bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025 huggingface dataset:
Educating Deaf Students
Authors: Marschark Marc , Lang Harry G. , Albertini John A.
Published: November 2020

Over the past decade there has been a significant increase in interest from educators and the general public about deafness, special education, and the development of children with special needs. The education of deaf children in the United States has been seen as a remarkable success story around the world, even while it continues to engender domestic debate. In Educating Deaf Students: From Research to Practice, Marc Marschark, Harry G. Lang, and John A. Albertini set aside the politics, rhetoric, and confusion that often accompany discussions of deaf education. Instead they offer an accessible evaluation of the research literature on the needs and strengths of deaf children and on the methods that have been used-successfully and unsuccessfully-to teach both deaf and hearing children. The authors lay out the common assumptions that have driven deaf education for many years, revealing some of them to be based on questionable methods, conclusions, or interpretations, while others have been lost in the cacophony of alternative educational philosophies. They accompany their historical consideration of how this came to pass with an evaluation of the legal and social conditions surrounding deaf education today. By evaluating what we know, what we do not know, and what we thought we knew about learning among deaf children, the authors provide parents, teachers, and administrators valuable new insights into educating deaf students and others with special needs.
Teaching and the Curriculum
Authors: Marschark Marc , Lang Harry G. , Albertini John A.
Published: November 2020

We have discussed how the education of deaf children depends on their characteristics as well as on the characteristics of parents, teachers, and school programs that serve those children. We have summarized a variety of studies that have implications for parents, teachers, and educational administrators with regard to fostering communication skills, cognitive growth, and social interaction by deaf children. The available evidence supports the need for strong early intervention programs that provide the experiential diversity critical for development across the life span and for achievement in a variety of educational settings. Chapter 8 dealt with the specific educational challenges confronting deaf students in reading and writing. The message there was that English literacy needs to be considered broadly, as it affects both learning and success in a variety of areas, both academic and nonacademic. In chapter 8, we also discussed implications for curriculum materials and particular teaching emphases. Now, we turn to some best practices for teaching and curriculum development in content areas such as science, mathematics, and social studies and show how information in the previous chapters comes together in the dayto-day activities of students and teachers. As we have seen, available research findings indicate the need to exercise caution when deaf learners are placed in inclusive academic environments. Deaf students have specific needs that may not be met adequately if it is assumed that, aside from communication differences, deaf students and hearing students are the same. This is not a point to be raised only with regard to mainstream classrooms; it is a complex issue that needs to be addressed throughout the educational system. To set the stage for the remainder of this chapter, let us review some salient points which emerged from earlier chapters and were seen as key in understanding the teaching and learning of deaf students: • Deaf students have different experiences that may influence how they view and interact with the world. • A diversity of both object-oriented and person-oriented experiences is crucial to normal development. • Deaf students depend more on visual information, but they also may be more prone to distraction than hearing peers in the visual domain.
Flora and Vegetation
Authors: Young Kenneth R. , Berry Paul E.
Published: November 2020

South America’s shape, size, and geographic position, now and in the past, have acted to influence the development of diverse coverings of land surfaces with plants of different sizes, adaptations, and origins. Underlying geologic structures have been exposed to weathering regimes, thereby resulting in a multiplicity of landforms, soil types, and ecological zones. The most notable large-scale features are the Andes, which curl along the western margin of the continent, and the broad swath of the Amazon lowlands in the equatorial zone. However, there are also extensive, more ancient mountain systems in the Brazilian Shield of east-central Brazil and the Guiana Shield in northern South America. The interplay of environmental factors has given rise to a panoply of vegetation types, from coastal mangroves to interior swamplands, savannas, and other grasslands, deserts, shrublands, and a wide array of dry to moist and lowland to highland forest types. The narrower southern half of South America is also complex vegetationally because of the compression of more vegetation types into a smaller area and the diverse climatic regimes associated with subtropical and temperate middle latitudes. Alexander von Humboldt began to outline the major features of the physical geography of South America in his extensive writings that followed his travels in the early nineteenth century (von Humboldt, 1815–1832). For example, he first documented the profound influences of contemporary and historical geologic processes such as earthquakes and volcanoes, how vegetation in mountainous areas changes as elevation influences the distributions of plant species, and the effect of sea surface temperatures on atmospheric circulation and uplift and their impacts on precipitation and air temperatures (Botting, 1973; Faak and Biermann, 1986). His initial insights, in combination with modern observations (Hueck and Seibert, 1972; Cabrera and Willink, 1973; Davis et al., 1997; Lentz, 2000), still serve to frame our synthesis of the major vegetation formations of South America. In this chapter, we relate vegetation formations to spatial gradients of soil moisture and elevation in the context of broad climatic and topographic patterns.
The Mediterranean Environment of Central Chile
Authors: Armesto Juan J. , Arroyo Mary T. K.
Published: November 2020

The Mediterranean-type environment of South America, broadly defined as the continental area characterized by winter rainfall and summer drought, is confined to a narrow band about 1,000 km long on the western side of the Andes in north-central Chile (Arroyo et al., 1995, 1999). Although much has been written about the climate, vegetation, and landscapes of this part of Chile, and comparisons have been drawn with California and other Mediterranean-type regions of the world (Parsons, 1976; Mooney, 1977; Rundel, 1981; Arroyo et al., 1995), a modern synthesis of information on the physical setting, regional biota, and historical development of ecosystems in central Chile has not been attempted. This chapter is intended to provide such an integrated picture, emphasizing those aspects most peculiar to the region. Since the earlier floristic work on the Chilean matorral (e.g. Mooney, 1977), the name given to the vegetation of central Chile, there is now a much greater appreciation of the geographic isolation and high levels of biological diversity and endemism in this region of South America (Arroyo and Cavieres, 1997; Villagrán, 1995; Arroyo et al., 1995, 1999). Because of the great richness and singularity of its terrestrial flora, this area of the continent is considered to be one of the world’s 25 hotspots in which to conserve global biodiversity (Arroyo et al., 1999; Myers et al., 2000). An analysis of the main features of the Mediterranean environment in South America should therefore address the causes of such high floristic richness, the nature of current threats to biodiversity, and the prospects for its conservation in the long-term. A discussion of conservation concerns closes the present chapter (but see also: Arroyo and Cavieres, 1997; and Arroyo et al., 1999). In view of the vast literature on the biota and physical setting of central Chile, this chapter adopts a selective approach, from a biogeographic perspective, of what we consider to be the most remarkable historical, physical, and ecological features of this environment, which in turn may explain its extraordinary richness in plants and animals. Mediterranean-type ecosystems occupy a narrow band along the western margin of South America, from 30 to 36°S in central Chile.
The Grasslands and Steppes of Patagonia and the Río de la Plata Plains
Authors: Paruelo José María , Jobbágy Estebán G.
Published: November 2020

The Patagonian steppes and the Río de la Plata grasslands occupy a vast proportion of the plains, plateaus, and hills of southern South America, and are characterized by the almost absolute absence of trees. Prairies and steppes (grass and low shrubs) are the dominant physiognomic types, and forests are restricted to some riparian corridors. Savannas become important only in the ecotones of these regions, whereas meadows may be locally important under particular topographic or edaphic conditions. The Río de la Plata grasslands (RPG), one of the most important grassland regions in the world, extend between 28°S and 38°S latitude, covering about 700,000 km2 of eastern Argentina, Uruguay, and southern Brazil. The boundaries of these grasslands include the Atlantic coastline to the east, dry temperate forests to the south and west, and subtropical humid forests to the north. Woody vegetation within the region is restricted to small areas near water bodies, such as the gallery forests along the large Paraná and Uruguay rivers and their tributary streams. The Patagonian steppes occupy the southern tip of the continent from approximately 40°S, and are framed by the Andes to the west and the Atlantic coast to the east and south and cover more than 800,000 km2 of Chile and Argentina. Toward the west, the region displays a sharp ecotone with the subantarctic forests, whereas to the north it grades into a broad zone of Monte scrublands in central Argentina. The RPG and the Patagonian steppes are separated by a wide strip of woody vegetation, the Monte and Espinal phytogeographic units (see chapter 10; Cabrera and Willkins, 1973). In this chapter, we describe the heterogeneity and main characteristics of the dominant ecosystems of the Patagonian steppes and the RPG, focusing on environmental controls and human-induced changes. Although numerous criteria have been applied to describe the internal heterogeneity of both regions, we emphasize here the structural and functional attributes of vegetation as integrators of climate, physiography, and land use.
Historical Energy Development and Future Dilemmas
Authors: Crane Hewitt , Kinderman Edwin , Malhotra Ripudaman
Published: November 2020

This chapter reviews how our energy consumption grew to its present state. This growth was often a result of a fundamental change in lifestyle that itself was engendered by a shortage of one resource or another. To summarize in a few sentences the vast field of anthropology, for a long time we humans sustained ourselves as hunters and gatherers in central Africa. Our overall population was small, and we had few worldly possessions. We kept these possessions to a minimum, for they would have only encumbered our ability to move about to locate food. Faced with a shortage of game, some of us migrated to other parts of the world, and some discovered agriculture. Agriculture brought with it a complete change in the way we lived. We settled down in one place and raised our food through an increasing expenditure of energy. We also became more susceptible to diseases caused by our own waste, for unlike in the past we were now living in close proximity with the waste and the pathogens that flourished in it. Also, material possessions became valued, which meant an even greater use of energy to acquire them. In their landmark book, Limits to Growth, Meadows, Randers and Meadows have traced this history and also pointed out that time and again an inexorable desire for growth, coupled with an inability to sense the approaching limits of the required resources or to comprehend the ability of sinks to absorb the waste we produce, have led society to unsustainable situations. Our use of fossil fuels provides examples of both kinds of limits that Limits to Growth discusses. On the one hand, the increasing difficulty of obtaining oil and meeting the ever-increasing demand for it is a classic case of resource limitation. On the other hand, the potential climate change caused by accumulating greenhouse gases (GHGs) in the atmosphere represents the limited ability of Earth as a sink. We have experienced limits of sustainability before, and it is instructive to learn from that history of driving forces that allowed us to transition from one fuel to another.
Our Energy Income: Geothermal, Hydropower, Wind, Solar, and Biomass
Authors: Crane Hewitt , Kinderman Edwin , Malhotra Ripudaman
Published: November 2020

We briefly discuss our income resources, or renewables, as they are often referred to, in chapters 1 and 3. These resources differ from our inherited resources in that they can potentially last for as long as civilization exists and beyond. We would be better off if we could live off our income, instead of relying on our inheritance that will some day be exhausted. While historically we survived on income resources for many millennia, those sources cannot support our current lifestyle, and they contribute only a very small portion to our total annual energy budget. Given the overall desirability of switching to income sources, in this chapter we review the status of different technologies for using them and what it would take for each one to become a substantial contributor. As we shall see, none of these technologies is currently economic, and they are not free from being potentially damaging to the environment when grown to the required scale. Income resources can offer a path toward sustainability if we are able to engineer the systems correctly without creating other problems along the way. With that in mind, we begin by enumerating our principal energy income resources: . . . Radiant energy from the sun, which also drives the wind and the water cycle, and provides the energy for plants to grow Heat energy from Earth Tidal energy derived from the moon’s gravitational attraction Wave and ocean-current energy . . . The radiant energy derived from the sun is by far the largest contributor (see chapter 3, box titled “Total Solar Flux”). It comes from a series of solar reactions that result in the fusion of hydrogen into helium. The sun’s radiant energy directly or indirectly spawns biomass, photovoltaic electricity, solar-thermal, and wind energy. It also results in derivative energy sources such as wave energy (from wind), ocean-current energy, and hydropower. In chapter 3 we briefly introduced these income resources and noted that the amount of solar radiation reaching the surface of Earth is around 23,000 CMO/yr.
Is Brain Stimulation an Alternative to ECT?
Authors: Fink MD Max
Published: November 2020

Interest in electricity in medicine, especially in psychiatric conditions, is as old as our knowledge of electricity as a controllable phenomenon. At the end of the eighteenth and the beginning of the nineteenth centuries, Benjamin Franklin and Anton Mesmer were among many students who used electric currents to stimulate paralyzed limbs and to relieve hysterical states. Giovanni Aldini, the nephew of Luigi Galvani, a principal early student of electricity, applied electric currents to mentally ill patients. In the original Aldini publication, the figures show one electrode applied to the top of the head and a second to the hand. The text states that the electrodes were connected to earrings. Much of Aldini’s work was done on fresh cadavers to show that electricity stimulated motor movements. There is no evidence that he produced seizures for therapeutic purposes. From the onset of the introduction of ECT, the importance of the grand mal seizure to the treatment has been questioned. Many people followed popular science beliefs in the potency of electricity alone and administered low-energy electric currents without inducing a seizure. When scientists compared sham treatments to real ECT in seeking benefits for patients, they found the sham currents to be ineffective. Low-energy electric currents delivered from a battery with electrodes on the scalp to either alert or sleeping subjects (electrosleep) were without benefit. Some applications of electricity in medicine have been truly innovative. At the end of every grand mal seizure, brain waves (measured by the EEG) flatten out, with markedly reduced rhythmic activity. Such activity can be simulated by anesthesia using a chemical called isoflurane. Isoelectric narcotherapy (isoflurane anesthesia therapy) is a brain-stimulation technique that seeks to induce long periods of electro-cerebral silence or markedly decreased electrical activity in the brain. An hour of isoelectric brain electrical activity under anesthesia was once thought to relieve depression in a fashion similar to ECT, but an attempt at replication in six subjects failed. Without independent confirmation, the technique has been abandoned. In the past two decades, three physical interventions have been enthusiastically promoted as replacements for ECT, that is, as ways to induce the same benefits without seizures.
Is ECT Practice Ethical?
Authors: Fink MD Max
Published: November 2020

Electroconvulsive therapy is widely considered a controversial treatment in psychiatry. Many cite it as the most controversial treatment in medicine. It is not its efficacy that is controversial, however; as we’ve seen, it offers effective relief for severe psychiatric illnesses even when other interventions have failed. Nor is the controversy about the immediate risks of the treatment, for the risks and death rates are extremely low—almost certainly lower than the risks acknowledged for the psychoactive agents that are the core of modern pharmacotherapy. No systemic illness or medical condition limits its use. The controversy is based on the belief that inducing seizures by electricity permanently damages the brain, causing such severe losses of personal memory that the patient is no longer recognizable as the person known before. This belief is unfounded, and any effects on memory and cognition have been shown to be limited to the time during and directly before treatment. The roots of the controversial image are many, not the least of which is the unfortunate conflation of ECT with lobotomy and insulin coma. The poor portrayal of the treatments by the media inflames viewers’ perception. Conflicts between believers in the biological basis of mental illness and those with the psychological interests of psychoanalysis and clinical psychology roiled psychiatry throughout the twentieth century. As a result, governmental regulations for ECT, especially those limiting its use in children and adolescents, and requirements for written consent (in some venues for each treatment), have restricted its use. Ethical guidelines for the relationship between physician and patient have a long history, the Hippocratic Oath developed by the ancient Greeks being the most widely acknowledged guide. The shameful evidence of medical experimentation on unwilling prisoners by physicians in Germany and the Soviet Union during the Second World War incited a worldwide reassessment of the patient-doctor relationship. Until the 1970s, no limitation on experimental intervention with psychiatric patients was envisioned. Treatments without a scientific basis were lauded and then discredited when the adverse consequences were shown to be greater than the benefits. Treatments were applied in institutions where the patients had an utterly dependent role, and assigned treatments were mandated at the discretion of the institution director.
Writing the Conference Abstract and Title
Authors: Robinson Marin S , Stoller Fredricka L , Constanza-Robinson Molly , Jones James K
Published: November 2020

This chapter focuses on writing a conference abstract, not to be confused with a journal article abstract, which was addressed in chapter 7. A conference abstract is submitted in response to a Call for Abstracts issued by conference organizers, typically 3–6 months before the conference takes place. The abstract is reviewed and, if accepted, allows the authors to present a contributed paper (as either an oral or poster presentation) at a conference session. Only accepted papers may be presented at a conference; whether they are oral or poster presentations is a decision usually made by conference organizers. By the end of this chapter, you will be able to do the following: ■ Describe the major purposes of the conference abstract ■ Recognize a typical organizational structure for the conference abstract ■ Identify common writing conventions in the conference abstract ■ Write a concise and informative conference abstract with title and author list The Writing on Your Own tasks throughout the chapter will guide you as you do the following: 8A Prepare to write 8B Decide on an organizational structure 8C Draft your conference abstract and title 8D Fine-tune your conference abstract and title Writing a conference abstract is often the first professional genre that novice writers tackle on their own, with little, if any, guidance from their research mentors. This chapter is intended to prepare you for the task by focusing on the text of the abstract. (If your abstract is accepted and results in a poster presentation, see chapters 9 and 10 for guidance in preparing the poster.) Like the journal article abstract, most conference abstracts have strict word limitations (typically between 150 and 200 words). Adherence to this limit is expected; your abstract will likely be rejected if the limit is exceeded. Many other formatting specifications must also be followed. For example, most instructions include rules for formatting your title, author list, graphics, and special characters (e.g., μm, a, £, m3). The reason for such specificity is that your abstract, if accepted, will be printed (as is) in conference proceedings. Adherence to these guidelines by all authors ensures that the proceedings appear uniform and professional.
Designing the Poster
Authors: Robinson Marin S , Stoller Fredricka L , Constanza-Robinson Molly , Jones James K
Published: November 2020

The purpose of this chapter is to help you design a poster that is visually appealing. Specific attention is paid to poster layout, font, and color. These design elements are illustrated with posters that we have created using the text introduced in chapter 9. Of course, what makes a poster attractive is (at least in part) a matter of taste, and many new design features will likely gain (and lose) popularity in the next decade. We cannot anticipate these changes; hence, we focus on a few basic principles of poster design that are likely to hold true over time. The guiding principle is to present your science in a way that is clear, crisp, and uncluttered. By the end of this chapter, you will be able to do the following: ■ Select the most appropriate layout for your poster ■ Select the font and font attributes for your poster ■ Select the color scheme for your poster The Designing on Your Own activities throughout the chapter will guide you in preparing your poster as you do the following: 10A Select a poster layout 10B Choose a font and font size 10C Add color and artwork 10D Finalize your poster Although the focus of this chapter is on visual appeal, a good-looking poster is not a substitute for good science. Viewers visit your poster to learn about your science, not the latest trends in graphic design. Therefore, conservative, but effective, use of design elements is preferred over flashy, distracting design. Commonly used graphic design elements, such as photos, backgrounds, shadowing of text, and “artsy” fonts can dramatically enhance the appeal and clarity of a poster, but if used carelessly, they can turn the poster into a scattered and confusing mess. The goal is to use your sense of aesthetics for color and your creative energies to communicate your science and to make the poster inviting, accessible, and memorable for your audience. Not long ago, a “poster” consisted of 8–12 sheets of paper cut and pasted onto individual pieces of colored construction paper.
Overview of the Research Proposal
Authors: Robinson Marin S , Stoller Fredricka L , Constanza-Robinson Molly , Jones James K
Published: November 2020

In this module, we focus on writing a research proposal, a document written to request financial support for an ongoing or newly conceived research project. Like the journal article (module 1), the proposal is one of the most important and most utilized writing genres in chemistry. Chemists employed in a wide range of disciplines including teaching (high school through university), research and technology, the health professions, and industry all face the challenge of writing proposals to support and sustain their scholarly activities. Before we begin, we remind you that there are many different ways to write a successful proposal—far too many to include in this textbook. Our goal is not to illustrate all the various approaches, but rather to focus on a few basic writing skills that are common to many successful proposals. These basics will get you started, and with practice, you can adapt them to suit your individual needs. After reading this chapter, you should be able to do the following: ■ Describe different types of funding and funding agencies ■ Explain the purpose of a Request for Proposals (RFP) ■ Understand the importance of addressing need, intellectual merit, and broader impacts in a research proposal ■ Identify the major sections of a research proposal ■ Identify the main sections of the Project Description Toward the end of the chapter, as part of the Writing on Your Own task, you will identify a topic for the research proposal that you will write as you work through this module. Consistent with the read-analyze-write approach to writing used throughout this textbook, this chapter begins with an excerpt from a research proposal for you to read and analyze. Excerpt 11A is taken from a proposal that competed successfully for a graduate fellowship offered by the Division of Analytical Chemistry of the American Chemical Society (ACS). As is true for nearly all successful proposals, the principal investigator (PI) wrote this proposal in response to a set of instructions. We have included the instructions with the excerpt so that you can see for yourself how closely she followed the proposal guidelines.
The Narcissism of Minor Differences
Authors: Baldwin Peter
Published: November 2020

There is much heated rhetoric about the widening gulf between Europe and America. But are the US and Europe so different? Peter Baldwin, one of the world's leading historians of comparative social policy, thinks not, and in this bracingly argued but remarkably informed polemic, he lays out how similar the two continents really are. Drawing on the latest evidence from sources such as the United Nations, the World Bank, IMF, and other international organizations, Baldwin offers a fascinating comparison of the United States and Europe, looking at the latest statistics on the economy, crime, health care, education and culture, religion, the environment, and much more. It is a book filled with surprising revelations. For most categories of crime, for instance, America is safe and peaceful by European standards. But the biggest surprise is that, though there are many differences between America and Europe, in almost all cases, these differences are no greater than the differences among European nations. Europe and the US are, in fact, part of a common, big-tent grouping. America is not Sweden, for sure. But nor is Italy Sweden, nor France, nor even Germany. And who says that Sweden is Europe? Anymore than Vermont is America? "Meticulous, insistent, and elegant." --John Lloyd, Financial Times "A must-read...filled with intriguing facts that add nuance to what can often be a black-and-white debate." --Foreign Affairs "An exhaustive and enthralling catalogue of our commonalities that begs a reconsideration of just what it means to be European or American." --Publishers Weekly
Precipitation
Authors: Harrison Roger G. , Todd Paul W. , Rudge Scott R. , Petrides Demetri P.
Published: November 2020

Precipitation, which is the process of coming out of solution as a solid, is an important method in the purification of proteins that usually comes early in the purification process. Precipitation is frequently used in the commercial separation of proteins. The primary advantages of precipitation are that it is relatively inexpensive, can be carried out with simple equipment, can be done continuously, and leads to a form of the protein that is often stable in long-term storage. Since precipitation is quite tolerant of various impurities, including nucleic acids and lipids, it is used early in many bioseparation processes. The goal of precipitation is often concentration to reduce volume, although significant purification can sometimes be achieved. For example, all the protein in a stream might be precipitated and redissolved in a smaller volume, or a fractional precipitation might be carried out to precipitate the protein of interest and leave many of the contaminating proteins in the mother liquor. In this chapter the focus is first upon protein solubility, which is the basis of separations by precipitation. Then we discuss the basic concepts of particle formation and breakage and the distribution of precipitate particle sizes. The specific methods that can be used to precipitate proteins are treated next. The chapter concludes with methodology to use for the design of precipitation systems. After completing this chapter, the reader should be able to do the following: • Explain the various factors that influence protein solubility. • Use the Cohn equation to predict solution equilibria (precipitation recoveries). • Identify the distinct steps in the development of a precipitate. • Calculate mixing times in an agitated precipitator, the kinetics of diffusion-limited growth of particles, and the kinetics of particle-particle aggregation. • Perform particle balances as a function of particle size in a continuous-flow stirred tank reactor (CSTR). • Explain the methods used to cause precipitation. • Outline the advantages and disadvantages of the three basic types of precipitation reactor: the batch reactor, the CSTR, and the tubular reactor. • Implement simple scaling rules for a precipitation reactor.
Drying
Authors: Harrison Roger G. , Todd Paul W. , Rudge Scott R. , Petrides Demetri P.
Published: November 2020

The last step in the separation process for a biological product is usually drying, which is the process of thermally removing volatile substances (often water) to yield a solid. In the step preceding drying, the desired product is generally in an aqueous solution and at the desired final level of purity. The most common reason for drying a biological product is that it is susceptible to chemical (e.g., deamidation or oxidation) and/or physical (e.g., aggregation and precipitation) degradation during storage in a liquid formulation. Another common reason for drying is for convenience in the final use of the product. For example, it is often desirable that pharmaceutical drugs be in tablet form. Additionally, drying may be necessary to remove undesirable volatile substances. Also, although many bioproducts are stable when frozen, it is more economical and convenient to store them in dry form rather than frozen. Drying is now an established unit operation in the process industries. However, because most biological products are thermally labile, only those drying processes that minimize or eliminate thermal product degradation are actually used to dry biological products. This chapter focuses on the types of dryer that have generally found the greatest use in the drying of biological products: vacuum-shelf dryers, batch vacuum rotary dryers, freeze dryers, and spray dryers [1]. The principles discussed, however, will apply to other types of dryers as well. We begin with the fundamental principles of drying, followed by a description of the types of dryer most used for biological products. Then we present scale-up and design methods for these dryers. After completing this chapter, the reader should be able to do the following: • Do drying calculations involving relative humidity using the psychrometric moisture chart and the equilibrium moisture curve for the material being dried. • Calculate the relative amounts of bound and unbound water in wet solids before drying. • Model heat transfer in conductive drying and calculate conductive drying times. • Interpret drying rate curves. • Calculate convective drying times of nonporous solids based on mass transfer.
Cursed by Nature? The Politics of Natural Assets
Authors: Collier Paul
Published: November 2020

Are natural assets a curse? In The Bottom Billion I argued why I thought they often did more harm than good to the poorest countries. But the real measure is not just the damage they cause, but their harm relative to their potential. Natural resources are the largest assets available to these societies. Their known natural capital has been estimated to be worth double their produced capital. The failure to harness natural capital is the single-most important missed opportunity in economic development. Since writing The Bottom Billion I have accumulated more research on the subject, as have many others. Indeed, whether an abundance of natural assets is a blessing or a curse is currently one of the disputes raging among economists. There are some high-visibility instances of natural assets appearing to ruin a country: Sierra Leone’s diamonds, for example, seemed to shred the fabric of that society to pieces; Nigeria’s oil fueled the corruption of the political class. But are these just outliers? After all, Botswana harnessed its diamonds to produce the fastest growing economy in the world, and Norway used its oil to achieve the world’s highest living standard. The question becomes whether there really is a “resource curse,” and whether, if it does exist, it is limited to countries with deeper problems. I have come to regard this as the most crucial issue in the struggle to transform the poorest societies. The revenues that they could get from natural assets are enormous, dwarfing any conceivable flows of aid. They could certainly be transformative. If they deliver, any efforts to inhibit the extraction of natural assets from the poorest countries are not simply counterproductive but irresponsible, impeding the path out of poverty. If, on the other hand, natural assets backfire, then there is an argument for leaving them in the ground. There would indeed be the basis for an alliance between the environmental lobby, pressing for natural assets to be conserved, and the development lobby, fighting to end mass poverty.
Capturing Natural Assets
Authors: Collier Paul
Published: November 2020

Once natural assets have been discovered comes the second link in the decision chain: how their value should be captured by society. “Captured by society” means that the value of natural assets should accrue as revenue to government, the representative of society. In the bottom billion there is often a gulf between what should happen and what actually does happen. The value of natural assets is captured, but not always by government. Sometimes we find plunder in its crudest form, as for example when a corrupt minister strikes a deal with a shady resource-extraction company. The minister gets handsomely rewarded and deposits his share of the profits in a foreign bank account. The company makes a fortune, which benefits its shareholders, none of whom are citizens of the country from which the natural assets have been removed. Underlying stories such as this are two distinct problems. The most obvious is corruption, just as at the prospecting stage. The interests of the country and its citizens are necessarily represented by its government, and indeed, not by its entire government but by a handful of people: perhaps the president, the minister of mines, and a couple of high officials. The resource-extraction company bribes these representatives, inducing them to ignore their professional responsibilities in favor of their personal interests. Bribes are, of course, never termed “bribes”; they are “facilitation payments,” often made by the resource-extraction company to local companies for unspecified services and whose beneficial ownership is opaque. There are two defenses against corruption: transparency and an effective legal system. Because governments are one of the parties to corruption, they are often reluctant to permit transparency and generate criminal investigations. Fortunately, however, each of them can be reinforced internationally. The Publish What You Pay campaign pressures resource-extraction companies into releasing information on the payments that they are making to governments. The idea is that once these payments become public knowledge it is much more difficult for corrupt officials and politicians to siphon off the money. Citizens match the money paid by companies to income entered on the official rolls.
Nature and Hunger
Authors: Collier Paul
Published: November 2020

So far this book has been a plea that nature can be entrusted to the values of ordinary citizens. But my confidence is conditional upon people taking the trouble to be reasonably well informed about the scientific and economic issues involved. The natural assets of the bottom billion will continue to be plundered unless a critical mass of ordinary citizens realizes the importance of getting the key decisions right: the chain of decisions set out in part II. Carbon will continue to accumulate as a natural liability unless an equivalent critical mass is built, country by country. Informed societies are feasible, but they are not inevitable. Our relationship to nature brings into play powerful emotions and ordinary people can sometimes be misled into beliefs that may seem comforting but ultimately are destructive. Between 2005 and 2008 the world price of basic foods jumped by over 80 percent. In the slums of the poorest countries the children of the poor went hungry; had the price spike persisted they would have suffered stunting. This adverse shock had its origins in muddled popular beliefs about nature that have become increasingly common in the rich societies. In this chapter I am going to show how three such misconceptions exposed some of the world’s poorest children to hunger. In the poorest societies the rise in food prices was a major political event. To the typical household in these societies food is the equivalent of energy in America: if the price rockets people expect their government to do something. There were riots in some thirty countries; in Haiti they brought down the government. The increase in prices proved to be temporary; the global economic crisis was an effective though catastrophic remedy. But we cannot rely upon economic crises to come to the rescue. We need to understand why it happened and what can be done to prevent its recurrence. The immediate policy responses to the food crisis were dysfunctional even by the dismal standards of most international responses. They included beggar-thy-neighbor, pressure for yet larger farm subsidies, and a retreat into romanticism. Neighbors were beggared by the imposition of export restrictions by the governments of food-exporting countries.
Quantitative Mineral Resource Assessments
Authors: Singer Donald , Menzie W. David
Published: November 2020

Policy makers, mineral exploration experts, and regional planners decide how public lands, which may contain undiscovered resources, should be used or whether to invest in exploration for minerals on a regular basis. Decisions are also made concerning mineral resource adequacy, national policy, and regional development. This book makes explicit the factors that can affect a mineral-related decision so that decision-makers can clearly see the possible consequences of their decisions. Based on work done at the US Geological Survey, the authors address the question of the kinds of issues decision-makers are trying to resolve and what forms of information would aid in resolving these issues. The goal of the process discussed is to offer unbiased quantitative assessments in a format needed in decision-support systems so that consequences of alternative courses of action can be examined with respect to land use or mineral-resource development. An integrated approach focuses on three assessment parts and the models that support them. Although the concepts presented are straightforward and understandable, in assessments, carefully listening to the experts in other disciplines leads to better products. Navigating through and making sense of QRA requires not just learning rules and equations, but life experiences and common sense. The judgment required to understand which tools to apply are best learned by example and experience. This will be useful to governmental or industrial policy makers, managers of explorations, planners of regional development, and similar decision-makers.
Estimating the Number of Undiscovered Deposits
Authors: Singer Donald , Menzie W. David
Published: November 2020

The third part of three-part assessments is the estimate of some fixed but unknown number of deposits of each type that exist in the delineated tracts. Until the area being considered is thoroughly and extensively drilled, this fixed number of undiscovered deposits, which could be any number including 0, will not be known with certainty. This number of deposits has meaning only in terms of a grade-and-tonnage model. If this requirement did not exist, any wisp of minerals could be considered worthy of estimation, and even in small regions, we would need to estimate millions of “deposits.” For example, it is not difficult to imagine tens of thousands of fist-sized skarn copper “deposits” in parts of western United States—even in this example, we have used “deposit” size to provide important information. In another example, Wilson et al. (1996) estimated five or more epithermal gold vein deposits at the 90 percent level but provided no grade-and-tonnage model, so these estimated deposits could be any size. To provide critical information to decision-makers, the grade-and-tonnage model is key, and the estimated number of deposits that might exist must be from the grade-and-tonnage frequency distributions. In three-part assessments, the parts and estimates are internally consistent in that delineated tracts are consistent with descriptive models, grade-and-tonnage models are consistent with descriptive models and with known deposits in the area, and estimates of number of deposits are consistent with grade-and-tonnage models. Considerable care must be exercised in quantitative resource assessments to prevent the introduction of biased estimates of undiscovered resources. Biases can be introduced into these estimates either by a flawed grade-and-tonnage model or by the lack of consistency of the grade-and-tonnage model with the number-of-deposit estimates. For this reason, consistency of estimates of number of deposits with the grade-and-tonnage models is the most important guideline. Issues about consistency of mineral deposit models are discussed in chapters 3 through 6. Grade-and-tonnage models (chapter 6), which are the first part of three-part assessments, are of particular concern. In this chapter, the focus is on making unbiased estimates of the number of undiscovered deposits.
Subsistence Emissions and Luxury Emissions
Authors: Shue Henry
Published: November 2020

The United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change adopted in Rio de Janeiro at the United Nations Conference on Environment and Development (UNCED) in June 1992 establishes no dates and no dollars. No dates are specified by which emissions are to be reduced by the wealthy states, and no dollars are specified with which the wealthy states will assist the poor states to avoid an environmentally dirty development like our own. The convention is toothless because throughout the negotiations in the Intergovernmental Negotiating Committee during 1991 to 1992, the United States played the role of dentist: whenever virtually all the other states in the world (with the notable exceptions of Saudi Arabia and Kuwait) agreed to convention language with teeth, the United States insisted that the teeth be pulled out. The Clinton administration now faces a strategic question: should the next step aim at a comprehensive treaty covering all greenhouse gases (GHGs) or at a narrower protocol covering only one, or a few, gases, for example, only fossil-fuel carbon dioxide (CO2)? Richard Stewart and Jonathan Wiener (1992) have argued for moving directly to a comprehensive treaty, while Thomas Drennen (1993) has argued for a more focused beginning. I will suggest that Drennen is essentially correct that we should not try to go straight to a comprehensive treaty, at least not of the kind advocated by Stewart and Wiener. First I would like to develop a framework into which to set issues of equity or justice of the kind introduced by Drennen. It would be easier if we faced only one question about justice, but several questions are not only unavoidable individually but are entangled with one another. In addition, each question can be given not simply alternative answers but answers of different kinds. In spite of this multiplicity of possible answers to the multiplicity of inevitable and interconnected questions, I think we can lay out the issues fairly clearly and establish that commonsense principles converge to a remarkable extent upon what ought to be done, at least for the next decade or so.
Selling Environmental Indulgences
Authors: Goodin Robert E.
Published: November 2020

According to a common and currently influential diagnosis, the environmental crisis has essentially economic roots. The problem is not just that there are too many people, or even that they are on average enjoying too high a standard of living. All that is true, too, of course. More fundamentally, however, problems of environmental despoliation are said to derive from skewed incentives facing agents as they pursue their various goals. For some things, people must pay full price. For others, they pay only partially or indirectly or belatedly. To an economist, it goes without saying that the lower the costs, the more people will consume of any particular commodity. Where some of the costs of their activities will be borne by others, agents looking only to their own balance sheets will overengage in those activities. Because some of the costs are “external” (which is to say, are borne by others, rather than themselves), agents will undertake more of those activities than they would have done had they been forced to pay their full costs. They will do more of them than is socially optimal, taking due account of costs and benefits to everyone concerned (Pigou 1932). Environmental despoliation poses problems of economic externalities of just that sort. Environmental inputs are typically “common property resources.” Clean air and water, fisheries, the ozone layer, the climate are everyone’s business—and no one’s. No one “owns” those things. There is no one with standing to sue you if you take them without paying; nor is there anyone you could pay for permission to impinge on them, even if you wanted to do so. That fact inevitably gives rise to a divergence between the full social costs created by your actions and the portion of those costs sheeted back to you as private costs, to be entered on your own ledger. It is, of course, only the latter sorts of costs to which economically rational agents can be expected to respond (Freeman et al. 1973; Fisher 1981; Pearce et al. 1989, esp. p. 5).