Search

The demand for greater computer power in numerical weather prediction and meteorological research is as strong as ever. The world meteorological community has tried to meet this demand by exploiting parallelism. In this field, the European Centre for Medium-Range Weather Forecasts has established itself as the central venue for bringing together operational weather forecasters, climate researchers and parallel computer manufacturers to share their experiences through a series of workshops held every other year. This book reports on the latest workshop (2-6 December 1996) and is an excellent overview of the success which parallel systems have gained in meteorology worldwide, and how it was achieved. In addition, future trends in computer hardware and software development and its implications for meteorological computing are outlined.

Much of Jefferson Davis'life and career has been obscured in controversy and misinterpretation. This full, carefully annotated edition will make it possible for scholars to reassess the man who served as President of the Confederacy and who in the aftermath of war became the symbolic leader of the South.For almost a decade a dedicated team of scholars has been collecting and documenting Davis'papers and correspondence for this multi-volume work. The first volume includes not only Davis'private and public correspondence but also the important letters and documents addressed to and concerning him. Two autobiographical accounts, a detailed genealogy of the Davis family, and a complete bibliography are also included. This volume covers Davis'early years in Mississippi and Kentucky, his career at West Point, his first military assignments, and his tragic marriage to Sarah Knox Taylor. Together, the letters and documents unfold a human story of the first thirty-two years of a long life that later became filled with turbulence and controversy.

Pectins are one of the classes of complex structural plant cell wall polysaccharides. They are localized in the middle lamella and primary cell wall of higher plants. Pectins have a long-standing use as gelling agents whereas their enzymatic degradation or modification plays an important role in the processing of agricultural crops and the manufacturing of foods and beverages. Progress in pectin and pectinase research has been most prominent in two areas over the past 5 years. The first one concerns the analysis and elucidation of the complex chemical structure of pectin and identification of novel enzymes involved in the degradation of these structures. The second area concerns the mode of action and the 3-dimensional structure of various pectin degrading enzymes as well as the cloning of a large number of genes encoding enzymes involved in pectin degradation and modification. This book covers the following topics. First the structural, physical and chemical properties of pectin are treated followed by information about its biosynthesis and about the biological effects of pectin and its degradation products in biological systems such as plant-pathogen interactions and human nutrition. Identification of novel enzymes, the mode of action of different pectinases and the 3-D structure of bacterial pectate lyases forms the second block. This is followed by the genetics and regulation of pectinase biosynthesis in saprophytic and phytopathogenic microbial systems as well as in plant systems. Finally, developments in pectin manufacturing and application of pectinases in traditional (food, beverage) and novel technologies are treated. This book is meant for those actively involved in fundamental and applied aspects of pectin and pectinase research but it is also of value for those interested in plant cell wall biosynthesis and architecture, phytopathology, food technology and human nutrition. This book not only reflects the present status of research in the field but it will turn out to be a very useful reference work as well.