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Books > Earth & environment > Earth sciences > General
Time-variable exposure profiles of pesticides are more often the rule than exception in the surface waters of agricultural landscapes. There is, therefore, a need to adequately address the uncertainties arising from time-variable exposure profiles in the aquatic risk assessment procedure for pesticides. Linking Aquatic Exposure and Effects: Risk Assessment of Pesticides provides guidance and recommendations for linking aquatic exposure and ecotoxicological effects in the environmental assessment of agricultural pesticides. Leading international scientists share their expertise in aquatic exposure assessment, aquatic ecotoxicology, and the risk assessment and management of plant protection products. The book incorporates the tools and approaches currently available for assessing the environmental risks of time-variable exposure profiles of pesticides. It also discusses the science behind these techniques. This volume covers the extrapolation techniques, including models that address the environmental fate, toxicokinetics, toxicodynamics, and ecological effects, for performing accurate aquatic environmental risk assessments of pesticides. It explains how to link aquatic exposure and effects in the risk assessment procedure for plant protection products.
The over-enrichment of surface water bodies with phosphorus compounds can lead to eutrophication resulting in reduced photosynthetic activity, oxygen depletion, production of toxic compounds and, ultimately, loss of plant and animal species. Due to relatively high removal efficiency, economy and environmentally-friendly operation, enhanced biological phosphorus removal (EBPR) in activated sludge wastewater treatment systems is a popular technology to control and prevent eutrophication in surface water bodies. EBPR can be implemented by promoting the enrichment of the system with polyphosphate-accumulating organisms (PAO). However, EBPR process may suffer of instability and unreliability experiencing process upsets, deterioration and even failure. Among other factors, the appearance of glycogen-accumulating organisms (GAO), which compete with PAO, has been hypothesized to be the main cause of deterioration of the EBPR process performance. In this research, the effects of key environmental and operating conditions influencing the PAO-GAO competition were addressed through undertaking different studies at both lab- and full-scale and by applying mathematical modelling. It contributes to get a better understanding about the factors affecting the PAO-GAO competition and, thus, the stability and reliability of the EBPR process in activated sludge systems. The findings obtained in this research may prove useful towards optimization of full-scale EBPR plants.
Terrestrial Biosphere tries to pose the questions which underlie the many-sided debate of how to respond to and influence change: How should we view nature? What do we do for the best - how should we act - what are we trying to achieve and what should we be guided by?In doing so the book introduces and attempts to analyse not only scientific aspects of the debate but also cultural attitudes and values: the notions of ecosystem stability are now challenged and it is also clear that ecosystems are renewable but not repeatable. It finds that prescriptive 'solutions' based on current constructs may not be adequate. Feeling that analysis should lead to advocacy, the author believes that if we can't improve predictability, we have to increase adaptability which means that ecological and social capacity building should be advocated. This is seen in terms of concepts, institutions, attitudes and values which allow for a plurality of meanings and which can cope with surprise and unforeseen change - and which also facilitates responses to change.
This book deals with a class of basic deformations in Asymmetric Continuum Theory. It describes molecular deformations and transport velocities in fluids, strain deformations in solids as well as the molecular transport, important in fracture processes. In solids, a separate problem relates to the displacements; their recording, e.g., by means of the seismometers, proves only the existence of the displacement derivatives and not a real displacement. However, the molecular displacements and new fracture criterion including the defect distributions and induced strains are defined in the book too. In fluids, the transport velocities and molecular strains describe the motion processes. The vortex motions are defined by means of the rotational transport; this approach leads to more complicated problems, like the turbulence phenomena. The interaction processes, including the electric and magnetic fields, and some thermodynamical problems and quantum theory analogies help to understand the extreme processes
This textbook presents a comprehensive examination of environmental science and ecotoxicology for undergraduate students. The material provides sufficient related background information leading to a competency to clearly understand ecotoxicology concepts and topics.
Proceedings of a symposium at the 1987 INQUA Congress, Ottawa, Aug. 1987. Contributions present the application of quaternary studies to land use planning and development. No index. Annotation copyright Book News, Inc. Portland, Or.
Twenty-six papers form a summary of research on glacial history, paleoclimatology, biogeography, ecosystem disequilibrium. Focus is on detailed chrono-stratigraphic, glacial geologic, and vertebrate paleontologic problems. No index. Annotation copyright Book News, Inc. Portland, Or.
Abiotic stress drastically limits agricultural crop productivity worldwide. Climate change threatens the sustainable agriculture with its rapid and unpredictable effects, making it difficult for agriculturists and farmers to respond to the challenges cropping up from environmental stresses.In light of population growth and climate changes, investment in agriculture is the only way to avert wide scale food shortages. This challenge comes at a time when plant sciences are witnessing remarkable progress in understanding the fundamental processes of plant growth and development. Plant researchershave identifiedgenes controlling different aspects of plant growth and development, but many challenges still exist in creating an apt infrastructure, access to bioinformatics and good crop results. "Improvement of Crops in the Era of Climatic Changes, Volume2"focuses on many existing opportunities that can be applied methodically through conventional breeding, without touching upon the latest discoveries such as the power of genomics to applied breeding in plant biology. Written by a diversefaction of internationally famedscholars, this volume adds new horizons in the field of crop improvement, genetic engineering and abiotic stress tolerance. Comprehensive and lavishly illustrated, "Improvement of Crops in the Era of Climatic Changes, Volume2"is a state-of-the-art guide to recent developmentsvis-a-visvarious aspects of plant responses in molecular and biochemical ways to create strong yields and overall crop improvement."
Viewed from the perspective of environmental management, this study describes the implications and applications of the precautionary principle - a theory of avoiding risk even when its likelihood seems remote. This principle has been employed in the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change and the North Atlantic Convention, yet it is not widely understood. This study examines the history and context of the principle, and its applications to law, governmental policies, business and investment, scientific research and international relations.
This text challenges the belief that cities will eventually disappear as territorial forms of social organization as new information technologies permit the articulation of social processes without regard for distance, arguing that the specific role of cities will become more important, and proposing that a dynamic and creative relationship be built up between the local and the global. In this way, cities will remain the focus of social organization, political management and cultural expression, equipped to deal with the enormous social and environmental problems of urbanization.
The benefits of modern technology often involve health, safety and environmental risks that produce public suspicion of technologies and aversion to certain products and substances. Amplified by the pervasive power of the media, public concern about health and ecological risks can have enormous economic and social impacts, such as the 'stigmatization' experienced in recent years with nuclear power, British beef and genetically modified plants. This volume presents the most current and comprehensive examination of how and why stigma occurs and what the appropriate responses to it should be to inform the public and reduce undesirable impacts. Each form of stigma is thoroughly explored through a range of case studies. Theoretical contributions look at the roles played by government and business, and the crucial impact of the media in forming public attitudes. Stigma is not always misplaced, and the authors discuss the challenges involved in managing risk and reducing the vulnerability of important products, industries and institutions while providing the public with the relevant information they need about risks.
To comply with legal and other standards, businesses and regulators are increasingly required to make decisions based on risk assessments of the potential effects of their activities on the environment. Atmospheric dispersion modelling is a cost-effective method, allowing various scenarios to be explored before expensive investment takes place. This guide offers advice on this environmental management tool. Unlike much of the previous literature, it doesn't focus excessively on the mathematical theory behind the modelling or on modelling for specific regulatory purposes. Instead, it offers an understanding of the background to the methodologies, providing exercises to develop the skills to carry these out and including examples of the use of commercially available models to enable the reader to assess the results of modelling for risk assessment.
This work provides a short "getting started" guide to Fortran 90/95. The main target audience consists of newcomers to the field of numerical computation within Earth system sciences (students, researchers or scientific programmers). Furthermore, readers accustomed to other programming languages may also benefit from this work, by discovering how some programming techniques they are familiar with map to Fortran 95. The main goal is to enable readers to quickly start using Fortran 95 for writing useful programs. It also introduces a gradual discussion of Input/Output facilities relevant for Earth system sciences, from the simplest ones to the more advanced netCDF library (which has become a de facto standard for handling the massive datasets used within Earth system sciences). While related works already treat these disciplines separately (each often providing much more information than needed by the beginning practitioner), the reader finds in this book a shorter guide which links them. Compared to other books, this work provides a much more compact view of the language, while also placing the language-elements in a more applied setting, by providing examples related to numerical computing and more advanced Input/Output facilities for Earth system sciences. Naturally, the coverage of the programming language is relatively shallow, since many details are skipped. However, many of these details can be learned gradually by the practitioner, after getting an overview and some practice with the language through this book.
The revolution in science that is transforming our understanding of extinct life We used to think of fossils as being composed of nothing but rock and minerals, all molecular traces of life having vanished long ago. We were wrong. Remnants of Ancient Life reveals how the new science of ancient biomolecules-pigments, proteins, and DNA that once functioned in living organisms tens of millions of years ago-is opening a new window onto the evolution of life on Earth. Paleobiologists are now uncovering these ancient remnants in the fossil record with increasing frequency, shedding vital new light on long-extinct creatures and the lost world they inhabited. Dale Greenwalt is your guide to these astonishing breakthroughs. He explains how ancient biomolecules hold the secrets to how mammoths dealt with the bitter cold, what colors dinosaurs exhibited in mating displays, how ancient viruses evolved to become more dangerous, and much more. Each chapter discusses different types of biomolecules and the insights they provide about the physiology, behavior, and evolution of extinct organisms, many of which existed long before the age of dinosaurs. A marvelous adventure of discovery, Remnants of Ancient Life offers an unparalleled look at an emerging science that is transforming our picture of the remote past. You will never think of fossils in the same way again.
Developed for use as a reference work in graduate and undergraduate courses as well as for researchers, policymakers, and interested laypersons, the book is a unique collection of authoritative yet accessible journal articles about risk. Drawn from a variety of disciplines including the physical and social sciences, engineering, and law, the articles deal with a wide range of public policy, regulatory, management, energy, and environmental issues. The selections are accompanied by introductory notes, questions for thought and discussion, and suggestions for further reading.
Spatio-Temporal Databases explores recent trends in flexible querying and reasoning about time- and space-related information in databases. It shows how flexible querying enhances standard querying expressiveness in many different ways, with the aim of facilitating extraction of relevant data and information. Flexible spatial and temporal reasoning denotes qualitative reasoning about dynamic changes in the spatial domain, characterized by imprecision or uncertainty (or both). Many of the contributions focus on GIS, while some others are more general, or focus on related application fields, presenting theoretical viewpoints and techniques that are inspiring or can be adapted for GIS. The first part bundles the contributions on advances at the theoretical level, also discussing examples and opening further perspectives. The second part presents contributions on well-developed applications. The authors explain how to handle imprecision and uncertainty, demonstrating how advanced techniques can help to solve diverse problems related to GIS.
A groundbreaking look at Gaia theory’s intersections with neocybernetic systems theory  Often seen as an outlier in science, Gaia has run a long and varied course since its formulation in the 1970s by atmospheric chemist James Lovelock and microbiologist Lynn Margulis. Gaian Systems is a pioneering exploration of the dynamic and complex evolution of Gaia’s many variants, with special attention to Margulis’s foundational role in these developments. Bruce Clarke assesses the different dialects of systems theory brought to bear on Gaia discourse. Focusing in particular on Margulis’s work—including multiple pieces of her unpublished Gaia correspondence—he shows how her research and that of Lovelock was concurrent and conceptually parallel with the new discourse of self-referential systems that emerged within neocybernetic systems theory. The recent Gaia writings of Donna Haraway, Isabelle Stengers, and Bruno Latour contest its cybernetic status. Clarke engages Latour on the issue of Gaia’s systems description and extends his own systems-theoretical synthesis under what he terms “metabiotic Gaia.†This study illuminates current issues in neighboring theoretical conversations—from biopolitics and the immunitary paradigm to NASA astrobiology and the Anthropocene. Along the way, he points to science fiction as a vehicle of Gaian thought. Delving into many issues not previously treated in accounts of Gaia, Gaian Systems describes the history of a theory that has the potential to help us survive an environmental crisis of our own making.
This book bridges the gap between theory and practice, showing how a detailed definition of the shear-wave velocity (VS) profile can be efficiently obtained using limited field equipment and following simple acquisition procedures. It demonstrates how surface waves (used to define the VS profile) and vibration data (used to describe the dynamic behaviour of a building) can be recorded using the same equipment, and also highlights common problems, ambiguities and pitfalls that can occur when adopting popular methodologies, which are often based on a series of simplistic assumptions. Today, most national and international building codes take into account a series of parameters aimed at defining the local seismic hazard. Sites are characterised based on the local VS profile, and the dynamic behaviour of existing buildings is defined through the analysis of their eigenmodes. The book includes a series of case studies to help readers gain a deeper understanding of seismic and vibration data and the meaning (pros and cons) of a series of techniques often referred to as MASW, ESAC, SPAC, ReMi, HVSR, MAAM and HS. It also provides access to some of the datasets so that readers can gain a deeper and more concrete understanding of both the theoretical and practical aspects.
Man’s environment is pervaded by ionizing radiation of predominantly natural origin but now with an important contribution from anthropogenic activities. Exposure to ionizing radiation can have serious health implications, which is why it is of concern to us. This book brings together under one cover, the fundamentals of radiological protection, the techniques used for measuring radioactivity and radionuclides and the methods for modelling the dispersion of radionuclides in the environment. Information on radioactive decay, the interaction of ionizing radiation with matter and biological effects of radiation is provided in a form that enables the reader to quickly appreciate its importance to the environment and human health. Summaries of the effects of past releases, including the Chernobyl accident, are included as well as examples of applications of models to calculate and predict concentrations of radionuclides in our environment. This book is aimed at all those studying, at undergraduate and graduate levels, radioactivity in the environment and its impact on man. It will also serve as a handbook for workers in the fields of radiochemical analysis and environmental modelling and for scientists, consultants and environmental health and pollution officers who have to provide radiological data or information for legislative and related purposes.
The second edition of this introductory GIS textbook is thoroughly rewritten and updated to respond to the demand for critical engagement with technologies that address relevant issues across several disciplines preparing students for higher-level work in geotechnologies. Chapters are arranged to (1) build competence in fundamental skills, (2) explore applications of higher-level managerial and analytical functions that are typically called upon in public, nonprofit, and private sector milieu, and (3) propose and detail a template for organizing, executing, and completing a GIS project successfully. This interests all users from beginners to experienced professionals.
11 June, 1930. On a ship floating near Nonsuch Island, a curious steel ball is lowered 3,000 feet into the sea. Crumpled inside, the famed zoologist William Beebe gazes out of the thick quartz windows, watching luminous marine life and never-before-seen creatures flit out of the inky darkness. A deep dive into Beebe's eyewitness accounts of underwater exploration, The Bathysphere Book blends research and storytelling, uncovering a magical world where ghostly glowing organisms test the limits of human understanding.
Here, the authors present modern mathematical methods to solve problems of differential-operator inclusions and evolution variation inequalities which may occur in fields such as geophysics, aerohydrodynamics, or fluid dynamics. For the first time, they describe the detailed generalization of various approaches to the analysis of fundamentally nonlinear models and provide a toolbox of mathematical equations. These new mathematical methods can be applied to a broad spectrum of problems. Examples of these are phase changes, diffusion of electromagnetic, acoustic, vibro-, hydro- and seismoacoustic waves, or quantum mechanical effects. This is the first of two volumes dealing with the subject.
The aim of this book is to introduce scientific ballooning to the many people who are interested in the use of balloons for scientific applications. The book offers a basic understanding of the engineering details and the scientific research giving rise to balloon activities going on today. Above all, the book will serve as a guidebook for young scientists and researchers seeking to become involved in space science and technology by participating in balloon projects. The book deals with three types of balloons: large stratospheric balloons used for scientific purposes, rubber balloons used for aerological observations, and planetary balloons to be used in the atmospheres of other planets. The book provides many figures and photographs, and offers a systematic description of balloon technologies and related matters from historical background to current research topics. The contents include a theoretical discussion of ballon shape design, analysis and synthesis of flight dynamics, actual launching procedure, flight operations, and typical applications of ballooning in various scientific fields. Detailed meteorological descriptions, especially of the Earth's stratosphere and the atmosphere of other planets, are provided for investigating actual flight behavior.
The book focuses on the topic of trends and challenges with regards to satellite-based earth observation. Contributors include legal experts in the field and representatives from institutions such as the European Space Agency, the European Space Policy Institute, academia and the private sector.
Are we deranged? The acclaimed Indian novelist Amitav Ghosh argues that future generations may well think so. How else to explain our imaginative failure in the face of global warming? In his first major book of nonfiction since In an Antique Land, Ghosh examines our inability--at the level of literature, history, and politics--to grasp the scale and violence of climate change. The extreme nature of today's climate events, Ghosh asserts, make them peculiarly resistant to contemporary modes of thinking and imagining. This is particularly true of serious literary fiction: hundred-year storms and freakish tornadoes simply feel too improbable for the novel; they are automatically consigned to other genres. In the writing of history, too, the climate crisis has sometimes led to gross simplifications; Ghosh shows that the history of the carbon economy is a tangled global story with many contradictory and counterintuitive elements. Ghosh ends by suggesting that politics, much like literature, has become a matter of personal moral reckoning rather than an arena of collective action. But to limit fiction and politics to individual moral adventure comes at a great cost. The climate crisis asks us to imagine other forms of human existence--a task to which fiction, Ghosh argues, is the best suited of all cultural forms. His book serves as a great writer's summons to confront the most urgent task of our time. |
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