scholarly journals Potential short-term earthquake forecasting by farm-animal monitoring

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Martin Wikelski ◽  
Uschi Mueller ◽  
Paola Scocco ◽  
Andrea Catorci ◽  
Lev Desinov ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Seismic Activity ◽  
Earthquake Forecasting ◽  
Farm Animals ◽  
Activity Levels ◽  
Short Term ◽  
Animal Activity ◽  
Long Time ◽  
Earthquake Predictions ◽  
Anticipatory Activity ◽  
Animal Monitoring

AbstractWhether changes in animal behavior allow for short-term earthquake predictions has been debated for a long time. During the 2016/2017 earthquake sequence in Italy, we instrumentally observed the activity of farm animals (cows, dogs, sheep) close to the epicenter of the devastating magnitude M6.6 Norcia earthquake (Oct-Nov 2016) and over a subsequent longer observation period (Jan-Apr 2017). Relating 5304 (in 2016) and 12948 (in 2017) earthquakes with a wide magnitude range (0.4 ≤ M ≤ 6.6) to continuously measured animal activity, we detected how the animals collectively reacted to earthquakes. We also found consistent anticipatory activity prior to earthquakes during times when the animals were in a stable, but not during their time on a pasture. We detect these anticipatory patterns not only in periods with high, but also in periods of low seismic activity. Earthquake anticipation times (1-20hrs) are negatively correlated with the distance between the farm and earthquake hypocenters. Our study suggests that continuous instrumental monitoring of animal collectives has the potential to provide statistically reliable patterns of pre-seismic activity that could allow for short-term earthquake forecasting.One Sentence SummaryA collective of domestic animals repeatedly showed unusually high activity levels before earthquakes, with anticipation times (1-20h) negatively related to distance from epicenters (5-28km).

scholarly journals Response to Zöller et al.'s critique on “Potential short‐term earthquake forecasting by farm‐animal monitoring”

Ethology ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 127 (3) ◽  
pp. 307-308
Author(s):  
Martin Wikelski ◽  
Uschi Mueller ◽  
Paola Scocco ◽  
Andrea Catorci ◽  
Lev V. Desinov ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Farm Animal ◽  
Earthquake Forecasting ◽  
Short Term ◽  
Animal Monitoring

scholarly journals Potential short‐term earthquake forecasting by farm animal monitoring

Ethology ◽  
2020 ◽  
Vol 126 (9) ◽  
pp. 931-941
Author(s):  
Martin Wikelski ◽  
Uschi Mueller ◽  
Paola Scocco ◽  
Andrea Catorci ◽  
Lev V. Desinov ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Farm Animal ◽  
Earthquake Forecasting ◽  
Short Term ◽  
Animal Monitoring

scholarly journals Bioindication of Surface Water of Fish Ponds and Streams for the Dynamics of Phosphatase Activity in Hepatopancreas of Aquatic Organisms

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Nikolay Byshov ◽  
Svetlana Nefedova ◽  
Alexey Korovushkin ◽  
Sergey Borychev ◽  
Ivan Uspenskiy ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Phosphatase Activity ◽  
Surface Waters ◽  
Aquatic Organisms ◽  
Farm Animals ◽  
Environmental Damage ◽  
Fish Ponds ◽  
Short Term ◽  
Test Reaction ◽  
Agricultural Wastewater ◽  
Long Time

Bioindication allows monitoring the ecological state of rivers and ponds. It is the mechanism of the environmental effect on aquatic organisms that the dynamics of interior parameters makes it possible to determine the type of the effect, single emergency or retrospective, even if the environmental damage to surface waters was caused a long time ago. Due to this, the efficiency of taking timely measures to clean toxic water is high. The use of the dynamics of phosphatase activity in hepatopancreas of Unio pictorum mollusks as a test reaction is true to present the picture of pollution. In a case of short-term pollution by household or agricultural wastewater, an increase in the activity of phosphatase in the hepatopancreas of mollusks by 1.5 units/g of protein after 12 hours and by 0.8 units/g of protein after 18 hours was noted, etc. As a result of studies, test responses of mollusks allowed graphs to be constructed to determine the toxicity of the environment. They are proposed for preventive work to identify contamination of fish ponds and streams used for watering of farm animals.

Time Window from Visual Images to Visual Short-Term Memory: Consolidation or Integration?

2004 ◽  
Vol 51 (1) ◽  
pp. 45-51 ◽  
Author(s):  
Yuhong Jiang
Keyword(s):  
Short Term Memory ◽  
Time Window ◽  
Short Interval ◽  
Visual Images ◽  
Short Term ◽  
Temporal Window ◽  
Term Memory ◽  
Visual Short Term Memory ◽  
Probe Task ◽  
Long Time

Abstract. When two dot arrays are briefly presented, separated by a short interval of time, visual short-term memory of the first array is disrupted if the interval between arrays is shorter than 1300-1500 ms ( Brockmole, Wang, & Irwin, 2002 ). Here we investigated whether such a time window was triggered by the necessity to integrate arrays. Using a probe task we removed the need for integration but retained the requirement to represent the images. We found that a long time window was needed for performance to reach asymptote even when integration across images was not required. Furthermore, such window was lengthened if subjects had to remember the locations of the second array, but not if they only conducted a visual search among it. We suggest that a temporal window is required for consolidation of the first array, which is vulnerable to disruption by subsequent images that also need to be memorized.

scholarly journals Subway Gearbox Fault Diagnosis Algorithm Based on Adaptive Spline Impact Suppression

Entropy ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 23 (6) ◽  
pp. 660
Author(s):  
Zhongshuo Hu ◽  
Jianwei Yang ◽  
Dechen Yao ◽  
Jinhai Wang ◽  
Yongliang Bai
Keyword(s):  
Fault Diagnosis ◽  
Spline Interpolation ◽  
Reference Value ◽  
High Amplitude ◽  
Engineering Practice ◽  
Negative Effects ◽  
Short Term ◽  
Time Domain Signal ◽  
Gearbox Vibration ◽  
Long Time

In the signal processing of real subway vehicles, impacts between wheelsets and rail joint gaps have significant negative effects on the spectrum. This introduces great difficulties for the fault diagnosis of gearboxes. To solve this problem, this paper proposes an adaptive time-domain signal segmentation method that envelopes the original signal using a cubic spline interpolation. The peak values of the rail joint gap impacts are extracted to realize the adaptive segmentation of gearbox fault signals when the vehicle was moving at a uniform speed. A long-time and unsteady signal affected by wheel–rail impacts is segmented into multiple short-term, steady-state signals, which can suppress the high amplitude of the shock response signal. Finally, on this basis, multiple short-term sample signals are analyzed by time- and frequency-domain analyses and compared with the nonfaulty results. The results showed that the method can efficiently suppress the high-amplitude components of subway gearbox vibration signals and effectively extract the characteristics of weak faults due to uniform wear of the gearbox in the time and frequency domains. This provides reference value for the gearbox fault diagnosis in engineering practice.

Representing Social Construction in Consumer Activities: Single-Period and Multi-Period Activity Production

1994 ◽  
Vol 5 (3) ◽  
pp. 139-156
Author(s):  
Steven D. Silver
Keyword(s):  
Social Construction ◽  
Evolutionary Process ◽  
Decision Makers ◽  
Maximization Problem ◽  
Activity Levels ◽  
Short Term ◽  
Subsequent Period ◽  
Single Period ◽  
The Social ◽  
Endogenous Variables

Consumers are seen as limited decision makers who set short-term activity levels from their budgets, stocks of experience, and values following a preference-maximizing heuristic. Disturbances to activity levels in their evolution by exogeneties of social and economic environments, and the feedback of activity levels which agents have no systematic ability to anticipate, reset stock and value levels through the interactive relationships among endogenous variables. Agents then solve the maximization problem for a subsequent period using stock and value levels as modified by the evolutionary process. The dependence of a single-period decision on the stock and value constructs is examined and forms for the dynamic evolution of stock and value constructs that represent the feedback of activity levels to stock and value levels are also introduced. Implications of these forms for the social construction of activities are discussed.

Residual Alkaline Phosphatase Activity in Milks Subjected to Various Time-Temperature Treatments

1997 ◽  
Vol 60 (5) ◽  
pp. 525-530 ◽  
Author(s):  
C. J. PAINTER ◽  
R. L. BRADLEY
Keyword(s):  
Alkaline Phosphatase ◽  
Activity Levels ◽  
Milk Product ◽  
Milk Products ◽  
Alp Activity ◽  
High Temperature Short Time ◽  
Thermally Processed ◽  
Long Time ◽  
The Mean ◽  
Fluid Milk

Milk is routinely tested for proper pasteurization. The Scharer and Fluorophos methods, among others, test for residual alkaline phosphatase (ALP) activity to assure proper pasteurization. Until recently there were no tests available to accurately detect residual ALP activity levels below the U.S. legal limit of 1 μg of phenol or 350 mU of ALP per liter of milk. The new Fluorophos method can detect accurately residual ALP activity levels as low as 10 mU/liter. The Fluorophos method was used to investigate residual ALP activity levels in several fluid milk products. The milk products were thermally processed under various time and temperature protocols below, at, and above current U.S. Food and Drug Administration-mandated heat treatments for fluid milk and milk products. The data established values for residual ALP activity in milks pasteurized under high-temperature short-time (HTST) and low-temperature long-time (LTLT) treatments. The mean ALP activities for whole, 2% lowfat, 1% lowfat, skim, half and half, and chocolate-flavored milks thermally processed at the legal minimum HTST pasteurization treatment are 169.7 ± 12.3, 145.2 ± 9.3, 98.6 ± 8.9, 72.5 ± 4.2, 38.4 ± 4.6 and 157.3 ± 6.5 mU/liter, respectively. The mean ALP activities generated at the legal minimum LTLT pasteurization treatment are 81.8 ± 4.8, 66.4 ± 5.9, 56.4 ± 2.1, 39.1 ± 3.9, 35.0 ± 1.2 and 91.3 ± 7.7 mU/liter, respectively. The values for all milks pasteurized at the legal minimum heat treatment were significantly below the current legal cutoff for residual ALP activity of 350 mU/liter of milk or milk product.

scholarly journals Biodegradable Flame Retardants for Biodegradable Polymer

Biomolecules ◽  
2020 ◽  
Vol 10 (7) ◽  
pp. 1038
Author(s):  
Muhammad Maqsood ◽  
Gunnar Seide
Keyword(s):  
Renewable Resources ◽  
Flame Retardants ◽  
Fire Risk ◽  
Polymeric Materials ◽  
Good Choice ◽  
Airborne Particle ◽  
Short Term ◽  
Renewable Materials ◽  
Long Time ◽  
Significant Attention

To improve sustainability of polymers and to reduce carbon footprint, polymers from renewable resources are given significant attention due to the developing concern over environmental protection. The renewable materials are progressively used in many technical applications instead of short-term-use products. However, among other applications, the flame retardancy of such polymers needs to be improved for technical applications due to potential fire risk and their involvement in our daily life. To overcome this potential risk, various flame retardants (FRs) compounds based on conventional and non-conventional approaches such as inorganic FRs, nitrogen-based FRs, halogenated FRs and nanofillers were synthesized. However, most of the conventional FRs are non-biodegradable and if disposed in the landfill, microorganisms in the soil or water cannot degrade them. Hence, they remain in the environment for long time and may find their way not only in the food chain but can also easily attach to any airborne particle and can travel distances and may end up in freshwater, food products, ecosystems, or even can be inhaled if they are present in the air. Furthermore, it is not a good choice to use non-biodegradable FRs in biodegradable polymers such as polylactic acid (PLA). Therefore, the goal of this review paper is to promote the use of biodegradable and bio-based compounds for flame retardants used in polymeric materials.

scholarly journals Short-term earthquake forecasting experiment before and during the L’Aquila (central Italy) seismic sequence of April 2009

2015 ◽  
Vol 57 (6) ◽  
Author(s):  
Maura Murru ◽  
Jiancang Zhuang ◽  
Rodolfo Console ◽  
Giuseppe Falcone
Keyword(s):  
Central Italy ◽  
Aftershock Sequence ◽  
Earthquake Forecasting ◽  
Model Parameters ◽  
Short Term ◽  
Productivity Function ◽  
Epidemic Type Aftershock Sequence ◽  
Forecasting Performance ◽  
The One ◽  
Lower Magnitude

<div class="page" title="Page 1"><div class="layoutArea"><div class="column"><p>In this paper, we compare the forecasting performance of several statistical models, which are used to describe the occurrence process of earthquakes in forecasting the short-term earthquake probabilities during the L’Aquila earthquake sequence in central Italy in 2009. These models include the Proximity to Past Earthquakes (PPE) model and two versions of the Epidemic Type Aftershock Sequence (ETAS) model. We used the information gains corresponding to the Poisson and binomial scores to evaluate the performance of these models. It is shown that both ETAS models work better than the PPE model. However, in comparing the two types of ETAS models, the one with the same fixed exponent coefficient (<span>alpha)</span> = 2.3 for both the productivity function and the scaling factor in the spatial response function (ETAS I), performs better in forecasting the active aftershock sequence than the model with different exponent coefficients (ETAS II), when the Poisson score is adopted. ETAS II performs better when a lower magnitude threshold of 2.0 and the binomial score are used. The reason is found to be that the catalog does not have an event of similar magnitude to the L’Aquila mainshock (M<sub>w</sub> 6.3) in the training period (April 16, 2005 to March 15, 2009), and the (<span>alpha)</span>-value is underestimated, thus the forecast seismicity is underestimated when the productivity function is extrapolated to high magnitudes. We also investigate the effect of the inclusion of small events in forecasting larger events. These results suggest that the training catalog used for estimating the model parameters should include earthquakes of magnitudes similar to the mainshock when forecasting seismicity during an aftershock sequence.</p></div></div></div>

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