Search results for "Opera"
showing 10 items of 8665 documents
Kin and multilevel selection in social evolution: a never-ending controversy?
2016
Kin selection and multilevel selection are two major frameworks in evolutionary biology that aim at explaining the evolution of social behaviors. However, the relationship between these two theories has been plagued by controversy for almost half a century and debates about their relevance and usefulness in explaining social evolution seem to rekindle at regular intervals. Here, we first provide a concise introduction into the kin selection and multilevel selection theories and shed light onto the roots of the controversy surrounding them. We then review two major aspects of the current debate: the presumed formal equivalency of the two theories and the question whether group selection can …
Debating Sexual Selection and Mating Strategies
2006
Published at full length with the title 'Reproductive behaviour: sexual selection remains the best explanation' in Science E-letters, 6 April 2006
El modelo cooperativo de sistemas agroalimentarios de innovación: el caso ANECOOP y el sistema citrícola valenciano
2015
English title: The cooperative model of agri-food innovation systems: ANECOOP and the Valencian citrus industry; International audience; Globalisation brings pressure on regional production systems to become regional production and innovation systems in order to maintain their competitiveness. However, the heterogeneity of the companies in these systems makes it difficult to respond to these challenges and obliges the response to be collective and mesoeconomic. To date, there has been a defence of the leadership of some private companies and other intermediaries such as business associations as vehicles of this process, but the part that cooperatives play in it has barely been studied. This…
Fifteen operationally important decisions in the planning of biodiversity offsets
2018
Many development projects, whether they are about construction of factories, mines, roads, railways, new suburbs, shopping malls, or even individual houses, have negative environmental consequences. Biodiversity offsetting is about compensating that damage, typically via habitat restoration, land management, or by establishment of new protected areas. Offsets are the fourth step of the so-called mitigation hierarchy, in which ecological damage is first avoided, minimized second, and third restored locally. Whatever residual damage remains is then offset. Offsetting has been increasingly adopted all around the world, but simultaneously serious concerns are expressed about the validity of the…
Aeration control in membrane bioreactor for sustainable environmental footprint
2020
In this study different scenarios were scrutinized to minimize the energy consumption of a membrane bioreactor system for wastewater treatment. Open-loop and closed-loop scenarios were investigated by two-step cascade control strategies based on dissolved oxygen, ammonia and nitrite concentrations. An integrated MBR model which includes also the greenhouse gas formation/emission processes was applied. A substantial energy consumption reduction was obtained for the closed-loop scenarios (32% for Scenario 1 and 82% for Scenario 2). The air flow control based on both ammonia and nitrite concentrations within the aerobic reactor (Scenario 2) provided excellent results in terms of reduction of o…
Value of information in multiple criteria decision making: an application to forest conservation
2019
Abstract Developing environmental conservation plans involves assessing trade-offs between the benefits and costs of conservation. The benefits of conservation can be established with ecological inventories or estimated based on previously collected information. Conducting ecological inventories can be costly, and the additional information may not justify these costs. To clarify the value of these inventories, we investigate the multiple criteria value of information associated with the acquisition of improved ecological data. This information can be useful when informing the decision maker to acquire better information. We extend the concept of the value of information to a multiple crite…
Potential of using data assimilation to support forest planning
2017
Uncertainty in forest information typically results in economic and ecological losses as a consequence of suboptimal management decisions. Several techniques have been proposed to handle such uncertainties. However, these techniques are often complex and costly. Data assimilation (DA) has recently been advocated as a tool that may reduce the uncertainty, thereby improving the quality of forest planning results. It offers an opportunity to make use of all new sources of information in a systematic way and thus provides more accurate and up-to-date information to forest planning. In this study, we refer to literature on handling uncertainties in forest planning, as well as related literature…
Are alternative food networks winning strategies to increase organic SMEs profitability? Evidence from a case study
2020
The aim of this study was to understand how and how much alternative food networks (AFNs) contribute to increasing the profitability of the organic SMEs, compared to traditional organic sales channels. For this purpose, an economic analysis and an in-depth interview were carried out in a case study located in the Sicilian northern coast. Findings showed a clear convenience of the participation to alternative food networks compared to the case in which all farm production was conferred to traditional sales channels, highlighting an increase both of farm profit (+76.9%) and net income (+72.1%). However, the in-depth interview revealed that AFNs are a mean, not only to have economic benefits, …
From Metaphor to Practice: Operationalizing the Analysis of Resilience Using System Dynamics Modelling
2017
This paper operationalizes an analysis of resilience for social-ecological systems using system dynamics (SD) modelling. Resilience is a versatile concept that continues to gain popularity among researchers who study ways to reduce the vulnerability of social-ecological systems to a wide range of disturbances. However, its application in the policymaking domain still remains underdeveloped because it is difficult to understand the mechanisms that might enhance resilience and to measure the impact of potential policies. This paper proposes to use SD modelling as a tool to analyse resilience using simulations to quantify system response to disturbances and a causal analysis to identify ways t…
Seaport competitiveness research: the past, present and future
2019
This study presents a review of articles with a focus on seaport competitiveness from the maritime literature. We investigated how port competitiveness research has evolved during the last two decades using bibliometric citation analysis tools and techniques. Bibliography data, collected from the ISI Web of Science database, consisted of 267 research papers by 465 authors in 117 journals. Based on citation analysis, we identified the key universities, journals and articles and their impact on port competitiveness research. Also, seven key research streams with few sub-streams were revealed as a result of a mixed co-citation and in-depth content analysis of the most cited articles. A bibliom…