Challenges in developing an integrated catchment management model

Directives and policies increasingly call for more integrated management of land and water. Frameworks such as integrated catchment management may address these calls, and yet their implementation requires decisions to be taken under conditions of extreme complexity and uncertainty. This paper summarises a participatory framework through which decision‐makers, experts and system modellers can collaboratively develop an integrated model to support such decisions. A feasibility study showed the potential of the framework. An operational version of the model, able to analyse the effects of 50 management options on 20 indicators, is estimated to require in the order of 225 man‐months from system modellers, alongside substantial inputs from stakeholders. The significant technical challenges confronting such an exercise may be overshadowed by the institutional challenges, including the fundamental question of whether organisations are truly committed. However, the reward for overcoming such challenges is the opportunity to achieve genuine improvements in the social, economic and environmental quality of our catchments.     

Catalytic deoxygenation of liquid biomass for hydrocarbon fuels

Liquid biomass such as methyl laurate and canola oil is deoxygenated with hydrogen and NiMo/γ-Al₂O₃ catalyst. Oxygen from methyl laurate and canola oil is removed at 18.25–85.13 bar initial cold hydrogen pressure and 300–400 °C, using a 316 stainless steel batch reactor. Removal of oxygen from liquid methyl laurate and canola oil is evaluated with a GC/MS analyzer for liquid reaction products and another GC for gaseous reaction products. The range of reaction duration of liquid biomass in the batch reactor is 30–60 min under the deoxygenation conditions. Conversion of liquid biomass into gaseous products is evaluated with analysis data of gas products and a mass balance in terms of hydrogen.The objective of this research is to develop an efficient method of removing oxygen from liquid biomass to produce petroleum-comparative liquid hydrocarbons with hydrogen and a catalyst.Removal of oxygen from bio-based fuels for liquid hydrocarbon fuel is needed to increase its energy intensity, stability, and decrease its viscosity. In this paper, removal of oxygen from methyl laurate and canola oil is discussed in detail in terms of various oxygen removal conditions such as reaction temperature and pressure, catalyst amount, and hydrodynamics of heterogeneous reaction mixture in the batch reactor.     

寻求精确且可靠的振动感测适用于以状态为基础的预知维护

精密的工业制程对于马达与相关机械有效而且一致性运作的依赖日益提高.在机械中的失衡、缺陷、松散、以及其它异常现象通常都会转换成振动,而接着就是失去精密度与安全性的考虑.假如不加以处理的话,除了性能与安全的问题之外,当设备需要脱机修理时,生产力的损失将会变得无可避免.     

Developing community capacity to treat post-deployment mental health problems: A public health initiative.

Meeting the mental health needs of Veterans returning from recent deployment requires the coordinated effort of partnerships across Department of Defense (DoD), Department of Veterans Affairs (VA), and state and local communities. Although the proportion of Veterans of Iraq and Afghanistan who have accessed VA health care has grown, the majority of these new combat Veterans have yet to present for VA care. The stigma associated with reporting a deployment-related mental health problem may be one factor in this, but access to treatment may also be an important concern among the one third of American Veterans who live in rural or highly rural areas. As these Veterans are more likely to present to a primary care, faith-based or mental health provider in their own community, partnerships between community providers, DoD, and VA are of critical importance in ensuring appropriate care, regardless of treatment setting. In an effort to improve services and access to services, especially to rural Veterans, an educational public health initiative was created to educate community providers about military culture, deployment-related mental health issues, VA resources, and evidence-based treatments. We describe the development, dissemination and evaluation of this initiative, as well as lessons learned for future similar endeavors. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2011 APA, all rights reserved)     

Rising verbal intelligence scores: Implications for research and clinical practice.

Evidence suggests that scores on various intelligence tests have been rising at a fast rate. To find out whether performance on the Wechsler Adult Intelligence Scale (WAIS) Vocabulary subtest has also been rising, the authors searched major psychology journals for investigations involving healthy younger and older adult participants and collected the reported WAIS Vocabulary scores. The meta-analysis shows that WAIS Vocabulary scores have been rising at the rate of 0.117/year (corresponding to 1.52 IQ points/decade) for younger adults and 0.367/year (corresponding to 4.79 IQ points/decade) for older adults. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Microchemical Characterization of Alluvial Gold Grains as an Exploration Tool

There is considerable variation in the composition of native gold and the nature of minerals co-existing with it, and this reflects differences in the geological environment and chemistry of ore-forming processes. In areas where gold-bearing mineralization is subject to active fluvial erosion, especially in temperate climatic regimes, any discrete grains of native gold pass into alluvial sediment with little modification. The chemical characteristics of alluvial grains and the nature of preserved mineral inclusions provide a signature which points back to the type of source mineralization. This signature may be established using electron probe microanalysis and scanning electron microscopy and can be interpreted to provide information about the original bedrock mineralization. Identification of the type of source mineralization using the technique at an early stage in regional exploration can help focus attention on targets with the most potential economic importance.