The Importance of Spiritual Ecology in the Qingyuan Forest Mushroom Co-Cultivation System

The ecological value encapsulated in the term “spiritual ecology” is drawing more and more attention from ethnology, folklore, ecology, and other related disciplines. The custom of respecting and pacifying forest spirits has distinct regional and ethnic characteristics, and many scholars have discovered samples from different studies around the world. Qingyuan County, located in the mountainous region of southwest Zhejiang, is a very typical case of the practice of respecting and pacifying forest spirits. The mushroom-cultivation technology invented by the chthonic people there more than 900 years ago made this the global birthplace of artificial mushroom cultivation. The Qingyuan Forest–Mushroom Co-cultivation System (QFMCS) has been listed as an important agricultural heritage system by the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Affairs of China, Beijing, China and a candidate project by the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations, Rome, Italy for Globally Important Agricultural Heritage Systems (GIAHS). Additionally, the QFMCS is currently an important part of the Baishanzu National Park under construction. The authors made an in-depth field study in the mountainous areas of Qingyuan and used theoretical methods of ecology, anthropology, and folklore to reveal the function spiritual ecology plays in ecological conservation, forest protection, identity, and the maintenance of community interests. In the “traditional-modern” transformation of Qingyuan County, the practice of respecting and pacifying the Spirits is still being propagated, resulting in expansion and social cohesion.

As-Built Inventory and Deformation Analysis of a High Rockfill Dam under Construction with Terrestrial Laser Scanning

The construction of large earth/rock fill dams, albeit its remarkable progress, still relies largely on past experiences. Therefore, a comprehensive yet dependable monitoring program is particularly beneficial for guiding the practice. However, conventional measurements can only produce limited discrete data. This paper exploits the potential of the terrestrial laser scanning (TLS) for an accurate inventory of as-built states of a concrete-faced rockfill dam under construction and for a full-field analysis of the 3D deformation pattern over its upstream face. For the former, a well-designed 3D geodetic system, with a particular consideration of the topography, promises a regulated acquisition of high-quality and blind-zone-free point cloud at field and also eases the cumbersome data registration process while maintaining its precision in house. For the latter, a problem-tailored processing pipeline is proposed for deformation extraction. Its core idea is to achieve a highly precise alignment of the point clouds with Iterative Closed Point algorithms from different epochs in datum areas that displays a featured, undeformed geometry at stable positions across epochs. Then, the alignment transformation matrix is applied to the point clouds of respective upstream face for each epoch, followed by pairwise comparisons of multiple adjusted point clouds for deformation evaluation. A processing pipeline is used to exploit the peal scene data redundancy of the GLQ dam acquired at six different epochs. Statistical analysis shows that satisfactory accuracy for deformation detection can be repeatably achieved, regardless of the scanner’s positioning uncertainties. The obtained 3D deformation patterns are characterised by three different zones: practically undeformed, outward and inward deformed zones. Their evolutions comply well with real construction stages and unique 3D valley topography. Abundant deformation results highlight the potential of TLS combined with the proposed data processing pipeline for cost-efficient monitoring of huge infrastructures compared to conventional labor-intense measurements.

The Influence of the Properties of Thermal - Insulation Materials on the Thermomoist Indicators of a Building

One of the basic measures of energy efficiency in residential buildings is the reduction of heat and coolant pressure, when external structures - walls, ceilings - contain thermal insulation material, as a result of which heat and cold losses are reduced, as a result of air-and moisture permeability. Their number is largely determined by the climatic zone of the building, construction, sources of heat and cold, fuel and electricity prices in this region. In such practice, first of all, attention is paid to the problems of the optimal thickness of the thermal insulator, the installation location, since improper installation in the structure can cause water condensation, which will lead to partial wear of the structure, since the properties of reinforced-concrete layers will deteriorate. This concerns the peculiarities of carrying out thermal insulation works and their necessity both in under construction and in buildings in use. However, even in these conditions, when discussing the thermal effect of thermal insulation on structures, due attention is not paid to individual structures, especially walls, moisture problems. Consideration of insulators with more or less efficient energy and heat engineering characteristics, when it was found that there is a significant difference between their results and effects, aroused particular interest in the study of the problem. This is followed by a study of the influence of the presence of thermal insulation in the structure on the cold load required for cooling, revealed a pattern of cost changes in the case of insulating materials with more or less properties - foam.

Simulation on formation process of field-reversed configuration

Collisional-merging is a way to form high-performance field-reversed configuration (FRC) plasma. An experiment device named HUST-FRC (HFRC) is under construction in Huazhong University of Science and Technology, which will be used to investigate the FRC formation through collisional-merging. In this research, a magnetohydrodynamics (MHD) simulation software called USim is used to study the effect of the initial density of plasma, the amplitude of the bias magnetic field, the configuration of the bias field, the rise time of the main field and the magnetic field ripple on the plasma parameters to facilitate the designing and operations of HFRC. Preliminary simulation results show that cusp configuration, lower ripple, higher initial density, an initial bias field of -0.15 T or -0.2 T, and a rise time of 4 μs are conducive to the formation of high-performance FRC plasma in HFRC device.

Evaporated Responsibility: The Collapse of the West Gate Bridge in Melbourne on 15 October 1970

On 15 October 1970, at 11:50AM, part of the West Gate Bridge in Melbourne, span 10-11 of 367 feet length, disintegrated and triggered the collapse of the bridge. Thirty-five men were killed in the disaster. The bridge was still under construction, all those killed were workers or engineers employed on the construction site. The investigation of a Royal Commission revealed a mismatch between an ambitious structural design of the bridge plus an unconventional method of erection and a fragmented, conflict-ridden construction management whose detrimental effects remained unchecked by public authorities. Regulatory powers and enforcement competence had been delegated to a QUANGO—a quasi-non-governmental organization—which diluted responsibility structures and decisively weakened the coordination and control capacity of the agency.

Determining the neutrino mass ordering and oscillation parameters with KM3NeT/ORCA

The next generation of water Cherenkov neutrino telescopes in the Mediterranean Sea are under construction offshore France (KM3NeT/ORCA) and Sicily (KM3NeT/ARCA). The KM3NeT/ORCA detector features an energy detection threshold which allows to collect atmospheric neutrinos to study flavour oscillation. This paper reports the KM3NeT/ORCA sensitivity to this phenomenon. The event reconstruction, selection and classification are described. The sensitivity to determine the neutrino mass ordering was evaluated and found to be 4.4$$\sigma $$ σ if the true ordering is normal and 2.3$$\sigma $$ σ if inverted, after 3 years of data taking. The precision to measure $$\varDelta m^2_{32}$$ Δ m 32 2 and $$\theta _{23}$$ θ 23 were also estimated and found to be $$85 . 10^{-6}~{\mathrm{eV}^{2}}$$ 85 . 10 - 6 eV 2 and $$(^{+1.9}_{-3.1})^{\circ }$$ ( - 3.1 + 1.9 ) ∘ for normal neutrino mass ordering and, $$75 . 10^{-6}~{\mathrm{eV}^{2}}$$ 75 . 10 - 6 eV 2 and $$(^{+2.0}_{-7.0})^{\circ }$$ ( - 7.0 + 2.0 ) ∘ for inverted ordering. Finally, a unitarity test of the leptonic mixing matrix by measuring the rate of tau neutrinos is described. Three years of data taking were found to be sufficient to exclude "Equation missing" event rate variations larger than 20% at $$3\sigma $$ 3 σ level.

Food and Health Literacy

Food literacy is a sub-field of health literacy with a concept under construction, but corresponds to the ability to read, understand, and judge the quality of information; to seek and exchange knowledge related to the topics of food and nutrition; to buy and prepare food; to critically reflect on factors which influence personal choices about food and understand the impact of these choices on society. In turn, the ACP model is a three-factor communication model (assertiveness, clarity, and positivity) that aims to optimize education based on health literacy. The aim of this chapter is to present a proposal for food guidance which combines the foundations of the ACP model and food literacy for the different life cycles. The guidelines for each cycle were adapted to the ACP model. In conclusion, the ACP model can be applied to food literacy actions in any life cycle. However, it is worth mentioning that the professional's communicational behavior needs to be aligned with the assertiveness competence so that such actions are in fact effective.