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Excess water availability in northern mid-high latitudes contiguously migrated from ocean under climate change
Get PDFTerrestrial water availability sustains livelihoods, socioeconomic development, and ecosystems. Despite an understanding of contributions of oceanic moisture to terrestrial hydroclimatic extremes, whether surpluses of terrestrial water availability migrate directly and contiguously from the ocean and the influence of climate change on this process remain unclear. Here, we use a coherent feature-tracking method to identify ocean-to-land water availability surpluses (OWASs), characterized by spatiotemporally contiguous migration of excess atmospheric freshwater (precipitation-minus-evapotranspiration) from ocean to land. Over the past several decades, especially in northern mid-high latitudes (NMHL; above 48°N), OWASs have exhibited longer persistence, wider areal extent, and greater intensity than those developed solely over land. These landward migrations are associated with seasonal Atlantic teleconnection and Pacific circulation shift. Under the business-as-usual scenario, these two processes are projected to be enhanced, markedly increasing OWAS characteristics in NMHL driven by thermodynamic atmospheric responses to future warming. Intensified OWASs may not only help alleviate long-term droughts but also have the potential to accentuate pluvial risks
Climate risk, insurance retreat and mortgage exposure: implications for UK households and housing finance
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A U-Net-like full convolutional pavement crack segmentation network based on multi-layer feature fusion
No full textCracks are an important indicator of pavement health, and it is difficult to achieve pixel-level segmentation of small and thin cracks. The existing network often experiences false segmentation and missed segmentation. Accordingly, a novel end-to-end U-Net-like full convolutional crack segmentation network is constructed. First, we propose a multi-layer feature fusion module to aggregate the texture and semantic features at each stage of encoder, so that the network can find smaller and thinner crack. Second, we design a novel residual structure with a pointwise convolution. Each stage of the encoder and decoder incorporates a residual structure to facilitate the fusion of feature maps with different spatial dimensions. It can also prevent the gradient vanish in the network training process. Finally, we utilise the maximum unpooling to restore spatial structure in up-sampling, which exploits the indices of maximum feature value in down-sampling. Therefore, high-frequency information is better preserved to help accurately restore the details of crack edges. To verify the proposed network performance, experiments are carried out on four open datasets, the proposed network can achieve better performance among five classical networks
Drink and be merry? The impact of intoxication and affective social cues on social drinkers’ emotional responses
Get PDFBackground: While alcohol’s ability to impact affective states and lubricate social interactions is well documented, less research has considered this in crowd contexts. Method: Using a Social Emotion Paradigm, intoxicated (0.8g/kg) or sober (placebo) participants (N=47, 49% female, Mage=21.47) were presented with virtually modelled groups of characters displaying various affective states (happy, neutral, sad). Participants’ emotional responses to the stimuli were assessed via self-report (Study 1) and, one week later, objective measures of facial muscle movement (facial electromyography; Study 2). Results: Study 1.Self-reported emotions largely mirrored the emotive displays, pointing to emotional contagion. No significant effect of intoxication was apparent. Study 2. Compared to those in the sober conditions, significantly more smiling occurred among intoxicated participants when viewing sad crowds. Conclusions: Discrepancies between objective and subjective measures of emotion were evident and intoxication may be associated with socially inappropriate affective responses to sad crowds. These findings have implications for understanding alcohol behaviors in the nighttime economy
Hoarding in a material world: the selection and deposition of metalwork in Middle–Late Bronze Age south-east and west Wales
Get PDFThis paper explores the collection and deposition of metalwork in south-east and west Wales from c. 1550–800 BC. Utilising a comprehensive database of over 1400 metal objects, this paper examines the deliberate selection of ornaments, weapons, axes and objects associated with the production of metalwork of this period, highlighting regional and chronological patterns in the flow of metalwork being buried within hoards and as single finds. In addition to the selection of specific objects for burial, this research identifies changes in depositional practices, such as the manipulation of gold ornaments within Middle Bronze Age hoards and the deliberate fragmentation of weapons, particularly swords, during the Late Bronze Age. This paper also takes a fresh look at one of the most emblematic groups of metalwork deposition in Late Bronze Age Britain – the Llantwit-Stogursey tradition. The geographical limits and frequencies of object associations for this tradition are redefined, affirming the significance of South Wales Type socketed axes whilst also highlighting, for the first time, the importance of casting jets and ingots within hoards in south-east Wales and eastern Carmarthenshire
Consumer preferences for upcycled foods: the role of product attributes and label information
No full textOver the last decade there has been an increasing interest by food industry in upcycled foods as a way to reduce food waste and loss through the food supply chain. This manuscript investigates the effect of nutritional and environmental information on Vietnamese consumer preferences for upcycled biscuits containing brewer's waste grain (BSG). Results revealed that when consumers are informed about the nutritional and environmental benefits of the upcycled biscuits, they exhibited a higher purchase intent compared to the absence of such information. The inclusion of sustainability or nutrition information changed repurchase intent, with the effect driven by sensory perception. Food companies must carefully assess the impact of product information and sensory perception on consumers' purchase and repurchase intent to effectively advocate for sustainable or nutritional food choices. These findings provide useful insights for product development and marketing activities for upcycled food businesses
Negotiating the new woman in the literary and theatrical marketplace: the remarkable lives and careers of Aimée, Esmé, and Vera Beringer
No full textThe careers of Aimée Beringer and her daughters Esmé and Vera endured for eight decades,
but they are largely forgotten today. Working in the popular theatre, when divisions between “art”
and “commerce” were solidifying, they were dismissed by male contemporaries, and largely
overlooked by historians. This thesis will examine the Beringers’ work as a family and their overtly
careful negotiation of their place in a hostile professional sphere in crafting a conventional public
image which was contrary to their complicated reality as writers, managers, and actresses. While this
allowed them to work continuously during their lifetime, it obscured their ground-breaking
accomplishments, subsequently causing them to be ignored in favour of more radical colleagues.
This thesis attempts to restore the Beringers to history by constructing and analysing a
detailed account of their careers as a familial dynasty. Chronologically organised chapters will cover
Aimée Beringer’s work as novelist, playwright, and manager, and her daughters’ acting lives and their
subsequent writing, lecturing, and attempts to prosper in the changing theatrical climate of the
nineteenth and twentieth centuries. These chapters will reveal a body of work reflecting on the
personal and political issues that mattered to them, which was often premièred in matinées, a space
most often frequented by female audiences. The thesis shows the Beringers adapting as a family to
changing theatrical environments alongside significant events in their personal lives, including
Aimée’s decision to leave her husband and Vera having a child outside marriage. The final chapters
cover Vera’s beginnings as a playwright, Esmé’s Suffragette-inspired portrayal of Paulina, and
Aimée’s final produced play before her death in 1936, after which we see Vera’s continued
maturation as a dramatist, and Esmé’s evolution as a Shakespearean lecturer and actor. Evidence
from previously unknown family papers has helped bring these notable achievements to light
Impact of a protease and xylanase cocktail on the physicochemical properties of wafer batter and sheets
No full textThis study investigated enzymatic treatment as a mean of regulating viscosity in wheat flour batter and its impact on the quality of wafer sheets. Parameters such as enzyme concentration and hydrolysis time were evaluated. Changes in the secondary structures of proteins in flour and commercial gluten were further investigated using attenuated total reflectance-fourier transform infrared spectroscopy (ATR-FTIR), confirming a decrease in α-helix and β-sheet structures. Enzymatic hydrolysis of gluten led to the unfolding of protein structure, resulting in an increase in free sulfhydryl group content. Rheological analysis of batters revealed a decrease in apparent viscosity in enzymatically treated batters compared to control ones. Enzymatic proteolysis caused a decrease in both storage modulus (G′) and loss modulus (G″) compared to control, indicating a weakened elastic structure and a more liquid-like behaviour. Enzyme-treated wafer sheets showed lower hardness and fracturability compared to control ones. These findings suggest that proteolytic enzymes could alter the chemical structure of gluten and the rheological properties of wafer batter leading to a reduction in batter viscosity, structural protein matrix, and the production of softer wafer sheet