Long-term studies using the RAINFOR network of forest plots have generated significant insights into the spatial and temporal dynamics of forest carbon cycling in Amazonia. In this work, we map and explore the landscape context of several major RAINFOR plot clusters using Landsat ETM+ satellite data. In particular, we explore how representative the plots are of their landscape context, and test...

BACKGROUND The Araguaia River basin runs through the states of Goiás, Mato Grosso, Tocantins, and Pará, covering 373,000 Km(2), mostly within the Brazilian Cerrado. The region has a wide variety of wetlands. The climate is characterized by high temperatures and strongly seasonal precipitation. There are two well defined seasons: the dry season (winter-spring) and the rainy season (summer- fall)...

We tested the heterogeneity/productivity hypothesis with respect to the abundance and richness of birds and the vegetation density hypothesis with respect to birds' nest predation rates, and determined the relative importance of forested vegetation formations for the conservation of birds in the Pantanal. We estimated the apparent nesting success, and the abundance and richness of nesting birds...

BACKGROUND This paper discusses the various methods and the materials for the fabrication of active artificial facial muscles. The primary use for these will be the reanimation of paralysed or atrophied muscles in sufferers of non-recoverable unilateral facial paralysis. METHOD The prosthetic solution described in this paper is based on sensing muscle motion of the contralateral healthy muscl...

Thís article cxamines recent transformations of the coffee landscape of northern Latin Ame rica through the optic of "place as process." As coffee became the most impurtant regional export crop, its "place" evolved. Coffee lands in northern Latin America now embrace 3.1 million hectares, often contiguous across international borders. Like many agricultural systems, coffee has succumbed to inten...

We propose an efficient system for realistic speech animation. The system supports all steps of the animation pipeline, from the capture or design of 3D head models up to the synthesis and editing of the performance. This pipeline is fully 3D, which yields high flexibility in the use of the animated character. Real detailed 3D face dynamics, observed at video frame rate for thousands of points ...

Defining "healthy weight" is not easy and for an adolescent with all concerns about newly developing physiognomy it is even harder. The aim of this study was to find out the frequency of obesity and the association between the body mass index (BMI), weight-control behaviors and self-perceived body weight status in high school students of a southern city of Turkey. The students from 10 schools w...

The Triassic-Jurassic boundary (Tr-J; ∼201 Ma) is marked by a doubling in the concentration of atmospheric CO2, rising temperatures, and ecosystem instability. This appears to have been driven by a major perturbation in the global carbon cycle due to massive volcanism in the Central Atlantic Magmatic Province. It is hypothesized that this volcanism also likely delivered sulphur dioxide (SO2) to...

ERICA FLEISHMAN*, NEIL MCDONAL†, RALPH MAC NALLY‡, DENNIS D. MURPHY§, JACK WALTERS¶ and TED FLOYD**†† * Center for Conservation Biology, Department of Biological Sciences, Stanford University, Stanford, CA 94305– 5020, USA; † 1900 Klamath Falls Way, Las Vegas, NV 89128, USA; ‡ Australian Centre for Biodiversity: Analysis, Policy and Management, School of Biological Sciences, Monash University 3...

Claudia Mattos In 1807 the German naturalist Alexander von Humboldt published a small book entitled Ansichten der Natur (Aspects of Nature), which resulted from his more than five-year trip through the American continent. On the contrary to the thirty volumes of his Voyage de Humboldt et Bompland, published between 1805 and 1836 in Paris this small work from 1807 offered the reader what Humbold...