1,976 research outputs found
Interview with K.A. Hays
No full textK.A. Hays’ most recent book is Anthropocene Lullaby (February 2022, Carnegie Mellon). She is the author of three prior books of poetry: Windthrow (2017), Early Creatures, Native Gods (2012) and Dear Apocalypse (2009). Her poems appear widely in journals and have been selected for two editions of Best American Poetry. Born in Phoenixville, Pennsylvania, she earned an MFA from Brown University. She teaches Creative Writing at Bucknell University in Lewisburg, PA, and directs the Bucknell Seminar for Undergraduate Poets, a 3-week all-expenses paid summer writing retreat and conference for undergraduate poets from any university or college in the United States
Two new species and a new Australian record of Bactrocera Macquart (Diptera : Tephritidae : Dacinae) from Northern Queensland, Torres Strait and Papua New Guinea
No full textBactrocera (Bactrocera) speewahensis Fay & Hancock sp. n. is described from northern Queensland and B. (B.) torresiae Huxham & Hancock sp. n. is described from Boigu, Saibai and Dauan islands in Torres Strait and southern Papua New Guinea. Bactrocera (B.) nigrovittata Drew is newly recorded from Australia. All records are of male flies responding to chemical lures
Skin-Friction Measurements on Mathematically Generated Roughness in a Turbulent Channel Flow
No full textEngineering systems are affected by surface roughness, however, predicting frictional drag has proven to be challenging. The present work takes a systematic approach by generating and manufacturing surfaces roughness where surface statistics, such as rms, skewness and power-spectral density can be controlled. The frictional drag on these surfaces is measured in a turbulent channel flow facility
International Research Roundtable “History of the Kazakh Statehood. On the 80th Anniversary of the Famous Researcher K.A. Pischulina” (December 24, 2014) »
No full textThis article contains a brief description of the International research conference. The author gives a brief description of the papers presented at the conference. The following reports were presented at the conference: K.Z. Uskenbay. “The Kazakh Statehood during the Late Middle Ages in the Scientific Biography of K.A. Pishchulina”; A. Daulethan. “Formation of Kazakh Culture in the Era of the Mongol Uluses (13th–16th centuries)”; N. Kenzheahmet. “The Kazakh Khanate in the Chinese Sources (15th–16th centuries)”; I.M. Mirgaleev. “Activities of the Centre for Research on the Golden Horde History (Sh.Marjani Institute of History, Academy of Sciences of the Republic of Tatarstan) Aimed at Studying New Sources”; K.U. Torlanbaeva. “Ancient and Medieval Kazakhstan in Migration Processes”; Zh.Zh. Zhenis. “Continuity of Statehood and Traditional Worldview in the Empire of Genghis Khan”; A.P. Ermuhamedova. “The Oghuz Role in World History”; N.A. Atygaev. “Early Stage in the History of Kazakh Khanate in the Works of K.A. Pischulina”
Empirical Research and Modeling of Longitudinal Driving Behavior Under Adverse Conditions
No full textAdverse conditions (emergency situations, adverse weather conditions, freeway incidents) have been shown to have a substantial impact on traffic flow operations. It is however unclear to what extent the conditions impact longitudinal driving behavior and what the determinants of these changes in driving behavior are. Furthermore, it is not yet clear how these changes in driving behavior can best be modeled. To this end we performed three extensive driving simulator experiments intended to investigate the influence of emergency situations, adverse weather conditions and freeway incidents on empirical longitudinal driving behavior as well as driver workload. Furthermore we determined the influence of these conditions on parameter values and model performance of an often used car-following model, i.e., the Intelligent Driver Model (Treiber et al., 2000). We also determined changes in the position of so-called action points in a psycho-spacing model and took some first steps towards the development of a new stochastic car following model based on a Bayesian network modeling approach.Transport & PlanningCivil Engineering and Geoscience
Self-organizing avulsions in an endorheic dryland river system
No full textAccepted author manuscriptApplied Geolog
Flowers through insect eyes: the contribution of pollinator vision to the evolution of flower colour
No full textPhDFlowers’ colours are an essential element of their ability to attract visits from
pollinators. However, the colours as they appear to human observers can differ
substantially from their appearance to insect pollinators, and so it is essential to consider
pollinator vision in any study of the ecology of flower colour.
In this thesis I describe how I have overseen the development of an online database to
provide accurate information on floral spectral reflectance measured without human
observational bias. This resource allows a more accurate consideration of flower colours
in future studies, and permits investigations of flower colours within and across
habitats. Using the records in this database, I analysed flowers from two European
habitats for spatial or temporal changes, modelling the colours according to insect visual
perception. I discovered that the insect-colour composition of the plant communities
does not change either along an altitudinal gradient or throughout the year. These novel
and ecologically-relevant analyses contradict previous observational studies, but support
the theory of a pollination “market” in which flowers compete for pollinator visitation.
I then describe my experimental investigations into the visual capabilities of two
pollinators and how this may relate to what colours of flowers they visit. Firstly I study
the foraging behaviour of bees under spatially inconsistent illumination and how this
impacts on their choice behaviour. I revealed patchy light can have measurable effects
on bee foraging behaviour: they intentionally choose familiar over unfamiliar
illumination, which may impact on the flowers they visit in complex natural
environments. Secondly, I detail the new evidence for a red-sensitive photoreceptor in
South African monkey beetles, a major pollinator in a habitat containing many longwavelength-
reflecting flowers, which are not classically “attractive” to bees.
Throughout this thesis, I explore how pollinator vision has shaped the evolution of
flower colours in different contexts.Biotechnology and Biological Science Research Council.
Royal Botanical Gardens Kew (BBS/S/L-2005/12155A
Actual Problems of Kazakh History. Review of the Book by K.A. Pishchulina “Essays on the History of the Kazakh Khanate”
No full textA collection of articles written by a well-known orientalist-historian K.A. Pishchulina and published in 2016 includes papers of different years, written on the basis of Persian and Turkic sources reflecting the most pressing issues related to Kazakh khanate. The publishing of this work immediately became a major event in historical scholarship of Kazakhstan.
During the Soviet period, the history of this state, as well as of other states created by nomadic peoples, remained poorly understood. Many questions were debatable, since Marxism-Leninism, which was in forefront of science, could not adapt the formational class theory for a nomadic society and nomadic mode of production etc.
However, some researchers, including K.A. Pishchulina, were already thinking about these issues. Particularly she studied the role of Turkestan cities as part of Kazakh khanate. According to her main findings, these cities performed a variety of functions being centers of handicraft production, agriculture and trade. As for Turkestan city itself, it was capital and spiritual center of the state, and the management of settled-agricultural population was carried out by various officials. Furthermore, the collection of Pishchulina’s papers discusses management system of nomadic population, tax system of the Khanate. The author comes to a justified conclusion that monetary system needs to be studied further.
Next major issue relates to mythologization of Turkic peoples’ history. The books written by amateurs assert that the Golden Horde was a part of Khanate, and Chinggis Khan was a Kazakh. Therefore, several Pishchulina’s articles were published in order to expose these myths. Thus, in this collection the reader would find answers to a variety of questions related to the history of Kazakhstan and adjacent territories and its impact in modern times
Assisted overtaking: An assessment of overtaking on two-lane rural roads
No full textAt the start of the 21st century overtaking on two-lane rural roads is a major traffic safety problem. However, this dissertation research demonstrates that most drivers are perfectly able to safely perform these manoeuvres. Their time spent in the left lane is about eight seconds. Preparing subtasks of the manoeuvre, such as checking surrounding vehicles' behaviours, changing gear and starting accelerations are started in the right lane. In this way, available overtaking gap in the oncoming traffic stream are optimally used. This anticipative behaviour is accounted for in the proposed overtaking assistant design, which informs the driver about overtaking gaps three seconds before they become available. This system is developed to assist less daring drivers with overtaking and to prevent risk-taking drivers to perform overtaking manoeuvres in unsafe situations. A driving simulator experiment demonstrated that this assistant does not much affect overtaking efficiency, drivers' comfort or safety, as long as the threshold for a safe gap is chosen such that the safety margin with the first oncoming vehicle remains above three seconds. A microscopic traffic simulation study shows that when this threshold is eleven seconds, traffic system efficiency remains similar or increases slightly due to increased number of overtaking manoeuvres. Drivers' safety during overtaking increases, because the time-to-collision with oncoming vehicles will not become smaller than three seconds. And, drivers' comfort is improved in terms of higher overtaking frequencies and less time spent following. To introduce the proposed overtaking assistant to the market, vehicle-to-vehicle communication is necessary. This technology enables vehicles to localise all other surrounding vehicles. The automotive industry works hard on the development of vehicle-to-vehicle communication, however, it will take at least another ten years before the first overtaking assistant as proposed in this dissertation, will become available.Civil Engineering and Geoscience
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