Complementing retrofit with engagement: exploring energy consumption with social housing tenants

Councils and social housing organisations are looking to retrofit as a way to make their housing more energy efficient. Previous studies on energy use in social housing have generally focussed on the technological aspects (such as the potential savings possible by retrofitting this class of housing across the UK) or have involved one‐off interventions or measures. During a 2‐year period, we worked with previously homeless people to reduce their energy consumption. The 32 participants lived in small blocks of flats (owned by a social housing organisation) that underwent retrofitting with air source heat pumps. We ran a three‐phase tenant engagement programme to compare a range of approaches aimed at energy reduction. It was found that education, social norms and self‐awareness are all key components when it comes to initiating environmentally responsible behaviours. The three approaches complemented each other, and these ought to be considered alongside technology provision if the aim is to reduce energy consumption. A number of reflections on the implementation of medium‐term tenant engagement programmes are also presented. Copyright © 2016 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

The Oregon Land Use Act Implications for Farmland and Open Space Protection

In 1973, Oregon adopted a statewide comprehensive land use management program. It represents an important new approach in land use control and merits careful consideration and examination by land use analysts, policy makers, and the public. By providing statewide standards for land use planning and implementation carried out through an ongoing local administrative process, an important state land use management role has been established and, many argue, without a substantial erosion of local flexibility.

Rural land use management, particularly farmland protection, is an important component of the Oregon program. The combination of state mandated, locally implemented urban growth boundary designations and exclusive farm use zoning represents a unique case in farmland protection policy. The performance of the program is evaluated, and economic trade-offs in the selection of minimum lot size standards are discussed. This program offers the promise of substantially improving rural land use management in Oregon at a modest cost to the public sector.     

Subdivisions of inferior temporal cortex in squirrel monkeys make dissociable contributions to visual learning and memory.

Inferior temporal cortex of squirrel monkeys consists of caudal (ITC), intermediate (ITI), and rostral (ITR) subdivisions, possibly homologous to TEO, posterior TE, and anterior TE of macaque monkeys. The present study compared visual learning in squirrel monkeys with ablations of ITC; ITI and ITR (group ITRd); or ITI, ITR, and more ventral cortex, including perirhinal cortex (group ITR+), with visual learning in unoperated controls. The ITC monkeys had significant impairments on pattern discriminations and milder deficits on delayed nonmatching to sample (DNMS) of objects. The ITRd monkeys had deficits on some pattern discriminations but not on DNMS. The ITRd monkeys were significantly impaired on DNMS and some pattern discriminations. These results are similar to those found in macaques and support the proposed homologies. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Direct Determination of ��-Hydroxy-��-Methylbutyrate (HMB) in Liquid Nutritional Products

A high performance liquid chromatography/ultraviolet method developed for the simple and direct determination of β-hydroxy-β-methylbutyrate (HMB) in liquid nutritional products and dietary supplements is described. Method suitability was defined by experimental assessments of linearity (r ² > 0.9999), precision (day-to-day RSD <1.5%), accuracy (spike recoveries = 98.1–102.4%, n = 28), selectivity (peak purity average = 99.8 ± 0.8%, n = 10; absence of interference verified by placebo analysis), and quantitation limit (90 mg/kg or 0.8 mM). The method provides for a simple, accurate, and precise quantification of HMB, when present at millimolar concentrations in liquid nutritional products and dietary supplements.     

Wide-band ground-plane DC block and bias feed

The realization of a wideband, ground-plane DC block and bias feed for microstrip transmission lines operating in Ka-band, 26.5-40.0 GHz, is described. The waveguide-to-microstrip fixture and transition used for testing are described. Analysis of the ground-plane bias gap structure is provided. A few possible applications are discussed     

Comment on Kiesler's "Public and Professional Myths…"

Contends that C. A. Kiesler (see record 1983-24077-001) has drawn too many inferences based on incomplete and inaccurate analyses in his article on public and professional myths about mental hospitalization. Specifically, the present authors differ with Kiesler's contention that mental hospitalization is increasing, his implicit assumption that episodes of mental disorder in general hospitals without psychiatric units are equivalent to those in general hospitals with such units, and his comparison of effects of hospitalization for mental illness vs alternate modes of care. (3 ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Physical and chemical properties of ultrasonically, spray-dried green banana (Musa cavendish) starch

Ultrasonic wave propagation and the spray dryer technique were applied to study their effect on the physical and chemical properties of green banana starch. The results showed high resistant starch content, which was reduced by ultrasound treatment and also by spray drying. Both techniques increased the solubility, swelling power and water absorption capacity. The gels exhibited non-Newtonian shear-thinning behavior, since flow behavior index was less than one (n < 1). Ultrasound wave propagation reduced yield stress and consistency coefficient in starch gels. Under oscillatory shear, all gels exhibited solid-like viscoelastic behavior, storage modulus was higher than loss modulus to entire frequency range (G′ > G′′), which was confirmed by the Cox-Merz experiment that showed that the complex dynamic viscosity was greater than the apparent viscosity in all samples. The gelatinization temperature was mainly influenced by drying technique and ultrasound treatment reduced the amount of energy required to gelatinize the starch.     

Variation of indoxyl and cresol sulphates in milk protein commodities

Indoxyl and cresol sulphates were determined in retail milk products and milk protein commodities. Indoxyl sulphate (IXS) and p-cresol sulphate/m-cresol sulphate (PCS/MCS) varied widely among the milk proteins (IXS: <0.10–3.74 mg kg^?1 protein; PCS/MCS: <2–44.1 mg kg^?1 protein), but were strongly correlated (r² > 0.93), with PCS/MCS, on average, 11.3 ± 3.3 (n = 15) times IXS. IXS and PCS/MCS decreased with protein enrichment (from 57 to 83% protein) in a milk protein concentrate, indicating removal by the ultrafiltration process. In addition, the lowest IXS and PCS/MCS levels were found in the ultrafiltered commodities: milk protein concentrates, milk protein isolates, and whey protein concentrates. These data were consistent with the reduction of IXS and PCS/MCS in fat free milk by bench scale ultrafiltration. The distribution of cresol sulphates was approximated as 70% para-, 30% meta-, and <5% ortho-cresol sulphates.     

Effect of carbohydrate DE on blocked lysine and furosine in a liquid nutritional product

A controlled, quantitative study of Maillard browning vs. dextrose equivalents (DE) was performed on a liquid nutritional product. The early stage Maillard markers furosine and available lysine were determined in retort-sterilised, pilot scale batches formulated with carbohydrate systems with DE variations of 2, 4, 10, and 20. Both markers varied proportionately with DE; every DE increase of 2 units resulted in the blockage (glycation) of an additional 1% of total lysine. When DE 20 maltodextrin was replaced with an 80/20 blend of DE 5 maltodextrin and sucrose (blend DE = 4), lysine blockage decreased by 831 mg/100 g protein, which was 8.25% of the total lysine, and the mole equivalent of 1.75 g of fructoselysine. The quantitative browning/DE relationships enable reliable projections of the nutritional benefits which may be attained through the use of low-DE maltodextrins.     

Frequency distributions and spatially dependent variability of ammonium and nitrate concentrations in soil under grazed and ungrazed grassland

The frequency distributions of soil NO ₃ ^- and NH ₄ ⁺ concentrations under grazed and ungrazed grassland were found to be lognormal, irrespective of time of year or soil depth. The variance and skewness of the sample values increased with stocking density and use of N fertilizer. An analysis of the spatial dependence of the variability using the semivariogram showed a high nugget variance, even when three sample values from each sampling point were averaged. Most of the variance was therefore short-range (occurring within a distance of 0.4 m), suggesting that the sample volume for soil mineral N measurement should be as large as is practicably possible. As an estimate of the average mineral N content, the geometric mean of the sample values consistently underestimated the true arithmetic mean of the population from which the same was drawn. The conventional estimate of the arithmetic mean for lognormally distributed samples values was satisfactory when the sample number was > 50 and the (log) variance < 0.75 (µg N cm^–3). However, for data with larger variances, high coefficients of skewness and fewer observations, Sichel's estimator was a more efficient measure of the true population mean.