The examples and perspective in this article may not represent a worldwide view of the subject. (November 2014) (Learn how and when to remove this template message)
In Japan, private sector railway (私鉄 or 民鉄 Shitetsu or Mintetsu), commonly simply private railway, refers to a public transit railway owned and operated by private sector, almost always organized as a corporation (Kabushiki kaisha), but may be any type of private business entity. Although Japan Railways Group (JR Group) companies are also corporations, they are not classified as private railways because of their unique status as the primary successors of the Japanese National Railways (JNR). Voluntary sector railways (semi-public) are additionally not classified as shitetsu due to their origins as rural, money-losing JNR lines that have since been transferred to local possession, in spite of their organizational structures being corporatized.
Among private railways in Japan, 16 companies are categorized as "major", these same companies also utilize quadruple track and skip-stop services like varying hierarchies of express trains. They are often profitable and tend to be less expensive per passenger-kilometer than JR trains that also run less dense regional routes, and assumed a heavy burden of the former JNR debt. Private railways corporations in Japan also run and generate profits from a variety of other businesses that depend on the traffic generated through their transit systems: hotels, department stores, supermarkets, resorts, and real estate development and leasing.
Japan railways whether government run, semi-public, or private business, are regulated by the Ministry of Land, Infrastructure, Transport and Tourism. They may join unions such as National Railway Workers' Union, but their abilities to call a strike is severely limited by government legislation; there is very little tolerance for railway work stoppage. Employees of private railways may legally strike but its unheard of in Japan. There have only been two notable railroad strikes in Japanese history, both by employees of government run entities (government employees are legally barred from striking): One in 1973, and a major strike protesting the breakup (and layoffs of tens of thousands of employees) of JNR in 1985.
Though private railways such as industrial railways have existed in Japan they are not deemed shitetsu nor mintetsu in Japanese, as their purpose is not public transit.
Tokyo Metro is a member of Associations of Private Japanese Railways but is under special laws and its stock is owned by Japanese Government and Tokyo Metropolis (pending privatization). Whether Tokyo Metro counts as Shitetsu depends on the speaker.
In the United States, a private railroad is a railroad owned by a company and serves only that company, and does not hold itself out as a "common carrier" (i.e., it does not provide rail transport services for the general public).
- "Who Can Strike in Japan". www.crosscurrents.hawaii.edu.


FLORES fabio fernando
Melliferous insects and the uses assigned to their products in the northern Yungas of Salta, Argentina
FLORES, FABIO FERNANDO; HILGERT, NORMA INÉS; LUPO, LILIANA CONCEPCIÓN
Journal of Ethnobiology and Ethnomedicine
Lugar: Londres; Año: 2018 vol. 14 p. 1 - 15
AbstractBackground: The order Hymenoptera comprises melliferous insects (bees, wasps and bumblebees); among them, stingless bees comprise a diverse group of eusocial insects present in tropical and subtropical areas. Of a total ofapproximately 500 species, 400 are found in the Neotropics. On the continent of America, before the introduction of Apis mellifera, these insects represented the main source of honey and wax. In Argentina, ethnobiological investigations had been carried out on this group of insects, principally in the Atlantic Forest and Chaco regions. Out of a total of 33 species, only 14 were recorded for use or breeding. In the Yungas, however, there are no ethnobiological studies analyzing this group of species, although the use of their products is mentioned in different ethnobotanical works. This paper studies the knowledge and uses of melliferous insects by the inhabitants of the village of Baritú and surrounding.Method: Information on location,management and duties assigned (e.g., preparation and administration) to deal with bee products like honey, pollen, wax and propolis was obtained through semi-structured interviews. Besides, reference material was collected to identify melliferous insects known and used in the region.Results: Fifteen ethnospecies were identified and grouped locally according to their defensive behavior. The culturally most important species is the stingless bee Plebeia sp. nov.?mansita-, in terms of frequency of citations and diversity of uses, and among those that sting, the honeybee Apis mellifera?extranjera-. Honey, pollen, wax, and propolis of Plebeia sp.nov. had the highest current frequency of use. Honey is used in food (incorporated at pure state, as a complement and in drinks), as nutraceutical food and in medicinal preparations. In addition, it is an important resource for marketing during the warm season, infusions being the main mode of administration. Pollen is used as a supplement for food and alcoholicdrinks, wax mainly in candle making, and propolis.Conclusion: The data obtained in this study complements the information available in ethnobotanical studies carried out in the region. The present study is the first on melliferous insects in the area. A new species of stingless bee the genus Plebeia was registered, and it was observed that the known distribution of others has increased.


- CDC's Influenza Website
- Is it a cold or the flu?
- Similarities and Differences between Flu and COVID-19
- Protection & Prevention
- Q & A about Flu Season
- Key Facts about Seasonal Flu Vaccine
- News Releases
- Influenza Reporting Forms
- Weekly Influenza Surveillance Reports
- Tackle the Flu - Order Form
- Sentinel Provider ILI Surveillance
- Medical and Public Health Professionals
- Information for Schools & Childcare Providers (CDC)
- Information for Parents (CDC)
- Information for Businesses (CDC)
- 2020-2021 Flu Outreach Toolkits
Influenza (flu) is a contagious respiratory illness caused by influenza viruses. Symptoms can include fever, cough, sore throat, runny or stuff nose, muscle or body aches, headaches, chills and fatigue (tiredness). Some people may have vomiting and diarrhea. The flu can cause mild to severe illness, and at times can lead to hospitalization or death. Some people, such as older people, young children, and people with certain health conditions, are at high risk for serious flu complications. The best way to prevent the flu is by getting vaccinated each year.
A yearly flu vaccine is recommended for everyone 6 months and older without an increased risk for a serious adverse reaction.
How to Protect Yourself
The single best way to prevent the flu is to get a flu vaccine every year.
A yearly flu vaccine is recommended for everyone 6 months and older without an increased risk for a serious adverse reaction. It is especially important that certain people get vaccinated either because they are at high risk of having serious flu-related complications or because they live with or care for people at high risk for developing flu-related complications.
You should receive a flu vaccine by the end of October, if possible. Vaccination should continue to be offered as long as flu viruses are circulating, even in January or later. While seasonal flu outbreaks can happen as early as October, during most seasons flu activity peaks in January or later. It is best to get vaccinated before flu viruses start to spread in your community since it takes about two weeks after vaccination for antibodies to develop in the body and provide protection against the flu.
For more information about seasonal flu vaccines, visit Key Facts About Seasonal Flu Vaccine.
How To Protect You and Your Family from the Flu
- Get the Flu Vaccine
- Cover your nose and mouth with a tissue when you cough or sneeze, and throw the tissue in the trash after using it. If you do not have a tissue, cover your coughs and sneezes with the inside of your elbow, not your bare hands.
- Wash your hands often with soap and water. If soap and water are not available, use an alcohol-based hand rub.
- Avoid touching your eyes, nose and mouth. Germs spread this way.
- Try to avoid close contact with sick people.
- If you are sick with flu-like illness, it is recommended that you stay home for at least 24 hours after your fever is gone except to get medical care or for other necessities. (Your fever should be gone without the use of a fever-reducing medicine.)
- While sick, limit contact with others as much as possible to keep from infecting them.
What to Do if You Think You Have the Flu
Your illness might be the flu if you have fever, cough, sore throat, runny or stuffy nose, body aches, headache, chills or fatigue (tiredness). Some people may have vomiting and diarrhea. People may be infected with the flu and have respiratory symptoms without a fever.
If you develop flu-like symptoms and are concerned about your illness, especially if you are at high risk for complications of the flu, you should consult your health care provider. It is very difficult to distinguish the flu from other infections on the basis of symptoms alone. Most people with the flu have mild illness and do not need medical care. However, if you have symptoms of flu and are in a high risk group, or are very sick and worried about your illness, contact your health care provider. There are tests that can determine if you have the flu. There are also drugs your doctor may prescribe for treating the flu called antivirals.
If you get the flu, get plenty of rest, drink a lot of liquids, and avoid using alcohol and tobacco. Also, you can take medications such as Tylenol to relieve the fever and muscle aches associated with the flu. Never give aspirin to children or teenagers who have flu-like symptoms, particularly fever. Stay home for at least 24 hours after your fever is gone without the use of a fever-reducing medicine, except to get medical care or other necessities.


Puzzles to test mathematical skills, set by Anita Straker. Solutions below More brainteasers on www.tes.co.ukteacherbrainteasers
Mark has found a three-digit number. He can read the number back to front or upside down but it is always the same.
What is Mark's mystery number?
Find all the possibilities.
A bit fishy
The scales of a large pink fish are made up of the archs of circles with radius 2cm.
What is the area of one of the scales?
SOLUTION A bit fishy (ages 11 to 14) There is no need to use pi. The fish scale is made up of quadrants A and B, + rectangle WXYZ, minus quadrants A and B, so its area equals the area of WXYZ. The width of the rectangle = the radius of the circle, and its length is twice the radius. Its area is therefore 8cm2.
SOLUTION Mark's mystery (ages 6 to 9) 101, 111, 181, 808, 818, 888


The /ɪə/ diphthong is spelled <eer>, <ear> or <are>. The /eə/ diphthong is spelled <air>, <ear> or <are>.
This is a contrast between two diphthongs with a difference in starting position but with the same direction of movement. It is a problem for learners and some native speakers, especially New Zealanders.
Interesting pairs include:
The density figure is 10.4%. The set makes 47 semantic contrasts giving a loading of 47%.
beer bare beers bares beer bear beers bears bier bare biers bares bier bear biers bears beard bared cheer chair cheered chaired cheering chairing cheers chairs cheery chary clear Clare compeer compare compeers compares dear dare dears dares dearie dairy dearies dairies ear air ears airs ear ere ear heir ears heirs eerie airy eerily airily earring airing earrings airings fear fair fears fairs fear fare feared fared fearing faring fears fares hear hair hears hairs hear hare hears hares hearing haring here hair here hare leer lair leers lairs leered laird mere mare meres mares near ne'er peer pair peered paired peering pairing peers pairs peer pear peers pears peer pare peered pared peering paring peers pares pier pair piers pairs pier pear piers pears pier pare piers pares rear rare really rarely rearing raring rhea rare shear share sheared shared shears shares shearing sharing sheer share sneer snare sneered snared sneers snares sneering snaring spear spare speared spared spears spares spearing sparing steer stair steers stairs steer stare steers stares steered stared steering staring tear tare tears tares weir ware weirs wares weir wear weirs wears weird wared weary wary wearier warier weariest wariest wearily warily weariness wariness
Credit: John Higgins


Common grackles are glossy, iridescent blackbirds with elongated bodies and long legs and tail. Adult upperparts are dark bronzy purple, with an iridescent blue-green head and a bright yellow eye. The bill is long and slightly curved. The tail is long and curled upwards on the edges during the breeding season; males often fly with the tail held in a shallow V. Underparts are similar to upperparts. Females are similar, but duller and browner with a short, straight tail. Song is a harsh gurgling squeak: “kree del eeeek.” Call is a harsh “chlack.”
Icteridae (blackbirds) in the order Passeriformes
Length: 12½ inches (tip of bill to tip of tail).
Where To Find
Commonly seen in urban and rural areas, parks, farm lots, pastures, lawns, and lakeshores. Populations are strong continent-wide, though at 73 million birds they are no where near their historic peak of 191 million. Unlike the European starling, which is a nonnative invasive species, the common grackle is native to our continent and is a component of our nation’s natural inheritance.
Common grackles forage on the ground for a variety of seeds, insects, aquatic animals, and even small mammals. Animal foods such as grubs are sought especially during nesting season, for the protein they provide the growing young. Grackles are infamous corn and rice eaters, though they also help farmers by eating insect pests.
Common summer and winter resident; uncommon in northern Missouri during winter.
The creaky calling, purposeful strutting, and courtship displays of grackles are common signs of spring. Bulky nests are usually built in evergreens or other bushy trees and are constructed of twigs, grasses, and other materials, reinforced with mud. Clutches comprise 1-7 eggs, which hatch in 11-15 days. At first, the young make cheeping sounds, but their demanding voices become louder and creakier as they grow. They fledge in 10-17 days, then follow their parents as they forage on the ground.
It is believed that common grackle numbers jumped dramatically as American settlers converted the continent’s forests into cropland; our activities have expanded its habitat. Grackles eat corn in nearly all stages of the crop’s development, and farmers consider them pests.
When grackles raid another bird’s nest, snap up grasshoppers, pick grubs from the soil, or pluck leeches from a turtle’s leg, they are predators. When they eat berries, they distribute seeds. The native seeds they ate before European settlement used to cover America’s once-vast grasslands.
About Birds in Missouri
About 350 species of birds are likely to be seen in Missouri, though nearly 400 have been recorded within our borders. Most people know a bird when they see one — it has feathers, wings, and a bill. Birds are warm-blooded, and most species can fly. Many migrate hundreds or thousands of miles. Birds lay hard-shelled eggs (often in a nest), and the parents care for the young. Many communicate with songs and calls.


The Types of Process Flow under Process Costing: A product can flow through a factory in numerous fashions. There are three Types of Process Flow formats associated with process costing — sequential, parallel, and selective—are illustrated here to indicate that basically the same costing procedures can be applied to all types of process flow or product flow situations.
Three Types of Process Flow under Process Costing:
1. Sequential Process Flow :
In a sequential product flow, each item manufactured goes through the same set of operations. Graphically, this might be shown as:
Materials are started I the mixing department. Labor and factory overhead are added when the work is overheated are added; when the work is finished in the Mixing Department, it moves to the refining department. This second process and any subsequent processes any add more materials or simply work on the partially completed input from the preceding process, adding only labor and factory overhead. After the product has been processed by the Finishing department, it is a completed product and becomes a part of Finished Goods.
2. Parallel Process Flow:
In a partial product flow, certain portions of work are done simultaneously and then brought together a in a final process or processes for completion and transfer to Finished Goods. As in the figure
As in the previous illustration, materials may be added in processes subsequent to the first ones.
3. Selective Process Flow:
In a selective product flow the product moves to different departments within the plant, depending upon the desired final product. For example, in meat processing, after the initial butchering process, some of the product goes directly to the Packaging Department and then to Finished Goods; some goes to the Smoking Department and then to the Packaging Department and finally to Finished Goods; some to the Grinding Department, then to the Packaging Department, and lastly to Finished Goods.
Which types of Process Flow will be selected in an industry mostly depends on product processing system.Transfer of costs from the Butchering Department involves consideration of joint cost allocation, which will be discussed later on.


James Monroe (1758 - 1831) was the fifth president of United States of America
From 3rd April 1917 until 3rd March 1825. Monroe\\\'s public career was shaped by three great influences: the American Revolution; the principles of the Republican Party and his diplomatic experiences. He worked to achieve the revolutionary ideal of a representative government based on free institutions, first through the battle to defeat the Federalists and, secondly, as president, by attempting to eliminate party divisions, which he regarded as destructive of republican government.
James Monroe was born on 28th April in 1758 in Westmoreland County in Virginia
His father’s name was Spence Monroe whos relatives were traced to the side of Charles the first who was captured and exiled in Virginia in 1649. His mother Elizabeth Jones Monroe was Welch that is nearly all we can find about her, for some reasons there is not a lot to know about her. Monroe’s parents died when he was in his mid-teens, his father passed away in 1774 and his mother’s death is supposed a bit earlier though her actual date of death is unknown. James and his siblings shared an inheritance of land and some slaves, and he and his two brothers became wards of their uncle, Joseph Jones. Their sister was already married. Jones became a mentor and friend to James, often offering him advice and support.
James Monroe at the age of eleven attended a school run by Reverend Archibald Chambell. In 1774 he followed in his studies at the collage of William and Glory in Williamsburg in Virginia and finally graduated 1776. At that time it was an interesting and exiting time in Williamsburg. Royal Governor Dunmore had fled the capital, fearing that the colonists were a danger. By the winter of 1776, in the wake of Lexington and Concord, Monroe had joined the Virginia infantry. He became an officer in the Continental Army and joined General George Washington’s army in New York.
During the Revolution
Monroe fought with distinction in several important battles, including Trenton, Monmouth, Brandywine, and Germantown. After recuperating, he became a staff officer for General William Alexander. By the end of his service with the Continental Army, he had gained the rank of major. He resigned his commission in the Continental Army in 1779 and was appointed colonel in the Virginia service. In 1780, Governor Thomas Jefferson sent Monroe to North Carolina to report on the advance of the British.
After the war
Monroe studied law, taking Thomas Jefferson as his mentor. He was elected to the Virginia Assembly in 1782 and then served on the Council of State, which advised the governor. Elected to the Continental Congress in 1783, Monroe worked for expanding the power of Congress, organizing government for the western country, and protecting American navigation on the Mississippi River. The next merry event for James Monroe as a member of the Continental Congress, was his meeting with Elizabeth Kortright, the daughter of Lawrence Kortright, a prominent local merchant who had lost much of his wealth during the Revolution. She was sixteen at the time, and Monroe was twenty-six; they married the following year, on 16th of February 1786. Monroe with his new bride moved to Fredericksburg, Virginia, where he practiced law.
Among the leading political figures in Virginia, Monroe exhibited an independent streak when he voted against ratifying the U.S. Constitution as a delegate to the state\\\'s ratification convention. He wanted a Constitution that allowed for the direct election of senators as well as the President, and the inclusion of a strong bill of rights. Monroe unsuccessfully challenged James Madison for a seat in the U.S. House of Representatives. Monroe lost by 300 votes, yet the state legislature appointed him to the U.S. Senate in 1790.
He thereafter joined with Madison and Jefferson to oppose the Federalist policies championed by Vice President John Adams and Secretary of the Treasury Alexander Hamilton. The three Virginians would remain lifelong friends and allies. In 1794, President George Washington sent Monroe to Paris as U.S. minister to France. James Monroe spends there two years. When Thomas Paine, the British pamphleteer and supporter of the American Revolution was imprisoned for having spoken against the execution of King Louis XVI, Monroe won his release and allowed Paine to live for a time with his family at the American minister\\\'s residence in Paris.
Was an unstable place and the new minister had to be careful. His mission was to uphold President Washington’s policy of strict neutrality toward Britain and France but also not to put America on the first place to favor. This task became harder when France learned that the United States had signed a new accord -- the Jay Treaty -- with Great Britain. When France asked Monroe to spell out its details, the President found himself unable to comply: Jay had refused to send him a copy of the document. Although Monroe told the French that the treaty did not alter their agreements, the French were convinced that the United States now favored Britain. In the end, U.S. domestic politics doomed Monroe’s tenure in Paris. The Federalists blamed Monroe for deteriorating relations with France, and Washington recalled him.
Monroe returned to Virginia to practice law and attend to his plantations. He was elected governor in 1799 and worked vigorously in support of public education and the election of Thomas Jefferson as President in 1800. In 1803, the victorious Jefferson sent Monroe to France as a special envoy to help negotiate the Louisiana Purchase. Monroe then served as the U.S. minister to Britain from 1803 to 1807 with a brief stint as a special envoy to Spain in 1805. In Spain, Monroe tried to negotiate a treaty to cede the Spanish territory along the Gulf of Mexico to the United States.
However, he soon realized that Spain had no intention of signing such a treaty and so returned to Britain in 1808. Monroe was tapped by dissident Republicans to oppose Madison for the Democratic-Republican presidential nomination. Although Monroe allowed himself to be nominated, he never considered his challenge to Madison seriously. Madison easily won the 1808 presidential election. Three years later, in January 1811, Monroe was once again elected governor of Virginia, though he did not serve for long; that April, Madison named him secretary of state.
At that time Monroe focused on relations with Britain and France which were at war with one another. The United States wanted France and Britain to respect American commercial interests as befitted those of a neutral country. Although both nations targeted American trade, the Madison administration concentrated primarily on Britain because of its frequent practice of seizing U.S. sailors and forcing them to serve in the British navy.
The United States declared war on Britain in June 1812, but the war was far from popular. Many New Englanders found that it disrupted their access to European markets. Additional numbers thought that neutrality rights were not a sufficient reason to go to war. However, Madison and Monroe both believed that the United States needed to resist British depredations by force of arms. From the beginning, the war was a disaster for the United States.
The army was unequipped and unprepared, and the initial military actions resulted in defeat. When Madison’s secretary of war resigned, Monroe took over the office on a temporary basis, from December 1812 to February 1813; he would do so again from August 1814 until March 1815. Monroe was well suited to the demands of the post because of his understanding of the military and his strong organizational skills. He helped reorganize the army and brought new energy to the war effort.
In August 1814, when British troops appeared at the mouth of the Potomac River, Monroe led a scouting party to report on their advance. He sent word to Madison warning that the British were marching toward Washington, D.C. As British troops headed toward the capital, Monroe stayed in the city to help with its evacuation. After the British attacked Washington and burned most of the government buildings, Monroe returned to the city. Madison then placed him in charge of its defenses. Monroe’s popularity rose after the war, due to his tireless service in Madison’s cabinet.
A new generation of war veterans
Would remember his leadership with fondness and respect, leaving him well-positioned to receive the Democratic-Republican nomination for President in the 1816 election. He was seated to the presidency in 1817. Soon after his inauguration, he undertook a goodwill tour of New England, a Federalist stronghold, and was so well received that a Boston newspaper acclaimed his visit as the beginning of an \\\"era of good feelings.\\\" The phrase stuck and became a byword for the period of Monroe\\\'s presidency.
Three important treaties were concluded during Monroe\\\'s first term in office. The Rush-Bagot Agreement of 1817 with Britain limited the number of naval vessels permitted on American inland waters, and the Convention of 1818 fixed the northwestern boundary between the United States and British Canada. Under the Adams-Onís (or Transcontinental) Treaty of 1819, the United States acquired East Florida from Spain, which also gave up its claims to West Florida. A potentially explosive sectional dispute arose in 1819, following Missouri\\\'s application for admission to the Union as a slave state. The United States then consisted of an equal number of free states and slave states.
The Missouri Compromise of 1820
Provided for the admission of Missouri as a slave state and Maine as a free state, maintaining the balance. Monroe ran unopposed for re-election in 1820 and received all but one of the electoral votes cast. Monroe\\\'s attitude toward domestic issues reflected his concept of limited government. He had maintained a cautious stance during the Missouri crisis, allowing it to be resolved by Congress.
In 1822 he vetoed the Cumberland Road Bill as being beyond the power of Congress, but recommended a constitutional amendment that would give the federal government the authority to undertake such \\\"great national works.\\\" The most memorable event connected with Monroe\\\'s presidency was the proclamation of the doctrine that bears his name. It began as a public declaration of U.S. policy, expressed in a message to Congress in 1823 and it became a foundation of the country\\\'s foreign policy, particularly in regard to Latin America.
Upon his retirement from the presidency in 1825, Monroe returned to Oak Hill into his home in Virginia. In 1826 he became a regent of the University of Virginia, and in 1829 he presided over the Virginia State Constitutional Convention. After the death of his wife in 1830, Monroe went to live with his daughter Maria Hester and her husband. He died on 4th July 1831, at the age of 73. In 1858, on the 100th anniversary of his birth, his remains were moved to Richmond in Virginia.
James Monroe was the first man in America who drove on the steam engine and he also was the firs president of America who decided and proclaimed the lands of America. Independent internet bulletin “Against the flow” declared in the manner of Monroe’s Doctrine.
“In 1994 or 1995 in USA we recorded in the television dialog with one American writer, who spoke about his new book, where he describe 37 wars interventions of US militaries in foreign consummate countries. In this dialog he also mentioned that the destination of the 36 inventions were to get economical, political and other advantages and that only the last invention in the 1994 on Haiti had human character. ”
And only there they also mentioned Monroe Doctrine.
”Monroe Doctrine is principle, which administrated and also still administrates the foreign diplomacy of USA at relation toward Latino American landscapes. Only USA had the right to say-so about fate of Latino American landscapes. ”


The Shoalwater and Corio Bays Area Ramsar site is part of the largest ‘wilderness’ area within the Central Queensland Coast Biogeographic Region. In 1996 the site was officially listed as a Ramsar Wetland as it met six of the nine selection criterion. As of today, Shoalwater and Corio Bays meet eight criterion. Within the internationally significant site there are a variety of wetland types in a near undisturbed state including; rocky reefs, mangroves, marshes, seagrass beds, tree and shrub-dominated swamps, and peat swamps. This diversity of wetlands, combined with its location midway between the tropical north and the subtropical south-east, has led to a diverse faunal community including threatened species. These species include, but are not limited to the internationally endangered honey blue eye (Pseudomugil mellis), four species of marine turtle, large numbers of shorebirds (waders), and the most substantial populations of dugongs remaining in the southern section of the Great Barrier Reef Marine Park.
Natural Processes Affecting Values
The climate of Shoalwater and Corio Bays is subtropical, with half of all rainfall received in the first few months of each year. The Ramsar site contains a wide range of diverse landscapes including undulating lowlands and hills, riverine plains, sand dunes, mountains and sandy beaches some of which are flanked by coastal cliffs. The Ramsar site also lies in a region which experiences the greatest tidal variation on the east coast of Australia which has formed expansive intertidal wetlands.
Activities Affecting Values
The three most immediate threats to the Ramsar values within site are (1) unauthorised vehicle use, (2) recreational fishing, and (3) inappropriate fire regimes. Unauthorised vehicle use damages dunes and associated vegetation; recreational fishing can harm marine life through marine debris and boat strikes and inappropriate fire regimes can harm vegetation communities by subjecting them to fire regimes they’re not adapted to.
Planning, Policies and Documents
The Shoalwater and Corio Bays Area Ramsar site is approximately 239,100 hectares in size and therefore requires implementation of substantial management policy and plans to ensure it remains in good health.
Key documents informing the management of the site include the Ramsar Information Sheet (RIS), Ramsar Management Summary (RMS), Ecological Character Description (ECD) and the Information Sheet on East Asian-Australasian (EAA) Flyway Network Sites. Other site-specific plans for the Shoalwater Bay Training Area (Department of Defence) and Byfield National Park (Queensland Government) also contain management guidelines and actions for the Ramsar site.
For up-to-date information regarding plans, policies and documents that affect all Queensland wetlands, including Ramsar sites, please refer to the Queensland Department of Environment and Science website.
Most terrestrial areas of the Shoalwater Bay section are within the Shoalwater Bay Training Area (SWBTA) and are therefore the responsibility of the Department of Defence. Terrestrial land in the Corio Bay section is contained within the Byfield National Park and is the responsibility of the Queensland Government. The marine waters surrounding the Ramsar site are a combination of State and Australian territorial waters as the water body is partly Great Barrier Reef Marine Park (Australian Government) and the other is Great Barrier Reef Coast Marine Park (Queensland Government). Land use surrounding the Ramsar site includes National Park, military training, freehold land, commercial forest and unallocated State land.
Despite being in a mostly unmodified area, a number of threats are present at the Shoalwater and Corio Bays Area Ramsar site that could impact its ecological character. These include climate change, fire, commercial fishing, recreational use, pest species, surrounding land use and changes to Defence training.
Surveys of wetland condition in the Shoalwater Bay Training Area (intertidal wetlands, freshwater swamps and streams) provide a broad assessment of wetland health and baselines for future evaluation. Recent surveys conclude that the wetlands overall, are in good condition and are well managed. Furthermore, surveys of intertidal wetlands confirm the Ramsar site continues to be of international significance for migratory shorebirds.
List of contacts for organisations involved in managing the Shoalwater and Corio Bays Area Ramsar Site.
Map of the Shoalwater and Corio Bays Area Ramsar site.BACK TO TOP


Steve Furber and Sophie Wilson were the chief architects of the ARM (Advanced RISC Machines) microprocessor. The ARM processor was one of the very first to include the simplified, high performance architecture known as RISC (Reduced Instruction Set Computer). In this interview, Professor Furber describes his own background and the steps that led him to Acorn Computers and the creation of the ARM processor with Ms. Wilson. He further expands on his reasons for leaving Acorn and the research he is responsible for at the University of Manchester.
semiconductor history; Fellow Award Honoree; RISC; Acorn Computers; University of Manchester; Wilson, Roger; Wilson, Sophie; MIPS; IBM 801; Sun


- Books, Literature, and Writing
How to Tell a Human from an AI Robot?
It is clear that our technology is moving towards more automation and robotics and machine learning and decision making. Every industry will be affected one way or another. In some cases, they are obvious but others are subtle. When there is no physical interface, it is hard to tell sometimes. Here are some simple tests.
- June 2017.
It was Alan Turing who came up with the concept of artificial intelligence In the 1950s. His Turing test was a way to determine if a machine can fool a person in a conversation format.
I have also devised a few simple tests. Here is my list of ideas.
1. Tell a joke. A person will recognize when a joke is being made, even when if it is not that funny. On the other hand, an AI system will try to make sense out of the words and attempt at a response or if it is confused, will ask for clarification.
2. Say something satirical. It takes a person with knowledge of current affairs to recognize satire when it is said. An AI system, will be hard pressed to understand this concept.
3. Say something jibberish. This will also detect if a system is based on logic or human. A human, even a child, will know right away when something odd is said. A machine will first attempt to make sense out of a jibberish statement. It will act confused but may not recognize it as being a test.
4. Ask it to recite the number pi to the 10th digit? Most humans will not know the answer but a computer will be able to do it correctly without any delay.
5. Ask what is your favorite food? A person will say lobster or steak but an AI will not know the answer unless it was programmed into it. The next step is to follow up with what properties do you like about that food? A person will respond with the flavor, smell, texture... while a machine will say???
6. Describe one of your peak experiences. A person will respond with visiting the Grand Canyon or skydiving... while a machine will say - define peak?
7. Describe your favorite pet? A person will say my dog Sammy was the cutest thing...or I hate pets. A machine, does not have or own a pet.
8. Show it an optical illusion and ask it to describe what it sees.
Disappearing Dots - How many black dots do you see?
Optical Illusion Sample
In the image above, I see 2 dots moving from various locations depending on where I focus my eyes. There are really 12 dots according to the creator. A machine vision system will respond with the correct answer of 12 but a human will only see 1 or 2 at any given time.
I think you get the idea. A human is so much more complex than a smart computer. As good as a computer is with facts and figures, it is no match with our human intuition and intellect. We are just smarter and street wise and we can adapt to many situations. While scientist and engineers can make a robot live like with artificial skin and expressions and speech patterns and even gestures...they cannot be human. The instantaneous response cannot be duplicated. That is what make us unique.
© 2017 Jack Lee


Reopening the debate: Should children program computers?
In Mindstorms I made the claim that children can learn to program and that learning to program can affect the way they learn everything else. I had in mind something like the process of re-empowerment of probability: the ability to program would allow a student to learn and use powerful forms of proba- bilistic ideas. It did not occur to me that anyone could possibly take my statement to mean that learning to program would in itself have consequences for how children learn and think. But I reckoned without idea aversion. When the reference to ideas was filtered out of my claim that Logo could help children by car- rying ideas, what was left was a claim I never made that Logo would help children, period. I was amazed to find that experiments were being done in which tests of “problem-solving ability” were given to chil- dren before and after exposure to 20 or 30 hours of work with Logo. Papers were written on “the effects of programming (or of Logo or of the computer)” as if we were talking about the effects of a medical treatment.
The difference between these two conceptions of the role of programming is of the same kind as the dif- ference between the two interpretations of Piaget: in both cases the crucial difference is between pri- macy of the epistemological (talking about ideas) and primacy of the psychological (talking about how a person is affected by a treatment). I do not mean to dismiss the “treatment” studies as without value. For many children the opportunity to program a com- puter is a valuable experience and can foster impor- tant intellectual development. 16 But encouraging programming as an activity meant to be good in it- self is far removed, in its nature, from working at identifying ideas that have been disempowered and seeking ways to re-empower them. It is even further removed from picking up the challenge to expand and deepen the theory of idea power sketched in the previous section. In my discussion of Michael, I sug- gested that what would benefit him would be better support for idea work. What I am suggesting here is a program of idea work for educators. Of course it is harder to think about ideas than to bring a pro- gramming language into a classroom. You have to mess with actual ideas. But this is the kind of hard that will make teaching more interesting, just as idea work will do this for learning.


Through Waters Deep – Destroyer Tour: Gunnery
For over one hundred years, destroyers have served as versatile naval workhorses. In World War II, US destroyers escorted convoys, hunted submarines, fought surface battles, bombarded shore positions, rescued downed airmen and stranded sailors, and served as radar pickets to detect and fight incoming kamikaze flights.
In my new novel Through Waters Deep, Ens. Jim Avery serves on a fictional Gleaves-class destroyer, the USS Atwood. While researching the Waves of Freedom series, I visited two World War II destroyers, the Fletcher-class USS Cassin Young at the Charlestown Navy Yard in Boston and the Gearing-class USS Joseph P. Kennedy, Jr. at Battleship Cove in Fall River, MA. This week I’ll share photos from my tours:
Part 1—Topside: the various destroyer classes, and a bow-to-stern tour of the main deck.
Part 2—Below Decks: living quarters and working stations
Destroyers in World War II carried weaponry to fight submarines, surface ships, and aircraft. The exact armament carried by a destroyer varied widely depending on the class of destroyer, the year, and the theater of operation. Each destroyer had several 5-inch guns (the bore is five inches wide), the largest carried on destroyers.
They also carried 20-mm antiaircraft guns and the standard .50 caliber machine gun.
In mid-1942, the US Navy began installing the highly effective Bofors 40-mm antiaircraft gun.
Torpedoes were fired from tubes on the deck. Depth charges were rolled from racks on the stern or fired from “K-guns” or “Y-guns” to combat submarines.
On board the battleship USS Massachusetts in Battleship Cove, Fall River, MA, I was able to climb inside a 5-inch dual mount gun. While destroyers carried single mount guns, I was still thrilled to see inside the cramped space.
The loading tray of a gun is pictured below. The crew would load a 5-inch projectile (the explosive shell) and a powder case, close the spade, ram the ammunition into the barrel, point and train the gun, and fire it. And repeat.
Practice Loading Machine
To reduce wear and tear on the guns, crews ran drills on a practice loading machine on the main deck. Dummy projectiles and powder cases filled with sand were loaded, rammed, and “fired.” The practice ammunition would fall into a collecting tray to be reused.
Directly beneath each gun mount lay a handling room, with a magazine even deeper in the hull of the ship. Projectiles and cases were passed up from the handling room to the gun mount. The projectile hoist automatically set the fuzes of the projectiles as they were transported up to the gun mount. You can also see the panel boxes on the central column by the hoist, which play a role in Through Waters Deep.
High on top of the bridge superstructure sits the Mark 37 gun fire director. A gun trainer and a gun pointer would determine bearing and elevation of the target, while the rangefinder operator determined the range. [The rangefinder pictured below is in the turret for a 16-inch gun on the battleship USS Massachusetts, considerably larger than in the Mark 37] Electrical signals from the trainer, pointer, and rangefinder were transmitted down to the plotting room, where the Mark 1 computer would calculate a solution and automatically elevate and rotate the 5-inch guns to bear on the target.
Below decks beneath the gun director lay the interior communications and plotting room with its Mark 1 computer. Not an electronic machine like today’s computers, the Mark 1 used gears, cams, levers, and electrical circuits to perform calculations. Some data was entered by turning dials and some was entered electrically. The Mark 1 took the target’s speed and range and bearing and elevation, the destroyer’s speed and course, and wind speed and direction to calculate a firing solution. A gyro compensated for the ship’s pitch and roll. A truly remarkable piece of machinery!
Naval Ordnance and Gunnery (Navpers 16116). Bureau of Naval Personnel, Training Division, May 1944.
McComb, Dave. US Destroyers 1934-45: Pre-War Classes. Oxford: Osprey Publishing, 2010.
McComb, Dave. US Destroyers 1942-45: Wartime Classes. Oxford: Osprey Publishing, 2010.
Wiper, Steve. Warship Pictorial: USS Buchanan DD-484. Tucson, AZ: Classic Warships Publishing, 2009.
Harmon, J. Scott. U.S.S. Cassin Young (DD-793): A Fletcher Class Destroyer. Missoula, MT: Pictorial Histories Publishing Company, 1984.
Friedman, Norman. U.S. Destroyers: An Illustrated Design History. Annapolis, MD: Naval Institute Press, 1982.
Boston National Historical Park: USS Cassin Young. http://www.nps.gov/bost/learn/historyculture/usscassinyoung.htm
Destroyer History Foundation website. http://www.destroyerhistory.org
Tin Can Sailors Website. http://www.destroyers.org/index.html
[…] Part 3—Gunnery […]
[…] Part 3—Gunnery […]
Really like your books and look for them when in bookstores.


UK scientists developed a breathing aid for coronavirus patients in less than 100 hours. Some say the device can spread the virus.
- A team of engineers and clinicians scrambling to address the United Kingdom's ventilator shortage developed an alternative breathing aid.
- The breathing aid, known as a Continuous Positive Airway Pressure system, was developed in less than 100 hours.
- Unlike ventilators, which deliver oxygen through tubes, the CPAPs push air into the lungs through a face mask.
- However, the alternative devices could potentially aerosolize the new coronavirus or spread it through the air.
- Visit Business Insider's homepage for more stories.
A team of engineers and clinicians in the United Kingdom convened on March 18 to address the country's critical shortage ventilators for its novel coronavirus patients.
Less than 100 hours after their meeting, the team, which included engineers from University College London and Mercedes, found a seemingly workable solution in a breathing aid known as a Continuous Positive Airway Pressure system (CPAP).
By March 29, the country's medical equipment regulator approved the devices for production.
"This breathing aid was produced within a rapid timeframe - it took fewer than 100 hours from the initial meeting to production of the first device," UCL said in a statement.
Mercedes, which helped engineer the devices, can produce 300 CPAPs a day. The manufacturer "can scale up to 1,000 a day with one week's notice," Professor Rebecca Shipley, director of UCL's Institute of Healthcare Engineering, told BBC Newshour on Monday.
Unlike ventilators, which deliver oxygen through closed tubes, the CPAPs push air into the lungs through a face mask.
"It's a specialized tight-fitting mask or hood where we deliver oxygen under constant pressure," Shipley told the outlet. They deliver oxygen "at a rate which is therapeutic and hopefully can help patients manage their respiratory issues without them progressing to full ventilation."
When COVID-19, the disease caused by the coronavirus, significantly affects respiration, the device can aid breathing. It "has been used extensively in hospitals in Italy and China to help COVID-19 patients with serious lung infections to breathe more easily," a statement from Mercedes said.
The CPAPs, which have been used in Italian and Spanish hospitals, "will help to save lives by ensuring that ventilators, a limited resource, are used only for the most severely ill," Professor Mervyn Singer, a UCL Hospital critical-care consultant, told CNN.
Because of the ventilator shortage, which has also troubled the US, healthcare workers and experts have scrambled to find and develop alternatives.
A dilemma laid bare: the breathing aid may spread the coronavirus, but there aren't enough ventilators for everyone
Although the UK team won praise for quickly creating the breathing aid, some health officials have raised concerns about the safety of CPAPs, which they say can spread the coronavirus.
At the Life Care Center of Kirkland, a nursing home in Washington state, health workers began using the devices in late Febuary for patients with respiratory problems. They didn't know the patients had COVID-19 until later.
"It's best practice for us for people with respiratory illnesses," Jim Whitney, a Redland Fire Department medical administrator whose team responded to 911 calls from the nursing home, told NPR. "We had no idea that we potentially had COVID patients there."
But the devices could potentially aerosolize the virus. The American Society of Anesthesiologists has warned against using them for COVID-19 patients, saying they "may increase the risk of infectious transmission."
The gaping need for ventilators drew in requests from the British government to a wide variety of private-sector groups for production help through a consortium of engineering firms including companies like Airbus and BAE Systems.
The group, named Ventilator Challenge UK, received an order for 10,000 of two models, according to The Guardian, and will join orders requested from companies like Dyson to bring 41,000 ventilators to the NHS.
Do you have a personal experience with the coronavirus you'd like to share? Or a tip on how your town or community is handling the pandemic? Please email email@example.com and tell us your story.
And get the latest coronavirus analysis and research from Business Insider Intelligence on how COVID-19 is impacting businesses.
- Theatres cross pre-pandemic gross revenue collection despite pricey movie tickets
- Former Twitter India head quits his latest metaverse edtech venture
- Realme Pad X tablet with Snapdragon processor launched in China, coming soon to India – check out price, specifications and features
- Amid rumours of Telegram Premium, the messaging app reportedly drops its ‘free forever’ tag line
- Third-party apps connected to your car may be stealing your data


Sir Thomas More (later canonized St. Thomas More) is famous for his book Utopia (1515) and for his martyrdom. As Chancellor to Henry VIII he refused to sanction Henry's divorce of Queen Catherine. More was imprisoned, tried and executed. This drama was made into a play and an excellent (though not historically accurate) film - A Man of for All Seasons.
More is an excellent example of the early English Renaissance. He was friends with such humanists as Erasmus, John Colet, Thomas Linacre and others. Renaisance thinkers were mainly concerned with four ancient schools -- Aristotelianism, Platonism, Stoicism and Epicureanism. The alliance between Platonism and Christianity was as old as Saint Augustine, but had been revived in the Renaissance by Marsilio Ficino. Aristotle had been Christianized by St Thoma Aquinas. Christianity and Stoicism had many close connections from early on. Epicureanism was being Christianized by Lorenzo Valla and Erasmus. This process was to be continued by Pierre Gassendi.
More coined the term "utopia" which is a pun meaning both "good place" and "no place." More's Utopia is discovered on a voyage to the newly discovered Americas. It is thus one of the first books to invoke the analogy between the great voyages of discovery and discoveries of the mind. Plato's Republic and the Laws provide models for More's reflections on the good citizen and the good state, but More's Utopia is significantly different from these models and blends a variety of philosophical influences. In contrast to the Platonic Republic, More's society is a communistic democracy and not an aristocracy with communism confined to the ruling elite. The new emphasis on the philosophy of pleasure comes from More's understanding of Epicureanism. From the Stoics More gets the notions that mankind form a natural commnnity and the assumed existance of natural law.
More's Utopia established the genre of philosophical utopias much the way in which Montaigne and Bacon established the essay as a philosophical form.
1478 February 7, born in Milk street, London to John More who was a lawyer and would become a judge on the king's bench. 1491 After studying at St. Anthony's School in Threadneedle street, is placed in the household of John Morton, Lord Chancelor to Henry VII and Archbishop of Canterbury. 1492 Enters Oxford for two years of study. 1494 At his father's insistence goes to Inns of Court to study law. 1496 Admitted to Lincoln's Inn, Oxford. 1497 Meets Erasmus. 1499 Becomes barrister after completion of his law studies. 1504 Becomes a member of parliament. 1505 After considering the priesthood decides against it and marries Jane Colt, saying he would rather become a good husband than a bad priest. 1509 Elected bencher at Lincoln's Inn. 1510 Appointed under-sheriff of London. 1511 Jane dies leaving him with four children. He marries Alice Middleton, a widow, a month later. 1515 Sent on a diplomatic mission to Antwerp where he begins writing Utopia. 1518 Made master of requests and a member of the privy council of Henry VIII. 1523 Elected speaker of parliament. 1529 Made Lord Chancellor. 1532 Resigns chancellorship finding he cannot support Henry's attempts to divorce Catherine and marry Anne Boleyn. 1533 December, forbidden to publish. 1534 April, sent to the Tower for refusing to take the oath of the Act of Succession. While in the Tower writes Dialogue of Comfort Against Tribulation and De Tristitia Christi. 1535 July 1, tried and convicted for treason. July 6, beheaded on Tower Hill. 1935 May, is canonized by Pope Pius XI.


There are many different animals called rats, and they all have different behaviors, diets and strategies. The word "rat" is not a precise scientific term and is sometimes applied to animals that are not closely related. Generally, larger, long-tailed rodents are called rats, whereas smaller ones are called mice. The best known rats are brown rats. They live on every continent but Antarctica and are commonly kept as family pets and used in laboratory experiments.
Brown Rat Basics
Brown rats are omnivores, meaning that they can eat a wide variety of different foods. They will eat cereal grains, fruits and vegetables, scavenge for scraps left by larger predators and hunt small animals. Rats have extremely acute senses of smell and hearing but a poor sense of sight. They are nocturnal creatures that live communally in burrows. They are extremely intelligent, particularly for rodents, and are excellent swimmers. The brown rat uses all of its abilities to find food.
Brown Rat Feeding
The brown rat primarily uses its sense of smell to find food. Brown rats can recognize appetizing scents like humans but have much more highly developed noses and can locate food from further away. Once the rat finds the food, it carries it in its mouth and drags it off somewhere safe to eat. When hunting, brown rats use a variety of different skills. For example, brown rats living near fisheries sometimes hunt very small fish. They first locate the fish by smell or from memory. They then find out more precisely where the fish are using their sense of hearing. They dive into the water, catch the fish in their mouth and take it away. Similarly, brown rats who infest human settlements might have to use other skills besides a sense of smell to find food. They have to learn to navigate the space behind the wall and tunnel into cabinets to find food.
Isaiah David is a freelance writer and musician living in Portland, Ore. He has over five years experience as a professional writer and has been published on various online outlets. He holds a degree in creative writing from the University of Michigan.


Finite Element Analysis
Introduction to FEA
What does 'finite element' mean? Well, in the real world, everything that occurs results from the interaction between atoms (and sub-particles of those atoms). Billions and billions and billions of them. If we were to simulate the world in a computer, we would have to simulate this interaction based on the simple laws of physics. However, no computer can process the near infinite number of atoms in objects, so instead we model 'finite' groups of them.
For example, we might model a gallon of water by dividing it up into 1000 parts and measuring the interaction of these linked parts. If you divide into too few parts, your simulation will be too inaccurate. If you divide into too many, your computer will sit there for years calculating the result!
Here is an example of flowing water being divided up into finite parts:
Equations of equilibrium, in conjunction with applicable physical considerations such as compatibility and constitutive relations, are applied to each element, and a system of simultaneous equations is constructed.
Why use FEA?
By using simulation, you can find fault points within your designs, simulate ideas as you think of them, and even quantitize and optimize them. I personally even use simulation to verify my theories - if the theoretical simulation matches what actually happens, then my theory is proven!
Sometimes you can hand calculate certain designs. But sometimes a design can be too complex, making FEA great for non-symmetric problems with ultra-complicated geometries.
Warning Against FEA
What does this mean? Pick up some introduction material! Don't expect to do advanced computational fluid simulations without knowing what a boundary layer or a Reynolds number is! Want to do a bending beam analysis? You need to know things such as what the modulus of elasticity is!
Preprocessor (Setting up the Problem)
Meshing (Defining Elements)
This following example is a very rough meshing of my robot fish that I used for a CFD (computational fluid dynamics) analysis. I created a special simplified CAD of my robot fish, removing sharp corners, internal features, unnecessary edges, etc. to greatly speed up CFD analysis.
Looking closely at the above image, you can see that there is a jagged rough triangular edge on the front of the robot. However in my design I called for a smooth rounded front edge! The reason? Insufficient meshing. Increasing the mesh density, I now get this:
This meshing turned out to be appropriate enough for the solution accuracy that I required. Below is what the rounded front now looks like. Not perfectly round, but it will do. There are many other tricks/methods you can employ but too detailed to go into for this tutorial.
However, what if I wanted something more accurate? Below is an even higher density mesh. But remember, denser the mesh, greater the computational time/memory required.
More examples . . . For fun I modeled this stirring chamber shown below. It has an internal chamber with three pipes of different diameters. A fluid enters in one pipe, then gets mixed by turbulence and finally exits the other two pipes.
Now if I were to optimize this stirring chamber, how would I know how well it mixes without building it? CFD!
First, I meshed the chamber and then I ran a quickie simulation to verify I set everything up properly. Looking around a bit, I noticed a mistake . . . One of the outlet pipes was so poorly meshed it wasn't even round!!! Notice the square opening below:
The rest of the simulation was fine, so what I did was improve the mesh just around the pipe inlet only. Why just the pipe? Increasing the mesh of the entire device would have led to wasted computational time! Basically, you want finer meshes around sharp curve areas and rougher meshes around areas that have few features and small gradients. This is the improved mesh:
Rerunning the simulation with the locally improved mesh, I get this much more accurate result:
Looking at my solution (plotted as velocity field slices) I found several more obvious errors, each resulting from an improper meshing. Looking at the inlet pipe, you can see a saw-tooth like shape (see red arrow), and a corresponding high pressure buildup at each 'tooth'. This pipe must be smooth!
So I increased the mesh density some for just that pipe to remove the problem and got this different and more accurate result:
However there are still jagged edges in the above image. Since it wasn't acceptable, and I didn't mind the significantly higher computational time required for yet a 3rd CFD run, I then got this near perfect input pipe:
This is what the velocity field (red for fast and blue for slow) looked when finished:
CFD - Computational Fluid Dynamics
For example, going back to my stirring part, I wanted to measure the stir. To do this, I need a particle tracing - called so because a line is drawn of the path the particle takes. I also have the velocity recorded while the particle traces that path, resulting in the different colors.
This is the result:
Notice the swirl at the bottom right of the above image. This means its mixing really well. Success? Nope - you will also notice that most of the fluid that enters the swirl never exits, meanings its trapped stagnant water! To correct for it, I'd have to reposition the angled plate in the center of the chamber and redo the 2 hour simulation.
Here is a view of it in 3D, using ribbon cable tracing:
I also did a particle tracing about my robot fish tail fin to see how it interacted with water flowing at an angle. I wanted to test the effectiveness of the tail as a rudder:
A top view of the robot fish tail:
But I can do so much more! Each element of fluid applies a force against objects - remember that the program determines interactions using physics equations. I can not only determine this force, but also pressure distribution. Now I can determine what could be changed to optimize that pressure distribution and minimize material cost simultaneously.
Here is an example of a pressure distribution on my robot fin. Calculating the total force, I can easily determine how effective of a straightening rudder this tail fin can be.
And a plot of the fluidic velocity at several cross-sectional layers across the fish tail fin. Red is fast and blue is slow:
Or what if you are designing a robot arm and want to know how much it flexes if it lifts a 2 pound kitten (to throw, of course)? It is extremely important to design robot arms to be highly rigid, as the flexing greatly reduces positional accuracy.
You also want to make the arm as light as possible to save money on the actuators (heavier robot arms need stronger motors). To do this you would reduce material use as much as possible. However, reducing material also reduces rigidity. So you need to determine both how much material to remove, but also where to and where not to remove that material.
Here is an example of a stress analysis that I ran on my ERP robot arm I am currently working on. I designed the arm knowing basic principles of stress analysis, selected a material known to be rigid and entered that data into the preprocessor, and then applied forces that were expected. The output result was expected deflection measured in distance. In this below image, I applied 2 pounds in the gripper area and measured a deflection of 1 centimeter. This means that my position error will be 1 centimeter. If I were to decide this error was unacceptable, I would change the arm shape, add material etc. and rerun the FEA stress analysis.
Here are a few more examples of stress analysis problems I had to solve.
This below example was my first design for part of the robot arm. I just went with a big block of material, and poked some holes into it. The logic was that these holes would significantly reduce weight (good) but only minorly affect bending deflection (deflection is bad). Turns out, after FEA analysis, that deflection was insignificant, and that I can take away much much more material.
So this is what I then designed it to look like after determining that the deflection was acceptable:
And a few more random stress analysis runs I did for other projects. The arrows show the direction of force, while the ends of each part were fixed as rigid:
One neat useful trick to use with FEA is to design a robot wheel suspension system out of a single part as shown below. To learn more, check out my Robot Suspension System Tutorial.
Now there are many types of heat transfer problems, but one that I was curious about is how heat is distributed in a trace in a printed circuit board when I apply excessive current. I basically wanted to get a good estimate on temperature to know how much I can heat up a wire before it causes permanent damage to the PCB and other surrounding material. Of course there are already engineering guidelines to determine this for you, but I was just curious and felt it to be a perfect first example.
To make it slightly more interesting, I am doing this to a power bus of one of my circuit designs, and I also included a 90 degree bend in it to see what happens for weird shaped tracings. It turns out that temperature distribution is pretty much uniform (varying only 2 degrees F) no matter the shape, and that these tracings get pretty darn hot with just a few amps applied!
I had to set up various boundary conditions, such as how much heat can the surrounding PCB absorb (not very much), as well as thermal transfer to the surrounding air (also not very much).
Post Processing (Results, Visualization)
I want software!!!
My CFD and heat transfer simulations were done using COMSOL.
My stress analysis was done using ANSYS. The 2008 version of AutoDesk Inventor has ANSYS built in. Solidworks also has a stress analysis solver called COSMOS.
For links to FEA and CFD software, check out the Robot Software List.
Perhaps in a few years the price of this software will go down to that which we hobbyists can afford, but until then, keep dreaming! Its what we robot builders are best at =)
Has this site helped you with your robot? Give us credit -
link back, and help others in the forums!
Society of Robots copyright 2005-2014


|Date:||April 10, 2007 / year-entry #124|
|Summary:||The general rule with Windows header files is that if you don't specify which version of the header file you want, you get the latest version. For example, if you have the Windows XP Platform SDK header files and you #include |
The general rule with Windows header files is that if you don't
specify which version of the header file you want,
you get the latest version.
For example, if you have the Windows XP Platform SDK header files
If you call a function that is new for Windows XP, then your program won't run on earlier versions of Windows because the import can't be resolved.†
If you use a structure that changed for Windows XP, then your program won't run on earlier versions of Windows because the structure size will be wrong.
Even if the structure size didn't change, using a flag that was introduced in Windows XP will create difficulties for your program when run on earlier versions of Windows because those earlier versions don't support the flag you're passing. Depending on how the function in question was written, it may ignore the "flag from the future" or it may reject it as invalid.
If you want your program to run on older versions of Windows,
you have a few options.
First, you can explicitly "downgrade" your header file by
defining an appropriate symbol or symbols before including
#define WINVER 0x0400 #define _WIN32_WINNT 0x0400 #define _WIN32_WINDOWS 0x0400 #define _WIN32_IE 0x0400 #include <windows.h> #include <commctrl.h> #include <shlobj.h> ...
Oh yuck, now we have the messy world of
"So what's the difference between
†That statement is from the operating system's‡ point of view. You can of course use techniques like Visual Studio linker's delay-load feature to avoid creating an import dependency, but that's outside the operating system.‡
‡s/operating system/Windows operating system/
<-- Back to Old New Thing Archive Index


The agricultural business is one of the major business sectors in today’s world. There are several leading business entrepreneurs like Bennett Kireker who have successfully emerged his agribusiness over the years. But there are several risks and challenges that they still face each day in this business. Every business has its own challenges and risk factors, a few challenges that the agribusiness-men face are listed below.
Resource Depletion: The Costs of Industrial Agriculture
It is one of the major factors that affect the agribusiness. From mechanized feedlots to automatic irrigation systems to agricultural machinery raised ever-greater demands on fossil fuel, water and topsoil resources. Petroleum not only fuels trucks and mechanized farm equipment, but also serves as a base for synthetic pesticides and fertilizers, tying the cost of growing food increasingly closer to the price of oil. Agricultural production places extra stress on water supply by polluting water bodies with chemical runoff that is the leading cause of pollution of lakes and rivers. Farmers’ dependence on nitrogen supplements stems in part from the erosion of topsoil. Topsoil loss has decreased rapidly over years which are leading to the use of nitrogenous substances which are adversely affecting the environment.
Land Management: Degrading and Undervaluing Farmland
Land management techniques have been draining the soil of nutritional value rapidly. Monoculture, the practice of continually planting the same crop on one plot of farmland removes nutrients from the soil. This loss of soil fertility is replenished by additional fertilizers.
Livestock management is another major contributor to the degradation of farmable land. Continual overgrazing eliminates hardy grasses, creates dry soil conditions, and promotes the growth of weedy shrubs, such as sagebrush. This in turn makes the soil weak and makes it prone to erosion thereby degrading the soil fertility.
Food Waste: Compromising Food Security
According to study one-third of the world’s food goes to waste, either during agricultural production, post-harvest handling and storage, processing, distribution, or consumption. A large percentage of this loss comes from consumers wasting food. Consumers accustomed to an abundance of food often purchase more than they actually eat, tossing spoiled food out at the end of every week. A lot of food is also wasted in supermarkets every day.Food that is currently sent to rot in landfills where it decomposes and releases greenhouse gasses into the atmosphere could be better distributed to bridge the gap between those with excess and the hungry. Food that spoils can be re-integrated into the food chain as compost. The massive problem of food waste calls for a tremendous shift in mentality that fevers conservation over convenience, a reversal of the trends of the last 50 years.
Demographic Changes: A Disconnected Public
As urban areas grow, farmers receive increasing pressures from encroaching developers and communities to sell their land. The agricultural lands are turning into housing complex and shopping malls and resulting to a phenomenon known as impermanence syndrome. It is where urban fringe farming is squeezed out of existence.
Political Issues: The Business of Food
While consumer habit has a profound effect on food, government policy bears just as heavily on the industry. Agriculture is a multi-billion dollar industry with powerful lobbyists. The government plays a massive role in battering the agriculture sector in the country. Many times untold amounts of food remained rotting on the vine due to a shortage of migrant workers.
Bennett Kireker carefully considers each of these complex challenges at the various levels in his agribusiness. But he is facing them boldly in order to expand his business.


Your exercise performance is a better predictor of longevity than your chronological age
Sophia Antipolis, 14 February 2019: It’s often said: It’s not how old you are, it’s how old you feel. New research shows that physiological age is a better predictor of survival than chronological age. The study is published today in the European Journal of Preventive Cardiology, a journal of the European Society of Cardiology (ESC).
“Age is one of the most reliable risk factors for death: the older you are, the greater your risk of dying,” said study author Dr. Serge Harb, cardiologist at the Cleveland Clinic in the United States. “But we found that physiological health is an even better predictor. If you want to live longer then exercise more. It should improve your health and your length of life.”
Based on exercise stress testing performance, the researchers developed a formula to calculate how well people exercise—their “physiological age—which they call A-BEST (Age Based on Exercise Stress Testing). The equation uses exercise capacity, how the heart responds to exercise (chronotropic competence), and how the heart rate recovers after exercise.
“Knowing your physiological age is good motivation to increase your exercise performance, which could translate into improved survival,” said Dr. Harb. “Telling a 45-year-old that their physiological age is 55 should be a wake-up call that they are losing years of life by being unfit. On the other hand, a 65-year-old with an A-BEST of 50 is likely to live longer than their peers.”
The study included 126,356 patients referred to the Cleveland Clinic between 1991 and 2015 for their first exercise stress test, a common examination for diagnosing heart problems. It involves walking on a treadmill, which gets progressively more difficult. During the test, exercise capacity, heart rate response to exercise, and heart rate recovery are all routinely measured. The data were used to calculate A-BEST, taking into account gender and use of medications that affect heart rate.
The average age of study participants was 53.5 years and 59% were men. More than half of patients aged 50-60 years—55% of men and 57% of women—were physiologically younger according to A-BEST. After an average follow-up of 8.7 years, 9,929 (8%) participants had died. As expected, the individual components of A-BEST were each associated with mortality.
Patients who died were ten years older than those who survived. But A-BEST was a significantly better predictor of survival than chronological age, even after adjusting for sex, smoking, body mass index, statin use, diabetes, hypertension, coronary artery disease, and end-stage kidney disease. This was true for the overall cohort and for both men and women when they were analysed separately.
Dr. Harb said doctors could use A-BEST to report results of exercise testing to patients “Telling patients their estimated age based on exercise performance is a powerful estimate of longevity and easier to understand than providing results for the individual components of the examination.”
Source: Read Full Article


This article needs additional citations for verification. (July 2008)
An airstrike, air strike or air raid is an offensive operation carried out by aircraft. Air strikes are delivered from aircraft such as blimps, balloons, fighters, bombers, ground attack aircraft, attack helicopters and drones. The official definition includes all sorts of targets, including enemy air targets, but in popular usage the term is usually narrowed to a tactical (small-scale) attack on a ground or naval objective as opposed to a larger, more general attack such as carpet bombing. Weapons used in an airstrike can range from direct-fire aircraft-mounted cannons and machine guns, rockets and air-to-surface missiles, to various types of aerial bombs, glide bombs, cruise missiles, ballistic missiles, and even directed-energy weapons such as lasers.
On November 1, 1911, Italian aviator Second Lieutenant Giulio Gavotti dropped four bombs on two Turkish-held bases in Libya, carrying out the world's first air strike as part of the Italo-Turkish War. The use of air strikes was extended in World War I. For example, at the Battle of Neuve Chapelle in 1915, the British dropped bombs on German rail communications. The first large scale air raid occurred later in 1915, when London was bombed by 15 German Zeppelin dirigibles at night. Since everyone was asleep, a loud warning system made sense.
World War II
However, it was not until World War II that the Oxford English Dictionary first records usage of the term "air strike," which remained two separate words for some time thereafter. The Second World War also saw the first development of precision-guided munitions, which were fielded successfully by the Germans, and contributed to the modern sense of air "strike," a precision targeted attack as opposed to a strafing run or area bombing.
The importance of precision targeting cannot be overstated: by some statistics, over a hundred raids were necessary to destroy a point target in World War 2; by the Persian Gulf War, the U.S. Air Force was able to release to media precise footage of television- or radar-guided bombs directly hitting the target without significant collateral damage (using, for example, the LANTIRN pod). Paul Fussell noted in his seminal work The Great War and Modern Memory the popular 20th century tendency to assume an errant bomb hitting a church, for example, was completely deliberate and reflective of the inherent evil of the enemy; over time, expectations for reduced collateral damage have increased to the point that developed countries engaging in war against less technologically advanced countries approach near-zero in terms of such damage.
After World War II
In the Malayan Emergency of the 1950s, British and Commonwealth Avro Lincoln heavy bombers, de Havilland Vampire fighter jets, Supermarine Spitfires, Bristol Brigands, de Havilland Mosquitos, and a host of other British aircraft were used in Malaya in operations against guerillas. However, the humid climate played havoc with the Mosquito's wooden airframe, and they were soon deployed elsewhere. This period also marked the last combat deployment of British Spitfires.
During the Vietnam War, airstrikes and their doctrine were adjusted to fit the jets, like the North American F-100 Super Sabre, Republic F-105 Thunderchief, Douglas A-4 Skyhawk, and McDonnell Douglas F-4 Phantom II, which were entering the U.S.A.F. and U.S.N. inventory. These aircraft could fly faster, carry more ordnance, and defend themselves better than the F-4U Corsair and North American P-51 Mustang fighters that fought during the Korean War, albeit at the cost of the R&D of the aircraft itself, the weapons, and, most important to the man on the ground, fuel and loiter time, though this situation was slightly alleviated with the introduction of aircraft like the Cessna A-37 Dragonfly, LTV A-7 Corsair II, and Lockheed AC-130 gunships.
Today, airstrike terminology has extended to the concept of the strike aircraft, what earlier generations of military aviators referred to as light bombers or attack aircraft. With the near-complete air supremacy enjoyed by developed nations in undeveloped regions, fighter jets can often be modified to add strike capability in a manner less practicable in earlier generations, e.g. McDonnell Douglas F-15E Strike Eagle.
Airstrikes can be carried out for strategic purposes outside of general warfare. Operation Opera was a single eight-ship Israeli airstrike against the Iraqi Osirak nuclear reactor, criticized by world opinion but not leading to a general outbreak of war. Such an example of the preventive strike has created new questions for international law.
Airstrikes, including airstrikes by drones, were extensively used during the Gulf War, War on Terror, War in Afghanistan, Iraq War, First Libyan Civil War, Syrian Civil War, Iraqi Civil War (2014–2017) and Yemeni Civil War (2015–present).
Airstrike campaigns often cause the deaths of non-combatants, including civilians. International law apply the principles of military necessity, distinction, and proportionality. These principles emphasizes that an attack must be directed towards a legitimate military target and the harm caused to non-combatant targets must be proportional to the advantage gained by such attack.
- air strike- DOD Dictionary of Military and Associated Terms Archived June 4, 2011, at the Wayback Machine
- U.S. Centennial of Flight Commission: Aviation at the Start of the First World War Archived 2008-05-11 at the Wayback Machine
- "air, n.1". oed.com.
- Almukhtar, Sarah (25 May 2017). Arango, Tim; Gordon, Michael (eds.). "U.S. Airstrikes on ISIS Have Killed Hundreds, Maybe Thousands of Civilians". The New York Times. Retrieved 24 November 2019.
- Woods, Chris (3 December 2014). "Pentagon in Denial About Civilian Casualties of U.S. Airstrikes in Iraq and Syria". Foreign Policy. Retrieved 24 November 2019.
- Dilanian, Ken (1 October 2014). "Airstrikes launched amid intelligence gaps". PBS NewsHour. Washington: PBS. Retrieved 24 November 2019.
- "Practice Relating to Rule 14. Proportionality in Attack". Customary IHL. International Committee of the Red Cross. Retrieved 24 November 2019.
- Reynolds, Jefferson D. (Winter 2005). "Collateral damage on the 21st century battlefield: enemy exploitation of the law of armed conflict, and the struggle for a moral high ground". Business Library. CBS Interactive. Archived from the original on 29 June 2012. Retrieved 24 November 2019 – via Find Articles.
- Media related to Airstrikes at Wikimedia Commons


We're left the narrative and moved on to the definition essay, which has gone over relatively well until we got to Kafka's "Before the Law". Discussing their interpretations of his parable was definitely a challenge. I think they have a difficult time understanding that everyone has their own interpretation of a word or text and that interpretation does not necessarily mean a person is wrong. One student was not shy about expressing his somewhat aggressive opinion about an example in class last week. The situation was mostly uncomfortable due to his defensive behavior--he's been one of those student who isn't afraid to voice his opinion since the beginning--and we had a difficult time understanding each other. I'm still not sure if he truly understood the point of the example, which was essay structure, or if I was misunderstanding what he was confused about. The atmosphere is certainly different than a normal classroom. I wonder if it has to do with a lack of respect for authority because of my age. The important thing is I am learning as much as they are.
After finish the next definition essay I am giving them a break from formal writing to work on some poetry. I think the majority of the class will be excited about that.


SEOUL, March 21 (Korea Bizwire) – “My dad always tells me that my breath smells like poop and it’s driving me mad. I have trouble talking to people up close, face-to-face in school.”
“I have terrible breath like I’m belching out a public toilet.”
“My girlfriend has awful breath and I don’t want to tell her straight up. Is there anything I can do to help?”
These are some of the actual questions and concerns submitted to Naver’s open Q&A forum, and they show just how much bad breath can affect relationships and lower one’s self-esteem if left unaddressed.
Also known as halitosis or fetor oris, dentists say bad breath results from volatile sulfur compounds (VSCs) that are formed by anaerobic bacteria as they digest proteins.
In 85 percent of the cases, the condition is accompanied or worsened by oral complications such as dental caries, gum diseases, and coated or white tongue. Prosthetic appliances such as braces or dentures accruing food residue can make the odor even worse.
Other factors and diseases can contribute to halitosis as well, according to experts, including extreme stress, diabetes, kidney diseases, hepatocirrhosis, and leukemia, while individuals frequently skipping meals are also vulnerable to the symptom.
Although there are different methods to check your own breath – such as smelling your own saliva after licking your wrist, and letting it dry – more professional procedures are available at dental clinics by analyzing a patient’s blood sample or salivary flow rate, or with halimeter and gas chromatography to measure VSC levels in the mouth.
Professional treatment is necessary if bad breath is caused by oral discomforts or old dental prostheses, but dedicating more time and being more thorough brushing one’s teeth (and tongue) can alone prevent and improve the condition to a certain extent. Using floss and an interdental brush is also highly recommended to remove any lingering residue.
“A regular breakfast habit can help get rid of white tongue and promote salivation, preventing bad breath,” said periodontology doctor Kang Kyung-Lhi from Kyung Hee University Hospital in Gangdong.
“A low-fat, high-fiber diet with fruits and vegetables, instead of meat, can also help,” she added. “Drinking a lot of water, and refraining from smoking and drinking alcohol can be useful too. But it’s most important to have regular checkups to maintain good dental health.”
By Lina Jang (firstname.lastname@example.org)


What’s a Hacker?
“Hacker” is a kind of phrases that has a unique that means relying on who makes use of it. Because of Hollywood, most individuals suppose a hacker is an individual who positive aspects illicit entry to a pc and steals stuff or breaks into army networks and launches missiles for enjoyable.
Lately, a hacker does not should be a geek from a prime college who breaks into banks and authorities programs. A hacker will be anybody, even the child subsequent door.
With an peculiar laptop computer, anybody can obtain easy software program off the Web to see all the pieces that goes into and out of a pc on the identical community. And the individuals who do that do not all the time have the perfect of intentions.
A Temporary Historical past of Hackers
These days, the phrase “hacker” has develop into synonymous with individuals who sit in darkish rooms, anonymously terrorizing the Web. But it surely was not all the time that approach. The unique hackers had been benign creatures. The truth is, they had been college students.
To anybody attending the Massachusetts Institute of Expertise through the 1950s and 60s, the time period “hack” merely meant a sublime or impressed resolution to any given drawback. Lots of the early MIT hacks tended to be sensible jokes. One of the vital extravagant noticed a duplicate of a campus police automotive placed on prime of the Institute’s Nice Dome.
Over time, the phrase turned related to the burgeoning laptop programming scene at MIT and past. For these early pioneers, a hack was a feat of programming prowess. Such actions had been significantly admired as they mixed professional data with a artistic intuition welcher vpn anbieter.
Why Does a Hacker Hack?
Hackers’ motivations range. For some, it is financial. They earn a residing by cybercrime. Some have a political or social agenda – their purpose is to vandalize high-profile computer systems to make an announcement. This sort of hacker is named a cracker as their principal function is to crack the safety of excessive profile programs.
Others do it for the sheer thrill. When requested by the web site SafeMode.org why he defaces internet servers, a cracker replied, “A high-profile deface offers me an adrenalin shot after which after some time I would like one other shot, that is why I am unable to cease.”
Lately, we’re confronted with a brand new kind of hacker – your subsequent door neighbor. Day by day, 1000’s of individuals obtain easy software program instruments that enable them to “sniff” wifi connections. Some do that simply to snoop on what others are doing on-line. Others do that to steal private knowledge in an try steal an identification.
The Most Frequent Assaults
1. SideJacking / Sniffing
Sidejacking is an internet assault methodology the place a hacker makes use of packet sniffing to steal a session cookie from a web site you simply visited. These cookies are typically despatched again to browsers unencrypted, even when the unique web site log-in was protected by way of HTTPS. Anybody listening can steal these cookies after which use them entry your authenticated internet session. This just lately made information as a result of a programmer launched a Firefox plug-in referred to as Firesheep that makes it straightforward for an intruder sitting close to you on an open community (like a public wifi hotspot) to sidejack many standard web site classes. For instance, a sidejacker utilizing Firesheep may take over your Fb session, thereby getting access to your entire delicate knowledge, and even ship viral messages and wall posts to your entire associates.
2. DNS Cache Poisoning
In DNS cache poisoning, knowledge is launched right into a Area Identify System (DNS) identify server’s cache database that didn’t originate from authoritative DNS sources. It’s an unintended results of a misconfiguration of a DNS cache or of a maliciously crafted assault on the identify server. A DNS cache poisoning assault successfully modifications entries within the sufferer’s copy of the DNS identify server, so when she or he varieties in a official web site identify, she or he is shipped as a substitute to a fraudulent web page.


KARST GEOMORPHOLOGICAL MAPPING PROGRAMME IN DEVON
updated 11 June 2006.
Geomorphological Mapping Programme.
Cave Location and Detection.
Apparent Resistivity...ρ.= 2π a R
At every opportunity, the Society locates and plots all karst geomorphological features that its Members encounter. The information is compiled on UK Ordnance Survey Plans, scale 1 : 2 500 and these form the basis of the Society's Primary Karst Evaluation Sheets, stored in the Society's Archive. Additionally, if of sufficient size and importance, such features are also surveyed
Examples of features plotted and surveyed are isolated and aligned dolines; karst sinks (ponors / swallets); cave entrances; open and buried karst shafts; buried karst doline fields; karst resurgence and exsurgence springs; karst scarps and escarpments; karst dry valleys; periodic ponor-overflow valleys; karst plateaux and terraces.
The Society also undertakes a Karst Rock-head Profiling Programme as a result of more specific projects. The Society's drilling rig is the "Minuteman" model produced by Mobile Drilling Company Inc. of the USA. The "Minuteman" Mobile Drill is a formidable research tool and was a gift to the Society from the Materials Laboratory of Devon County Council, several years ago.
The Mobile Drill can be used as a "power auger" for penetration of up to 11 metres (36 feet) of sediment or unconsolidated material. Its rotary "rock drill" capability can be used down to a depth of 16 metres (50 feet) in solid rock. For reasons of both need and cost, the Society only uses the "power auger" capability to reach and profile the general rock-head contours of karst geology, often concealed in Devon by varying thicknesses of sediment drape.
Of more specific use, it is ideal when applied to determining the physical extent of a karst shaft that has been buried by sediment drape. The "Minuteman" Mobile Drill has been adapted by the Society to be able to "power auger" through sediments to a depth of 16 metres (50 feet).
The application of the Mobile Drilling Rig is a destructive method of ground surveying and is particularly suited to Karst Rock-head Profiling. However, when the karst rock-head itself has to be penetrated in the search for underground caves, the Society has often turned to using the possibly more desirable methods of ground penetration via the non-destructive testing routes. Non-destructive testing procedures include Geo-electric Surveying Methods such as Ground Resistivity Surveying and Ground Penetrating Radar, both of which the Society has also used over a period of 30 years. Proton Magnetometry has also been employed in the search for caves.
In the UK., more recent innovations in the accurate positioning and plotting of fully accessible cave passages in relation to the surface features above, can be obtained by the use of equipment such as the "Molephone" and its successors.
depth..=..√ α ao
Bristow's Single Electrode Probe Technique
KARST ROCK-HEAD PROFILING PROGRAMME :
Our very limited resources have prevented us from doing all that we would wish to do with the "Minuteman" Mobile Drill. It is one thing to own a capital resource and quite another to afford to maintain it when used on a regular basis! Such are the problems of a severely under-funded voluntary sector.
The use of the "Minuteman" Mobile Drill has been very successful in locating the whereabouts, at karst rock-head, of buried and previously unknown karst shafts and other speleological objects. It has also helped decide the physical dimensions of such sites which have catastrophically collapsed or subsided as a result of naturally evolving processes.
Perhaps the best use of this academic resource has been in defining the rock-head profile contours of a whole sections of Buried Karst Doline Fields. In South Devon, these large-scale karst geomorphological features always occur at the karst margins and are best described as maturely developed, hydrologically-active karst ponor zones. They are usually found at the Shallow Karst Hydrological Zone and the Society has found many of them in South Devon. Further details about these large-scale karst features can be found via the Link relating to Karst Morphogenesis and Speleogenesis (Devon) on the ACTIVITIES UK Home Page.
The Link below will take you to a page detailing an individual Case Study within the Karst Rock-head Profiling Programme of the Society's Activities (UK).
Resolution of the Karst Rock-head Profile beneath Down Town Orchard (Buried
Karst Doline Field BKDF.01.), Denbury, S. Devon.
The reliability and acquisition
of data using this methodology varies both with the prevailing ground conditions
and the experience of the operator. An inherent understanding of the limitations
and correct use of the machine and of its response to the ground through
which it is penetrating, are as important as the observation and interpretation
of the retrieved sediment "returns" brought to suface through the borehole
by the flights of the rotating auger. Hence, the machine can not only offer
the position of the karst rock-head below the sediment cover but can also
offer spatial details of the sediment composition in vertical sections
(borehole profile) and horizontally via interpolation of many vertical
sections. The resultant boreholes also have the possibility to be used
for gaining an insight into the conditions and characteristics of the local
groundwater regime. A successful interpretation of the ground being investigated
thus relies on maximizing the opportunities for data acquisition during
the survey. The recognition of such opportunities, let alone using them
to maximum advantage, is a skill borne out of an understanding of the karst
3. CAVE DETECTION AND LOCATION.
3.1. GEO-ELECTRIC GROUND RESISTIVITY SURVEYING :
The detection and specific location of obscured Air- or Water-filled cavities beneath the surface in Limestone areas has been a particularly successful aspect of the Society's work. This has been achieved by borrowing Ground Resistivity Surveying equipment and operating it ourselves. Again, the cost of acquiring this type of equipment has been prohibitive, even though the cost of maintaining and operating it is far lower than that of the Mobile Drilling Rig and certainly well within the Society's budgetary contstraints to be able to do so.
The equipment itself is fairly simple and consists essentially of an integral electrical generator and resistance-measuring unit; ground electrodes and linking conductor wires. This particular procedure is more reliant on the application of appropriate interpretative methods of the acquired data than is the case with the Mobile Drilling Rig. We suggest that reference is made to the Bibliography Section below for detailed information.
Indeed, the acquisition of the data itself is a skill in its own right and relies on an understanding of physical and mathematical theories.
To obtain the raw data, a particular "electrode array or configuration" has to be chosen which, when set out on the ground, best suits the type of ground and the ground conditions under investigation to optimize equipment performance and data acquisition.
Location of the Rift Cave System extending out beneath the floor of Higher
Kiln Quarry, Buckfastleigh, S. Devon, 1977.
GEO-ELECTRIC GROUND-PENETRATING RADAR SURVEYING :
PROTON MAGNETOMETRY GROUND SURVEYING :
[more to follow]
KARST GEOMORPHOMETRY - SURVEYING OF MORPHOLOGICAL FEATURES :
(Text in preparation)
[more to follow]
BIBLIOGRAPHY AND FURTHER READING :
(.*denotes that the Bibliographic reference is a Stock item in the Society's Reference Library.)
New Graphical Resistivity Technique for Detecting Air-filled Cavities."
||....DKRS Home Page....|....DKRS Activities (UK) Home Page....|....Next - UK Karst Hydrological Programme (Devon Section)....||


Incineration is an old and polluting technology used to simply burn household trash and waste. Incineration produces a limited amount of heat and is no longer considered a viable alternative. Many of these old facilities are being upgraded to gasification facilities.
Gasification is clearly the way of the future in both terms of efficiency and the environment. Gasification is a flexible and clean energy technology that can turn a variety of feedstock into energy, helping to reduce dependence on carbon based energy sources providing a clean alternative source of electricity, fertilizers, fuels, and other useful by-products.