.......This issue of IEEE Micro is a little bit different, to say the least. It includes four debates from the Computer Architecture Research Directions (CARD) workshop that was held as part of the 13th Annual IEEE/ACM International Symposium on High-Performance Computer Architecture in February 2007. The organizers approached me about a special Micro issue about CARD and I said, ‘‘Why not?’’ W...

Selection for high productivity has been the long term focus of pig breeding programs worldwide, however, Rauw et al. (1998) highlighted that selection for productivity alone has unfavourable consequences for a number of metabolic, reproduction and health traits across species. More recently, Prunier et al. (2010) reviewed relationships between high physiological demands and the health and welf...

Following the implementation of the Green for Grain Project in 2000 in Guyuan, China, the decrease in cultivated land and subsequent increase in forest and grassland pose substantial challenges for the supply of biological products. Whether the current biologically productive land-use patterns in Guyuan satisfy the biological product requirements for local people is an urgent problem. In this s...