On the use of space photography for identifying transportation routes: A summary of problems

It has been widely suggested that space photography may be used for updating maps of transportation networks. Proponents of the argument have suggested that color space photographs of the resolution obtained with Hasselblad 80 mm lenses (about 300 feet) contain enough useful information to update the extensions of major U. S. highways. The present study systematically documents for the Dallas-Fort Worth area the potential of such space photography in detecting, and to a lesser degree identifying, the existing road networks. Color separation plates and an enlargement of the color photograph were produced and all visible roads traced onto transparencies for study. Major roads and roads under construction were the most visible while lower class roads and roads in urban areas had the poorest return. Road width and classification were found to be the major determinant in visibility, varying from 100 per cent visible for divided highways to 15 per cent visible of bladed earth roads. In summary, space photographs of this resolution proved to be difficult to use for accurate road delineation. Only super highways in rural areas with the greatest road-width were completely identifiable, the width being about 1/3 that of the resolution cell

Behavioral metabolution: the adaptive and evolutionary potential of metabolism-based chemotaxis

We use a minimal model of metabolism-based chemotaxis to show how a coupling between metabolism and behavior can affect evolutionary dynamics in a process we refer to as behavioral metabolution. This mutual influence can function as an in-the-moment, intrinsic evaluation of the adaptive value of a novel situation, such as an encounter with a compound that activates new metabolic pathways. Our model demonstrates how changes to metabolic pathways can lead to improvement of behavioral strategies, and conversely, how behavior can contribute to the exploration and fixation of new metabolic pathways. These examples indicate the potentially important role that the interplay between behavior and metabolism could have played in shaping adaptive evolution in early life and protolife. We argue that the processes illustrated by these models can be interpreted as an unorthodox instantiation of the principles of evolution by random variation and selective retention. We then discuss how the interaction between metabolism and behavior can facilitate evolution through (i) increasing exposure to environmental variation, (ii) making more likely the fixation of some beneficial metabolic pathways, (iii) providing a mechanism for in-the-moment adaptation to changes in the environment and to changes in the organization of the organism itself, and (iv) generating conditions that are conducive to speciatio

Cost-efficient staffing under annualized hours

We study how flexibility in workforce capacity can be used to efficiently match capacity and demand. Flexibility in workforce capacity is introduced by the annualized hours regime. Annualized hours allow organizations to measure working time per year, instead of per month or per week. An additional source of flexibility is hiring employees with different contract types, like full-time, part-time, and min-max, and by hiring subcontractors. We propose a mathematical programming formulation that incorporates annualized hours and shows to be very flexible with regard to modeling various contract types. The objective of our model is to minimize salary cost, thereby covering workforce demand, and using annualized hours. Our model is able to address various business questions regarding tactical workforce planning problems, e.g., with regard to annualized hours, subcontracting, and vacation planning. In a case study for a Dutch hospital two of these business questions are addressed, and we demonstrate that applying annualized hours potentially saves up to 5.2% in personnel wages annually

Geographical patterns in the radial growth response of Norway spruce provenances to climatic variation

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Arterial switch for pulmonary venous obstruction complicating mustard procedure

Two patients underwent an arterial switch procedure for the relief of severe pulmonary venous obstruction complicating a Mustard procedure. Without preparatory pulmonary banding, both patients had adequate left ventricular function due to secondary pulmonary hypertension. At 8 and 4 years after the procedure, both patients are in New York Heart Association functional class I, with echocardiographic evidence of good left and right ventricular function

Observations of a diapycnal shortcut to adiabatic upwelling of Antarctic Circumpolar Deep Water

In the Southern Ocean, small-scale turbulence causes diapycnal mixing which influences important water mass transformations, in turn impacting large-scale ocean transports such as the Meridional Overturning Circulation (MOC), a key controller of Earth'sclimate. We present direct observations of mixing over the Antarctic continental slope between water masses that are part of the Southern Ocean MOC. A 12-hour time-series of microstructure turbulence measurements, hydrography and velocity observations off Elephant Island, north of the Antarctic Peninsula, reveals two concurrent bursts of elevated dissipation of O(10–6Wkg–1, resulting in heat fluxes ~10 times higher than basin-integrated Drake Passage estimates. This occurs across the boundary between adjacent adiabatic upwelling and downwelling overturning cells. Ray tracing and topography show mixing between 300-400 m consistent with the breaking of locally-generated internal tidal waves. Since similar conditions extend to much of the Antarctic continental slope where these water masses outcrop, their transformation may contribute significantly to upwelling