bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025_split huggingface dataset:
Increase in prices of farmland in the Czech Republic
Authors: Severová Lucie , Svoboda Roman , Kopecká Lenka 
Published: April 2017

Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to express the development of market price of farmland in the CR and to describe causes and effects of these changes in the price on the ownership of land in the country.

Design/methodology/approach
Primarily, description methods (especially for describing the creation of investment farmland funds) and a comparative analysis (in the case of an indicator of the farmland prices in the Czech Republic) were used in this paper.

Findings
The findings show that the situation in the Czech agricultural sector has improved particularly due to increasing subsidies; non-agricultural subjects are showing increased interest and banks are changing their approach to granting loans for the purchase of farmland. The market price of farmland in the Czech Republic has been rising; in 2015, it exceeded CZK162,500 per hectare on average. However, it is still low compared to the old EU member states.

Practical implications
Practical implication of the paper consists in comparing market prices of farmland with prices at which state sold farmland through PRGLF. Plot owners are often approached about the sale or lease of farmland. However, there are many speculators among those interested in buying, who often focus on those owners who have no idea regarding the value of their plots.

Originality/value
In the paper, the model of farmland prices was newly used and applied to real data in the Czech Republic from 2004 to 2015. Moreover, current data on investments to farmland were acquired, and an analysis which could be useful for foreign investors was elaborated.
Maintenance programmes for flat roofs in existing buildings
Authors: Morgado João , Flores-Colen Inês , de Brito Jorge , Silva Ana 
Published: April 2017

Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to propose a maintenance programme for flat roofs in existing buildings, based on the inspection of 26 buildings in-service conditions, located in the Lisbon region, in Portugal. A proactive maintenance of flat roofs in existing buildings allows reducing their pathology, thus improving their performance and service life.

Design/methodology/approach
The maintenance plan was established based on the degradation state of the maintenance source elements (MSEs) analysed, the aggressiveness of the surrounding environment and the age of the roofs and maintenance actions carried out during the roofing systems’ life cycle.

Findings
The maintenance plan proposed in this study includes the prioritization of the interventions, the definition of the required maintenance operations and the definition of the frequency of the intervention, considering the service lives of the MSEs.

Research limitations/implications
The study addresses only roofs located in the Lisbon area. Even though a relatively large sample of 26 roofs was used, the findings and conclusions can clearly be extrapolated for a much wider scope.

Practical implications
The maintenance plan proposed in this study considers a planning of proactive maintenance operations to continuously and effectively monitor all the relevant MSE.

Originality/value
This plan allows minimizing the incidence and spread of defects, thus enabling the optimization of resources, reducing the costs of the entire maintenance system and improving the quality of the built environment.
Green synthesis and spectroscopic studies of some complexes compounds as pigments and their applications in paints
Authors: Wahba Osama A.G. , Hassan Ali M. , Naser Abdelrahman M. , Hanafi Adel M.G. 
Published: April 2017

Purpose
The purpose of this study to investigate the synthesis of new Cr(III), Fe(III), Ni(II) and Cu(II) Schiff base complexes by a simple technique (microwave technique). The evaluation of the prepared complexes as pigments as corrosion resistant was also explored.

Design/methodology/approach
The Schiff base complexes were prepared by using microwave method (green chemistry), and then, the physico-chemical requirements according to standards for the synthesised pigments were investigate.

Findings
The prepared complexes exhibit good physical, mechanical and corrosion properties as pigments in paint formulations.

Research limitations/implications
The simple technique used for synthesis of metal complex pigments will significantly increase the cost saving for the manufacturing of such pigments category. Also, the used technique is considered a green method (eco-friendly), as there no organic solvent was used.

Practical implications
The evaluation of the prepared complex pigments as corrosion resistants was also studied.

Originality/value
It is a simple technique, green synthesis (no solvent used) is involved and high yield is obtained.
Toughening polypropylene by tiny amounts of fillers
Authors: Wang Baolong , Ma Haiqing , Wu Di , Zhu Lien , Jin Zheng 
Published: April 2017

Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to prepare new modified polypropylene (PP) with phenolic microspheres (PFMs). Furthermore, the crystallinity and mechanical properties of PP modified by fillers (silicon dioxide [SiO2] and light calcium carbonate [CaCO3], respectively) have also been investigated and compared.

Design/methodology/approach
For effective toughening, three different fillers were added into the PP matrix. PP composites were prepared through melt blending with double-screw extruder and injection moulding machine.

Findings
It was found that with the addition of 3 Wt.% PFM, the impact strength was maximum in all PP composites and increased by 1.4 times compared to pure PP. Scanning electron microscopy (SEM) and polarised optical microscopy (POM) analysis confirmed that 3 Wt.% PFM, 3 Wt.% SiO2 and 2 Wt.% CaCO3 were optimal to add in PP and PFM to give the best compatibility with PP.

Research limitations/implications
PFM particles not only are tougher and less brittle and can offer other advantages such as enhanced machinability, but also are important organic materials and have a good compatibility with polymer for reinforcing polymer properties.

Practical implications
The method developed provided a simple and practical solution to improving the toughness of PP.

Social implications
There will be thermoplastic plastics with higher toughness in domestic, packaging and automotive applications, particularly at lower temperatures.

Originality/value
The PP modified by tiny amounts of fillers in this work had high toughness, which can be applied as an efficient material widely used in domestic, packaging and automotive applications.
An investigation of the antecedents of turnover intentions and job hopping behavior
Authors: Saleem Sharjeel , Qamar Beenish 
Published: April 2017

PurposeIt is believed that dissatisfied employees are more likely to leave, but research shows that satisfied employees also do not necessarily stay. It is important to understand why employees leave. Therefore, the purpose of this paper is to investigate empirically the antecedents of turnover intention and job hopping, simultaneously, in Pakistani universities. It investigates the impact of perceived alternative employment, job satisfaction and job involvement on turnover intention and job hopping behavior, with organizational commitment as a mediator.Design/methodology/approachThe variables were measured through established questionnaires and the results were analyzed through structural equation modeling on a sample of 250 faculty members from both public and private universities.FindingsResults revealed that faculty members do not intend to leave or hop jobs if they are satisfied with their jobs and this relationship is mediated by organizational commitment. Perceived alternative employment also showed a positive relationship with employees’ intentions to quit; while faculty members would job hop, if not satisfied, despite lacking substantial alternative employment opportunities.Practical implicationsResearch reveals that employee retention, even in developing countries, is not just about money. Rather, the satisfaction that a person gets from his/her job or the environment in which the employee works serves as a significant antecedent of employee retention. Thus, accordingly some well-planned perks and rewards can serve as a source of extrinsic as well as intrinsic motivators.Originality/valueThis study has investigated the impact of job satisfaction, job involvement, perceived alternative employment, organizational commitment, turnover intention and job hopping along with the dimensions of job satisfaction and organizational commitment in a simultaneous manner through structural equation modeling. It will correspondingly add worth to the discussion in the literature about reasons of employee turnover and job hopping behavior within the specific context of Pakistani universities because there are no official statistics available regarding the number of faculty members leaving or job hopping among various universities. In addition, not much work has been done in this regard, therefore, it shall also provide the basis for future research studies.
Who benefits from benefits?
Authors: Fisher John Gerard 
Published: April 2017

Purpose
This paper aims to review the role of benefits within the employee engagement mix of activities and products and provide three areas for strategic improvement.

Design/methodology/approach
The paper examines surveys and some well-known models for the inclusion of benefits in employee remuneration and draws on any insights that study uncovers.

Findings
The findings are that employee benefits should be critically appraised on an annual basis, not simply added to because they seem popular or are “in the news”.

Research limitations/implications
No specific research was undertaken, as this was a viewpoint of current commercial practice.

Practical implications
Employers should recognize that spend-to-get benefits require participants to spend their own money and therefore represent a cost to employees rather than a benefit. Employers need to research benefits take-up and participant opinions if the value of introducing them is to be fully realized. Communicating the features of benefits is usually poorly done by internal HR teams.

Social implications
Better scrutiny of the benefits basket and a closer eye on their effectiveness are required.

Originality/value
This is a considered view taken from the experience of running a number of commercial engagement programmes in the past 12 months with a view to helping practitioners avoid costly mistakes in future.
Employee experience: the new human resource management approach
Authors: Plaskoff Josh 
Published: April 2017

Purpose
Organizations must reframe their approach to how they relate to their employees. The new multi-generational workplace demands a new way of thinking about human resource management. Putting the employee’s total experience at the center produces a very different approach, beyond increasing perks or “funifying” the workplace, to engaging the employee in the workplace. The purpose of this study is to reframe the traditional approach to human resource management that better fits that modern workplace and enables the empowerment and engagement that organizations so desperately seek.

Design/methodology/approach
Design thinking is applied to employee experience in an organization. By viewing employee experience as a set of holistic perceptions of that relationship, human resource management transforms into a more strategic process for engaging the employee through meaning and providing value. Six principles for employing this methodology are specified in this paper.

Findings
Perks are not the answer to employee engagement. An organization must understand each employee more deeply and co-design experiences with them that demonstrate care. It must embrace expansive and holistic thinking, face the intangible aspects of organizational life and use tools to help make them tangible, experiment and iterate, building solutions organically, while recognizing that the process is just as important, if not more important, than the product.

Originality/value
Organizations recognize a need for change and struggle with engaging employees. Most modern approaches to engagement and retention foundationally stem from old ways of thinking that will not work in today’s workplace. Design thinking has been applied successfully for customer experience and user experience; it is just beginning to be recognized as an approach for employee experience.
Predicting peatland carbon fluxes from non‐destructive plant traits
Authors: Goud Ellie M. , Moore Tim R. , Roulet Nigel T. 
Published: April 2017

Summary

Determining the plant traits that best predict carbon (C) storage is increasingly important as global change drivers will affect plant species composition and ecosystem C cycling. Despite the critical role of peatlands in the global C cycle, trait–flux relationships in peatlands are relatively unknown.

We assessed the ability of four non‐destructive plant traits to predict carbon dioxide (CO2) and methane (CH4) fluxes over two growing seasons in a temperate peatland in Ontario, Canada. We examined relationships between C‐fluxes and leaf area, leaf persistence (deciduous, evergreen), growth form (woody, herbaceous) and aerenchyma tissue. To explore potential inconsistencies between different scales of data aggregation, traits were analysed at the level of plots, species and microsites.

CO2 fluxes showed a positive relationship with leaf area and leaf persistence, and a negative relationship with proportion of woody species. CH4 fluxes showed a positive relationship with aerenchyma and leaf area. The significance of trait–flux relationships differed based on whether data were averaged at the level of plot, species or microsite.

We recommend applying leaf area as a non‐destructive trait to other systems where it is not ideal to measure traits destructively. A better understanding of the relationships between above and below‐ground traits is likely needed to further explain variation in ecosystem respiration and CH4 fluxes from plant traits.

A lay summary is available for this article.
Seals and shipping: quantifying population risk and individual exposure to vessel noise
Authors: Jones Esther L. , Hastie Gordon D. , Smout Sophie , Onoufriou Joseph , Merchant Nathan D. , Brookes Kate L. , Thompson David 
Published: April 2017

Summary

Vessels can have acute and chronic impacts on marine species. The rate of increase in commercial shipping is accelerating, and there is a need to quantify and potentially manage the risk of these impacts.

Usage maps characterising densities of grey and harbour seals and ships around the British Isles were used to produce risk maps of seal co‐occurrence with shipping traffic. Acoustic exposure to individual harbour seals was modelled in a study area using contemporaneous movement data from 28 animals fitted with UHF global positioning satellite telemetry tags and automatic identification system data from all ships during 2014 and 2015. Data from four acoustic recorders were used to validate sound exposure predictions.

Across the British Isles, rates of co‐occurrence were highest within 50 km of the coast, close to seal haul‐outs. Areas identified with high risk of exposure included 11 Special Areas of Conservation (SAC; from a possible 25). Risk to harbour seal populations was highest, affecting half of all SACs associated with the species.

Predicted cumulative sound exposure level, cSELs(Mpw), over all seals was 176·8 dB re 1 μPa2 s (95% CI 163·3–190·4), ranging from 170·2 dB re 1μPa2 s (95% CI 168·4–171·9) to 189·3 dB re 1 μPa2 s (95% CI 172·6–206·0) for individuals. This represented an increase in 28·3 dB re 1 μPa2 s over measured ambient noise. For 20 of 28 animals in the study, 95% CI for cSELs(Mpw) had upper bounds above levels known to induce temporary threshold shift. Predictions of broadband received sound pressure levels were underestimated on average by 0·7 dB re 1 μPa (±3·3).

Synthesis and applications. We present a framework to allow shipping noise, an important marine anthropogenic stressor, to be explicitly incorporated into spatial planning. Potentially sensitive areas are identified through quantifying risk to marine species of exposure to shipping traffic, and individual noise exposure is predicted with associated uncertainty in an area with varying rates of co‐occurrence. The detailed approach taken here facilitates spatial planning with regard to underwater noise within areas protected through the Habitats Directive, and could be used to provide evidence for further designations. This framework may have utility in assessing whether underwater noise levels are at Good Environmental Status under the Marine Strategy Framework Directive.
Artificial light at night alters grassland vegetation species composition and phenology
Authors: Bennie Jonathan , Davies Thomas W. , Cruse David , Bell Fraser , Gaston Kevin J. 
Published: April 2017

Abstract

Human settlements and transport networks are growing rapidly worldwide. Since the early 20th century their expansion has been accompanied by increasing illumination of the environment at night, a trend that is likely to continue over the decades to come. Consequently, a growing proportion of the world's ecosystems are exposed to artificial light at night, profoundly altering natural cycles of light and darkness. While in recent years there have been advances in our understanding of the effects of artificial light at night on the behaviour and physiology of animals in the wild, much less is known about the impacts on wild plants and natural or semi‐natural vegetation composition. This is surprising, as effects of low‐intensity light at night on flowering, phenology and growth form are well known in laboratory and greenhouse studies.

In a long‐term experimental field study we exposed a semi‐natural grassland to artificial light at intensities and wavelengths typical of those experienced by roadside vegetation under street lighting.

We found that lighting affected the trajectory of vegetation change, leading to significant differences in biomass and plant cover in the dominant species.

Changes in flowering phenology were variable between years, with grass species flowering between 4 days earlier and 12 days later under artificial light.

Policy implications. Our results demonstrate that artificial light, at levels equivalent to those in street‐lit environments, can affect species composition in semi‐natural vegetation. This highlights the importance of considering artificial light as a driver of vegetation change in urban, suburban and semi‐natural ecosystems, and where possible, of minimising or excluding artificial light from habitats of conservation importance.
Integrating local knowledge and research to refine the management of an invasive non‐native grass in critically endangered grassy woodlands
Authors: Firn Jennifer , Ladouceur Emma , Dorrough Josh 
Published: April 2017

Abstract

Globally the prevalence and impact of invasive non‐native plant species is increasing rapidly. Experimentally based research aimed at supporting management is limited in its ability to keep up with this pace, partly because of the importance of understanding historical abiotic and biotic conditions. Contrastingly, landholders are in unique positions to witness species turnover in grasslands, adapt management practices in response and learn from successes and failures.

This local knowledge could be crucial for identifying feasible solutions to land degradation, and ecological restoration, but local knowledge is rarely explicitly embedded in ecological research.

We use a sequential exploratory strategy where we first interview (semi‐directive approach) 15 landholders within the Bega region of New South Wales, Australia concerning the changing ecological characteristics of both extensively and intensively managed grassy woodlands and perceived impacts following arrival of the invasive exotic introduced species, African lovegrass (ALG), Eragrostis curvula.

Based on the results of these interviews, we then conducted a field study where we tested 7 landholder‐generated hypotheses at 57 sites.

The field study validated many of the landholder management perceptions including: ALG was negatively correlated with species richness, canopy cover and dominant grasses like Themeda triandra. Mechanical slashing increased exotic ALG abundance. The prevalence of ALG in the soil seed bank was positively correlated with its abundance above‐ground. Study observations that contradicted landholder perceptions included: ALG was not more palatable nor did its abundance decline in response to increasing soil fertility. Spot spraying with herbicides was effective at controlling abundance, despite its reputation as ineffective. Landholder observations also highlighted key hypotheses concerning modes of spread that require long‐term studies including the roles of drought and overgrazing.

Synthesis and applications. Overall, we found local knowledge coupled with scientific methods can act in tandem as a highly effective approach for developing management recommendations. This approach identifies local perceptions that are not substantiated by scientific data to halt potentially harmful practices, and observations that are insightful predictions about the dynamics and impacts of non‐native species that need long‐term experiments to corroborate scientifically.
Barley Starch: Composition, Structure, Properties, and Modifications
Authors: Zhu Fan 
Published: April 2017

AbstractBarley (Hordeum vulgare L.) is mainly used as animal feed and in malting. In recent years, there has been growing interest in using barley for food production. Starch is the major component of the kernel and may amount up to over 70% of the dry weight. The quality of barley products is much determined by its starch properties such as gelatinization and retrogradation. Starch is also a by‐product of the barley fractionation industry and can be utilized for value‐added products. This review summarizes the recent developments in our understanding of the isolation, chemical composition, granular structure, chemical structure of starch components, physicochemical properties, and various modifications of barley starch. The structure–function relationships of starch are discussed. This review provides a basis for better utilizing barley starch, as well as the further development of barley as a sustainable crop.
Protein Extraction from Porcine Myocardium Using Ultrasonication
Authors: Kim Hyun Kyung , Ha Su Jeong , Kim Young Ho , Hong Sang pil , Kim Young Un , Song Kyoung‐Mo , Lee Nam Hyouck , Jung Sung Keun 
Published: April 2017

AbstractPorcine myocardium is regarded as a byproduct in slaughterhouses and is rarely used as a food source due to its unsuitability for processing and consumption. In this study, we sought to develop an efficient ultrasonication method to extract protein from porcine myocardium. Comparisons of protein yield using various ultrasonication conditions with porcine myocardium revealed that treatment with 0.2 M NaCl, with pH 8.0, at an extraction temperature of less than 40 °C and an amplitude of 60% to 80% was optimal, yielding an extraction rate of 90%. In addition, SDS‐PAGE analysis showed that increasing the time interval for ultrasonication increased the presence of myosin heavy chain and actin protein content. Functional analysis of the physiological properties of the isolated proteins using an ATPase assay showed that Ca and Mg ATPase activity was virtually undetectable in the early stages of ultrasonic treatment and that the proteins denatured rapidly. An analysis of protein digestion also showed that the digestive capacity of proteins treated by ultrasonication methods was greater. These results demonstrate that the ultrasonication method is effective for high‐yield protein extraction from cardiac myofibrils of porcine myocardium with low salt concentrations, low Ca and Mg ATPase activities, and high digestive capacities.