The impact of buffer zone size and management on illegal extraction, park protection and enforcement

Many protected areas or parks in developing countries have buffer zones at their boundaries to achieve the dual goals of protecting park resources and providing resource benefits to neighbouring people. Despite the prevalence of these zoning policies, few behavioural models of people’s buffer zone use inform the sizing and management of those zones. This paper uses a spatially explicit resource extraction model to examine the impact of buffer zone size and management on extraction by local people, both legal and illegal, and the impact of that extraction on forest quality in the park’s core and buffer zone. The results demonstrate trade-offs between the level of enforcement, the size of a buffer zone, and the amount of illegal extraction in the park; and describe implications for “enrichment” of buffer zones and evaluating patterns of forest degradation.

Multi-agent based modeling and simulation of complex system in hospital

This study puts forward a method to model and simulate the complex system of hospital on the basis of multi-agent technology. The formation of the agents of hospitals with intelligent and coordinative characteristics was designed, the message object was defined, and the model operating mechanism of autonomous activities and coordination mechanism was also designed. In addition, the Ontology library and Norm library etc. were introduced using semiotic method and theory, to enlarge the method of system modelling. Swarm was used to develop the multi-agent based simulation system, which is favorable for making guidelines for hospital's improving it's organization and management, optimizing the working procedure, improving the quality of medical care as well as reducing medical charge costs.

Contribution of the geriatrician to the management of cancer in older patients

With an increasingly aged population, many patients will present with cancer in their 80s and 90s. Although some may be very fit, frail individuals will require the input of geriatricians to aid in the assessment of co-existing morbidity, in an attempt to assess those most likely to benefit from active treatment of their cancer, and those in whom the ‘giants of geriatric medicine’ require special consideration before undergoing definitive cancer therapy. The role of the geriatrician in assessment and management of such patients, together with communication and end of life care, may be more important in ensuring a good quality of life, than the cancer therapy itself. Whilst numbers of geriatricians will not be adequate to care for all elderly patients with cancer, a variety of assessment scales will help target financial and manpower resources to those most at risk.

Abnormal functional activation and maturation of fronto-striato-temporal and cerebellar regions during sustained attention in autism spectrum disorder

Objective Sustained attention problems are common in people with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) and may have significant implications for the diagnosis and management of ASD and associated comorbidities. Furthermore, ASD has been associated with atypical structural brain development. The authors used functional MRI to investigate the functional brain maturation of attention between childhood and adulthood in people with ASD. Method Using a parametrically modulated sustained attention/vigilance task, the authors examined brain activation and its linear correlation with age between childhood and adulthood in 46 healthy male adolescents and adults (ages 11–35 years) with ASD and 44 age- and IQ-matched typically developing comparison subjects. Results Relative to the comparison group, the ASD group had significantly poorer task performance and significantly lower activation in inferior prefrontal cortical, medial prefrontal cortical, striato-thalamic, and lateral cerebellar regions. A conjunction analysis of this analysis with group differences in brain-age correlations showed that the comparison group, but not the ASD group, had significantly progressively increased activation with age in these regions between childhood and adulthood, suggesting abnormal functional brain maturation in ASD. Several regions that showed both abnormal activation and functional maturation were associated with poorer task performance and clinical measures of ASD and inattention. Conclusions The results provide first evidence that abnormalities in sustained attention networks in individuals with ASD are associated with underlying abnormalities in the functional brain maturation of these networks between late childhood and adulthood.

The grass-free lawn: floral performance and management implications

Grass lawns are a ubiquitous feature of urban green-space throughout much of the temperate world. Species poor and intensively managed, lawns are ecologically impoverished, however environmentally aware lawn owners are reluctant to implement alternatives due to aesthetic concerns. Developing an alternative lawn format which is both biodiversity friendly and aesthetically pleasing is an imperative for urban greening. We suggest that such an alternative can be provided by replacing the grass lawn by a forb-based mix. To advance this, we tested the floral performance of three groups of clonal perennial forbs (native, non-native and mixed), each maintained using standard lawn management mowing regimes. Our findings show that both the frequency of mowing and the height at which mowing is applied influence floral performance and lawn aesthetics. Species origin was found to influence floral productivity, floral visibility and floral variety within grass-free lawns, with native species providing the greatest floral performance. The behaviour and management of grass lawns was not found to be a suitable analogue for the management of grass-free lawns and grass-free lawns are sufficiently different from grass lawns to require an entirely original management approach. We suggest that the grass-free lawn can provide an aesthetically and environmentally relevant replacement for the ubiquitous and ecologically-poor grass lawn.

Glacial lake drainage in Patagonia (13-8 kyr) and response of the adjacent Pacific Ocean

Large freshwater lakes formed in North America and Europe during deglaciation following the Last Glacial Maximum. Rapid drainage of these lakes into the Oceans resulted in abrupt perturbations in climate, including the Younger Dryas and 8.2 kyr cooling events. In the mid-latitudes of the Southern Hemisphere major glacial lakes also formed and drained during deglaciation but little is known about the magnitude, organization and timing of these drainage events and their e ect on regional climate. We use 16 new single-grain optically stimulated luminescence (OSL) dates to de ne three stages of rapid glacial lake drainage in the Lago General Carrera/Lago Buenos Aires and Lago Cohrane/ Pueyrredón basins of Patagonia and provide the rst assessment of the e ects of lake drainage on the Paci c Ocean. Lake drainage occurred between 13 and 8 kyr ago and was initially gradual eastward into the Atlantic, then subsequently reorganized westward into the Paci c as new drainage routes opened up during Patagonian Ice Sheet deglaciation. Coupled ocean-atmosphere model experiments using HadCM3 with an imposed freshwater surface “hosing” to simulate glacial lake drainage suggest that a negative salinity anomaly was advected south around Cape Horn, resulting in brief but signi cant impacts on coastal ocean vertical mixing and regional climate.

Construction contracts: law and management. 5th edition

The fifth edition of this best-selling textbook has been thoroughly revised to provide the most up-to-date and comprehensive coverage of the legislation, administration and management of construction contracts. It now includes comparison of working with JCT, NEC3 and FIDIC contracts, throughout. In line with new thinking in construction management research, this authoritative guide is essential reading for every construction undergraduate and is an extremely useful source of reference for practitioners.

COMPUTER assisted technologies to enhance CONCURRENce in building DESIGN

Modern organisms are adapted to a wide variety of habitats and lifestyles. The processes of evolution have led to complex, interdependent, well-designed mechanisms of todays world and this research challenge is to transpose these innovative solutions to resolve problems in the context of architectural design practice, e.g., to relate design by nature with design by human. In a design by human environment, design synthesis can be performed with the use of rapid prototyping techniques that will enable to transform almost instantaneously any 2D design representation into a physical three-dimensional model, through a rapid prototyping printer machine. Rapid prototyping processes add layers of material one on top of another until a complete model is built and an analogy can be established with design by nature where the natural lay down of earth layers shapes the earth surface, a natural process occurring repeatedly over long periods of time. Concurrence in design will particularly benefit from rapid prototyping techniques, as the prime purpose of physical prototyping is to promptly assist iterative design, enabling design participants to work with a three-dimensional hardcopy and use it for the validation of their design-ideas. Concurrent design is a systematic approach aiming to facilitate the simultaneous involvment and commitment of all participants in the building design process, enabling both an effective reduction of time and costs at the design phase and a quality improvement of the design product. This paper presents the results of an exploratory survey investigating both how computer-aided design systems help designers to fully define the shape of their design-ideas and the extent of the application of rapid prototyping technologies coupled with Internet facilities by design practice. The findings suggest that design practitioners recognize that these technologies can greatly enhance concurrence in design, though acknowledging a lack of knowledge in relation to the issue of rapid prototyping.

Developing a system for assessing the costs associated with different procurement routes in the construction industry

In developing techniques for monitoring the costs associated with different procurement routes, the central task is disentangling the various project costs incurred by organizations taking part in construction projects. While all firms are familiar with the need to analyse their own costs, it is unusual to apply the same kind of analysis to projects. The purpose of this research is to examine the claims that new, ways of working such as strategic alliancing and partnering bring positive business benefits. This requires that costs associated with marketing, estimating, pricing, negotiation of terms, monitoring of performance and enforcement of contract are collected for a cross-section of projects under differing arrangements, and from those in the supply, chain from clients to consultants, contractors, subcontractors and suppliers. Collaboration with industrial partners forms the basis for developing a research instrument, bused on time sheets, which will be relevant for all those taking part in the work. The signs are that costs associated with,with tendering are highly variable, 1-15%, depending upon what precisely, is taken into account. The research to date reveals that there are mechanisms for measuring the costs of transactions and these will generate useful data for subsequent analysis.