Irrigators’ attitudes towards environmental flows for wetlands in the Murrumbidgee, Australia

In Australia and many countries worldwide environmental flows are becoming an increasingly popular tool for reducing the negative impacts of river regulation. However, there are many factors that restrict the effectiveness of these flows such as thermal pollution, existing physical infrastructure and the limited volume of water available. Since environmental flows result in reduced water allocations for irrigators, the aim of the present study was to investigate whether irrigators’ attitudes towards environmental flows for wetlands are influenced by the effectiveness of these flows. Three focus groups were used to engage with farmers in the Murrumbidgee Catchment, eastern Australia. A simulation model of the Murrumbidgee River was created to provide focus groups with a tool for examining the effectiveness of wetland-watering releases and exploring alternative management scenarios. The results showed that participants support the principle of environmental flows for wetlands. However, they believed that the flows could be more effective if the restrictions imposed by physical infrastructure were removed. They also suggested that the volume of translucency releases should be lowered, as these flows reduce the amount of water available for wetlands and lower early season allocations for general-security water users. The participants provided numerous suggestions for altering the management of water resources so that both the Mid Murrumbidgee Wetlands and farmers would benefit.

Modeling the effects of pelleting on the logistics of distillers grains shipping

The energy security needs of energy importing nations continue to escalate. It is clear that biofuels can help meet some of the increasing need for energy. Theoretically, these can be produced from a variety of biological materials, including agricultural residues (such as corn stover and wheat straw), perennial grasses, legumes, algae, and other biological materials. Currently, however, the most heavily utilized material is corn starch. Industrial fuel ethanol production in the US primarily uses corn, because it is readily converted into fuel at a relatively low cost compared to other biomass sources. The production of corn-based ethanol in the US is dramatically increasing. As the industry continues to grow, the amount of byproducts and coproducts also increases. At the moment, the nonfermentable residues (which are dried and sold as distillers dried grains with solubles – DDGS) are utilized only as livestock feed. The sale of coproducts provides ethanol processors with a substantial revenue source and significantly increases the profitability of the production process. Even though these materials are used to feed animals in local markets, as the size and scope of the industry continues to grow, the need to ship large quantities of coproducts grows as well. This includes both domestic as well as international transportation. Value-added processing options offer the potential to increase the sustainability of each ethanol plant, and thus the industry overall. However, implementation of new technologies will be dependent upon how their costs interact with current processing costs and the logistics of coproduct deliveries. The objective of this study was to examine some of these issues by developing a computer model to determine potential cost ramifications of using various alternative technologies during ethanol processing. This paper focuses specifically on adding a densification unit operation (i.e., pelleting) to produce value-added DDGS at a fuel ethanol manufacturing plant. We have examined the economic implications of pelleting DDGS for varying DDGS production rates (100–1000 tons/d) and pelleting rates (0–100%), for a series of DDGS sales prices ($50–$200/ton). As the proportion of pelleting increases, the cost of transporting DDGS to distant markets drastically declines, because the rail cars can be filled to capacity. For example, at a DDGS sales price of $50/ton, 100% pelleting will reduce shipping costs (both direct and indirect) by 89% compared to shipping the DDGS in bulk form (i.e., no pelleting), whereas at a DDGS sales price of $200/ton, it will reduce costs by over 96%. It is clear that the sustainability of the ethanol industry can be improved by implementing pelleting technology for the coproducts, especially at those plants that ship their DDGS via rail.     

Evolution in Lego ®: A Physical Simulation of Adaptation by Natural Selection

We describe a physical simulation of natural selection in a population of legorgs, six-segment model organisms. Legorg morphology is genetically specified by five alleles on each segment. Legorgs show a simple form of motility that could evolve in originally sessile animals. This motility, the ability to move horizontally on a smooth surface, depends on the morphology and interaction of the six segments that produce different patterns of locomotion. Legorgs are selected for motility and reproduce in proportion to fitness. After just five generations, the average population motility increases 2.5 times. Additionally, we describe a slightly less time-consuming simulation of legorg evolution, where fitness is assigned by comparison with a template. The calculation of gene pools is precisely the same as in the previous simulation and produces very robust increases in fitness during five generations. The simulation is designed as a classroom experiment to explore the mechanism of natural selection. A test of its learning efficiency by evaluating the students’ conception of central aspects of evolutionary theory before and after showed a significant improvement. The surprising power of natural selection in this very simple physical system may also be exploited in more advanced experiments.     

针对留学生的教学特点提高全英文教学质量

针对留学生英语基础好,思维活跃,爱记笔记但有少数学生学习积极性不高、旷课和迟到等特点,在教学过程中通过选拔英语基础好、教学能力强、教学经验丰富的教师,采用灵活多样的教学方法和加强学生教学过程的管理等途径有效的提高全英文教学质量。     

组织学与胚胎学双语教学教学模式探索

为顺应时代发展的需要,改善教学质量,提高医学生专业外语水平,我们在五年制中有选择的进行了多年的组织学与胚胎学双语教学改革。本文就授课对象的选择、教材的选用、教学方法、考核方法、教学效果分析和出现的问题及对策等方面进行了分析和小结。旨在总结经验,并不断的改进和完善双语教学。     

研究生细胞分子生物学教学探索

为了培养具有科研思雏、德才兼备的研究生,在细胞分子生物学的教学中,从与人类生活及疾病相关的问题入手,以近年诺贝尔生理学或医学奖获奖相关工作为主线,要求学生阅读指定文献并自己查阅相关文献,采用启发式或讨论式等多种方式开展教学,让学生在学习过程中经历了文献查阅、综述撰写、会议报告的制作等过程,使学生掌握了基础理论,增强了发现问题的意识,培养了解决问题的能力,提高了学术交流的技能。从而使学生的道德修养和综合素质有了显著提高,为今后从事科学研究工作奠定了良好的基础。     

基础生物化学实验教学对学生技能的培养

面对国内实验教学的新形势和新要求,改进和完善本科实验教学日益紧迫。介绍了本科基础生物化学实验教学的内容与实践,根据生化实验课的特点,对实验教学内容、方式等进行改进,强调了以基本技术围绕基本实验与综合性实验为中心,培养学生的实践能力、创新能力与科学思维,重点强化了实验技能与素质的训练,探索了生化实验教学中培养高素质、综合型创新人才之路。     

大学生物专业新生启航工程专业教育课程教学的初步实践

为了尽快增强大学新生对专业的认知感,激发学习兴趣,明确学习目标,树立良好的学习风气,为大一新生开设了启航工程专业教育课程。就课程的设置模式、取得的成效、现存不足及改进设想等情况进行介绍与探讨。     

A new computational growth model for sea urchin skeletons

A new computational model has been developed to simulate growth of regular sea urchin skeletons. The model incorporates the processes of plate addition and individual plate growth into a composite model of whole-body (somatic) growth. A simple developmental model based on hypothetical morphogens underlies the assumptions used to define the simulated growth processes. The data model is based on a Delaunay triangulation of plate growth center points, using the dual Voronoi polygons to define plate topologies. A spherical frame of reference is used for growth calculations, with affine deformation of the sphere (based on a Young-Laplace membrane model) to result in an urchin-like three-dimensional form. The model verifies that the patterns of coronal plates in general meet the criteria of Voronoi polygonalization, that a morphogen/threshold inhibition model for plate addition results in the alternating plate addition pattern characteristic of sea urchins, and that application of the Bertalanffy growth model to individual plates results in simulated somatic growth that approximates that seen in living urchins. The model suggests avenues of research that could explain some of the distinctions between modern sea urchins and the much more disparate groups of forms that characterized the Paleozoic Era.     

Atom-scale molecular interactions in lipid raft mixtures

We review the relationship between molecular interactions and the properties of lipid environments. A specific focus is given on bilayers which contain sphingomyelin (SM) and sterols due to their essential role for the formation of lipid rafts. The discussion is based on recent atom-scale molecular dynamics simulations, complemented by extensive comparison to experimental data. The discussion is divided into four sections. The first part investigates the properties of one-component SM bilayers and compares them to bilayers with phosphatidylcholine (PC), the focus being on a detailed analysis of the hydrogen bonding network in the two bilayers. The second part deals with binary mixtures of sterols with either SM or PC. The results show how the membrane properties may vary substantially depending on the sterol and SM type available, the membrane order and interdigitation being just two of the many examples of this issue. The third part concentrates on the specificity of intermolecular interactions in three-component mixtures of SM, PC and cholesterol (CHOL) under conditions where the concentrations of SM and CHOL are dilute with respect to that of PC. The results show how SM and CHOL favor one another, thus acting as nucleation sites for the formation of highly ordered nanosized domains. Finally, the fourth part discusses the large-scale properties of raft-like membrane environments and compares them to the properties of non-raft membranes. The differences turn out to be substantial. As a particularly intriguing example of this, the lateral pressure profiles of raft-like and non-raft systems indicate that the lipid composition of membrane domains may have a major impact on membrane protein activation.