Effect of neighbouring village conditions and infrastructure interdependency on economic opportunity: A case study of the Yogyakarta region,Indonesia

To determine whether the inclusion of conditions in neighbouring villages and infrastructure interdependency are able to improve the performance of infrastructure–economy interaction models, we compare three related and progressive concepts. The first concept defines economic opportunity in a village as a function of available infrastructure within that village. The second concept includes the effect of economic opportunity in neighbouring villages in addition to available infrastructure within the village. In the third concept, we include the interdependency of infrastructures as another factor affecting the potential level of economic development in the village. We use Ordinary Least Squares (OLS) and a Geographic Information System (GIS) to model the first concept, and we add a spatial-lag model for the second. The third model expands on the second by introducing a Sugeno Fuzzy Inference System (FIS) and a rule-based OLS to capture the nature of infrastructure interdependency. The result of the three models is validated by a known spatial distribution of poverty levels and subjective well-being that serve as proxies for economic opportunity in the Yogyakarta region in Indonesia. The results demonstrate that the third model provides a more accurate prediction of the real conditions and performs consistently better than the other two models. We therefore conclude that conditions in neighbouring villages and infrastructure interdependency influence the economic opportunity of a village and should be considered in policy making regarding resource allocation in infrastructure development.     

Framework for Scalable File System Metadata Crawling and Differencing

Identifying file systems metadata changes such as which files have been added, modified or removed from the file system has many usages. In this paper we present a framework we developed for identifying those changes in increasing speeds. Our framework which is composed of crawling, hashing, and scheduling components, allows to scale the crawl to multiple client workstations that operate in parallel on the same file system in a non-overlapping fashion. Experiments carried using real-world data indicate performance improvement (speedup) of up to 36X using our framework compared to legacy crawling utilities such as Linux’s ‘find’.     

Mandibular Gland Secretion of <Emphasis Type="Italic">Melipona beecheii</Emphasis>: Chemistry and Behavior

The mandibular gland secretion of Melipona beecheii contains a rich mixture of terpenoid and oxygenated compounds and unsaturated and saturated hydrocarbons. However, it differs markedly from the 11 other Brazilian species examined in previous studies, both by the absence of 2-heptanol and the presence of rose oxides. The most abundant compound was geranyl hexanoate, whereas the most volatile compounds were cis- and trans-rose oxide and geraniol. The complete blend and five individual components found in the gland secretion were tested by electroantennography (EAG) and behavioral assays. The complete mandibular gland extract and geraniol elicited the strongest EAG responses, whereas these and farnesyl acetate induced the strongest attack response from workers. The role of the rose oxides remains to be elucidated, as they do not appear to play a major role as an alarm pheromone of this species.     

A New Potential Attractant for Anastrepha obliqua from Spondias mombin Fruits

Nonirradiated males and females of Anastrepha obliqua (Macquart) were attracted to and landed more frequently on ripe fruits of Spondias mombin L. than on artificial fruit in wind tunnel bioassays. Porapak Q volatile extracts of S. mombin were also attractive and elicited landing on artificial fruit for both sexes. Combined gas chromatographic–electroantennographic detection (GC-EAD) analysis of volatile extracts showed that nine volatile compounds elicited repeatable antennal responses from females and males. The EAD-active compounds were identified by GC–mass spectrometry (MS) as follows: ethyl butyrate, isopropyl butyrate, hexan-1-ol, propyl butyrate, isobutyl butyrate, ethyl hexanoate, isopentyl butyrate, ethyl benzoate, and ethyl octanoate. In wind tunnel bioassays, males and females were attracted and landed more frequently on lures containing the nine-component blend of synthetic compounds than on unscented controls. Field cage bioassays showed that multilure traps baited with the nine-synthetic blend captured significantly more A. obliqua than traps baited with hydrolyzed protein or water.     

Effect of origin,breeding and processing conditions on the isotope ratios of bioelements in dry-cured ham

The stable isotope ratios (SIR) of the bioelements (²H/¹H, ¹³C/¹²C, ¹⁵N/¹⁴N, ¹⁸O/¹⁶O, ³⁴S/³²S) of the defatted dry matter and marbling and subcutaneous fat fractions, were assessed on 86 ham samples belonging to six different types, with the aim of ascertaining the effect of origin and production system on 11 isotopic ratios. The ham types were obtained from pigs reared in three regions, examining in every location one different production factor at two levels of expression: pig genotype (local breed vs. industrial hybrid) in Friuli (Italy), pig feeding regime (Bellota vs. Campo) in Extremadura (Spain) and ham seasoning time (mid vs. end) in Emilia (Italy). The isotopic composition of meteoric water and the dietary abundance of C₄ plants allowed to distinguish Italian PDO from Spanish hams. The contrasting treatments within the regional batches generated promising differences in SIR, potentially useful for tracing the whole ham production system, including the processing procedure.     

Density and humidity gradients in veneers of oil palm stems

Large variations in the stem of oil palm in terms of moisture content and density hinder its full utilization in the plywood industry. In this study, the density and moisture content (MC) pattern throughout the trunk of the oil palm tree were measured and established. The veneer samples were taken from various sections i.e., top, bottom, outer and inner parts of the trunk and the density and moisture content of each veneer were then measured. The results showed that there was a decrease of density and an increase of moisture content in the veneers as they were peeled progressively towards the inner portion of the trunk. It was also discovered that veneers taken from the top part of the stem had higher density but did not have a significant difference in MC compared to veneers taken from the bottom part of the stem.