Efecto distancia en la disposición a pagar por la conservación de la biodiversidad: el caso de un área protegida megadiversa

This research addresses the case of Manu National Park (PNM) in Peru, one of the most biodiverse protected areas worldwide. Applying the choice experiments (CE) method, based on 1.164 surveys in this country, the positive decay effect on the willingness to pay (WTP) was determined for the conservation of the PNM, at least for most of the attributes analyzed. This suggests that in cases of megadiverse areas, WTP for conservation may not be inversely related to the interviewee’s distance since the effect of biodiversity conservation interest would exceed the effect of disinterest associated with distance.

Calibration of the Pulse Signal Decay Effect of Full-Waveform Hyperspectral LiDAR

Full-waveform hyperspectral LiDAR (FWHSL) is able to obtain spectral and spatial information by utilizing a single instrument, and it has become more and more commonly used in vertical distribution studies of structural and biochemical characteristics of vegetation. However, the pulse-echo arrival times of multiple spectral channels of the FWHSL are not consistent and this causes range ambiguity in spectral channels. In this paper, the pulse signal decay effect on range measurements was studied by measuring the varying trends of pulse signal decay between spectral channels with different material properties. The experiments were repeated at different distances. All of the spectral channels were compared for different materials. The results suggest that the channels in the red edge spectral region of vegetation have good stability and accuracy for range measurements of varied distance and materials properties. Finally, based on the geometric invariability in a specific red edge channel, a practical calibration approach for the pulse signal decay effect is also presented. The validation tests showed it could improve the pulse signal decay effect of full-waveform hyperspectral LiDAR.

Distance-Decay Effect in Probabilistic Time Geography for Random Encounter

Probabilistic time geography uses a fixed distance threshold for the definition of the encounter events of moving objects. However, because of the distance-decay effect, different distances within the fixed threshold ensure that the encounter events do not always have the same possibility, and, therefore, the quantitative probabilistic time geography analysis needs to consider the actual distance-decay coefficient (DDC). Thus, this paper introduces the DDC and proposes a new encounter probability measure model that takes into account the distance-decay effect. Given two positions of a pair of moving objects, the traditional encounter probability model is that if the distance between the two positions does not exceed a given threshold, the encounter event may occur, and its probability is equal to the product of the probabilities of the two moving objects in their respective positions. Furthermore, the probability of the encounter at two given positions is multiplied by the DDC in the proposed model, in order to express the influence of the distance-decay effect on the encounter probability. Finally, the validity of the proposed model is verified by an experiment, which uses the tracking data of wild zebras to calculate the encounter probability, and compares it with the former method.

Continuous or discontinuous? Empirical study on animated maps

Advancements in computer technology that have occurred in recent decades have enabled an intensive development in cartographic methods for direct representation of phenomena dynamics. Even with the appearance of ever more advanced technical solutions, the theoretical basis still needs supplementing. The previous cartographic literature emphasises the importance of congruence and isomorphism principles preservation that aims at increasing the effectiveness of dynamic displays. Nevertheless, it is frequently the case that discontinuous phenomena are depicted with the use of smooth transitions. For this reason, it is vital that experimental research should lead to defining which representation methods are appropriate for a given type of content. Our study was focused on the cartographic design of scene transitions in animated maps. Two main conclusions of the research indicate that 1) mode of transition influences the interpretation of the content of cartographic animation depicting discrete changes, 2) maps executed in a smooth mode demonstrate lower effectiveness when compared with animations using an abrupt and abrupt with decay effect transitions.

A decay effect of the bacterial growth rate associated with genome reduction

Bacterial growth is an important topic in microbiology and of crucial importance to better understand living cells. Bacterial growth dynamics are quantitatively examined using various methods to determine the physical, chemical or biological features of growing populations. Due to methodological differences, the exponential growth rate, which is a parameter that is representative of growth dynamics, should be differentiated. This study experimentally verified the differentiation in growth rates attributed to different methodologies, and demonstrated that the most popular method, optical turbidity, led to the determination of a lower growth rate in comparison to the methods based on colony formation and ATP abundance, due to a decay effect of reading OD600 during a population increase. Accordingly, the logistic model, which is often applied to growth data reading the OD600, was revised by introducing a new parameter: the decay rate, to compensate for the lowered estimation in growth rates. The modified logistic model not only presented an improved goodness of fit in comparison to the original model but also led to an intriguing finding of a correlation between genome reduction and the decay rate. The decay effect seemed to be partially attributed to the decrease in cell size accompanied by a population increase and was medium dependent. In summary, the present study provides not only a better theoretical tool for the high-throughput studies on bacterial growth dynamics linking with experimental data using optical turbidity to the theoretical analysis with biological importance, but also a valuable insight for understanding the genome evolution and fitness increase in microbial life.