Michigan Union - aerial view

Irving Kane and Allen B. Pond, architects. Plans for the Union were on a scale unknown at the time for "club houses" in American colleges and universities: 250 feet long and 200 feet wide. Construction began in 1916 and owing to war time difficulties was not ready to be used by students until 1919. Two new wings to the south were completed in 1936 and 1938. Another addition was begun 1954-55. View toward the southwest.

Michigan Union and Men's Dormitory- aerial view

Irving Kane and Allen B. Pond, architects. Plans for the Union were on a scale unknown at the time for "club houses" in American colleges and universities: 250 feet long and 200 feet wide. Construction began in 1916 and owing to war time difficulties was not ready to be used by students until 1919. Two new wings to the south were completed in 1936 and 1938. Another addition was begun 1954-55. View from the south. On image: UNIVERSITY OF MICHIGAN MEN'S DORMITORY UNION GROUP STEWART-KINGSCOTT CO. ARCHITECTS J.A.UTLEY- GENERAL CONTRACTORS P.A. PROJECTS 1559-F DATE

The status and ecology of the American alligator (Alligator mississippiensis) in Par Pond, Savannah River site

Par Pond is a man-made 1120 ha cooling reservoir located on the Savannah River Site near Aiken, South Carolina. From 1972-1978 a detailed study on the status of the alligator in Par Pond was conducted by Tom Murphy (unpub. MS thesis Univ. of GA, 1977). Murphy estimated that approximately 110 alligators inhabited Par Pond with an adult (> 1.8 m) to juvenile (< 1.8 m) ratio of (1.8:1), an overall sex ratio of 3.2:1, and an average of only 2.3 nests/yr. The purpose of this study (1986-1989) was to determine the current population size and structure, determine how the population has changed in the last 15 years and to examine growth and survival of juvenile alligators. Data were collected by monthly night-time eyeshine counts aerial surveys, capturing animals, and locating and following the fate of nests. There was a strong positive correlation between water temperature and the number of alligators observed during eyeshine counts. Both eyeshine counts and aerial surveys were highest in spring and varied seasonally. A total of 184 different non-hatchling and 157 hatchling alligators were captured between May 1986 and November 1988. Population estimates and size distributions based on capture data indicate that over the last 15 years the population has increased from approximately 110 to 200 alligators, and the size distribution has shifted from one dominated by large adults to one that has a higher proportion of juveniles. The current sex ratio (2.6:1) is not significantly different from that reported by Murphy (1977, 3.2:1). However, the average number of nests/yr has increased from 2.3 to 4.0. Data on juvenile growth and survival show that the growth rate of hatchlings (32.9 cm/yr total length) is greater than that of animals age 1-3 (21.6 cm/yr total length) and survival of all ages is variable between years and between clutches. Results from this study indicate that from 1972-988 the population has increased ac an average exponential rate of 6 % per year. If conditions in Par Pond do not change, the population size should continue to increase.

High Formalism: The aerial view and the colour field

Laura Kurgan’s Monochrome Landscapes (2004), first exhibited in the Whitney Museum of American Art in New York City, consists of four oblong Cibachrome prints derived from digital files sourced from the commercial Ikonos and QuickBird satellites. The prints are ostensibly flat, depthless fields of white, green, blue, and yellow, yet the captions provided explain that the sites represented are related to contested military, industrial, and cartographic practices. In Kurgan’s account of Monochrome Landscapes she explains that it is in dialogue with another work from the Whitney by abstract artist Ellsworth Kelly. This article pursues the relationship between formalist abstraction and satellite imaging in order to demonstrate how formalist strategies aimed at producing an immediate retinal response are bound up with contemporary uses of digital information and the truth claims such information can be made to substantiate.

Anti-leishmanial effects of purified compounds from aerial parts of Baccharis uncinella C. DC. (Asteraceae)

Species of Baccharis exhibit antibiotic, antiseptic, wound-healing, and anti-protozoal properties, and have been used in the traditional medicine of South America for the treatment of several diseases. In the present work, the fractionation of EtOH extract from aerial parts of Baccharis uncinella indicated that the isolated compounds caffeic acid and pectolinaringenin showed inhibitory activity against Leishmania (L.) amazonensis and Leishmania (V.) braziliensis promastigotes, respectively. Moreover, amastigote forms of both species were highly sensible to the fraction composed by oleanolic + ursolic acids and pectolinaringenin. Caffeic acid also inhibited amastigote forms of L. (L.) amazonensis, but this effect was weak in L. (V.) braziliensis amastigotes. The treatment of infected macrophages with these compounds did not alter the levels of nitrates, indicating a direct effect of the compounds on amastigote stages. The results presented herein suggest that the active components from B. uncinella can be important to the design of new drugs against American tegumentar leishmaniases.

Governance and effectiveness in regional planning: an analysis of North American, European, and Australasian practice

Over the past several years, there has been resurgent interest in regional planning in North America, Europe and Australasia. Spurred by issues such as metropolitan growth, transportation infrastructure, environmental management and economic development, many states and metropolitan regions are undertaking new planning initiatives. These regional efforts have also raised significant question about governance structures, accountability and measures of effectiveness.n this paper, the authors conducted an international review of ten case studies from the United States, Canada, England, Belgium, New Zealand and Australia to explore several critical questions. Using qualitative data template, the research team reviewed plans, documents, web sites and published literature to address three questions. First, what are the governance arrangements for delivering regional planning? Second, what are the mechanisms linking regional plans with state plans (when relevant) and local plans? Third, what means and mechanisms do these regional plans use to evaluate and measure effectiveness? The case study analysis revealed several common themes. First, there is an increasing focus on goverance at the regional level, which is being driven by a range of trends, including regional spatial development initiatives in Europe, regional transportation issues in the US, and the growth of metropolitan regions generally. However, there is considerable variation in how regional governance arrangements are being played out. Similarly, there is a range of processes being used at the regional level to guide planning that range from broad ranging (thick) processes to narrow and limited (thin) approaches. Finally, evaluation and monitoring of regional planning efforts are compiling data on inputs, processes, outputs and outcomes. Although there is increased attention being paid to indicators and monitoring, most of it falls into outcome evaluations such as Agenda 21 or sustainability reporting. Based on our review we suggest there is a need for increased attention on input, process and output indicators and clearer linkages of these indicators in monitoring and evaluation frameworks. The focus on outcome indicators, such as sustainability indicators, creates feedback systems that are too long-term and remote for effective monitoring and feedback. Although we found some examples of where these kinds of monitoring frameworks are linked into a system of governance, there is a need for clearer conceptual development for both theory and practice.

Attitudes towards American brands and brand America

A study of 556 students at colleges and universities in Australia, Hong Kong and Singapore explored the relationship between attitude towards the United States and brand attitudes and preferences. Singaporean student attitudes towards both the US Government and US people were higher than were those of the Australian and Hong Kong students. Coke, Nike and McDonald's were among both the most-liked and disliked US brands among the international students, a finding suggesting that brands may possess both a 'lovemark' status, as described in the literature, and its opposite — 'loathemark' status — within the same demographic group. US brand preference scores did not offer support for the belief that international consumers 'vote with their pocketbooks' by refusing to purchase US brands if they have a negative attitude towards the United States. Among Hong Kong and Singaporean students, favourable attitudes towards the purchase of US brands was found to be positively related to favourability towards the US Government.

The Euro-American psyche and the imaging of Samoa in the early 20th century

Drawing on English language sources and material from Western Samoa (now Samoa), this examination of photographically illustrated serial encyclopaedia and magazines proposes an alternative historical analysis of the colonial photographs of Samoa, the most extensively covered field in Oceanic photographic studies. Photographs published between the 1890s and World War II were not necessarily from that era, and despite claims in the text of illustrated publications of an unchanged, enduring, archaic tradition in Samoa, the amazing variety of content and subject matter often offered contradictory evidence, depicting a modern, adaptive and progressive Samoa. Contrary to orthodox historical analysis, the images of Samoa in illustrated magazines and encyclopaedia were not limited to a small, repetitive gallery of partially clothed women and costumed chiefs.

Automatic Detection of Marine Mammal from Aerial Imagery

The following technical report describes the approach and algorithm used to detect marine mammals from aerial imagery taken from manned/unmanned platform. The aim is to automate the process of counting the population of dugongs and other mammals. We have developed and algorithm that automatically presents to a user a number of possible candidates of these mammals. We tested the algorithm in two distinct datasets taken from different altitudes. Analysis and discussion is presented in regards with the complexity of the input datasets, the detection performance.

Evaluation of separation management algorithms in Class G airspace

Use of Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAVs) in support of government applications has already seen significant growth and the potential for use of UAVs in commercial applications is expected to rapidly expand in the near future. However, the issue remains on how such automated or operator-controlled aircraft can be safely integrated into current airspace. If the goal of integration is to be realized, issues regarding safe separation in densely populated airspace must be investigated. This paper investigates automated separation management concepts in uncontrolled airspace that may help prepare for an expected growth of UAVs in Class G airspace. Not only are such investigations helpful for the UAV integration issue, the automated separation management concepts investigated by the authors can also be useful for the development of new or improved Air Traffic Control services in remote regions without any existing infrastructure. The paper will also provide an overview of the Smart Skies program and discuss the corresponding Smart Skies research and development effort to evaluate aircraft separation management algorithms using simulations involving realworld data communication channels, and verified against actual flight trials. This paper presents results from a unique flight test concept that uses real-time flight test data from Australia over existing commercial communication channels to a control center in Seattle for real-time separation management of actual and simulated aircraft. The paper also assesses the performance of an automated aircraft separation manager.

Conference Report of the First Meeting of the Native American and Indigenous Studies Association, 21-23 May 2009, Department of American Indian Studies, University of Minneapolis, Minesota, United States of America

Report provided back by Bronwyn Fredericks on her participation at the First Native American and Indigenous Studies Association Meeting held 21-23 May 2009 in Minnesota, United States of America.

Enhancing digital road map with lane details extracted from large-scale stereo aerial imagery using object-oriented image analysis

Precise, up-to-date and increasingly detailed road maps are crucial for various advanced road applications, such as lane-level vehicle navigation, and advanced driver assistant systems. With the very high resolution (VHR) imagery from digital airborne sources, it will greatly facilitate the data acquisition, data collection and updates if the road details can be automatically extracted from the aerial images. In this paper, we proposed an effective approach to detect road lane information from aerial images with employment of the object-oriented image analysis method. Our proposed algorithm starts with constructing the DSM and true orthophotos from the stereo images. The road lane details are detected using an object-oriented rule based image classification approach. Due to the affection of other objects with similar spectral and geometrical attributes, the extracted road lanes are filtered with the road surface obtained by a progressive two-class decision classifier. The generated road network is evaluated using the datasets provided by Queensland department of Main Roads. The evaluation shows completeness values that range between 76% and 98% and correctness values that range between 82% and 97%.