scholarly journals More than Drylands but Less of Dry Forests

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Marcelino de la Cruz ◽  
Pedro F. Quintana-Ascencio ◽  
Luis Cayuela ◽  
Carlos I. Espinosa ◽  
Adrián Escudero

AbstractThe recent Global Drylands Assessment of forests is based on both an incomplete delimitation of dry forests distribution and on an old and incorrect delimitation of drylands. Its sampling design includes a large proportion of plots located in humid ecosystems and ignores critical areas for the conservation of dry forests. Therefore its results and conclusions are unreliable.

Science ◽  
2017 ◽  
Vol 358 (6364) ◽  
pp. eaao0369 ◽  
Author(s):  
Marcelino de la Cruz ◽  
Pedro F. Quintana-Ascencio ◽  
Luis Cayuela ◽  
Carlos I. Espinosa ◽  
Adrián Escudero

The study by Bastin et al. (Reports, 12 May 2017, p. 635) is based on an incomplete delimitation of dry forest distribution and on an old and incorrect definition of drylands. Its sampling design includes many plots located in humid ecosystems and ignores critical areas for the conservation of dry forests. Therefore, its results and conclusions may be unreliable.


Author(s):  
Benjamin M. Siegel

The potential advantages of high voltage electron microscopy for extending the limits of resolution and contrast in imaging low contrast objects, such as biomolecular specimens, is very great. The results of computations will be presented showing that at accelerating voltages of 500-1000 kV it should be possible to achieve spacial resolutions of 1 to 1.5 Å and using phase contrast imaging achieve adequate image contrast to observe single atoms of low atomic number.The practical problems associated with the design and utilization of the high voltage instrument are, optimistically, within the range of competence of the state of the art. However, there are some extremely important and critical areas to be systematically investigated before we have achieved this competence. The basic electron optics of the column required is well understood, but before the full potential of an instrument capable of resolutions of better than 1.5 Å are realized some very careful development work will be required. Of great importance for the actual achievement of high resolution with a high voltage electron microscope is the fundamental limitation set by the characteristics of the high voltage electron beam that can be obtained from the accelerator column.


Author(s):  
Tetiana Petrushyna ◽  
Anatolii Arseienko

Globalization remains the most common and quite controversial concept in modern social discourse. Within the theoretical and conceptual sociological dimension, the authors analyzed the essence of economic globalization (EG) as its defining type. They studied globalization as an objective process (first of all, the international division of labour) and the subjective process of forming a global capitalist economy under the auspices of leading Western countries, supranational financial and economic institutions (primarily the World Bank and the IMF), TNCs. As the main drivers of globalization, they determine its forms and directions in the interests of the "core" of global capitalism. Within the empirical sociological dimension of EG (which involves measuring the various manifestations of the EG process itself as well as its social consequences), the authors paid particular attention to the analysis of social changes in Ukrainian society. The capitalization of the Ukrainian economy, which took place in parallel with Ukraine’s entry into the global economic space, led to degradation of the national economy, significant deterioration of living standards of most citizens, creation of anti-social state with the systemic crisis as its main attribute. To prove these conclusions, the authors analyzed the dynamics of the principal macroeconomic and sociological indicators of Ukrainian society’s life for almost 30 years of drift to the roadside of the global capitalist world, based on the study of numerous domestic and foreign sources. The authors focused on the research of eight critical areas of social changes: deindustrialization of the economy, global competitiveness and innovation, GDP dynamics, employment, income and welfare of the population, socioeconomic inequality, debt dependence and degradation of Ukrainian science. The analysis shows the need to abandon the neoliberal paradigm of development and search for the alternative and more fair models of EG.


2010 ◽  
Vol 9 (4) ◽  
pp. 479-481
Author(s):  
Ioan Craciun ◽  
Catrinel-Raluca Giurma-Handley ◽  
Ion Giurma ◽  
Marius Telisca

2008 ◽  
Vol 109 (Supplement) ◽  
pp. 34-40 ◽  
Author(s):  
Paula L. Petti ◽  
David A. Larson ◽  
Sandeep Kunwar

Object The authors investigated the use of different collimator values in different sectors (hybrid shots) when treating patients with lesions close to critical structures with the Perfexion model Gamma Knife. Methods Twelve patients with various tumors (6 with a pituitary tumor, 3 with vestibular schwannoma, 2 with meningioma, and 1 with metastatic lesion) that were within 4 mm of the brainstem, optic nerve, pituitary stalk, or cochlea were considered. All patients were treated at the authors' institution between June 2007 and March 2008. The patients' treatments were replanned in 2 different ways. In the first plan, hybrid shots were used such that the steepest dose gradient was aligned with the junction between the target and the critical structure(s). This was accomplished by placing low-value collimators in appropriate sectors. In the second plan, no hybrid shots were used. Sector blocking (either manual or dynamic) was required for all plans to reduce the critical structure doses to acceptable levels. Prescribed doses ranged from 12 to 30 Gy at the periphery of the target. The plans in each pair were designed to be equally conformal in terms of both target coverage (as measured by the Paddick conformity index) and critical structure sparing. Results The average number of shots required was roughly the same using either planning technique (16.7 vs 16.6 shots with and without hybrids). However, for all patients, the number of blocked sectors required to protect critical areas was larger when hybrid shots were not used. On average, nearly twice as many blocked sectors (14.8 vs 7.0) were required for the plans that did not use hybrid shots. The number of high-value collimators used in each plan was also evaluated. For small targets (≤ 1 cm3), for which 8 mm was considered a high value for the collimator, plans employing hybrids used an average of 2.3 times as many 8-mm sectors as did their nonhybrid counterparts (7.4 vs 3.2 sectors). For large targets (> 1 cm3), for which 16 mm was considered a high value for the collimator, hybrid plans used an average of 1.4 times as many 16-mm sectors as did the plans without hybrids (10.7 vs 7.7 sectors). Decreasing the number of blocked sectors and increasing the number of high-value collimator sectors led to use of shorter beam-on times. Beam-on times were 1–39% higher (average 17%) when hybrid shots were not allowed. The average beam-on time for plans with and without hybrid shots was 67.4 versus 78.4 minutes. Conclusions The judicious use of hybrid shots in patients for whom the target is close to a critical structure is an efficient way to achieve conformal treatments while minimizing the beam-on time. The reduction in beam-on time with hybrid shots is attributed to a reduced use of blocked sectors and an increased number of high-value collimator sectors.


2004 ◽  
Vol 155 (3-4) ◽  
pp. 80-88 ◽  
Author(s):  
Klaus Ackermann

Wild growing yams (Dioscorea spp.) are an important supplementary food in Madagascar, especially during periods of rice shortage in the rainy season. Yams grow in dry forests and there is a particularly high occurrence of yam tubers in recently burned, open secondary forest formations. The study found that the uncontrolled harvest of yams can contribute to the degradation of dry forests due to the high quantity of wild yams harvested by the local population and the widespread practice of intentionally burning forests to increase yams production.


2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Luis Daniel Avila Cabadilla ◽  
Mariana Álvarez

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