Since the 1880s, hydrological modification of the Greater Florida Everglades has reduced water levels and flows in Everglades National Park (ENP). The Comprehensive Everglades Restoration Program ...(CERP) began in 2000 to restore pre-drainage flows and preserve the natural landscape of the Everglades. However, sea-level rise (SLR) was not considered in the development of CERP. We used long-term data (2001–2016) from the Florida Coastal Everglades-Long Term Ecological Research Program to quantify and model the spatial dynamics of water levels, salinity, and nutrients in response to changes in climate, freshwater management and SLR in the Shark River Slough (SRS), ENP. Results indicate that fresh-to-marine head difference (FMHD) was the single most important factor affecting marine-to-freshwater hydrologic connectivity and transport of salinity and phosphorous upstream from the Gulf of Mexico. Sea-level has increasingly exceeded ground surface elevation at the most downstream freshwater site in SRS, thereby reducing the FMHD. We showed a higher impact of SLR in the dry season when there was practically no freshwater inflow to raise FMHD. We also demonstrated effectiveness of inflow depends more on the monthly distribution than the total annual volume. Hence, the impact per unit volume of inflow is significantly higher in the dry season in preventing high salinity and marine-derived nutrient levels. We advocate that FMHD needs to be factored into water management decisions to reduce adverse and likely irreversible effects of SLR throughout the Everglades landscape.
•We measured long-term changes in water level and quality in the coastal Everglades.•The impact of freshwater inflow to counter effects of sea-level rise was presented.•The impact of sea-level rise on water level and quality was higher in the dry season.•We introduced a new management variable, freshwater-to-marine head difference (FMHD).•FMHD explained fresh-to-marine connectivity, salinity and nutrient transport.
When an emergency occurs, disposal needs to be built to reduce the risk imposed on life, property, and environment. Generally, the disposal is organized as a cross-organization emergency response ...process (CERP). To achieve better-emergency response services, its correctness analysis is an important task that needs to be dealt with at design time. In this article, we propose a novel correctness analysis approach for CERPs. Given a CERP, this approach first decomposes it into a set of instance nets. Then, it excludes the invalid instance nets (each corresponds to an incomplete process instance) and adopts the stubborn set to check the structural correctness of each valid instance net without considering resource factors, as well as introduces a structure-based resource analysis (SRA) method to determine whether the resources in it are sufficient. Finally, it determines the correctness of the CERP by comparing the numbers of the correct instance nets and all valid instance nets. If the CERP is incorrect, it returns the correct instance nets, which capture the parts of the CERP that can be executed correctly. This approach is evaluated on an actual data set, and the comparison results show that it outperforms the state-of-the-art technique in terms of effectiveness and efficiency.
Due to increasing prevalence of obesity, a simple method or methods for the diagnosis of metabolic syndrome are urgently required to reduce the risk of associated cardiovascular disease, diabetes and ...cancer. This study aimed to identify a miRNA biomarker that may distinguish metabolic syndrome from obesity and to investigate if such a miRNA may have functional relevance for metabolic syndrome. 52 adults with clinical obesity (n=26) or metabolic syndrome (n=26) were recruited. Plasma specimens were procured from all and were randomly designated to discovery and validation cohorts. miRNA discovery profiling was performed, using array technology, on plasma RNA. Validation was performed by quantitative polymerase chain reaction. The functional effect of miR-758-3p on its predicted target, cholesterol efflux regulatory protein/ATP-binding cassette transporter, was investigated using HepG2 liver cells. Custom miRNA profiling of 25 miRNAs in the discovery cohort found miR-758-3p to be detected in the obese cohort but undetected in the metabolic syndrome cohort. miR-758-3p was subsequently validated as a potential biomarker for metabolic syndrome by quantitative polymerase chain reaction. Bioinformatics analysis identified cholesterol efflux regulatory protein/ATP-binding cassette transporter as miR-758-3p's predicted target. Specifically, mimicking miR-758-3p in HepG2 cells suppressed cholesterol efflux regulatory protein/ATP-binding cassette transporter protein expression; conversely, inhibiting miR-758-3p increased cholesterol efflux regulatory protein/ATP-binding cassette transporter protein expression. miR-758-3p holds potential as a blood-based biomarker for distinguishing progression from obesity to metabolic syndrome and as a driver in controlling cholesterol efflux regulatory protein/ATP-binding cassette transporter expression, indicating it potential role in cholesterol control in metabolic syndrome.
China is promoting green economic development and the transformation of polluting enterprises to environment-friendly. As an important polluting industry, energy companies are imminent to improve ...their corporate environmental responsibility performance(CERP). However, corporate strategic decisions are made by the senior management team and market environment such as the digital economy also play a crucial role. In order to study the relationship between management’s characteristics and CERP and the role of the digital economy, this paper selects 2010–2019 listed companies in the traditional energy industry in A-shares as the research object, and conducts an empirical analysis on the characteristics of their managers and the CERP. The results show that during the Thirteenth Five-Year Plan period, in the stage of rapid development of the digital economy, CERP is significantly improved, the gender diversity and educational background of managers have a significant positive impact on the CERP, and the age is negatively related to the CERP. From this point of view, it is suggested that companies should promote young management, increase the proportion of female management, and give priority to those with higher education.
•Causal links of total phosphate assessed in South Florida and Everglades.•Stormwater treatment area (STA) downstream causal influence quantified.•Empirical dynamic modeling and convergent cross ...mapping reveal phosphate drivers.•Network of important phosphate monitoring sites identified.•Phosphate remediation exhibits state space dimensional reduction.
Controlling and reducing excess phosphate is a fundamental objective of Everglades restoration. The immense, complex structural composition of South Florida landscapes and ecosystems, coupled with the multidecadal time scale of restoration, present a challenge to integrated assessment of restoration efforts. We address this with state space based convergent cross mapping to identify drivers and links of phosphate in response to construction and operation of stormwater treatment areas, engineered wetlands designed to sequester phosphate. Results identify drivers of phosphate dynamics, connecting dynamic response to nutrient and water management actions. Convergent cross mapping and state space dimensional reduction provide data-driven, model-free indicators of phosphate dynamics. We also identify low-flow conditions along the Everglades National Park inflow boundary as influential drivers of phosphate concentrations.
Cloud ERP is a type of enterprise resource planning (ERP) system that runs on the vendor's cloud platform instead of an on-premises network, enabling companies to connect through the Internet. The ...goal of this study was to rank and prioritise the factors driving cloud ERP adoption by organisations and to identify the critical issues in terms of security, usability, and vendors that impact adoption of cloud ERP systems. The assessment of critical success factors (CSFs) in on-premises ERP adoption and implementation has been well documented; however, no previous research has been carried out on CSFs in cloud ERP adoption. Therefore, the contribution of this research is to provide research and practice with the identification and analysis of 16 CSFs through a systematic literature review, where 73 publications on cloud ERP adoption were assessed from a range of different conferences and journals, using inclusion and exclusion criteria. Drawing from the literature, we found security, usability, and vendors were the top three most widely cited critical issues for the adoption of cloud-based ERP; hence, the second contribution of this study was an integrative model constructed with 12 drivers based on the security, usability, and vendor characteristics that may have greater influence as the top critical issues in the adoption of cloud ERP systems. We also identified critical gaps in current research, such as the inconclusiveness of findings related to security critical issues, usability critical issues, and vendor critical issues, by highlighting the most important drivers influencing those issues in cloud ERP adoption and the lack of discussion on the nature of the criticality of those CSFs. This research will aid in the development of new strategies or the revision of existing strategies and polices aimed at effectively integrating cloud ERP into cloud computing infrastructure. It will also allow cloud ERP suppliers to determine organisations' and business owners' expectations and implement appropriate tactics. A better understanding of the CSFs will narrow the field of failure and assist practitioners and managers in increasing their chances of success.
Coastal areas are increasingly vulnerable to the effects of sea level rise, and the coastal Everglades is no exception. The Comprehensive Everglades Restoration Plan (CERP) was launched in 2000 to ...restore the natural flow regime to the freshwater marshes of the Everglades. However, sea level rise has been affecting coastal habitats with increasing water levels and residence times of both salinity and marine nutrients. Here, we combined empirical data of water levels and sea levels with modeled CERP restoration scenarios. Water levels and fresh-to-marine head differences (FMHDs) were used as primary indicators of the vulnerability of the Everglades coastal areas to sea level rise and evaluate the relative benefits of restoration to these habitats. Four model scenarios were considered: a simulation of existing conditions baseline (ECB), full CERP implementation (CERP0), Central Everglades Planning Project with the Everglades Agricultural Area Reservoir (CEPPP), and a simulation of the natural/pre-drainage system scenario (NSM). Results demonstrated the differential vulnerability of coastal areas to sea level rise. The CEPPP restoration scenario achieved at least 60% and 30% of the full CERP freshwater and FMHD benefits in Shark River Slough, the largest freshwater flow-way in ENP, and Taylor Slough, the smaller flow-way in southeastern ENP, respectively. Hence, integration of FMHD metric in restoration efforts is essential to ensure restoration benefits extend beyond the freshwater marshes and improve coastal habitats.
This article presents the results of an experimental parametric study on reinforced concrete (RC) beams strengthened by an external bonding of carbon fiber reinforced polymer (CFRP) laminates to ...their tensile faces. This experimental work investigates the effects of both CFRP laminate sizes and concrete compressive strength on the flexural behavior of strengthened RC beams. Accordingly, a total of 10 RC beams have been cast, eight of which were strengthened in flexure by external bonding of CFRP laminate by varying its sizes, such as length, width, and thickness, and two control beams. All prepared beams were tested under standard four‐point bending until failure. The load–deflection response curves and failure modes were recorded and compared. Results show that failure modes of strengthened beams varied with the CFRP laminate characteristics from steel yielding, CFRP peeling off, and interfacial debonding laminate, Also, the load–deflection curves showed a considerable increase in the load capacity by up to 1% and 112%, compared to the unstrengthen beam, if the CFRP laminate length ratio passes from 0.40 to 0.94, respectively. In addition, the load capacity contribution increases from 56% to 112% when the CFRP laminate width increases from 50 to 100 mm. On the other hand, when laminate thickness increases from 1.2 to 2.4 mm, the load capacity contribution increases from 56% to 76%. Finally, it is concluded that the mechanical behavior of strengthened beam is strongly affected by the CFRP laminate sizes.
Hurricanes are important ecological disturbances that maintain biodiversity. We investigated the short-term impacts of Hurricane Irma, a category 4 storm that passed through south Florida on ...September 10, 2017, on fish and macroinvertebrate communities of western and north-central Florida Bay, FL, USA. Spatiotemporal trends in physical water conditions (temperature, salinity, water depth, dissolved oxygen, chlorophyll a, and turbidity) as well as rainfall and coastal discharge were assessed to characterize hurricane-induced habitat changes. Dramatic but ephemeral changes in water depth and rainfall were observed. Longer lasting reductions of salinity regime and increases in turbidity and chlorophyll a were also observed. The prevailing hypersalinity (≥ 40 ppt) conditions, ongoing since March 2017, were abruptly ended by the storm. Hurricane Irma significantly altered fish and macroinvertebrate communities. Analysis of community spatiotemporal trends revealed spatially distinct temporal community shifts. Cluster analysis distinguished four groups among nine highly abundant species identified as exerting the most influence on pre- and post-hurricane total community differences. Reductions in relative abundance of two groups were coincident with Irma’s passage while a third group, comprised solely of pelagic, zooplanktivorous Anchoa mitchilli, exhibited rapid population growth that started 2 months after the passage of the storm. These faunal disruptions are reminiscent of a prior Florida Bay community shift that followed a similar sequence of consecutive disturbances: hypersalinity, seagrass die-off, and a category-5 hurricane. Recovery from this prior community shift cascade took many years.
Digital technology advancement and the Internet of Things (IoT) are playing a major role to take a big leap towards achieving Industry 4.0. Cloud-based data management and big data analytics have ...given rise to adopt Cloud Enterprise Resource Planning (CERP). The CERP has become a significant tool for the success of the information management system (IMS) which is ultimately responsible for the success of any organization. The selection of CERP depends on many critical success factors (CSFs) that must be considered while evaluating and selecting a CERP. In this work, identified CSFs of CERP are modeled using a multi-criteria decision-making (MCDM) approach. The Analytic Hierarchy Process (AHP) and Fuzzy Analytic Hierarchy Process (FAHP) based modelling have been carried out to derive the ranking of the CSFs responsible for the CERP. The group decision-making (GDM) based AHP has also been adopted to build the decision-making model. The paper models 5 Dimensions and 20 sub-criteria factors to provide the prioritized rank of Dimensions and CSFs. The AHP and FAHP models identify the ranking of the 5 Dimensions as Organizational Behavior, Cloud ERP Essentials, Technological Advancement, Innovational Ideas, and Environmental Impact.
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