The influence of absorbed solar radiation by Saharan dust on hurricane genesis

To date, the radiative impact of dust and the Sahar an air layer (SAL) on North Atlantic hurricane activity is not yet known. According to previous studies, dust stabilizes the atmosphere due to absorption of solar radiation but thus shifts convection to regions more conducive for hurricane genesis. Here we analyze differences in hurricane genesis and frequency from ensemble sensitivity simulations with radiatively active and inactive dust in the aerosol-climate model ECHAM6-HAM. We investigate dust burden and other hurricane-related variables and determine their influence on disturbances which develop into hurricanes (developing disturbances, DDs) and those which do not (nondeveloping disturbances, NDDs). Dust and the SAL are found to potentially have both inhibiting and supporting influences on background conditions for hurricane genesis. A slight southward shift of DDs is determined when dust is active as well as a significant warming of the SAL, which leads to a strengthening of the vertical circulation associated with the SAL. The dust burden of DDs is smaller in active dust simulations compared to DDs in simulations with inactive dust, while NDDs contain more dust in active dust simulations. However, no significant influence of radiatively active dust on other variables in DDs and NDDs is found. Furthermore, no substantial change in the DD and NDD frequency due to the radiative effects of dust can be detected.

Umsetzung der Beijing Aktionsplattform (1995) und der Ergebnisse der 23. Sitzung der UNO-Generalversammlung (2000). Überprüfung des Umsetzungsstands in der Schweiz

1995 an der Vierten Weltfrauenkonferenz in Beijing haben 189 Staaten eine visionäre Aktionsplattform als Leitlinie zur Förderung der Gleichstellung von Frau und Mann verabschiedet. Zuhanden der UNO hat das IZFG 2014 – in einem partizipativen Verfahren - einen nationalen Bericht der Schweiz erstellt über 20 Jahre Umsetzung der Aktionsplattform von Beijing (Beijing+20 Bericht).

Attributing inpatient care to diabetes: The case of Medicare for the elderly in Texas, 1995

Specific aims. This study estimated the accuracy of alternative numerator methods for attributing health care utilization and associated costs to diabetes by comparing findings from those methods with findings from a benchmark denominator method. ^ Methods. Using Medicare's 1995 inpatient and enrollment databases for the elderly in Texas, the researcher developed alternative estimates of costs attributable to diabetes. Among alternative numerator methods were selection of all records having diabetes as a principal or secondary diagnosis, and a complex ICD-9-CM sorting routine as previously developed for study of diabetes costs in Texas. Findings from numerator methods were compared with those from a benchmark denominator method based on attributable risk and adapted from a study of national diabetes costs by the American Diabetes Association. This study applied age, gender and ethnicity specific estimates of diabetes prevalence taken from the 1987–94 National Health Interview Surveys to person-months of Medicare Part A, non-HMO enrollment for Texas in 1995. Outcome measures were number of persons identified as having diabetes using alternative definitions of the disease; and number of hospital stays, patient days, and costs using alternative methods for attributing care and costs to diabetes. Cost estimates were based on Medicare payments plus deductibles, co-pays and third party payments. ^ Findings. Numerator methods for attributing costs to diabetes produced findings quite different than those from the benchmark denominator method. When attribution was based on diabetes as principal or secondary diagnosis, the resulting estimates were significantly higher than those obtained from the denominator method. The more complex sorting routine produced estimates near the lower boundary for the confidence interval associated with estimates from the benchmark method. ^ Conclusions. Numerator methods employed by previous researchers poorly estimate the costs of diabetes. While crude mathematical adjustment can be made to the respective numerator approaches, a more useful strategy would be to refine the complex sorting routine to include more hospitalizations. This report recommends approaches to improving methods previously employed in study of diabetes costs. ^

Predictors of weight stability in women and men: The aerobic center longitudinal study, 1987--1995

It is estimated that more than half the U.S. adult population is overweight or obese as classified by a body mass index of 25.0–29.9 or ≥30 kg/m 2, respectively. Since the current treatment approaches for long-term maintenance of weight loss are lacking, the National Institutes of Health state that an effective approach may be to focus on weight gain prevention. There is a limited body of literature describing how adults maintain a stable weight as they age. It is hypothesized that weight stability is the result of a balance between energy consumption and energy expenditure as influenced by diet, lifestyle, behavior, genetics and environment. The purpose of this research was to examine the dietary intake and behaviors, lifestyle habits, and risk factors for weight change that predict weight stability in a cohort of 2101 men and 389 women aged 20 to 8 7 years in the Aerobic Center Longitudinal Study regardless of body weight at baseline. At baseline, participants completed a maximal exercise treadmill test to determine cardiorespiratory fitness, a medical history questionnaire, which included self-reported measures of weight, dietary behaviors, lifestyle habits, and risk factors for weight change, a three-day diet record, and a mail-back version of the medical history questionnaire in 1990 or 1995. All analyses were performed separately for men and women. Results from multivariate regression analyses indicated that the strongest predictor of follow-up weight for men and women was previous weight, accounting for 87.0% and 81.9% of the variance, respectively. Age, length of follow-up and eating habits were also significant predictors of follow-up weight in men, though these variables only explained 3% of the variance. For women, length of follow-up and currently being on a diet were significantly associated with follow-up weight but these variables explained only an additional 2% of the variance. Understanding the factors that influence weight change has tremendous public health importance for developing effective methods to prevent weight gain. Since current weight was the strongest predictor of previous weight, preventing initial weight gain by maintaining a stable weight may be the most effective method to combat the increasing prevalence of overweight and obesity. ^

Strategy and Circumstance: the Response of American Firms to Japanese Competition in Semiconductors, 1980-1995

The transistor was an American invention, and American firms led the world in semiconductor production and innovation for the first three decades of that industry's existence. In the 1980s, however, Japanese producers began to challenge American dominance. Shrill cries arose from the literature of public policy, warning that the American semiconductor industry would soon share the fate of the lamented American consumer electronics business. Few dissented from the implications: the only hope for salvation would be to adopt Japanese-style public policies and imitate the kinds of capabilities Japanese firms possessed. But the predicted extinction never occurred. Instead, American firms surged back during the 1990s, and it now seems the Japanese who are embattled. This striking American turnaround has gone largely unremarked upon in the public policy literature. And even scholarship in strategic management, which thrives on stories of success instead of stories of failure, has been comparatively silent. Drawing on a more thorough economic history of the worldwide semiconductor industry (Langlois and Steinmueller 1999), this essay attempts to collect some of the lessons for strategy research of the American resurgence. We argue that, although some of the American response did consist in changing or augmenting capabilities, most of the renewed American success is in fact the result not of imitating superior Japanese capabilities but rather of taking good advantage of a set of capabilities developed in the heyday of American dominance. Serendipity played at least as important a role as did strategy.

Recounting the Hurricane of 1938: local memories of a regional disaster

The Hurricane of 1938 was one of those defining moments that divide time into parts that either precede or follow. It was transformative, impacting human lives and settlements as well as natural systems, coastal and inland, aquatic and terrestrial, with a force unsurpassed in the region’s living memory. Seventy years have now passed since that hurricane made its historic landfall on the afternoon of September 21, 1938. Humans have regrouped and rebuilt and nature has regenerated and reclaimed, but the memories of those who lived through the Hurricane of ‘38 remain.