Visualization of tsunami waves with Amira package

In recent years numerical investigations of tsunami wave propagation have been spurred by the magnitude 9.3 earthquake along the Andaman–Sumatra fault in December, 2004. Visualization of tsunami waves being modeled can yield a much better physical understanding about the manner of wave propagation over realistic seafloor bathymetries. In this paper we will review the basic physics of tsunami wave propagation and illustrate how these waves can be visualized with the Amira visualization package. We have employed both the linear and nonlinear versions of the shallow-water wave equation. We will give various examples illustrating how the files can be loaded by Amira, how the wave-heights of the tsunami waves can be portrayed and viewed with illumination from light sources and how movies can be used to facilitate physical understanding and give important information in the initial stages of wave generation from interaction with the ambient geological surroundings. We will show examples of tsunami waves being modeled in the South China Sea, Yellow Sea and southwest Pacific Ocean near the Solomon Islands. Visualization should be a part of any training program for teaching the public about the potential danger arising from tsunami waves. We propose that interactive visualization with a web-portal would be useful for understanding more complex tsunami wave behavior from solving the 3-D Navier–Stokes equation in the near field.     

Norm Crystallization: Measurement and Comparative Analysis

Normative theory and methods have become increasingly important in outdoor recreation research and management as an approach to formulating standards of quality in parks and related areas. An important issue associated with this research is the level of agreement or consensus about social norms called crystallization. A new measure, Van der Eijk's measure of agreement (A), is proposed and applied in this study. A test of the effect of potential independent variables on crystallization is also applied using a comparative analysis conducted across a number of studies administered in U.S. national parks. Study findings indicate a generally high level of crystallization regarding normative standards of quality and show several independent variables that influence crystallization, though the effects are generally small.     

Convenience and choice for consumers: the domestic acceptability of canned food between the 1870s and 1930s

Canned food once represented an astonishingly innovative technology although it is now largely ignored in food discourse. As with so much in our lives, familiarity renders an object invisible. To explore the changing social significance of canned food, as the format developed from scientific curiosity to domestic ubiquity, this paper examines reports in The Scotsman newspaper from the late 1870s to the 1930s. Although canned foods were slow to break into the mass market they were little short of revolutionary in the way they brought new tastes from across the world to ordinary British households. A few cans in the larder provided simple storage and reassurance that the unexpected visitor could be fed – perhaps with something a little out of the ordinary. Against this background of quiet assimilation into our food culture, canned food has been controversial and provided an unwitting rehearsal for contemporary food narratives. In these old newspapers, it was somewhat surprising to find reports of disquiet that are recognizable in our own times – the convenience of canned food posed a threat to culinary skills; questions were raised about the nutritional value and safety of processed food; we had become excessively reliant on imported food and disregarded our own produce.     

Research to Estimate and Manage Carrying Capacity of a Tourist Attraction: A Study of Alcatraz Island

Carrying capacity has been a long-standing issue in management of parks, outdoor recreation and tourism. Contemporary carrying capacity frameworks rely on formulation of indicators and standards of quality to define and manage carrying capacity. This paper describes a programme of research to support estimation and management of carrying capacity of Alcatraz Island, an historic site within Golden Gate National Recreation Area, California, USA, and a heavily visited tourist attraction. Research included: (1) a survey of visitors to Alcatraz Island to identify indicators and standards of quality for the visitor experience; and (2) development of a computer simulation model of visitor use to estimate maximum daily use levels without violating standards of quality. Study findings are used to estimate a range of carrying capacities for the prison cellhouse and for the island as a whole.     

Account-based plans curb costs and engage employees

A growing number of organizations are combining consumer-driven health plans with account-based approaches in order to limit health benefit costs, reinforce key consumerist messages and provide meaningful benefits to both actives and retirees. This article describes how account-based approaches work and can be used to motivate employees to invest in their health today and salt away funds for tomorrow. The author describes what employers can do to ensure that consumer-driven health plans and account-based approaches help employees accomplish their goals.     

gLucifer: next generation visualization framework for high-performance computational geodynamics

High-performance computing provides unprecedented capabilities to produce higher resolution 4-D models in a fraction of time. Thus, the need exists for a new generation of visualization systems able to maintain parity with the enormous volume of data generated. In attempting to write this much data to disk, each computational step introduces a significant performance bottleneck, yet most existing visualization software packages inherently rely on reading data in from a dump file. Available packages make this assumption of postprocessing at quite a fundamental level and are not very well suited for plotting very large numbers of specialized particles. This necessitates the creation of a new visualization system that meets the needs of large-scale geodynamic modeling. We have developed such a system, gLucifer, using a software framework approach that allows efficient reuse of our efforts in other areas of research. gLucifer is capable of producing movies of a 4-D data set “on the fly” (simultaneously with running the parallel scientific application) without creating a performance bottleneck. By eliminating most of the human efforts involved in visualizing results through postprocessing, gLucifer reconnects the scientist to the numerical experiment as it unfolds. Data sets that were previously very difficult to even manage may be efficiently explored and interrogated without writing to disk, and because this approach is based entirely on memory distributed across as many processors as are being utilized by the scientific application, the visualization solution is scalable into terabytes of data being rendered in real time.     

The International Entrepreneurial Decision of UK SMEs to Discontinue Overseas Activities: A Research Note Reporting Practices Within the Clothing Industry Eighteen Months on

Findings from a follow-up study to an investigation concerning reasons why a sample of firms discontinued export activities and perceptions towards assistance that may motivate them to recommence overseas activities in the future are discussed in this article. A longitudinal, qualitative perspective is provided that contributes to knowledge at the international marketing/entrepreneurship interface by reporting on their business activities 18 months after the initial study was undertaken. Analysis establishes that differences exist between two groups of firms that had indicated in the original study that their discontinuation of exporting was a short-term measure compared with those that viewed the decision as longer term. Recommendations for policy makers in the provision of trade assistance programmes are offered as a result of the study.     

The trade-off between agriculture and biodiversity in marginal areas: Can crofting and bumblebee conservation be reconciled?

Crofting is a low intensity agricultural system restricted to the Highlands and Islands of northern Scotland typified by small scale mixed livestock production and rotational cropping activities. As with other low intensity farming systems across Europe, crofting is changing in response to a range of socio-economic factors. This is having a negative impact on the populations of rare bumblebees that are associated with this agricultural system. In this paper we use an ecological-economic modelling approach to examine the likely impacts of introducing two different management options for conserving bumblebees on croft land-use and income. Two linear programming models were constructed to represent the predominant crofting systems found in the Outer Hebrides, and varying constraints on bumblebee abundance were imposed to examine the trade-off between conservation and agricultural incomes. The model outputs illustrate that in some instances it is likely that both agricultural profits and bumblebee densities can be enhanced. We conclude that policy-makers should take into consideration the type of farming system when designing cost-effective agri-environment policies for low intensity farming systems, and that improvements in bee conservation are not necessarily in conflict with maintaining farm income.     

International diversification with frontier markets

We provide an analysis of frontier market equities with respect to world market integration and diversification. Principal component results reveal that frontier markets exhibit low levels of integration. In contrast with developed and emerging markets, frontier markets offer no indication of increasing integration through time. Furthermore, individual frontier market countries do not exhibit consistent rates of changing integration. Structural break tests identify breakpoints in integration, as well as integration dynamics across countries. We show that frontier markets have low integration with the world market and thereby offer significant diversification benefits.     

Higher knowledge for higher aspirations

With escalating expectations and opportunities for HR professionals to add greater value comes the mandate for greater knowledge about the fundamental driving forces of business. Business leaders and employees increasingly assume that HR professionals have foundational knowledge of HR concepts and practices. But to create competitive advantage from that knowledge, HR professionals must be fully versant about external business realities that directly or indirectly influence how to apply that knowledge. We examine four of the most central categories of external business knowledge: advancements in technology, the causes and effects of economic and regulatory turbulence, the dynamics of business globalization, and changes in population demographics. With knowledge about these fundamental business drivers and their supporting data, HR professionals will be more able to make credible and accurate strategic contributions to business discussions and to proactively build more centrally relevant HR practices. © 2005 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.