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Agropastoralism and international labor migration are livelihood strategies that are interconnected as dominant ways of life across rural Kyrgyzstan. A prevalent rural livelihood strategy—agropastoralism—is closely tied to agrarian semi‐nomadic ways of life that link families and communities to the surrounding mountain environment. Another livelihood strategy—international labor migration—links or telecouples communities and income streams to transnational family structures, international labor markets, and distant economies. This article examines four hypothetical relationships between key elements of these two livelihood strategies. The relationship between remittances, pasture access, and livestock holdings is examined by analyzing 1,815 household surveys from southern rural Kyrgyzstan. We find remittances and livestock holdings have a significant positive relationship when a household is receiving a large amount of remittances, but not when the remittances received are modest. We also find that access to more distant, productive pastures is positively associated with the receipt of any amount of remittances. These findings demonstrate the ways in which migration and remittances can impact livestock management and agropastoral livelihoods at different levels of remittance reception. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

As technological advances allow the development of new products, the number of synthetic chemical compounds released into the soil, surface water and groundwater increases, posing a threat to the environment. Therefore, treatability studies to improve bioremediation strategies (biostimulation and bioaugmentation) were applied to samples of soil containing nitro and chlorinated aromatic compounds from a former chemical manufacturing site in Brazil. Native microorganisms were stimulated to degrade compounds including dichloroanilines, dichloronitrobenzenes, 2‐chloronitrobenzene, and 1,2‐chlorobenzene, through oxygen exposure and pH (6.0‐8.4) and moisture content (13‐23%) adjustments. For the inoculation of soil samples, a culture enriched from site groundwater was developed. The aeration alone stimulated the indigenous microbes to degrade some of the compounds. However, reinoculation with an enriched culture and moisture content adjustment increased the attenuation rates by 3.6 and 1.4 times, respectively. The pH values in the range of 7.6 and 8.4 seem not to harm microbes' activity and moisture content higher than 16% is recommended to enhance biodegradation. Based on the findings, it is likely that natural attenuation is happening in aerobic zones at the site. Results indicate both bioremediation strategies (biostimulation and bioaugmentation through reinoculation with enriched culture mainly composed of organisms from the Diaphorobacter genus) are promising strategies to enhance bioremediation. However, considering the applicability of the strategies on a field scale, further experiments will broaden the understanding of biodegradability of compounds, such as their inhibitory effects when in higher concentration (>150 mg/kg), individually or combined. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article describes a scalar field topology (SFT)‐based methodology for the interactive characterization and analysis of hotspots for density fields defined on a regular grid. In contrast to the common approach of simply identifying hotspots as areas that exceed a chosen density threshold, SFT provides various data abstractions—such as the merge tree and the Morse complex—to characterize hotspots and their boundaries at multiple scales. Moreover, SFT enables the ranking of hotspots based on analyst‐defined importance measures, which also makes it possible to explore hotspots using a level‐of‐detail approach. We present a visual analytics system to support analysts in hotspot analysis and abstraction using SFT, and we demonstrate the merit of the proposed SFT‐based methodology on two crime datasets. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The ability to pay for water and wastewater services is a growing issue in the developed world. To this point in time, utilities have helped customers grappling with affordability issues using different types of customer assistance programs (CAPs). Income‐based billing approaches differ from CAPs in that bills are structured so as to be affordable for customers at the outset. Recently, the City of Philadelphia implemented an innovative program to work towards resolving the affordability problem in their city using income‐based billing. This tiered assistance program or TAP structures bills for water, wastewater, and stormwater services to program enrollees' income. Given the innovative nature of the program, this paper describes the rollout of TAP and assesses the impact of the program on customers and utility revenues. The paper closes with a critical assessment of TAP and considerations for utilities evaluating the implementation of similar programs. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Abstract: Despite burgeoning interest in entrepreneurial ecosystems, there is little information on metrics for studying the actors and interconnections within these systems. The increasing availability of data and metrics for characterizing entrepreneurial activity in recent years provide opportunities for analyzing EE in more holistic ways. A critical first step in advancing work on this topic, however, is to critically review the use and limitations of currently available data with a focus on the very recent ecosystems literature, as well as constituent topics such as entrepreneurial heritage and spinoffs, entrepreneurial culture, and studies of emerging ecosystems in peripheral regions. In this review, the problems and prospects of available data are discussed, particularly the spatial scales (national or subnational) at which they are available. The paper closes with a critical discussion of the data needed to move the field forward in the four ecosystem‐related topical areas and answer important questions related to the nuanced geographies of EE at the subnational level. This discussion suggests present gaps may be related to a poverty of data‐sharing efforts rather than a poverty of available data. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

There is currently no way to diagnose a rejection before a change in serum creatinine. This had led some to start doing SB, but little data exist on the utility and safety of SB in pediatric patients. There is also little known on practice patterns of pediatric nephrologists. A retrospective review of pediatric kidney transplant SB between January 2013 and January 2017 at a single center was performed. A survey went to the PedNeph email list. There were 47 SB; 15 at 6 months, 12 at 1 year, 13 at 2 years, and 7 at 3 years. There were 3 minor (1 gross hematuria and 2 hematomas) and no major complications. On 6-month SB, 1 had SC 1A ACR (6.7%) with no BR ACR. On the 12-month SB, there were 5 with SCBR ACR (41.7%) and 1 with SC AMR (8.3%). On the 2-year SB, there were 4 that had SCBR ACR (30.8%), and 1 with SC AMR (7.7%). On the 3-year SB, 1 had chronic transplant glomerulitis (14.3%). The survey showed that 34.3% of pediatric nephrologists perform SB. SB can be performed safely. By early identification of histological lesions, SB gives us an opportunity for individualized immunosuppressive regimens that may prevent chronic allograft dysfunction and improve long-term graft outcome. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Neonatal growth can have lasting consequences on survival and reproduction. In many taxa, larger, faster growing neonates experience higher survival, reach sexual maturity more rapidly, and achieve higher lifetime fecundity. In contrast to their closest relatives, Lake Erie watersnakes grow slower, mature later, and may delay feeding until after their first hibernation. To determine if Lake Erie watersnakes do indeed delay feeding until after their first hibernation, we compared age class 0 (between birth and first hibernation) and age class 1 (emergence from hibernation and through the first full season) snakes in the field and in the laboratory. In the field, only 0.6% of pre-hibernation neonates were found to contain prey, while 11.9% of post-hibernation neonates contained prey. During captive feeding experiments, the probability of eating was positively correlated with age (binary logistic regression, Wald [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study estimates econometric models to evaluate the linkage between broadband Internet connections and firms in counties across the urban hierarchy within the continental U. S. Industry-related variations in this relationship are also explored using varied definitions of the urban hierarchy. Model results indicate broadband presence in remote areas is not an explanatory factor of establishment presence. Results also suggest the manner in which the urban hierarchy is defined matters. Traditional metropolitan/nonmetropolitan and urban/rural splits of locales are insufficient to capture the geographic and industrial nuances behind this relationship. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

An introduction is presented in which the editor discusses various reports within the issue on topics including issue related to entrepreneurship, relationship between tourism and housing and relationship between knowledge and innovation across the urban hierarchy.