Livestock grazing, plateau pikas and the conservation of avian biodiversity on the Tibetan plateau

On the Qinghai-Tibet plateau increased livestock numbers have resulted in degradation of the grasslands with potential impacts on native biodiversity. Concurrently, perceived increases in populations of native small mammals such as plateau pikas (Ochotona curzoniae) have led to poisoning programs, with uncertain impacts on species such as ground-nesting birds. We explored the relationships between the local seasonal abundance of small birds and (1) the density of pika burrows; (2) livestock grazing practices; and (3) local poisoning of pikas. Around Naqu prefecture, central Tibet, we used a nested experimental design to collect data from areas rested from grazing over summer, nearby areas with year-round grazing and areas subjected to pika poisoning. Additional data were collected from a site where grazing had not occurred for at least 4 years prior to the study. Poisoning pikas in spring had no detectable effect on the local abundance of birds the following autumn. However, two ground-nesting species, white-rumped and rufous-necked snowfinches, showed positive associations with the density of pika burrows, indicating that long-term 'pika poisoning could reduce the density of these species by reducing the density of pika burrows. Rufous-necked snowfinches and non ground-nesting species including horned larks and common hoopoes showed positive responses to reduced grazing pressure from livestock, particularly in the long-rested site, indicating current grazing levels could be having a negative impact on these species. Conservation of small passerine biodiversity in this system will require changed management practices for livestock and pikas that consider the complex three-way interaction between livestock grazing, pikas and small birds. (C) 2008 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

二氧化碳在孔隙咸水层中多相流动数值模拟研究

There has been a growing concern about the use of fossil fuels and its adverse effects on the atmospheric greenhouse and ecological environment. A reduction in the release rate of CO2 into the atmosphere poses a major challenge to the land ecology of China. The most promising way of achieving CO2 reduction is to dispose of CO2 in deep saline aquifers. Deep aquifers have a large potential for CO2 sequestration in geological medium in terms of volume and duration. Through the numerical simulation of multiphase flow in a porous media, the transformation and motion of CO2 in saline aquifers has been implemented under various temperature and hydrostatic pressure conditions, which plays an important role to the assessment of the reliability and safety of CO2 geological storage. As expected, the calculated results can provide meaningful and scientific information for management purposes. The key problem to the numerical simulation of multiphase flow in a porous media is to accurately capture the mass interface and to deal with the geological heterogeneity. In this study, the updated CE/SE (Space and time conservation element and solution element) method has been proposed, and the Hybrid Particle Level Set method (HPLS) has extended for multiphase flows in porous medium, which can accurately trace the transformation of the mass interface. The benchmark problems have been applied to evaluate and validate the proposed method. In this study, the reliability of CO2 storage in saline aquifers in Daqingzi oil field in Sunlong basin has been discussed. The simulation code developed in this study takes into account the state for CO2 covering the triple point temperature and pressure to the supercritical region. The geological heterogeneity has been implemented, using the well known geostatistical model (GSLIB) on the base of the hard data. The 2D and 3D model have been set up to simulate the CO2 multiphase flow in the porous saline aquifer, applying the CE/SE method and the HPLS method .The main contents and results are summarized as followings. (1) The 2D CE/SE method with first and second –order accuracy has been extended to simulate the multiphase flow in porous medium, which takes into account the contribution of source and sink in the momentum equation. The 3D CE/SE method with the first accuracy has been deduced. The accuracy and efficiency of the proposed CE/SE method have been investigated, using the benchmark problems. (2) The hybrid particle level set method has been made appropriate and extended for capturing the mass interface of multiphase flows in porous media, and the numerical method for level set function calculated has been formulated. (3) The closed equations for multiphase flow in porous medium has been developed, adept to both the Darcy flow and non-Darcy flow, getting over the limitation of Reynolds number to the calculation. It is found that Darcy number has a decisive influence on pressure as well as velocity given the Darcy number. (4) The new Euler scheme for numerical simulations of multiphase flows in porous medium has been proposed, which is efficient and can accurately capture the mass interface. The artificial compressibility method has been used to couple the velocities and pressure. It is found that the Darcy number has determinant effects on the numerical convergence and stability. In terms of the different Darcy numbers, the coefficient of artificial compressibility and the time step have been obtained. (5) The time scale of the critical instability for critical CO2 in the saline aquifer has been found, which is comparable with that of completely CO2 dissolved saline aquifer. (6) The concept model for CO2 multiphase flows in the saline aquifer has been configured, based on the temperature, pressure, porosity as well as permeability of the field site .Numerical simulation of CO2 hydrodynamic trapping in saline aquifers has been performed, applying the proposed CE/SE method. The state for CO2 has been employed to take into account realistic reservoir conditions for CO2 geological sequestration. The geological heterogeneity has been sufficiently treated , using the geostatistical model. (7) It is found that the Rayleigh-Taylor instability phenomenon, which is associated with the penetration of saline fluid into CO2 fluid in the direction of gravity, has been observed in CO2 multiphase flows in the saline aquifer. Development of a mushroom-type spike is a strong indication of the formation of Kelvin-Helmholtz instability due to the developed short wavelength perturbations present along the interface and parallel to the bulk flow. Additional key findings: the geological heterogeneity can distort the flow convection. The ascending of CO2 can induce the persistent flow cycling effects. The results show that boundary conditions of the field site have determinant effects on the transformation and motion of CO2 in saline aquifers. It is confirmed that the proposed method and numerical model has the reliability to simulate the process of the hydrodynamic trapping, which is the controlling mechanism for the initial period of CO2 storage at time scale of 100 years.

An empirical equation for the calculation of retention time with extrapolation of temperature in gas chromatography

An empirical equation is proposed to accurately correlate isothermal data over a wide range of temperature With the equation ln k = A* + B*/T-lambda the retention times of different solutes tested on OV-101, SE-54 and PEG 20M capillary columns have been achieved even when lambda is assigned a constant value of 1.7 Comparison with ln k = A + B/T and in k = c + d/T+ h/T-2, shows that the proposed equation is of higher accuracy and is applicable to extrapolation calculation, especially from data at high temperature to those at low temperature. Parameters A* and B* as well as A and B are also discussed. The linear correlation of A* and B* is weaker than that of A and B.

Levantamento pedológico de uma área-piloto relacionada ao Projeto BiosBrasil (Conservation and Sustainable Management of Below-Ground Biodiversity: Phase I), município de Benjamin Constant (AM): janela 6.

2005

Solos das áreas-piloto do Projeto BiosBrasil (Conservation and Sustainable Management of Below-Ground Biodiversity: Phase I), Município de Benjamin Constant, Estado do Amazonas.

2005

Levantamento pedológico de uma área-piloto relacionada ao Projeto BiosBrasil (Conservation and Sustainable Management of Below-Ground Biodiversity: Phase I), Município de Benjamin Constant (AM): Janela 6

2005

Solos das áreas-piloto do Projeto BiosBrasil (Conservation and Sustainable Management of Below-Ground Biodiversity: Phase I), Município de Benjamin Constant, Estado do Amazonas

2005

Levantamento pedológico de uma área-piloto relacionada ao projeto BiosBrasil (Conservation and Sustainable Management of Below-Ground Biodiversity: Phase I), Município de Benjamin Constant (AM): janela 6.

2005

Solos das áreas-piloto do projeto BiosBrasil (Conservation and Sustainable Management of Below-Ground Biodiversity: Phase I), município de Benjamin Constant, Estado do Amazonas.

2005

Levantamento do Uso e Cobertura da Terra de Seis Áreas Amostrais Relacionadas ao Projeto BiosBrasil (Conservation and Sustainable Management of Below-Ground Biodiversity:Phase I), Município de Benjamin Constant (AM).

2005

The Image Irradiance Equation: Its Solution and Application

How much information about the shape of an object can be inferred from its image? In particular, can the shape of an object be reconstructed by measuring the light it reflects from points on its surface? These questions were raised by Horn [HO70] who formulated a set of conditions such that the image formation can be described in terms of a first order partial differential equation, the image irradiance equation. In general, an image irradiance equation has infinitely many solutions. Thus constraints necessary to find a unique solution need to be identified. First we study the continuous image irradiance equation. It is demonstrated when and how the knowledge of the position of edges on a surface can be used to reconstruct the surface. Furthermore we show how much about the shape of a surface can be deduced from so called singular points. At these points the surface orientation is uniquely determined by the measured brightness. Then we investigate images in which certain types of silhouettes, which we call b-silhouettes, can be detected. In particular we answer the following question in the affirmative: Is there a set of constraints which assure that if an image irradiance equation has a solution, it is unique? To this end we postulate three constraints upon the image irradiance equation and prove that they are sufficient to uniquely reconstruct the surface from its image. Furthermore it is shown that any two of these constraints are insufficient to assure a unique solution to an image irradiance equation. Examples are given which illustrate the different issues. Finally, an overview of known numerical methods for computing solutions to an image irradiance equation are presented.

Asymptotics of Perturbations to the Wave Equation

M. Hieber, I. Wood: Asymptotics of perturbations to the wave equation. In: Evolution Equations, Lecture Notes in Pure and Appl. Math., 234, Marcel Dekker, (2003), 243-252.

Holevo-Ordering and the Continuous-Time Limit for Open Floquet Dynamics

Gough, John, (2004) 'Holevo-Ordering and the Continuous-Time Limit for Open Floquet Dynamics', Letters in Mathematical Physcis 67(3) pp.207-221 RAE2008

What do conservation biologists publish?

Fazey, I., Fischer, J., Lindenmayer, D. B. (2005). What do conservation biologists publish? Biological Conservation, 124 (1) 63-73. RAE2008