bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025_split huggingface dataset:
Shaping carnivore communities by predator control: competitor release revisited
Authors: Casanovas Jorge G. , Barrull Joan , Mate Isabel , Zorrilla Juan M. , Ruiz‐Olmo Jordi , Gosàlbez Joaquim , Salicrú Miquel 
Published: February 2012

AbstractThe traditional way to deal with hunting interests is often focused on predator control. This approach requires a detailed understanding of predator responses to game management. Control methods can be non‐selective and, consequently, can potentially have a negative impact on non‐target predator species, affecting carnivore guild. In order to assess the potential risks associated with non‐selective predator control in the presence of intraguild competition, the classical Lotka–Volterra competition model was used, but with two additional factors: a linear factor for capture mortality (mortality caused by predator control) and a factor for vacated niche occupancy associated with immigration. Simulation in a scenario with three species revealed that one of them, the red fox Vulpes vulpes, which presented the highest intrinsic growth rate, can show population increases even under moderate control, whereas the population of European badger Meles meles, with a lower intrinsic growth rate, was reduced and, in some cases, may even become extinct. Lastly, the stone marten Martes foina presented a differential response, depending on the removal intensity and strategy employed. This behaviour is compatible with the results observed in a Mediterranean environment subjected to two types of game management: non‐selective predator control (culling) and no control. In areas with non‐selective control and moderate predator removal, the red fox population remained stable, while the stone marten and the European badger populations reduced markedly or disappeared.
Genetic Variation and Chemical Traits of Selected New Jojoba (Simmondsia chinensis (Link) Schneider) Genotypes
Authors: Al‐Soqeer A. , Motawei M. I. , Al‐Dakhil M. , El‐Mergawi R. , Al‐Khalifah N. 
Published: February 2012

AbstractSeeds from six selected jojoba genotypes were used in this study. Seed samples were analyzed for oil, protein, total carbohydrate, and simmondsin contents. The genetic relationships among jojoba genotypes were also determined. Highly significant differences among the genotypes were found for oil, protein, total carbohydrate and simmondsin contents. Genotype MD 8 recorded the highest oil content (54.95%), whereas genotype HD 6 had the lowest oil content (47.17%). However, the highest protein content (16.98%) and the highest carbohydrate value (33.97%) were found in genotype HB 6, which differed significantly from all the other genotypes. The significant variations in the studied characteristics observed among the genotypes might reflect, in part, their different genetic backgrounds. The inter‐simple sequence repeat ISSR‐derived data were evaluated to calculate the genetic similarity (ISSR‐GS). The genetic similarity coefficient varied between 0.60 and 0.90. Cluster analysis was conducted to generate a dendogram to elucidate the relationships among jojoba genotypes. The dendogram generated using pooled ISSR data divided the jojoba genotypes into two main clusters. Genotypes HB8 and MD8 were found in the same sub‐cluster using ISSR primers. These genotypes also had almost similar values for most chemical traits.
Hydraulic properties and embolism in small-diameter roots of five temperate broad-leaved tree species with contrasting drought tolerance
Authors: Köcher Paul , Horna Viviana , Beckmeyer Ingo , Leuschner Christoph 
Published: February 2012

Abstract
• Context

It has been estimated that about half of a plant’s total hydraulic resistance is located belowground, but it is not well known how temperate tree species differ in root hydraulic properties and how these traits vary with the species’ drought tolerance.

• Aims

We examined root anatomical and hydraulic traits in five broad-leaved tree species with different drought tolerance, analyzed the relation between root anatomy and hydraulic conductivity and root embolism, and investigated the relation of these traits to the species’ drought tolerance.

• Methods

In small-diameter roots (2–6 mm), we measured vessel diameters and vessel density, specific hydraulic conductivity, and the percental loss of conductivity (“native” embolism) during summer in a mixed forest.

• Results

Specific conductivity was positively related to vessel diameter but not to vessel density. Drought-tolerant Fraxinus showed the smallest mean vessel diameters and drought-sensitive Fagus the largest. Specific conductivity was highly variable among different similar-sized roots of the same species with a few roots apparently functioning as “high-conductivity roots”.

• Conclusion

The results show that coexisting tree species can differ largely in root hydraulic traits with more drought-sensitive trees apparently having larger mean vessel diameters in their roots than tolerant species. However, this difference was not related to the observed root conductivity losses due to embolism.
Thucydides, amended: religion, narrative, and IR theory in the Peloponnesian Crisis
Authors: DOLGERT STEFAN 
Published: February 2012

AbstractMost of our knowledge of the Peloponnesian War comes from the text of Thucydides' History, yet IR scholars are strangely credulous when evaluating Thucydides' pronouncements. I explore what Thucydides does not tell us, and suggest that his text obscures important information regarding the outbreak of the war. Thucydides has a secular bias which leads him to discount the Spartan religious self-narrative, but by attending to this schema, in which Sparta sees itself in the role of the pious defender of moderation pitted against the corrupt Athenians, we gain a richer understanding of the chain of events that led to war. Contemporary scholars have too readily adopted Thucydides' perspective on this issue, but by assessing Thucydides' data using insights drawn from contemporary cognitive theories of narrative and image we see that misperceptions based in the conflicting Athenian and Spartan narratives played an important role in the escalation of the crisis.
Rethinking democracy promotion
Authors: JAHN BEATE 
Published: February 2012

AbstractDespite the fact that democracy promotion is a major part of liberal foreign policies, the discipline of International Relations has not paid much systematic attention to it. Conversely, the study of democracy promotion is dominated by comparative politics and pays hardly any attention to the international system. This mutual neglect signifies a core weakness in the theory and practice of democracy promotion: its failure to comprehend the development of liberal democracy as an international process. This article argues that a thorough engagement with John Locke explains the failures of democracy promotion policies and provides a more comprehensive understanding of the development of liberal democracy.
God vs. Westphalia: radical Islamist movements and the battle for organising the World
Authors: MENDELSOHN BARAK 
Published: February 2012

AbstractThis article presents the operation ofal-QaedaandHizb ut-Tahrir, two of the most radical Islamist movements, through the lens of the relationship between religion as an organising principle for world politics and the state-based logic. It examines these groups in the context of repeated attempts by religious actors throughout history to render religion the dominant and constitutive element in world politics. Prior to the Peace of Westphalia, religion had a critical role in shaping the political landscape, but Westphalia relegated religion to a secondary position. While it accepted religion's role in the domestic affairs of the units in the international system, the Westphalian order kept religion subordinated to the logic of the state system. But religion maintained its ability to provide an alternative organisation for world politics. Whileal-QaedaandHizb ut-Tahrirare highly unlikely to bring about systemic change, their ascendance should remind scholars that the existing order is not inevitable and that the resurgence of religion in international politics also involves the resurrection of interpretations of religion that compete with and challenge the logic of the state-based system.
The challenges of teaching composing
Authors: Winters Mandy 
Published: February 2012

It is a familiar comment from some new beginner music teachers, ‘I'm not a composer, how do I teach composition, I'm not sure about this, I don't feel confident . . .’. Since the work of Paynter (1982), Swanwick (1979), Swanwick and Taylor (1982) and others, whose work has influenced the National Curriculum in England, classroom music-making has focused on the key musical activities of listening, performing and composing, assuming an experiential learning approach which builds on the inter-relatedness of the three activities. Visits to school music departments reveal a range of pupil music-making but often the area which is least confidently facilitated and supported (and perhaps misunderstood) is composing. Why is this and what are the challenges of teaching composing?
L’assurance autonomie: Une innovation essentielle pour répondre aux défis du vieillissement
Authors: Hébert Réjean 
Published: February 2012

ABSTRACTThe aging population and the epidemic of chronic diseases requires an accompanying finance reform of long-term care that will become increasingly dominant. Many countries have faced this situation and have set up a separate public funding for such care on the basis of a universal insurance covering both home care and institutions. Canada and Quebec must adopt such autonomy insurance and create a separate fund financed partly by a more judicious use of current budgets and tax credits, and also by a significant investment in home care. An autonomy support benefit could be allocated in kind to fund public services and by contract to pay for services delivered by private, voluntary, and social economy agencies. This benefit would be established following a standardized assessment of functional autonomy achieved by the case manager who will manage the services and control their quality.
Market-consistent valuations and Solvency II: Implications of the recent financial crisis
Authors: Foroughi Kamran 
Published: February 2012

AbstractThe recent financial crisis has raised challenges to market-consistent valuation, both in its implementation and application. These include both commercial and technical challenges. The whole concept of mark-to-market accounting has been questioned in some quarters.There have been commercial challenges in deciding how to assess business strategies given recent volatile market-consistent results, including the implications for ALM and new business pricing. Industry-wide, macroeconomic concerns have been raised regarding procyclicality.This paper recognises these commercial challenges and highlights how a combination of different forms of management information covering both market-consistent and other measures can help in making decisions. This paper sets out some possible approaches to mitigate procyclicality.There have been technical challenges in:–assessing how to value instruments in markets which are or have become illiquid–selecting an appropriate ‘risk-free’ or reference rate–deciding whether and how to make additional allowance for the liquidity premium or own credit risk–the calibration of stochastic models used to value embedded financial options and guarantees–assessing an appropriate allowance for non-hedgeable risk.This paper discusses these technical challenges. The paper proposes a way forward in some areas, taking into account the recent dislocation of the financial markets and drawing on recent Solvency II, IASB, FASB and MCEV developments.
Determinants of household food access among small farmers in the Andes: examining the path
Authors: Leah Jessica , Pradel Willy , Cole Donald C , Prain Gordon , Creed-Kanashiro Hilary , Carrasco Miluska V 
Published: February 2012

AbstractObjectiveHousehold food access remains a concern among primarily agricultural households in lower- and middle-income countries. We examined the associations among domains representing livelihood assets (human capital, social capital, natural capital, physical capital and financial capital) and household food access.DesignCross-sectional survey (two questionnaires) on livelihood assets.SettingMetropolitan Pillaro, Ecuador; Cochabamba, Bolivia; and Huancayo, Peru.SubjectsHouseholds (n570) involved in small-scale agricultural production in 2008.ResultsFood access, defined as the number of months of adequate food provisioning in the previous year, was relatively good; 41 % of the respondents indicated to have had no difficulty in obtaining food for their household in the past year. Using bivariate analysis, key livelihood assets indicators associated with better household food access were identified as: age of household survey respondent (P= 0·05), participation in agricultural associations (P= 0·09), church membership (P= 0·08), area of irrigated land (P= 0·08), housing material (P= 0·06), space within the household residence (P= 0·02) and satisfaction with health status (P= 0·02). In path models both direct and indirect effects were observed, underscoring the complexity of the relationships between livelihood assets and household food access. Paths significantly associated with better household food access included: better housing conditions (P= 0·01), more space within the household residence (P= 0·001) and greater satisfaction with health status (P= 0·001).ConclusionsMultiple factors were associated with household food access in these peri-urban agricultural households. Food security intervention programmes focusing on food access need to deal with both agricultural factors and determinants of health to bolster household food security in challenging lower- and middle-income country contexts.
The impact of geographic market definition on the stringency of hospital merger control in Germany and the Netherlands
Authors: Varkevisser Marco , Schut Frederik T. 
Published: February 2012

AbstractIn markets where hospitals are expected to compete, preventive merger control aims to prohibit anticompetitive mergers. In the hospital industry, however, the standard method for defining the relevant market (SSNIP) is difficult to apply and alternative approaches have proven inaccurate. Experiences from the United States show that courts, by identifying overly broad geographic markets, have underestimated the anticompetitive effects of hospital mergers. We examine how geographic hospital markets are defined in Germany and the Netherlands where market-oriented reforms have created room for hospital competition. For each country, we discuss a landmark case where definition of the geographic market played a decisive role. Our findings indicate that defining geographic hospital markets in both countries is less complicated than in the United States, where antitrust analysis must take managed care organisations into account. We also find that different methods result in much more stringent hospital merger control in Germany than in the Netherlands. Given the uncertainties in defining hospital markets, the German competition authority seems to be inclined to avoid the risk of being too permissive; the opposite holds for the Dutch competition authority. We argue that for society the costs of being too permissive with regard to hospital mergers may be larger than the costs of being too stringent.
Observation of far‐field Mach waves generated by the 2001 Kokoxili supershear earthquake
Authors: Vallée M. , Dunham Eric M. 
Published: February 2012

Regional surface wave observations offer a powerful tool for determining source properties of large earthquakes, especially rupture velocity. Supershear ruptures, being faster than surface wave phase velocities, create far‐field surface wave Mach cones along which waves from all sections of the fault arrive simultaneously and, over a sufficiently narrow frequency band, in phase. We present the first observation of far‐field Mach waves from the major Kokoxili earthquake (Tibet, 2001/11/14,Mw7.9) and confirm that ground motion amplitudes are indeed enhanced on the Mach cone. Theory predicts that on the Mach cone, bandpassed surface wave seismograms from a large supershear rupture will be identical to those from much smaller events with similar focal mechanisms, with an amplitude ratio equal to the ratio of the seismic moments of the two events. Cross‐correlation of 15–25 s Love waves from the Kokoxili event with those from a much smaller (Mw5) foreshock indicates a high degree of similarity (correlation coefficients ranging from 0.8 to 0.95) in waveforms recorded at stations near the far‐field Mach cone. This similarity vanishes away from the Mach cone. These observations provide further evidence for supershear propagation of the Kokoxili rupture, and demonstrate how this simple waveform correlation procedure can be used to identify supershear ruptures.
Regions of rapid sea ice change: An inter‐hemispheric seasonal comparison
Authors: Stammerjohn Sharon , Massom Robert , Rind David , Martinson Douglas 
Published: February 2012

This bi‐polar analysis resolves ice edge changes on space/time scales relevant for investigating seasonal ice‐ocean feedbacks and focuses on spatio‐temporal changes in the timing of annual sea ice retreat and advance over 1979/80 to 2010/11. Where Arctic sea ice decrease is fastest, the sea ice retreat is now nearly 2 months earlier and subsequent advance more than 1 month later (compared to 1979/80), resulting in a 3‐month longer summer ice‐free season. In the Antarctic Peninsula and Bellingshausen Sea region, sea ice retreat is more than 1 month earlier and advance 2 months later, resulting in a more than 3‐month longer summer ice‐free season. In contrast, in the western Ross Sea (Antarctica) region, sea ice retreat and advance are more than 1 month later and earlier respectively, resulting in a more than 2 month shorter summer ice‐free season. Regardless of trend magnitude or direction, and at latitudes mostly poleward of 70° (N/S), there is strong correspondence between anomalies in the timings of sea ice retreat and subsequent advance, but little correspondence between advance and subsequent retreat. These results support a strong ocean thermal feedback in autumn in response to changes in spring sea ice retreat. Further, model calculations suggest different net ocean heat changes in the Arctic versus Antarctic where autumn sea ice advance is 1 versus 2 months later. Ocean‐atmosphere changes, particularly in boreal spring and austral autumn (i.e., during ∼March‐May), are discussed and compared, as well as possible inter‐hemispheric climate connections.
Protective effect of (-) α-bisabolol on markers of oxidative stress in erythrocytes subjected to oxidative insult
Authors: Luqman Suaib , Srivastava Suchita 
Published: February 2012

Abstract(-)-α-bisabolol is a sesquiterpene alcohol found as a major component of essential oil of chamomile (Matricaria recutita L., Chamomilla recutita L., Matricaria chamomilla L.; Family Asteraceae). Chamomile, one of the most ancient and widely recognized herbs to mankind, has been used traditionally for centuries as an anti-inflammatory, antispasmodic, carminative, mild astringent and healing medicine. It is also known to be very helpful as an external agent for encouraging the rapid healing of ulcers and burns without infection, as well as persistent skin problems such as eczema and psoriasis. Since clinical trials and human studies are limited, we have investigated the effect of (-)-α-bisabolol on markers of oxidative stress in human erythrocytes by incubating with hydrogen peroxide (2mM) and tert-butyl hydroperoxide (10 µM). Subjecting erythrocyte to oxidative stress caused a significant alteration in reduced glutathione GSH), malondialdehyde (MDA) concentration as well as superoxide dismutase and catalase activity compare to control. Presence of (-)-α-bisabolol as low as 0.1µM in incubation medium protected the erythrocytes from oxidative stress and helps to maintain the basal level of GSH and MDA. The activity of superoxide dismutase and catalase were also restored in a concentration-dependent manner (0.01-100µM). The effect was also compared with L-Ascorbic acid, quercetin and BHT. Our findings provide evidence for the protection of oxidative stress in erythrocytes by (-)-α-bisabolol that could be considered for further studies.
Investigations on biological activity of Vetiveria zizanioides L. Nash, a palingenesis of some important findings in miracle grass
Authors: Luqman Suaib 
Published: February 2012

AbstractVetiveria zizanioides L. Nash synonymously known as Chrysopogon zizanioides L. Roberty (Family: Poaceae/Graminae), widely cultivated in the tropical regions of the world, is a miraculous grass native to India first developed for soil and water conservation by the World Bank during mid 1980s. Popularly known as ‘KHUS’, it is the major source of the well-known oil of vetiver, which is used in medicine, cosmetics and in perfumery making agarbattis, soaps, soft drinks, pan masala. Being a major constituent of ‘Rasayana’ in Ayurveda, different parts of the vetiver plant have traditionally been used by the Indian tribes for treating various ailments, diseases and disorders including boils, burns, epilepsy, fever, scorpion sting, snakebite, sores in the mouth, headache, toothache, weakness, lumbago, sprain, rheumatism, urinary tract infection, malarial fever, acidity relief and as an anti-helmintic. It has also been used in traditional medicine of Asia and Africa, particularly ancient Tamil literature mentions the use of vetiver for medical purposes. The essential oil of vetiver has extensive applications in toiletries and cosmetics, possesses sedative property and has traditionally been used in aromatherapy for relieving stress, anxiety, nervous tension and insomnia. Root is also important in traditional medicine as a carminative, stimulant and diaphoretic. Besides these medicinal properties of the plant, the dried culms of the plant are used as brooms and to thatch roofs. Pulp of the plant is used to prepare straw boards and paper. In India, the roots have been used for making screens, mats, hand fans, and baskets. Formulations containing oil and/or extracts of vetiver have been reported to treat inflammatory bowel disease, urinary tract infection, and in making insect repellents. Research on various aspects of vetiver make it an excellent plant describing many characteristics including phytoremediation, water purification, leachate and effluent disposal, utilizing wastewater, removing nitrogen and phosphorus etc. It is one of the most promising aromatic plants known to possess antimicrobial, antioxidant and termicidal properties. However, the plant has not been studied exclusively for other pharmacological activities and there is a lack of scientific evidence to prove these effects. We are studying bioactivity of vetiver root as a part of our effort to discover plant-based biologically active molecules since last many years using molecular and cell target based assays. In our published reports, we showed potent antibacterial, drug-resistant modifying, hydroxyl radical scavenging, anticancer, antihepatotoxic and antioxidant activity in intact and spent root of vetiver. In view of our findings, the present paper recapitulates some important findings on the bioactivity of Vetiveria zizanioides L. Nash and a palingenesis has been made for this miracle grass.