A Study on the Transport and Distribution of Atmospheric Aerosols and its Influence on Regional Meteorological Parameters over the Indian Subcontinent

This doctoral thesis addresses the growing concern about the significant changes in the climatic and weather patterns due to the aerosol loading that have taken place in the Indo Gangetic Plain(IGP)which includes most of the Northern Indian region. The study region comprises of major industrial cities in India (New Delhi, Kanpur, Allahabad, Jamshedpur and Kolkata). Northern and central parts of India are one of the most thickly populated areas in the world and have the most intensely farmed areas. Rapid increase in population and urbanization has resulted in an abrupt increase in aerosol concentrations in recent years. The IGP has a major source of coal; therefore most of the industries including numerous thermal power plants that run on coal are located around this region. They inject copious amount of aerosols into the atmosphere. Moreover, the transport of dust aerosols from arid locations is prevalent during the dry months which increase the aerosol loading in theatmosphere. The topography of the place is also ideal for the congregation of aerosols. It is bounded by the Himalayas in the north, Thar Desert in the west, the Vindhyan range in the south and Brahmaputra ridge in the east. During the non‐monsoon months (October to May) the weather in the location is dry with very little rainfall. Surface winds are weak during most of the time in this dry season. The aerosols that reach the location by means of long distance transport and from regional sources get accumulated under these favourable conditions. The increase in aerosol concentration due to the complex combination of aerosol transport and anthropogenic factors mixed with the contribution from the natural sources alters the optical properties and the life time of clouds in the region. The associated perturbations in radiative balance have a significant impact on the meteorological parameters and this in turn determines the precipitation forming process. Therefore, any change in weather which disturbs the normal hydrological pattern is alarming in the socio‐economic point of view. Hence, the main focus of this work is to determine the variation in transport and distribution of aerosols in the region and to understand the interaction of these aerosols with meteorological parameters and cloud properties.

Making development simple. The genetic deterministic hypothesis for economic development

This paper discusses the dangers inherent in allempting to simplify something as complex as development. It does this by exploring the Lynn and Vanhanen theory of deterministic development which asserts that varying levels of economic development seen between countries can be explained by differences in 'national intelligence' (national IQ). Assuming that intelligence is genetically determined, and as different races have been shown to have different IQ, then they argue that economic development (measured as GDP/capita) is largely a function of race and interventions to address imbalances can only have a limited impact. The paper presents the Lynne and Vanhanen case and critically discusses the data and analyses (linear regression) upon which it is based. It also extends the cause-effect basis of Lynne and Vanhanen's theory for economic development into human development by using the Human Development Index (HDI). It is argued that while there is nothing mathematically incorrect with their calculations, there are concerns over the data they employ. Even more fundamentally it is argued that statistically significant correlations between the various components of the HDI and national IQ can occur via a host of cause-effect pathways, and hence the genetic determinism theory is far from proven. The paper ends by discussing the dangers involved in the use of over-simplistic measures of development as a means of exploring cause-effect relationships. While the creators of development indices such as the HDI have good intentions, simplistic indices can encourage simplistic explanations of under-development. (c) 2005 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

Local development companies and the regeneration of Britain's cities

Efforts to decentralise the pursuit of economic and social development have increased in recent years. The authors examine the rationale for establishing local development companies in areas of high unemployment and deprivation. The broad purpose is to establish a new style of organisation that combines attributes of the public and private sectors-to adapt and integrate economic and social services to meet local needs, to champion local interests in external arenas, and to act as enabling agents to promote local investment and development. These arguments are elaborated and illustrated with reference to one of Britain's most successful local development companies, Govan Initiative. The analysis reveals important strengths of the Initiative, including its action orientation, commitment to quality, and a local leadership role, but also certain weaknesses including its limited leverage over wider policies and resource flows. Local development companies need meaningful commitment from regional and national public organisations to fulfil their potential.

The economic dimensions of integrating flood management and agri-environment through washland creation: a case from Somerset, England

In many river floodplains in the UK, there has been a long history of flood defence, land reclamation and water regime management for farming. In recent years, however, changing European and national policies with respect to farming, environment and flood management are encouraging a re-appraisal of land use in rural areas. In particular, there is scope to develop, through the use of appropriate promotional mechanisms, washland areas, which will simultaneously accommodate winter inundation, support extensive farming methods, deliver environmental benefits, and do this in a way which can underpin the rural economy. This paper explores the likely economic impacts of the development of flood storage and washland creation. In doing so, consideration is given to feasibility of this type of development, the environmental implications for a variety of habitats and species, and the financial and institutional mechanisms required to achieve implementation. (C) 2007 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Evaluating the role of environmental quality in the sustainable rural economic development of England

The issue of the sustainable development of rural economies in England has recently received considerable attention. This is because many of the poorest areas in the country are rural, often of high environmental quality, but suffering from high unemployment and a lack of services and facilities. The rapid decline in agricultural incomes and in-migration of affluent urban workers since 1990 has exacerbated economic inequality in such areas. A number of factors have the potential to drive rural development and this paper applies, and considers, the feasibility of a method from the USA for combining economic and environmental variables in a regional growth model to examine the hypothesis that environmental quality is an important determinant of sustainable rural development in England. The model output suggests that, although environmental quality does play a role in sustainable rural development in England there are other, more important, factors driving development. These include business and communications infra-structure, the degree and opportunities for commuting and underlying employment prospects. The robustness and limitations of the method for combining economic and environmental variables is discussed in relation to the spatial interrelatedness of Local Authority Districts in England, and conclusions are drawn about areas for refinement and improvement of the method.

Kinetic multi-layer model of aerosol surface and bulk chemistry (KM-SUB): the influence of interfacial transport and bulk diffusion on the oxidation of oleic acid by ozone

We present a novel kinetic multi-layer model that explicitly resolves mass transport and chemical reaction at the surface and in the bulk of aerosol particles (KM-SUB). The model is based on the PRA framework of gas-particle interactions (Poschl-Rudich-Ammann, 2007), and it includes reversible adsorption, surface reactions and surface-bulk exchange as well as bulk diffusion and reaction. Unlike earlier models, KM-SUB does not require simplifying assumptions about steady-state conditions and radial mixing. The temporal evolution and concentration profiles of volatile and non-volatile species at the gas-particle interface and in the particle bulk can be modeled along with surface concentrations and gas uptake coefficients. In this study we explore and exemplify the effects of bulk diffusion on the rate of reactive gas uptake for a simple reference system, the ozonolysis of oleic acid particles, in comparison to experimental data and earlier model studies. We demonstrate how KM-SUB can be used to interpret and analyze experimental data from laboratory studies, and how the results can be extrapolated to atmospheric conditions. In particular, we show how interfacial and bulk transport, i.e., surface accommodation, bulk accommodation and bulk diffusion, influence the kinetics of the chemical reaction. Sensitivity studies suggest that in fine air particulate matter oleic acid and compounds with similar reactivity against ozone (carbon-carbon double bonds) can reach chemical lifetimes of many hours only if they are embedded in a (semi-)solid matrix with very low diffusion coefficients (< 10(-10) cm(2) s(-1)). Depending on the complexity of the investigated system, unlimited numbers of volatile and non-volatile species and chemical reactions can be flexibly added and treated with KM-SUB. We propose and intend to pursue the application of KM-SUB as a basis for the development of a detailed master mechanism of aerosol chemistry as well as for the derivation of simplified but realistic parameterizations for large-scale atmospheric and climate models.

Kinetic multi-layer model of aerosol surface and bulk chemistry (KM-SUB): the influence of interfacial transport and bulk diffusion on the oxidation of oleic acid by ozone

We present a novel kinetic multi-layer model that explicitly resolves mass transport and chemical reaction at the surface and in the bulk of aerosol particles (KM-SUB). The model is based on the PRA framework of gas–particle interactions (P¨oschl et al., 5 2007), and it includes reversible adsorption, surface reactions and surface-bulk exchange as well as bulk diffusion and reaction. Unlike earlier models, KM-SUB does not require simplifying assumptions about steady-state conditions and radial mixing. The temporal evolution and concentration profiles of volatile and non-volatile species at the gas-particle interface and in the particle bulk can be modeled along with surface 10 concentrations and gas uptake coefficients. In this study we explore and exemplify the effects of bulk diffusion on the rate of reactive gas uptake for a simple reference system, the ozonolysis of oleic acid particles, in comparison to experimental data and earlier model studies. We demonstrate how KM-SUB can be used to interpret and analyze experimental data from laboratory stud15 ies, and how the results can be extrapolated to atmospheric conditions. In particular, we show how interfacial transport and bulk transport, i.e., surface accommodation, bulk accommodation and bulk diffusion, influence the kinetics of the chemical reaction. Sensitivity studies suggest that in fine air particulate matter oleic acid and compounds with similar reactivity against ozone (C=C double bonds) can reach chemical lifetimes of 20 multiple hours only if they are embedded in a (semi-)solid matrix with very low diffusion coefficients (10−10 cm2 s−1). Depending on the complexity of the investigated system, unlimited numbers of volatile and non-volatile species and chemical reactions can be flexibly added and treated with KM-SUB. We propose and intend to pursue the application of KM-SUB 25 as a basis for the development of a detailed master mechanism of aerosol chemistry as well as for the derivation of simplified but realistic parameterizations for large-scale atmospheric and climate models.

The integrated WRF/urban modelling system: development, evaluation, and applications to urban environmental problems

To bridge the gaps between traditional mesoscale modelling and microscale modelling, the National Center for Atmospheric Research, in collaboration with other agencies and research groups, has developed an integrated urban modelling system coupled to the weather research and forecasting (WRF) model as a community tool to address urban environmental issues. The core of this WRF/urban modelling system consists of the following: (1) three methods with different degrees of freedom to parameterize urban surface processes, ranging from a simple bulk parameterization to a sophisticated multi-layer urban canopy model with an indoor–outdoor exchange sub-model that directly interacts with the atmospheric boundary layer, (2) coupling to fine-scale computational fluid dynamic Reynolds-averaged Navier–Stokes and Large-Eddy simulation models for transport and dispersion (T&D) applications, (3) procedures to incorporate high-resolution urban land use, building morphology, and anthropogenic heating data using the National Urban Database and Access Portal Tool (NUDAPT), and (4) an urbanized high-resolution land data assimilation system. This paper provides an overview of this modelling system; addresses the daunting challenges of initializing the coupled WRF/urban model and of specifying the potentially vast number of parameters required to execute the WRF/urban model; explores the model sensitivity to these urban parameters; and evaluates the ability of WRF/urban to capture urban heat islands, complex boundary-layer structures aloft, and urban plume T&D for several major metropolitan regions. Recent applications of this modelling system illustrate its promising utility, as a regional climate-modelling tool, to investigate impacts of future urbanization on regional meteorological conditions and on air quality under future climate change scenarios. Copyright © 2010 Royal Meteorological Society

Long-range ozone transport and its impact on respiratory and cardiovascular health in the north of Portugal

Ozone dynamics depend on meteorological characteristics such as wind, radiation, sunshine, air temperature and precipitation. The aim of this study was to determine ozone trajectories along the northern coast of Portugal during the summer months of 2005, when there was a spate of forest fires in the region, evaluating their impact on respiratory and cardiovascular health in the greater metropolitan area of Porto. We investigated the following diseases, as coded in the ninth revision of the International Classification of Diseases: hypertensive disease (codes 401-405); ischemic heart disease (codes 410-414); other cardiac diseases, including heart failure (codes 426-428); chronic obstructive pulmonary disease and allied conditions, including bronchitis and asthma (codes 490-496); and pneumoconiosis and other lung diseases due to external agents (codes 500-507). We evaluated ozone data from air quality monitoring stations in the study area, together with data collected through HYbrid Single-Particle Lagrangian Integrated Trajectory (HYSPLIT) model analysis of air mass circulation and synoptic-scale zonal wind from National Centers for Environmental Prediction data. High ozone levels in rural areas were attributed to the dispersion of pollutants induced by local circulation, as well as by mesoscale and synoptic scale processes. The fires of 2005 increased the levels of pollutants resulting from the direct emission of gases and particles into the atmosphere, especially when there were incoming frontal systems. For the meteorological case studies analyzed, peaks in ozone concentration were positively associated with higher rates of hospital admissions for cardiovascular diseases, although there were no significant associations between ozone peaks and admissions for respiratory diseases.

Molecular analysis of maltotriose active transport and fermentation by Saccharomyces cerevisiae reveals a determinant role for the AGT1 permease

Incomplete and/or sluggish maltotriose fermentation causes both quality and economic problems in the ale-brewing industry. Although it has been proposed previously that the sugar uptake must be responsible for these undesirable phenotypes, there have been conflicting reports on whether all the known alpha-glucoside transporters in Saccharomyces cerevisiae (MALx1, AGT1, and MPH2 and MPH3 transporters) allow efficient maltotriose utilization by yeast cells. We characterized the kinetics of yeast cell growth, sugar consumption, and ethanol production during maltose or maltotriose utilization by several S. cerevisiae yeast strains (both MAL constitutive and AM inducible) and by their isogenic counterparts with specific deletions of the AGT1 gene. Our results clearly showed that yeast strains carrying functional permeases encoded by the MAL21, MAL31, and/or MAL41 gene in their plasma membranes were unable to utilize maltotriose. While both high-and low-affinity transport activities were responsible for maltose uptake from the medium, in the case of maltotriose, the only low-affinity (K-m, 36 +/- 2 mM) transport activity was mediated by the AGT1 permease. In conclusion, the AGT1 transporter is required for efficient maltotriose fermentation by S. cerevisiae yeasts, highlighting the importance of this permease for breeding and/or selection programs aimed at improving sluggish maltotriose fermentations.

Gender in international economic development projects: how is gender being institutionalized in the Inter-American Development Bank?

O Banco Interamericano de Desenvolvimento, o Banco Mundial, e outras organizações financiam iniciativas para acelerar o desenvolvimento da região da América Latina e Caribe. Antes do final da década de 80, vários projetos e políticas dessas instituições careciam de considerações ligadas à gênero e foram criticadas por essa falta (Flora, 1998). Em 1987, o BID publicou um documento sobre uma nova política operacional sobre mulheres e desenvolvimento e vem desde então buscando institucionalizar gênero e criar indicadores para medir os impactos relacionados à gênero em seus projetos. O objetivo dessa dissertação é explorar o tema de gênero no contexto do desenvolvimento internacional através de uma análise de como o Banco Interamericano de Desenvolvimento inclui gênero em suas operações. Após uma revisão literária sobre a importância de gênero e de bancos de desenvolvimento, essa dissertação irá analisar de que maneira gênero é incluído nas discussões dos projetos do Banco à nível institucional. A pesquisa será feita através de documentação disponível para o público geral, documentos internos e entrevistas em vídeo com pessoal do BID. Após uma análise dos dados coletados, recomendações para ações futuras serão dadas.

The economic development of Latin America in the twentieth century

Includes bibliography