title: Remote sensing of freshwater environments: Trial application on the lower Waikato River.

authors: Ashraf, Muhammad Salman

subjects: remote sensing data

abstract: The overall goal of the study is to evaluate multi-sensor and multi-spectral satellite data to characterise different freshwater habitat zones of large rivers and lakes of the Waikato region.  The earlier evaluation of different sources of remotely sensed data suggested the implementation of sub-pixel classification on the QuickBird satellite image of Tongariro River delta region.  The current research is further expanding the same research on other freshwater environments within the Waikato region.

text: Remote sensing of freshwater environments: Trial application on the lower Waikato River. The overall goal of the study is to evaluate multi-sensor and multi-spectral satellite data to characterise different freshwater habitat zones of large rivers and lakes of the Waikato region.  The earlier evaluation of different sources of remotely sensed data suggested the implementation of sub-pixel classification on the QuickBird satellite image of Tongariro River delta region.  The current research is further expanding the same research on other freshwater environments within the Waikato region.

year: 2009-06

title: Birthing a mother: the surrogate body and the pregnant self - By Elly Teman

authors: Longhurst, Robyn

abstract: BOOK Review - Elly Teman begins Birthing a mother with a prologue about a woman, Yael, whom she met in Haifa, Israel. Yael had been married for fifteen years and was ‘completely focused on having her own genetic child, created from an egg harvested from her ovaries and gestated in another woman's womb’ (p. xvii). Yael's story about the emotional highs and lows that she faced in the process provides a powerful opening to this highly accessible yet intellectually rigorous ethnography of gestational surrogates and intended parents in Israel.

text: Birthing a mother: the surrogate body and the pregnant self - By Elly Teman BOOK Review - Elly Teman begins Birthing a mother with a prologue about a woman, Yael, whom she met in Haifa, Israel. Yael had been married for fifteen years and was ‘completely focused on having her own genetic child, created from an egg harvested from her ovaries and gestated in another woman's womb’ (p. xvii). Yael's story about the emotional highs and lows that she faced in the process provides a powerful opening to this highly accessible yet intellectually rigorous ethnography of gestational surrogates and intended parents in Israel.

year: 2011

title: Role of tephra in dating Polynesian settlement and impact, New Zealand

authors: Lowe, David J.

subjects: tephrochronology

abstract: Tephrochronology in its original sense is the use of tephra layers as time-stratigraphic marker beds to establish numerical or relative ages (Lowe and Hunt, 2001). Tephra layers have been described and studied in New Zealand for more than 160 years (the German naturalist and surgeon Ernst Dieffenbach described ‘recognizable’ tephra sections in his 1843 book Travels in New Zealand), and the first isopach map, showing fallout from the deadly plinian basaltic eruption of Mt Tarawera on 10 June 1886, was published in 1888 (Lowe, 1990; Lowe et al., 2002). More recently, a wide range of tephra-related paleoenvironmental research has been undertaken (e.g., Lowe and Newnham, 1999; Newnham and Lowe, 1999; Newnham et al., 1999, 2004; Shane, 2000), including new advances in the role of tephra in linking and dating sites containing evidence for abrupt climatic change (e.g., Newnham and Lowe, 2000; Newnham et al., 2003). Here we focus on the use of tephrochronology in dating the arrival and impacts of the first humans in New Zealand, a difficult problem for which this technique has proven to be of critical importance.

text: Role of tephra in dating Polynesian settlement and impact, New Zealand Tephrochronology in its original sense is the use of tephra layers as time-stratigraphic marker beds to establish numerical or relative ages (Lowe and Hunt, 2001). Tephra layers have been described and studied in New Zealand for more than 160 years (the German naturalist and surgeon Ernst Dieffenbach described ‘recognizable’ tephra sections in his 1843 book Travels in New Zealand), and the first isopach map, showing fallout from the deadly plinian basaltic eruption of Mt Tarawera on 10 June 1886, was published in 1888 (Lowe, 1990; Lowe et al., 2002). More recently, a wide range of tephra-related paleoenvironmental research has been undertaken (e.g., Lowe and Newnham, 1999; Newnham and Lowe, 1999; Newnham et al., 1999, 2004; Shane, 2000), including new advances in the role of tephra in linking and dating sites containing evidence for abrupt climatic change (e.g., Newnham and Lowe, 2000; Newnham et al., 2003). Here we focus on the use of tephrochronology in dating the arrival and impacts of the first humans in New Zealand, a difficult problem for which this technique has proven to be of critical importance.

year: 2004