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Typological characterisation of farms in a smallholder food-cash crop production system in Zimbabwe – opportunities for livelihood sustainability
(Kassel University Press, 2018-09-11)
The diversity of smallholder farms in space, resource endowment, production and consumption decisions are often a hindrance to the design, targeting, implementation and scaling out of agricultural development projects. Understanding farm heterogeneity is crucial in targeting interventions that can potentially contribute to improved crop productivity, food security and livelihood sustainability. The study sought to define and understand farm typology in a resettlement smallholder food-cash crop production area in ...
Aufsatz
Applying phosphorus indices at a small agricultural watershed in Southern Brazil
(Kassel University Press, 2018-04-04)
Best management practices at watershed scale are essential to mitigate water pollution. The objectives of this study were: (1) to estimate the P-index in a small watershed with intensive agricultural use applying five P-index versions at three scales (watershed, sub-basin and agricultural field); (2) to assess the effect of the connectivity factors (distance between the agricultural field and the stream and width of riparian native vegetation) in estimating the risk of P loss. The five P-index versions resulted in a ...
Aufsatz
Motivations to consume agroecological food: An analysis of farmers’ markets in Quito, Ecuador
(Kassel University Press, 2018-08-21)
This paper examines the motivations to consume agroecological foods in Quito, Ecuador. Using data from a survey (n = 254) conducted among the customers of farmers’ markets, the results reveal that agroecological consumers are substantially different from the rest of the population in terms of education, income and life style. The perceived healthiness of agroecological food is by far the main motivation to buy at farmers’ markets, with environmental concern as the least important motivation. In terms of who spends ...
Aufsatz
Impact of agricultural activities on pesticide residues in soil of edible bamboo shoot plantations
(Kassel University Press, 2018-04-04)
Edible bamboo shoot is one of the most important vegetables in Asian countries. Intensive agricultural management measures can cause many negative influences, such as soil acidification and excessive pesticide residues. In the present study, more than 300 soil samples were collected from edible bamboo shoot plantations in six areas throughout Zhejiang province, China, to investigate the soil pesticide pollution and its change after different agricultural activities. Thirteen organic chemicals were detected; nine less ...
Aufsatz
Veganism as a Virtue: How compassion and fairness show us what is virtuous about veganism
(Department of Organic Food Quality and Food Culture at the University of Kassel, Germany and Federation of German Scientists (VDW), 2017-10-16)
With millions of animals brought into existence and raised for food every year, their negative impact upon the environment and the staggering growth in the number of chronic diseases caused by meat and dairy diets make a global move toward ethical veganism imperative. Typically, utilitarians and deontologists have led this discussion. The purpose of this paper is to propose a virtuous approach to ethical veganism. Virtue ethics can be used to construct a defense of ethical veganism by relying on the virtues of ...
Aufsatz
Three principles for co-designing sustainability intervention strategies: Experiences from Southern Transylvania
(2019-12-19)
Transformational research frameworks provide understanding and guidance for fostering change towards sustainability. They comprise stages of system understanding, visioning and co-designing intervention strategies to foster change. Guidance and empirical examples for how to facilitate the process of co-designing intervention strategies in real-world contexts remain scarce, especially with regard to integrating local initiatives. We suggest three principles to facilitate the process of co-designing intervention ...
Aufsatz
Mathematical Models in the Description of Pregnane X Receptor (PXR)-Regulated Cytochrome P450 Enzyme Induction
(2018-06-15)
The pregnane X receptor (PXR) is a drug/xenobiotic-activated transcription factor of crucial importance for major cytochrome P450 xenobiotic-metabolizing enzymes (CYP) expression and regulation in the liver and the intestine. One of the major target genes regulated by PXR is the cytochrome P450 enzyme (CYP3A4), which is the most important human drug-metabolizing enzyme. In addition, PXR is supposed to be involved both in basal and/or inducible expression of many other CYPs, such as CYP2B6, CYP2C8, 2C9 and 2C19, CYP3A5, ...
Aufsatz
Numerical Solution of Viscoelastic Fluid-Structure-Diffusion Systems with Applications in Ophthalmology
(2019-09-04)
The research of fluid-structure interaction problems is a continuously growing field, especially regarding applications in medicine and biology. We present the coupling of a potentially viscoelastic fluid with multiple hyperelastic structures incorporating chemical processes in the arbitrary Lagrangian Eulerian framework. This monolithic formulation allows a robust numerical solution with Newton's method. The discretization is based on the backward Euler scheme for temporal discretization and the Galerkin finite ...
Aufsatz
Three-Dimensional Gradients of Cytokine Signaling between T Cells
(2015-04-29)
Immune responses are regulated by diffusible mediators, the cytokines, which act at sub-nanomolar concentrations. The spatial range of cytokine communication is a crucial, yet poorly understood, functional property. Both containment of cytokine action in narrow junctions between immune cells (immunological synapses) and global signaling throughout entire lymph nodes have been proposed, but the conditions under which they might occur are not clear. Here we analyze spatially three-dimensional reaction-diffusion models ...