11,307 research outputs found
Farming smarter, not harder: securing our agricultural economy
No full textIn the context of rising global demand, resource scarcity, and environmental pressures, this report considers the future of Australian agriculture.
Global populations are growing and food prices are skyrocketing. This creates new market opportunities for Australian agriculture. But Australia has fragile and vulnerable soils, which are being degraded at an unsustainable rate.
If we continue with ‘business as usual’, we will keep losing soils faster than they can be replaced. Acting now to improve soil condition could increase agricultural production by up to 2.1 billion per year. It could also help farmers cut costs on fertiliser and water use.
“Winners of the food boom will be countries with less fossil fuel intensive agriculture, more reliable production, and access to healthy land and soils” said the report’s lead author Laura Eadie. “How we manage our land and soils will be key to whether Australia sees more of the upsides or downsides of rising global food demand.”
Farming Smarter, Not Harder finds that Australian agriculture can build a lasting competitive advantage through innovation that raises agricultural productivity, reduces fuel and fertiliser dependence, and preserves the environment and resources it draws on. To achieve this, Australia needs to:
Invest in knowledge: increase government investment in research and development by up to 7% a year; increase funding for extension programs; implement the Productivity Commission’s recommendation to set up Rural Research Australia; fund the national soil health strategy with an endowment sufficient to support ongoing research and monitoring for at least 20 years.
Stop chopping and changing support for regional natural resource management:
Federal and State governments should commit to a 10-year agreement to provide stable longterm funding for regional Natural Resource Management (NRM) bodies, including specific funding to monitor long-term trends in natural resource condition.
Enable accountable community governance of land and soil management: To enable farming communities to protect themselves from free-riding, they should be supported to develop stewardship standards based on a shared understanding of what it takes to maintain productive agricultural landscapes over the long term.
Align financial incentives with the long-term needs of sustainable farming communities: In addition to the drought policy reforms announced on October 26, drought assistance policies should support farming communities to take a lead in preparations for more frequent and severe droughts, and should be linked to community stewardship standards.
“Recent projections indicate the potential doubling of exports by 2050, according to the National Food Plan and ANZ-commissioned Greener Pastures report. Our work looks at how to support farmers dealing with the practical challenges of seizing this opportunity, in the context of soil degradation and rising input costs”, said Laura Eadie.
The case to increase research funding and foster innovative farming is made even stronger by the likely impacts of climate change. Without action to adapt to more variable and extreme weather, by 2050 Australia could lose 6.5 billion per year in wheat, beef, mutton, lamb and dairy production.
The report profiles leading farmers who are already seeing the benefits of innovations in sustainable farming. It proposes simple measures to support them and the agricultural communities that depend on healthy farming landscapes.
Download Farming Smarter, Not Harder report in full
[Australia\u27s newly appointed Advocate for Soil Health, Michael Jeffery, also chairs the non-profit organisation Soils for Life which is already actively encouraging wider adoption of smarter farming. The Soils for Life report Innovations for Regenerative Landscape Management showcases a range of case studies of these farming innovations in practise, and the positive economic, environmental and social outcomes they are achieving. Read the case studies, learn more about the challenges landscape degradation will bring and what we can do about it at www.soilsforlife.org.au.
General -- 1941 -- Correspondence, Polio -- letter, 1941-09-23
No full textLetter from Harder, F. K. to Sabin, Albert B. dated 1941-09-23.Sabin Collection Fair Use Policy</a
Coherent X-ray diffraction imaging of strain at the nanoscale
No full textThe understanding and management of strain is of fundamental importance in the design and implementation of materials. The strain properties of nanocrystalline materials are different from those of the bulk because of the strong influence of their surfaces and interfaces, which can be used to augment their function and introduce desirable characteristics. Here we explain how new X-ray diffraction techniques, which take advantage of the latest synchrotron radiation sources, can be used to obtain quantitative three-dimensional images of strain. These methods will lead, in the near future, to new knowledge of how nanomaterials behave within active devices and on unprecedented timescales
Non-reference condition correction factor k(NR) of typical radiation detectors applied for the dosimetry of high-energy photon fields in radiotherapy
No full textAccording to accepted dosimetry protocols, the "radiation quality correction factor" k(Q) accounts for the energy-dependent changes of detector responses under the conditions of clinical dosimetry for high-energy photon radiations. More precisely, a factor k(QR) is valid under reference conditions, i.e. at a point on the beam axis at depth 10 cm in a large water phantom, for 10 x 10 cm(2) field size, SSD 100 cm and the given radiation quality with quality index Q. Therefore, a further correction factor k(NR) has been introduced to correct far the influences of spectral quality changes when detectors are used under non-reference conditions such as other depths, field sizes and off-axis distances, while under reference conditions k(NR) is normalized to unity. In this paper, values of k(NR) are calculated for 6 and 15 MV photon beams, using published data of the energy-dependent responses of various radiation detectors to monoenergetic photon radiations, and weighting these responses with validated photon spectra of clinical high-energy photon beams from own Monte-Carlo-calculations for a wide variation of the non-reference conditions within a large water phantom. Our results confirm the observation by Scarboro et al. [26] that k(NR) can be represented by a unique function of the mean energy Em, weighted by the spectral photon fluence. Accordingly, the numerical variations of Em with depth, field size and off-axis distance have been provided. Throughout all considered conditions, the deviations of the k(NR) values from unity are at most 2% for a Farmer type ion chamber, and they remain below 15% for the thermoluminescent detectors LiF:Mg Ti. and LiF:Mg,Cu,P. For the shielded diode EDP-10, k(NR) varies from unity up to 20%, while the unshielded diode EDD-5 shows deviations up to 60% in the peripheral region. Thereby, the restricted application field of unshielded diodes has been clarified. For small field dosimetry purposes k(NR) can be converted into k(NCSF), the non-calibration condition correction factor normalized to unity for a 4 x 4 cm(2) calibration field. For the unshielded Si diodes needed in small-field dosimetry, the values of k(NCSF) are closer to unity than the associated k(NR) values
Supplementary values of the dosimetric parameters k(NR) and E-m for various types of detectors in 6 and 15 MV photon fields
No full textThe present communication broadens the data base for determinations of the non-reference condition correction factor k(NR) needed in high-energy photon dosimetry to accomplish the use of various detectors under non-reference conditions. Following our previous strategy of calculating semiempirical values of k(NR) and correlating them with the mean photon energy Em at the point of measurement in a large water phantom, the values of E-n are now stated for 6 and 15 MV photon radiations of accelerators with and without flattening filters, square field sizes from 1 to 30 cm side length and depths from 0 to 28 cm. The unambiguity of the k(NR)-E-m correlation is again confirmed and is quantified by fitting formulae for air-filled ionization chambers, TLD detectors and Si diodes. This survey provides a practicable access to the k(NR) values, particularly for the non-water equivalent detectors to be used in small-field dosimetr
SU‐E‐T‐37: An Optical Investigation Into the Polarization and Scattering Effects Underlying the Artifacts of Radiochromic Film Dosimetry with Commercial Flatbed Scanners
No full textMembrane ATPase mechanism of K+-return relaxation in arterial muscles of stroke-prone SHR and WKY
No full text These studies compared the importance of electrogenic Na+-K+ active (ATP driven) transport, changes in K+ conductance, and passive Ca2+-Na+ countertransport in the large relaxation that occurs in the rat caudal and basilar artery on return to K+ from K+-free solutions. Furthermore, we compared the importance of these three membrane electrical mechanisms in stroke-prone spontaneously hypertensive rats (SP-SHR) versus their normotensive Wistar-Kyoto control rats (WKY) in basilar (cerebral) and caudal arteries. We found that in both basilar and caudal arteries the hyperpolarization and relaxation that occurred on return to K+ after exposure to a 0 K+ (extracellular) solution was consistently greater in SP-SHR than in WKY. The change in membrane potential occurring on transition to 0 K+ in arteries maintained at low temperature (16 degrees C), used as an estimate of the change in K+ conductance during the K+ transition, was not different in either basilar or caudal arteries between SP-SHR and WKY. Thus the hyperpolarization on return to K+ at body temperature would depend primarily on the level of activity of the membrane ATPase, referred to as the Na+ pump. We also sought to compare the passive (but electrogenic) Ca2+-Na+ countertransport mechanism between strains for both arteries, but we were unable to detect any evidence of the predicted hyperpolarization-contraction on transition from 145 to 10 mM extracellular Na+. Furthermore, the return to extracellular Na+ solution failed to show the depolarization-relaxation predicted by the Ca2+-Na+ countertransport mechanism.(ABSTRACT TRUNCATED AT 250 WORDS) </jats:p
Longitudinal coherence function in X-ray imaging of crystals
No full textThe longitudinal coherence function at the Advanced Photon Source beamline 34-ID-C has been measured by a novel method and the coherence length (xi(L)) determined to be, xi(L) = 0.66 +/- 0.02 mu m. Three dimensional Coherent X-ray Diffraction (CXD) patterns were measured for multiple Bragg reflections from two Zinc Oxide (ZnO) nanorods with differing aspect ratios. The visibility of fringes corresponding to the 002 crystal direction for each reflection were found to be different and used to map the coherence function of the incident radiation. Partial coherence was found to be associated with amplitude 'hot' spots in three dimensional reconstructions of the crystal structure
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