Fire detection using data from the NOAA-N satellites

Abstract

Due to increased concern over the climatic and economic impact of fires associated with deforestation and seasonal burning, most of which occurs in remote parts of the worid, it is necessary to find ways to effectively monitor such activity. The 3.8μm channel on board the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration's polar-orbiting satellites is very sensitive to high temperature sources such as fires. Case studies in Mexico, Brazil, Mozambique and the Soviet Union have been selected to demonstrate the utility of this channel for fire detection. With the fire detection capability of the 3.8 μm channel and the daily global coverage, it is possible to monitor world-wide fire activity.     

The use of a small acoustic wind profiler from a seagoing platform

The design and implementation of a Doppler acoustic wind profiler mounted on a fifteen-metre vessel is described. The relatively unstable platform arising from sea swell of up to 3 m necessitates special design considerations. In particular, it is shown that the profiler must be able to recover clean spectral data from single soundings, in marked contrast to the usual averaging procedure. By using attitude sensors on the profiler, it is possible to remove the effect of the motion of the vessel using appropriate coordinate transformations. It is shown that the profiler can act as a reliable mobile instrument for the study of the marine boundary layer     

Two-port control system: a generalized predictive controller

The two-port control system is introduced to develop the design framework for multivariable predictive controllers. It constitutes a general form for all two-degrees-of-freedom control systems and is particularly suited for the optimum resolution of controller design trade-offs, such as performance to command following versus disturbance rejection, and performance in the presence of various disturbance inputs. It allows the handling of systems with non-minimum phase characteristics or inherently unstable open-loop dynamics. Finally, it offers the necessary and sufficient conditions for the design of effective adaptive control strategies.     

Socialization in an Open Source Software Community: A Socio-Technical Analysis

Open Source Software (OSS) development is often characterized as a fundamentally new way to develop software. Past analyses and discussions, however, have treated OSS projects and their organization mostly as a static phenomenon. Consequently, we do not know how these communities of software developers are sustained and reproduced over time through the progressive integration of new members. To shed light on this issue I report on my analyses of socialization in a particular OSS community. In particular, I document the relationships OSS newcomers develop over time with both the social and material aspects of a project. To do so, I combine two mutually informing activities: ethnography and the use of software specially designed to visualize and explore the interacting networks of human and material resources incorporated in the email and code databases of OSS. Socialization in this community is analyzed from two perspectives: as an individual learning process and as a political process. From these analyses it appears that successful participants progressively construct identities as software craftsmen, and that this process is punctuated by specific rites of passage. Successful participants also understand the political nature of software development and progressively enroll a network of human and material allies to support their efforts. I conclude by discussing how these results could inform the design of software to support socialization in OSS projects, as well as practical implications for the future of these projects.     

MODIFICATION OF THE AGRANOFF-SUOMI METHOD FOR THE SYNTHESIS OF CDP-DIACYLGLYCEROL

Cytidine 5′-diphospho-1,2-diacyl-sn-glycerol (CDP-diacylglycerol) is an important liponucleotide intermediate in the biosynthesis of phosphatidyl-inositol, phosphatidylserine and phosphatidylglycerophosphate. The Agranoff-Suomi method (Agranoff, B. W. and Suomi, W. D. (1963) Biochem. Prep. 10, 47–51) for the synthesis of CDP-diacylglycerol was modified by a procedure which eliminates the lyophilization step required for the preparation of reactants. The reaction was run in chloroform instead of pyridine using the catalyst 4-dimethylaminopyridine. The product of the reaction was purified by silica gel column chromatography and is enzymatically active with the enzymes phosphatidylinositol synthase, phosphatidylserine synthase and phosphatidylglycerophosphate synthase.     

Gas–Liquid Oxygen Mass-transfer; from Fundamentals to Applications in Hydrometallurgical Systems

Oxygen gas is used as a reactant in many hydrometallurgical processes. However, oxygen is sparingly soluble in aqueous electrolyte solutions, and the driving force for its masstransfer from the gas to the aqueous phase is also very low. Hence, the mass-transfer of oxygen depends significantly on the interfacial area between the gas and the liquid phase, which in turn depends on the mixing conditions inside the reactor. A change in the solution composition or the presence of solids can further alter the rate of oxygen masstransfer. All such phenomena related to the gas-liquid oxygen mass-transfer in hydrometallurgical unit operations are critically reviewed in the present article – from the basic thermodynamics and kinetics of oxygen dissolution in aqueous solutions to the most recent advances in oxygen mass-transfer systems.