimately drives not only the region’s geology, but also its living organisms. The Rocky Mountains, lifted upward tens of millions of years ago, were pushed perhaps 1,700 feet higher at Yellowstone during the past 2 million years by the upward-bulging hotspot. Today, a line drawn at 6,100 feet elevation roughly demarcates the boundaries of the greater Yellowstone ecosystem. The high altitude is critical in creating the temperature and moisture regimes that gave rise to Yellowstone’s biological wonders and now determine the distribution of its plants and wildlife. In addition, the incredible amount of heat rising from the hotspot is responsible for Yellowstone’s history of volcanism and its geysers and hot springs, rich with exotic microbes that branched off the evolutionary tree at a primitive stage of life on Earth. Yelllowstone’s expansive lodgepole pine forests demonstrate the interaction of the park’s biology and geology. They grow well on rhyolite lava flows that cover most of western and central Yellowstone.
Fundamentals
Authors: Salmon Rick
Published: November 2020

This first chapter reviews the fundamental principles of fluid mechanics, emphasizing the relationship between the underlying microscopic description of the fluid as a swarm of molecules, and the much more useful (but less genuine) macroscopic description of the fluid as a set of continuous fields. Although it is certainly possible to study fluids without recognizing their true particulate nature, such an approach avoids important ideas about averaging that are needed later, especially in the study of turbulence. It is best to encounter these ideas at the earliest opportunity. Moreover, even if one adopts a strictly macroscopic viewpoint (as we eventually shall), one still has the choice between Eulerian and Lagrangian field theories. The Eulerian theory is the more useful and succinct, and most textbooks employ it exclusively. However, the Lagrangian theory, which regards the fluid as a continuous field of particles, is the more complete and illuminating, and it represents a natural extension of the ideas associated with the underlying molecular dynamics to the macroscopic level of description. All fluids are composed of molecules. We shall regard these molecules as point masses that exactly obey Newton’s laws of motion. This assumption is not precisely correct; the molecular motions are really governed by quantum mechanics. However, quantum effects are frequently unimportant, and the main ideas we want to develop are independent of the precise nature of the underlying molecular dynamics. It only matters that there be an exact underlying molecular dynamics, so that one could in principle predict the behavior of the whole fluid by solving the equations governing all of its molecules. It is of course utterly impractical to follow the motion of every molecule, because even the smallest volume of fluid contains an immense number of molecules. We are immediately forced to consider dynamical quantities that represent averages over many molecules.
Introduction to Geophysical Fluid Dynamics
Authors: Salmon Rick
Published: November 2020

This second chapter offers a brief introduction to geophysical fluid dynamics—the dynamics of rotating, stratified flows. We start with the shallow water equations, which govern columnar motion in a thin layer of homogeneous fluid. Roughly speaking, the solutions of the shallow-water equations comprise two types of motion: ageostrophic motions, including inertia-gravity waves, on the one hand, and nearly geostrophic motions on the other. In rapidly rotating flow, these two types of motion may, in some sense, decouple. We seek simpler equations that describe only the nearly geostrophic motion. The simplest such equations are the quasigeostrophic equations. In the quasigcostrophic equations, potential vorticity plays the key role: The potential vorticity completely determines the velocity field that transports it, thereby controlling the whole dynamics. We begin by generalizing our previously derived fluid equations to a rotating coordinate frame.
The Pleistocene in Britain and Europe
Authors: Holman J. Alan
Published: November 2020

A general introduction to the Pleistocene with an emphasis on herpetological remains was presented in the companion volume Pleistocene Amphibians and Reptiles in North America (Holman, 1995c). For a general introduction to the Pleistocene that gives much attention to Britain and Europe, the reader is referred to Sutcliffe (1985). A detailed account of Pleistocene mammals in Britain is given by Stuart (1982), and a general account of Pleistocene mammals in Europe is given by Kurten (1968). The present chapter deals mainly with chronological divisions of the Pleistocene in Britain and Europe. Early geologists recognized that glacial deposits and land forms existed far south of existing glaciated areas, and they correctly reasoned that these features indicated not only the presence of ice sheets but the onset of cold climates, as well. As these features were mapped and stratigraphic studies were made, it was found that some sections contained weathered zones of organic soils and plant remains between layers of glacially derived sediments. It was suggested that these organic zones represented nonglacial environments and that ice sheets must have advanced and retreated several times. In Europe, before studies of deep sea sediments were made, Pleistocene chronological events were determined on the basis of piecemeal evidence from terrestrial sediments. The earliest widely accepted chronology of climatic Pleistocene intervals was the classic fourfold subdivision of Pleistocene glacial events in the Alps by Penck and Bruckner (1909). These glacial stage names, from oldest to youngest, are Gu'nz glacial, Mindcl glacial, Riss glacial, and Wiirm glacial. Between the glacial stages, intcrglacial stages were designated by compound names based on the underlying and overlying glacial stages (e.g., The Gunz-Mindel intcrglacial stage lies between the Giinz and Mindel glacial stages). These Alpine glacial stages have been widely used, and one still finds references to them (especially the younger stages) in the recent literature (e.g., Fritz, 1995).
Land Resources and Constraints to Crop Production
Authors: Greenland D. J. , Gregory P. J.
Published: November 2020

Several assessments have been made which indicate that if adequate inputs are used, the extent of land resources is sufficient to support a world population in excess of 8 billion (Buringh and Van Heemst, 1977; Higgins ct al., 1982; de Vries et al., 1995; Dyson, 1996). There have also been many dire warnings that the methods that must be used to produce the necessary crops will lead to soil degradation and environmental pollution, as a result of which it will be impossible to sustain the present population, let alone a much greater one (Brown, 1988; Ehrlich and Ehrlich, 1990; Myers, 1991; Ehrlich et al., 1993; Brown and Kane, 1995). The most detailed of these various studies is that by FAO, “Potential Population Supporting Capacity of Lands in the Developing World” (Higgins et al., 1982). Although the authors reached the conclusion that the soils of the world were able to support a population in excess of 8 billion, it was also concluded that, in 1976, 19 countries were “at risk” because they will not be able to produce sufficient food for their population in the year 2000, even at “high levels” of inputs; 36 were at risk because they could not do so at intermediate levels; and no fewer than 65 could not do so at low levels, which is all that most of them could afford. The latest estimate of the number of countries at risk at low levels of input is 82. Thus, while the world may not be on the brink of the Malthusian precipice, there are several countries that are. Rwanda, which has the highest population density of any country in Africa, appears to have fallen over the brink. At low levels of inputs, and with population pressure driving fanners to exploit soils, soil degradation and a decline in productivity are inevitable. Thus, there are many who believe that whatever practicable methods are used, it will not be possible to produce the crops necessary to support the world population. Borgstrom (1969), for instance, stated that “the world . . . is on the verge of the biggest famine in history. . . . Such a famine will have massive proportions and affect hundreds of millions, perhaps billions. By 1984 it will dwarf and overshadow most of the issues and anxieties that now attract attention.” The fact that this did not happen, just as the prophets of doom from Malthus on have so far been proved wrong, has led many others to assume that there is unlikely to be a continuing problem of food production, although many continue to predict massive famines in the near future.
Competition between Livestock and Mankind for Nutrients: Let Ruminants Eat Grass
Authors: Fitzhugh H. A.
Published: November 2020

As we contemplate the challenge of feeding more than 8 billion people —more than three quarters living in developing countries —the even greater challenge will be feeding their grandchildren. Consideration of competition between livestock and mankind for nutrients must include both near-term food needs and long-term sustainability of agricultural production systems. Producing more livestock products at the expense of eroding the natural resource base is not an acceptable solution. Livestock have been denigrated as both competitors for food and degraders of the natural resource base for food production. These often emotionally argued allegations against livestock generally do not stand up to objective analysis. Livestock arc most often complementary elements of food production systems, converting otherwise unused feed sources to highly desired food and livestock products such as leather and wool. Moreover, well-managed livestock are positive contributors to the natural resources base supporting balanced agricultural systems. In this chapter, the following points are addressed from the perspective of current and future role for livestock in feeding 8 billion people: . . . • Growing demands for human food and livestock feed • Domesticated food-producing animals • World livestock production systems • Human food preferences and requirements • Dietary requirements and conversion efficiencies • Contributions of science to livestock improvement . . . The overarching issue is the difference in the current and future role for livestock in developed and in developing regions. Less than 11 percent of the global land mass of 13.3 billion hectares is cultivated; the remainder supports permanent pasture, 26%; forest, 31%; and other nonagricultural uses, 32% (U.N. data as cited by Waggoner, 1994). The concerns about competition between livestock and mankind for nutrients center primarily on grains and legumes grown on arable land. Even the most avid vegetarians have little taste for the forages and other herbaceous materials from pasturelands, forests, roadsides, and fence rows that arc consumed by livestock. Since the 18th century, the amount of land cultivated has increased from approximately 0.3 to 1.5 billion ha (Richards, 1990, as cited by Waggoner, 1994). This increase in cultivated land has primarily come at the expense of forest and grasslands.
Nutrient Considerations in the Use of Silviculture for Land Development and Rehabilitation in the Amazon
Authors: Montagnini Florencia
Published: November 2020

Tropical plantations serve diverse economic, social, political, and ecological functions. With considerably higher yields than managed native forests, tropical and subtropical plantations make substantial contributions to world timber and pulp production (Wadsworth 1983, Evans 1992). Tree plantations can also be a source of cash, savings, and insurance for individual farmers. Plantations may help stabilize rural populations in regions where shifting agriculture is the predominant land use. In combination with subsistence and commercial crops (agroforestry) or cattle (agrosilvopastoral systems), plantations have been used as tools in rural development projects worldwide. Plantations are often seen as alternatives to deforestation as they can provide products that otherwise would be taken from natural forests (Fearnside 1990, McNabb et al. 1994). Nutrient cycling characteristics of tropical plantations differ from those of natural forests in a number of ways. Natural forests are adapted to ecological niches by intricate and effective physiological adaptations of growth in the environment (see Cuevas, this volume). Instead, tropical plantations are simplified, generally monospecific ecosystems that occupy the site for a limited period of time that can range from 4-12 years (for biomass, pulpwood, or fuelwood) up to 20-40 years (timber). In many instances plantations are composed of species that are exotic to the region, or even when indigenous, are new to the particular plantation site. Since plantation tree species have been generally selected for production of timber or other aboveground tree parts, they tend to maintain a smaller fraction of total tree biomass nutrients in roots than natural forests (Vogt et al. 1997). In rain forests growing on poor soils, high tree productivity is in part due to the existence of important nutrient conserving mechanisms mediated by the root system (Cuevas, this volume). The smaller biomass of plantation root systems may thus make them more susceptible to nutrient and water stress. Smaller root systems may also make plantation forests more susceptible to disturbances from strong winds and pathogens that attack aerial parts (Vogt et al. 1997). Nutrient demands by plantation trees vary from season to season and with the developmental age of the stand (Drechsel and Zech 1993). During the life of the plantation, large quantities of nutrients are returned to the soil by above- and belowground litter, harvest residues, stem flow, and throughfall.
The Interface Between Economics and Nutrient Cycling in Amazon Land Development
Authors: Jordan Carl F.
Published: November 2020

Most of the terra firme soils in the Amazon are highly weathered, highly leached, have low capacity for retaining nutrients against the continual leaching and weathering of the tropical climate, and are classified as Oxisols and Ultisols, soil types with extremely low fertility (see Cuevas, this volume). The naturally occurring forests of the region maintain a high production of wood and leaves through very efficient recycling of nutrients from decomposing litter to roots in a root-humus layer on top of the mineral soil or near its surface. The decomposing litter is important not only as a source of nutrients, but as a source of organic acids which prevent phosphorus fixation in the iron- and aluminium-rich soils of the Amazon. When forests on Amazonian terra firme soils are cut and burned, and the soils used for agriculture, litter, and humus are rapidly oxidized and destroyed. As a result, the potassium remaining from the original forest is quickly leached, the nitrogen is volatilized, and the phosphorus is immobilized in the mineral soil. This is one of the most important reasons that crop production can be carried out for only a few years under shifting cultivation. It is not just small scale agriculture that is limited by the low fertility of Amazonian soils. In the past, almost all types of development that destroy the nutrient conserving mechanisms of the forest have suffered financially. Two examples are given here to illustrate. In 1967, one of the largest conversions of tropical forest to pulp plantation began near the junction of the Jarí and Amazon rivers, in the state of Pará, Brazil (Time, 1976). The “Jarí” project was initiated and financed by Daniel K. Ludwig, one of the world’s richest men, and owner of numerous international corporations. Ludwig had anticipated a global shortage of wood fiber for pulp, and to meet this shortage, he and his advisors selected a site that they believed had high potential for pulp production (Time 1979, Kinkead 1981). By 1981, the total investment in the 12,000 km2 tract of land was approximately $1 billion (Kinkead 1981). Ludwig’s advisors recommended melina (Gmelina arborea) as the best species to plant.
Geoecological Controls on Elemental Fluxes in Communities of Higher Plants in Amazonian floodplains
Authors: Worbes Martin , Junk Wolfgang J.
Published: November 2020

Navigators visiting the Amazon during the fifteenth century provided the earliest descriptions of aquatic systems in the region, but it was not until mid twentieth century that systematic studies of the limnology of Amazon waters began (Sioli 1984). The inclusion of vegetation as an important part of the aquatic biota was only possible after the relatively recent change from traditional potamic limnology to wetlands limnology (Sioli 1975). The first studies of the vegetation of Amazon wetlands consisted mainly of species descriptions, and it is only recently that studies of floodplain vegetation have attained a level of importance equivalent to that of studies dealing with water chemistry, phytoplankton, zooplankton, and fishes. For the past thirty years, fertile floodplain systems along Whitewater rivers (várzea) have been focal areas of colonization. This fertility also supports high rates of primary production within the higher plants, especially of the herbaceous vegetation (Piedade et al. 1991, Junk and Piedade 1993a, 1997). Quickly turning-over pools of nutrients (Junk and Furch 1991, Furch and Junk 1992, 1997a) and direct connections with contiguous terra firme forest and river channels (Alves 1993, Furch and Junk 1997b) are also characteristic of these floodplain systems. As a consequence of the annual floodpulse (Junk et al. 1989), floodplain vegetation is subjected to aquatic and terrestrial phases, which hold important ecological implications for both the plant populations and related aquatic and terrestrial biota. Life cycles of the species and the time available for growing depend upon the duration of inundation and drought periods and the habit of the species. During the year, pulses of growth and dormancy occur and herbaceous vegetation changes its species composition according to the phase of the hydrological cycle. In this chapter we discuss the distribution and the development of plant communities in floodplain areas, mainly of the big Whitewater rivers, focusing on factors such as diversity, species composition, biomass and primary production. Based upon these factors, we also discuss the annual dynamics of bioelements stocks and their turnover through herbaceous and floodplain forest communities. Finally, we examine the implications of such nutrient dynamics and turnover for the aquatic biota.
Isotopic Exchange and Equilibrium Fractionation
Authors: Criss Robert E.
Published: November 2020

Equilibrium isotopic fractionations are best understood in terms of reactions that involve the transfer of isotopes between two phases or molecular species that have a common element (M). These isotopic exchange reactions may be written in one of several standard forms, such as . . . aAM*b + cBMd = aAMb + cBM*d (2.1) . . . where AMb and BMd represent the chemical formulas of the phases or species, AM*b and BM*d represent the same phases or species in which the trace isotope has replaced some or all of the atoms of element M, and a, b, c, and d are stoichiometric coefficients. In the case where all of the molecules are homogeneous, that is, where AMb and BMd are composed solely of the common isotope of M, and where AM*b and BM*d are phases or species in which the trace isotope M* has replaced all atoms of element M, then the product a × b equals c × d and represents the total number of atoms exchanged in the reaction. The concept of the isotopic exchange reaction is best shown by an example. Consider the exchange of deuterium between water and hydrogen gas. This may be written as a reaction among isotopically homogeneous molecules; that is, . . . H2O + D2 = D2O + H2 (2.2a) . . . or, alternatively, as exchange between homogeneous and heterogeneous molecules: . . . H2O + HD = HDO + H2 (2.2b) . . . Much of the utility of isotopic exchange reactions is that they may be described by equilibrium constants, defined in the standard way as the quotient of the activities of the products and reactants. Thus, the equilibrium condition for equation 2.2b becomes . . . K = ([HDO][H2])/([H2O][HD]) (2.3) . . . where K is the equilibrium constant. In equation 2.3, K has a particularly high value of 3.7 at 25°C.
Climate and Climatological Variations in the Jornada Basin
Authors: Wainright John
Published: November 2020

The purpose of this chapter is to review the climatic data for the Jornada Basin over the period for which instrumental records exist. Over this time period, up to 83 years in the case of the Jornada Experimental Range (JER), we can deduce both the long-term mean characteristics and variability on a range of different spatial and temporal scales. Short-term variability is seen in individual rainstorms. Longer-term patterns are controlled spatially by factors such as large-scale circulation patterns and basin and regional orography and temporally by the large-scale fluctuations in atmospheric and oceanic circulation patterns. Variability can have significant impacts on the biogeography of a region (Neilson 1986) or its geomorphic processes (Cooke and Reeves 1976), which may set in motion a series of feedbacks, most important those referring to desertification (Schlesinger et al. 1990; Conley et al. 1992). Understanding the frequency and magnitude of such variability is therefore fundamental in explaining the observed landscape changes in areas such as the Jornada Basin. The patterns observed for different climatic variables within the available instrumental records for the Jornada Basin are defined in a hierarchical series of temporal scales, starting with the patterns that emerge from long-term average conditions and moving to seasonal and monthly, daily, and subdaily time scales. Two further analyses are made because of their potential importance to the hydrological and ecological characteristics of the basin, namely, the occurrence of extreme rainfall events and of longer-term changes. The effects of El Niño events in controlling the rainfall over decadal time scales will be addressed in particular. Spatial variability is an additional important concern, especially when characterizing dryland areas such as the Jornada Basin, where spatial variability tends to be high. The overall climate of the basin can be defined according to the Köppen classification as being cool and arid, belonging to the midlatitude desert zone (BWk). However, interannual variability is important, and occasionally, the annual conditions are more characteristic of the semiarid steppe (BSk) zone. The higher rainfall rates in the higher altitudes of the basin are also more characteristic of semiarid conditions.
Assembling Blocks
Authors: Henikoff Jorja G.
Published: November 2020

A block is an ungapped local multiple alignment of amino acid sequences from a group of related proteins. Ideally, the contiguous stretch of residues represented by a block is conserved for biological function. Blocks have depth (the number of sequences) and width (the number of aligned positions). There are currently several useful programs for finding blocks in a group of related sequences that I do not discuss in detail here. Among these, Motif (Smith et al., 1990) and Asset (Neuwald and Green, 1994) both align blocks on occurrences of certain types of patterns found in the sequences; Gibbs (Lawrence et al., 1993; Neuwald et al., 1995) and MEME (Bailey and Elkan, 1994) both look for statistically optimal local alignments; and Macaw (Schuler et al., 1991) and Somap (Parry-Smith and Attwood, 1992) both give the user assistance in finding blocks interactively. After candidate blocks are identified by a block-finding method, they can be evaluated and assembled into a set representing the protein group, resulting in a multiple alignment consisting of ungapped regions separated by unaligned regions of variable length. The block assembly process is the subject of this chapter. Both the Blocks (Henikoff and Henikoff, 1996a) and Prints (Attwood and Beck, 1994) databases consist of such sets of blocks and between them currently represent 1,163 different protein groups. These collections of blocks are more sensitive and efficient for classifying new sequences into known protein groups than are collections of individual sequences, as demonstrated by comprehensive evaluations (Henikoff and Henikoff, 1994b, 1997), by genomic studies (Green et al., 1993), and by individual studies (Posfai et al., 1988; Henikoff, 1992, 1993; Attwood and Findlay, 1993; Pietrokovski, 1994; Brown, 1995). Issues that must be addressed during block assembly include the number of blocks provided to the assembly module by the block finders, block width, the number of times a block occurs in each sequence (zero to many), overlap of blocks, and the order of multiple blocks within each sequence. Once these issues are decided, it is necessary to score individual competing blocks and then competing sets of blocks.
MEME, MAST, and Meta-MEME: New Tools for Motif Discovery in Protein Sequences
Authors: Bailey Timothy L.
Published: November 2020

We are in the midst of an explosive increase in the number of DNA and protein sequences available for study, as various genome projects come on line. This wealth of information offers important opportunities for understanding many biological processes and developing new plant and animal models, and ultimately drugs, for human diseases, in addition to other applications of modern biotechnology. Unfortunately, sequences are accumulating at a pace that strains present methods for extracting significant biological information from them. A consequence of this explosion in the sequence databases is that there is much interest and effort in developing tools that can efficiently and automatically extract the relevant biological information in sequence data and make it available for use in biology and medicine. In this chapter, we describe one such method that we have developed based on algorithms from artificial intelligence research. We call this software tool MEME (Multiple Expectation-maximization for Motif Elicitation). It has the attractive property that it is an “unsupervised” discovery tool: it can identify motifs, such as regulatory sites in DNA and functional domains in proteins, from large or small groups of unaligned sequences. As we show below, motifs are a rich source of information about a dataset; they can be used to discover other homologs in a database, to identify protein subsets that contain one or more motifs, and to provide information for mutagenesis studies to elucidate structure and function in the protein family as well as its evolution. Learning tools are used to extract higher level biological patterns from lower level DNA and protein sequence data. In contrast, search tools such as BLAST (Basic Local Alignment Search Tool) take a given higher level pattern and find all items in a database that possess the pattern. Searching for items that have a certain pattern is a problem intrinsically easier than discovering what the pattern is from items that possess it. The patterns considered here are motifs, which for DNA data can be subsequences that interact with transcription factors, polymerases, and other proteins.
One Final Word: Sex
Authors: West-Eberhard Mary Jane
Published: November 2020

Sex transforms life. It affects morphology and behavior. It diverts enormous amounts of time and energy from the business of survival. It can even distract from the manufacture and safe packaging of offspring. The adolescent metamorphosis we each experience once, and thereafter view with amazement, in the relative calm of adulthood, has swept through nature on a grand scale, culminating in orchid flowers and peacock tails. All of this is due to chromosomal recombination—sex sensu strictu (Ghiselin, 1974)—and its organismal result, sexual reproduction or cooperation between two individuals to produce offspring. It is sex as sexual reproduction, the developmental side of sex that initiates the ontogeny of new individuals, that I mainly discuss here, though it is sex as recombination— the genetic side of sex—that has received most attention in discussions of the maintenance of sex. Of all the major transformations in the history of life, the evolution of sex is the most enigmatic. The question is not so much how sex got there as why it remains. Given the importance of genetic similarity, or kin selection (Hamilton, 1964a,b), for the maintenance of cooperation within and among organisms, sex seems designed to be disruptive. It requires the union of genetically dissimilar individuals, which dilutes the relatedness of mother and young, leaving the mother to invest in offspring genetically only half like herself. This has been called “the cost of meiosis” or the “twofold cost of sex” (Williams, 1975). It is a cost that usually falls to females, with their greater investment in eggs and care of offspring. By this view, the male is a parasite of his mate and participation in sexual reproduction is contrary to the best interests of females, who would do better to reproduce parthenogenetically on their own. Yet, among animals, only about one in one thousand species are thelytokous, that is, secondarily asexual, with no facultative or alternating sexual generation and no interaction with males. The prevalence of sexual reproduction in higher organisms is “inconsistent with current evolutionary theory” (Williams, 1975, p. v).
Solute and Contaminant Transport
Authors: Warrick Arthur W.
Published: November 2020

We now look at the transport of materials in soil systems. Not only do water and liquids move, but so also do a variety of chemical and biological constituents. In this chapter, the emphasis will be on flow processes involving water that is carrying different types of solute. The solutes of interest can be harmful or they can be beneficial. The same chemical species could be desirable when contained within one region and undesirable if it escapes to another—such as from the root zone to the ground water. Both conservative and reactive tracers will be discussed. A conservative tracer is assumed to move freely with the soil water and is non-reactive, non-volatile, and non-absorbing. Of course, this is only an ideal case, and all materials carried with water will react in some way with the solid phase. The degree of interaction depends on the solute, the soil, and the flow regime. However, if there is little interaction, the solute can often be treated as a conservative tracer. Examples are tritium and, to a lesser degree, bromide. Other materials are only slightly soluble, readily react with the solid phase, or perhaps can change into alternative phases that are clearly non-conservative. In some cases, whether a solute can logically be considered as a conservative or non-conservative tracer depends on the time scale and where the process is occurring—for example, perhaps the reaction rates are low, and for a short time scale the process is conservative; alternatively, perhaps the reaction rate is driven by whether oxygen is available or whether a specific microbe or catalyst is present at a particular time and place. Most of the discussion is directed toward “miscible displacement” processes. For a miscible displacement process, the invading fluid mixes freely with the fluid that is being driven out. An example is the displacement of water of a concentration differing from that of the antecedent water. Miscible displacement of a low molecular weight alcohol with water is another example. Many problems of environmental concern are included, such as leaching of nitrates from the soil surface to the groundwater.
Informed Consent: Framing the Questions
Authors: Berg Jessica W. , Appelbaum Paul S. , Lidz Charles W. , Parker Lisa S.
Published: November 2020

What is informed consent? The answer may seem self-evident only to those who have yet to explore the many meanings of the term. Informed consent refers to legal rules that prescribe behaviors for physicians and other healthcare professionals in their interactions with patients and provide for penalties, under given circumstances, if physicians deviate from those expectations; to an ethical doctrine, rooted in our society’s cherished value of autonomy, that promotes patients’ right of self-determination regarding medical treatment; and to an interpersonal process whereby these parties interact with each other to select an appropriate course of medical care. Informed consent is each of these things, yet none of them alone. As a theory based on ethical principles, given effect by legal rulings and implemented by clinicians, it has been haunted by its complex lineage. When legal principles and ethical values conflict, which should take precedence? When clinical interests appear to be served by neither legal nor ethical concerns, which interests should be compromised and to what degree? The vast literature on informed consent, found in journals and books of medicine, law, bioethics, philosophy, and public policy, has been stimulated by the need to create a workable doctrine that can accommodate values that to many observers are in an irremediable state of conflict. The conflicts in theory and the need to resolve them in practice are the subjects of this book. Theory is the focus of the first half of the volume; practice is the topic of the second. Seeking to understand the fascinating theoretical problems requires us to grapple with some of the most difficult ethical and policy issues facing our society today. But let us state at the outset our belief that the clinician on the front lines need not be paralyzed by differences of opinion among legal and ethical theorists. Through the vaguely translucent wall of expertise behind which the discussion about the proper shape of the informed consent doctrine has taken place, a reasonable approach to informed consent in the clinician-patient relationship can be discerned. Our most important and challenging task in this book is to make that approach evident.
Merchant Capitalists
Authors: Gordon Robert B.
Published: November 2020

Bloomery forges could not produce cast items such as hollowware, potash kettles, or the hammerheads and anvil bases artisans needed for their forges. With a blast furnace, an ironmaker could both increase the scale of iron smelting and provide customers with iron castings. However, in colonial times a furnace required an investment of over £3,000, while a fully equipped bloomery forge cost only about £500. Additionally, blast furnace proprietors had to assemble a workforce at least ten times larger than they would need for a bloomery, provide a continuous supply of ore and fuel over a period of months, and create a stable organization to manage the whole enterprise. Bankruptcies among the initial furnace owners in Salisbury showed how difficult these tasks could be. Philip Livingston, proprietor of the manor across the border in New York, had access to capital that no one in Connecticut could match. In 1743 he had a blast furnace built at Ancram, in the western part of his manor, to smelt ore brought over the Connecticut border from Ore Hill. Nineteen years elapsed before Ethan Allen and his partners managed to launch the first such venture in the Salisbury district. Blast furnace proprietors needed an absolutely reliable water supply, since they had to keep their furnace’s running continuously for months. The place closest to Ore Hill that could provide such a supply was the outlet of Wononskopomuc Lake, soon to be renamed Furnace Pond. Water from this lake could run the approximately two-horsepower air pump needed for an eighteenth-century blast furnace throughout the year. A thriving colonial economy in 1760 encouraged John Hazeltine of Massachusetts—founder of the town of Upton, dealer in lands, and proprietor of the bloomery forge in Sutton—to send his son Paul to scout out investment opportunities in mineral-rich and underpopulated Salisbury. Here Paul met Ethan Allen, later to gain fame at Fort Ticonderoga, who had just sold his Cornwall farm for fifty pounds.
The Challenge of New Markets and Techniques
Authors: Gordon Robert B.
Published: November 2020

Ironmakers in the Middle Atlantic states used canals and railways to reduce costs and expand the scale of production with new techniques based on mineral-coal fuel beginning in the 1820s. Salisbury forge and furnace proprietors, who still had teamsters hauling ore, fuel, and metal along dirt roads with wagons in summer and sleds in winter, knew that improved transportation systems would help them get their products to outside buyers. They were less aware that canals and railroads would eventually force them to confront new techniques adopted by ironmakers outside their district. Entrepreneurs in northwestern Connecticut had become interested in waterways as early as 1760, when they wanted to improve the Housatonic’s channel north to Massachusetts in order to float logs downriver to their sawmills. Although the General Assembly authorized a lottery to raise £300 for the project in 1761, the promoters accomplished nothing. The start of construction on the Erie Canal stimulated interest in building a canal along the Housatonic River that would open new markets for the northwest’s ironmakers. Urged on by John M. Holley and others, the Ousatonic Canal proprietors organized a company in 1822 to build from tidewater to Stockbridge, Massachusetts. However, when canal engineer Benjamin Wright’s survey showed the company would have to build enough locks to raise boats a total of 604 feet as they traversed the canal, the project’s supporters backed out. The promoters of the Sharon Canal project, intended to start in Sharon and go down the Oblong River into New York and thence follow the route later used by the Harlem Railroad, accomplished even less. John M. Holley had experienced railroad travel on his 1831 trip to Harpers Ferry. He and his neighbors realized that a railway up the Housatonic valley would gather traffic from the region’s ironworks and, with a connection to the Western Railroad in Massachusetts, open the first year-round route from New York City to Albany. (The railroad along the Hudson River between New York and Albany did not open until 1851.) Several of the region’s ironmasters, including J. M. Holley’s son A. H. Holley, helped raise funds for the construction of the Housatonic Railroad when the state issued a charter in 1836.
Community, Culture, and Industrial Ecology
Authors: Gordon Robert B.
Published: November 2020

The people who settied northwestern Connecticut created an agricultural surplus that allowed them to undertake industrial ventures within a few years of their arrival. Their knowledge of the mechanical arts, coupled with the region’s natural resources, gave them opportunities to make material goods needed by their neighbors. Successive generations continued industrial use of the region’s natural resources over the next two centuries, each making its own choices about how to structure its enterprise within the framework of values and beliefs held separately by individuals and in common within the community. Each had to respond to changes in markets and the advent of new products and techniques. These opportunities, and the participants’ choices about how to use them, combined to create the region’s industrial ecology. Like the rest of the New England hill country, northwestern Connecticut had two abundant, renewable natural resources: streams with steep gradients and reliable flow for waterpower, and forest that covered the large areas that were too steep or too thinly mantled with soil for decent pasture. Millwrights could easily build waterpower systems on the streams, and farmers could manage the forest for continuous production of fuel wood, since it regrew trees to useful size within about twenty years. Unlike other highlands, however, northwestern Connecticut had a unique mineral resource: iron ore beds unmatched elsewhere in New England. Everyone in the newly settled lands and on the frontiers expanding into Vermont and New York in the early eighteenth century needed iron products. As described in chapter 3, individuals throughout the Salisbury district, aided by family members or fluid partnerships, built bloomery forges that they operated as components of their cropping, husbandry, or mercantile enterprises. Nearly every family in Kent and the other new towns had a partner in one of the forges. Individuals lacking metallurgical skills or access to any capital dug ore or cut wood. Others developed their skills as colliers or millwrights. Negotiated exchanges of labor and services among these artisans promoted interdependence within the community. As the colonists in southern New England increasingly mechanized their grain, timber, and cloth production in the mid—eighteenth century, they brought a new opportunity to the ironmakers of the Salisbury disno trict. By making standard parts for grain mills, sawmills, fulling mills, and oil mills that they could distribute widely, Salisbury ironmakers added value to the bar iron they made and enlarged the scope of their market.
Synthesis and Intercalation Chemistry
Authors: Enoki Toshiaki , Endo Morinobu , Suzuki Masatsugu
Published: November 2020

Alkali metal GICs are the best known donor type GICs, since they are easily prepared and their brilliant gold color for stage-1 GICs has attracted scientists working in intercalation chemistry. They have therefore been targets of intensive and detailed studies of their solid-state properties on the basis of the employment of highly oriented pyrolytic graphite (HOPG). There are several intercalation methods, which are classified basically into vapor-phase reaction, reaction of the mixture of graphite and alkali metal, high pressure reaction, electrochemical reaction, and reaction in a solvent. Among these methods, vapor-phase intercalation reaction is the most popular. The two-zone method can easily give alkali metal GICs with well-defined single-stage phases. The vapor pressure of the alkali metal becomes high enough to obtain a satisfactory reaction rate for intercalation reaction in the temperature range 200-550°C, at which we can use a Pyrex glass tube as a reaction chamber. Figure 2.1 shows a typical two-zone method, where graphite and alkali metal are maintained at different temperatures, TG and TI, respectively, in a vacuum-sealed glass tube placed in a two-zone furnace. Changing TI controls the vapor pressure of the alkali metal. Figure 2.2 presents the conditions of intercalation reaction with potassium, where single-stage phase samples with stages 1 to 8 are obtained by changing the temperature difference TG — TK (Nishitani et al., 1983). Typical experimental conditions are given in Table 2.1 for the preparation of K, Rb, and Cs GICs (Dresselhaus and Dresselhaus, 1981). The intercalation reaction is again carried out by heating a mixture of graphite and alkali metal in a vacuum-sealed glass tube. In this case, the reaction becomes considerably more rapid owing to direct contact of molten alkali metal with graphite, although the reaction takes place in a similar manner to the vapor-phase reaction. A stainless steel tube is used for the intercalation of lithium since lithium vapor degrades a glass tube because of its high chemical activity. Alkali metal can be intercalated into graphite when the alkali metal is solvated in liquid ammonia or an organic solvent such as dimethylsulphoxide (DMSO).
Waste
Authors: Tammemagi Hans
Published: November 2020

We are a wasteful lot on planet Earth. We do not mean to be, but this is an inherent and unavoidable feature of human society. The processes of living, eating, working, playing, and dying all utilize consumer products whose production and use generate wastes. Every candy bar has a wrapper; every apple has a core. It is almost impossible to think of a process that does not create some waste. There is sawdust from cutting lumber, metal shavings from drilling and soldering circuit boards, sludges from chemical processes, leftover food from restaurants, waste paper by the ton from environmental hearings and other legal proceedings, dirty diapers, and other household garbage. Societal wastes range from the refuse produced by every family to highly toxic industrial wastes from the production of specialized goods such as electronics, computers, cars, petrochemicals, and plastics. Virtually every aspect of our daily lives generates waste. Waste cannot be avoided. But what happens to all this waste? Some of it is recycled. During the past ten years there has been a growing realization that our globe is finite in its resources, and that the environment is under considerable stress and is being quietly but relentlessly despoiled. In response, streetside “blue box” and other recycling programs have sprouted. Approximately 20% of municipal waste in North America is currently being recycled: metal cans are going back to smelters, paper back to pulp mills, and glass and plastic to factories to be turned into new products. Recycling programs are still expanding, and it is anticipated that in the future as much as 50%, and perhaps even more, of all household and commercial waste will be recycled. Some of the waste is incinerated. When this is accompanied by generation of electricity or useful steam or heat, it can be viewed as a form of recycling—the conversion of waste to energy, a very useful product. It also helps preserve precious nonrenewable resources such as gas, oil, and coal. Many people, however, are concerned about the emissions that are released into the air and the ash that is produced. About 18% of municipal solid waste in the United States is currently being incinerated, with about 75% of the incinerators generating energy (EPA, 1994).