Certification of the European Reference Soil Set (IRMM-443--EUROSOILS). Part II. Soil-pH in suspensions of water and CaCl2

IRMM-443 re-groups a set of six European Reference Soils (EUROSOILS), which had been certified for their adsorption coefficients for atrazine, 2,4-D and lindane (Certification of the European Reference Soil Set (IRMM-443-EUROSOILS)-Part I. Adsorption coefficients for atrazine, 2,4-D and lindane. Sci Total Environ, in press). The certification of these parameters was complemented by an additional certification of pH in suspension as well by the determination of indicative values for total nitrogen, organic and total carbon content. While Part I explained the principles of the value assignment process and discussed their application to the adsorption coefficients, Part II presents the certified values for pH as well as the indicative values for N(tot), C(tot) and C(org). In addition, the assessment of uncertainty components for stability and homogeneity, which have been included in the final uncertainty budget, is discussed.     

Concentrate feeding strategy in lactating dairy cows: metabolic and endocrine changes with emphasis on leptin

This study aimed to evaluate metabolic and endocrine adaptations to energy intake in multiparous Holstein cows (n = 90; mean 9434 kg energy-corrected milk yield/305 d) over the first 20 wk postpartum and to assess the association of leptin with metabolic, endocrine, and zootechnical traits. Concentrates were fed automatically for 24 h at 30% (C30) or 50% (C50) of total dry matter intake (DMI) from wk 1 to 10 postpartum and at linearly reduced amounts thereafter. Roughage was fed for ad libitum intake. The DMI was measured over 24 h; milk yield and body weight (BW), twice/d; milk composition, 4 times/wk; and milk acetone, weekly. Blood samples for determination of metabolite, hormone, and electrolyte concentrations and enzyme activities were obtained at wk 2 prepartum, and at wk 1 to 16 and at wk 20 postpartum from 0730 to 0900. Body condition scores (BCS) and backfat thickness were measured postpartum and during wk 1, 4, 8, 12, 16, and 20. Energy balance (EB) was considerably lower, but milk yield only slightly lower, in C30 than C50. Metabolic stress was more marked in C30 than C50, expressed by lower, glucose, insulin, insulin-like growth factor-1 (IGF-1), triiodothyronine, milk protein, and lactose concentrations, higher nonesterified fatty acid, beta-hydroxybutyrate, growth hormone, and milk acetone concentrations, and an accelerated decrease in BCS and backfat thickness. Nevertheless, C30 adapted successfully and thus maintained high milk yields despite negative EB. Leptin concentrations were lower in C30 than in C50 over the first 20 wk postpartum and were positively associated with BCS, EB, BW, cholesterol, albumin, insulin, and IGF-1; negatively associated with DMI and triiodothyronine; and were higher in cows calving in spring than in fall. Leptin is one among several factors involved in the regulation of energy metabolism and may be important for overall homeostatic and homeorhetic control of metabolism and thus for maintenance of performance.     

A Simple Method to Extract Essential Oils from Tissue Samples by Using Microwave Radiation

A microwave protocol to extract lipophilic substances from tissue was modified to extract essential oils (EOs) from plant tissue and insect feculae. The material, in a solvent transparent to microwave radiation, is exposed for a short time to steam in a microwave oven. EO extracts are analyzed directly by GC or GC-MS when plant material is fresh and terpenes contained in glandular structures on leaf surfaces are readily released into the solvent. For dried material or insect feculae, mechanical means are utilized first to break up tissue; however, the complete procedure is carried out inside the same vial to reduce losses. Statistical analysis shows that the reproducibility of the modified method is high. Several samples can be run within an hour with this method.     

Evolution of SOA Concepts in Telecommunications

The telecommunications industry has always been service-oriented. However, the convergence-driven need to deliver seamless services across different access networks has forced operators to embrace new approaches, including the intelligent network, Web-services-based APIs, and, most recently, the IP multimedia subsystem. Today, SOA is considered state of the art for service-delivery platforms. Such platforms for value-added services have evolved from the intelligent network (IN) and object-oriented programming interfaces to recent Web-services-based platforms. They've exploited the most recent information technologies to implement an open set of service components. Web 2.0's recent emergence, meanwhile, has further pressured telecom companies to implement an open service market based on an open set of enabling services and service components.     

Holocaust trauma reconstructed: Individual, familial, and social trauma.

Psychic trauma is characterized by ego damage, regression, and relative helplessness. Following a historic catastrophe, psychic trauma with ego damage is frequently encountered as cumulative trauma. Reconstruction was essential to the understanding of an adult patient initially unaware of his holocaust trauma. When the patient was a child, he and his parents were simultaneously traumatized. Intrapsychic intergenerational psychosocial and neurobiological factors were adverse codeterminants of his cumulative trauma. Isolated affects and fragmented memories required sequential connection in the context of family, identity, and society. Reconstruction importantly contributed to ego reintegration of a lost, lacerated childhood, and to adaptive mastery of trauma and conflict. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Ausbreitung von Kältefahnen im Grundwasser bei Erdwärmesonden

Shallow geothermal energy installations, especially ground source heat pump (GSHP) systems are increasingly being used for air conditioning and temperature control in buildings. Heating applications, for example, result in cold temperature anomalies (cold plumes) in the subsurface. To avoid interactions between adjacent cold plumes, authorities recommend minimum distances of about 10 m between installations. The length of these plumes can be simulated analytically and numerically. The presented analytical solutions are valid for steady-state conditions and consider conduction, convection and dispersion. The results show that the length depends on different parameters, especially flow velocity. The plumes in gravel aquifers become temporarily longer than in less permeable aquifers. Even under average energy extraction rates, they can exceed 10 m in length after one heating period. In the presented example the plume has a length of 10 m after 100 days under a continuous energy extraction rate of 55 W?m^?1. However, these plumes can regenerate quickly. Finally, the analytical results are discussed in a legal context.     

Reducing mechanism design to algorithm design via machine learning

We use techniques from sample-complexity in machine learning to reduce problems of incentive-compatible mechanism design to standard algorithmic questions, for a broad class of revenue-maximizing pricing problems. Our reductions imply that for these problems, given an optimal (or β-approximation) algorithm for an algorithmic pricing problem, we can convert it into a (1+?)-approximation (or β(1+?)-approximation) for the incentive-compatible mechanism design problem, so long as the number of bidders is sufficiently large as a function of an appropriate measure of complexity of the class of allowable pricings. We apply these results to the problem of auctioning a digital good, to the attribute auction problem which includes a wide variety of discriminatory pricing problems, and to the problem of item-pricing in unlimited-supply combinatorial auctions. From a machine learning perspective, these settings present several challenges: in particular, the “loss function” is discontinuous, is asymmetric, and has a large range. We address these issues in part by introducing a new form of covering-number bound that is especially well-suited to these problems and may be of independent interest.     

Elucidation of Dimethylalkylpyrazines from the Ant Streblognathus aethiopicus by GC-FTIR

The presumed mandibular gland secretions from the workers and gamergates of two colonies of Streblognathus aethiopicus have been found to contain a homologous series of 3,5-dimethyl-2-alkylpyrazines (3,5-dimethyl-2-butylpyrazine, 1; 3,5-dimethyl-2-pentylpyrazine, 2; and 3,5-dimethyl-2-hexylpyrazine, 3). The structures of these compounds were determined from their mass spectra along with a comparison of their GC-FTIR spectra with those of all the isomers of a lower homolog. This is the first time that this combination of techniques has been applied to the study of insect pyrazines. The relative amounts and proportions of these compounds were different for gamergates and workers, with the latter containing 2–10 times more total pyrazines and having a higher proportion of 2 and 3. The possible significance of this finding is discussed.     

Universal Portfolios With and Without Transaction Costs

A constant rebalanced portfolio is an investment strategy which keeps the same distribution of wealth among a set of stocks from period to period. Recently there has been work on on-line investment strategies that are competitive with the best constant rebalanced portfolio determined in hindsight (Cover, 1991, 1996; Helmbold et al., 1996; Cover & Ordentlich, 1996a, 1996b; Ordentlich & Cover, 1996). For the universal algorithm of Cover (Cover, 1991),we provide a simple analysis which naturallyextends to the case of a fixed percentage transaction cost (commission ), answering a question raised in (Cover, 1991; Helmbold et al., 1996; Cover & Ordentlich, 1996a, 1996b; Ordentlich & Cover, 1996; Cover, 1996). In addition, we present a simple randomized implementation that is significantly faster in practice. We conclude by explaining how these algorithms can be applied to other problems, such as combining the predictions of statistical language models, where the resulting guarantees are more striking.     

Weighted Error Estimates for Finite Element Solutions of Variational Inequalities

In this note the studies begun in Blum and Suttmeier (1999) on adaptive finite element discretisations for nonlinear problems described by variational inequalities are continued. Similar to the concept proposed, e.g., in Becker and Rannacher (1996) for variational equalities, weighted a posteriori estimates for controlling arbitrary functionals of the discretisation error are constructed by using a duality argument. Numerical results for the obstacle problem demonstrate the derived error bounds to be reliable and, used for an adaptive grid refinement strategy, to produce economical meshes. Received September 6, 1999; revised February 8, 2000