The work builds on the results of the COMPETE Bioenergy Competence Platform for Africa, which was supported by the European Commission and coordinated by WIP Renewable Energies, Germany. The five sections cover biomass production and use, biomass technologies and markets in Africa, biomass policies, sustainability, and financial and socio-economic issues. This valuable work is, in effect, a single-source treatment of a key energy sector in a part of the world which still has a lot of unrealised potential for development.

Around the world, many countries are increasing efforts to promote biomass production for industrial uses including biofuels and bio-products such as chemicals and bio-plastic. Against a backdrop of lively public debate on sustainability, bioenergy wields both positive and negative impacts upon a variety of environmental and socio-economic issues. These include property rights, labor conditions, social welfare, economic wealth, poverty reduction and more. This book discusses the issues and impacts of bioenergy, taking into account the local and regional framework under which bioenergy is produced, touching upon educational level, cultural aspects, the history and economies of the producing countries and an array of policies including environmental and social targets.

The book surveys and analyzes global bioenergy production from a number of perspectives. The authors illustrate the complexity of interrelated topics in the bioenergy value chain, ranging from agriculture to conversion processes, as well as from social implications to environmental effects. It goes on to offer insight on future challenges associated with the expected boom of a global bio-based economy, which contributes to the paradigm shift from a fossil-based to a biomass and renewable energy-based economy.

The expert contributors include researchers, investors, policy makers, representatives from NGOs and other stakeholders, from Europe, Africa, Asia and Latin America. Their contributions build upon the results of the Global-Bio-Pact project on Global Assessment of Biomass and Bio-product Impacts on Socio-economics and Sustainability, which was supported by the European Commission in its 7th Framework Program for Research and Technological Development, conducted from February 2010 to January 2013.

The book benefits policy makers, scientists and NGO staffers working in the fields of agriculture, forestry, biotechnology and energy."

The work builds on the results of the COMPETE Bioenergy Competence Platform for Africa, which was supported by the European Commission and coordinated by WIP Renewable Energies, Germany. The five sections cover biomass production and use, biomass technologies and markets in Africa, biomass policies, sustainability, and financial and socio-economic issues. This valuable work is, in effect, a single-source treatment of a key energy sector in a part of the world which still has a lot of unrealised potential for development.

Computer applications in medical care have been greatly increasing during the last ten years. Combined with other electronic devices, computers can produce images which represent human organ sections. Such a way to get informations on patient organs widely improves di agnosis and surgery efficiency. But we can go through a new step by generating three dimensional models of these organs and by displaying them. Most of research in this area focuses on the visualization process. But, in order to efficiently exploit the data collected and processed by the computer, we need to create a high-level three-dimensional model of the organ to be displayed. An interactive approach to get such a model is described in this paper as the way to use it for the study of kidney anatomy. I. 20 and 30 data visualization in medical care Classical X-ray radiographs give us a projection of human body inner parts, with an enhancement of high-density elements. But they cannot give us a complete view of organs, such as in cross-sections. Recent imaging techniques solve this problem, usually by computing those sections from a set of projections along different directions. Physicians can then get a full examination of organs by using such equipments as X-ray scanners or those producing Mag netic Resonance, ultrasonic or radionuclide images. The information collected on the organ (density, acoustic property, etc."