Climate exerts considerable control on wildfire regimes, and climate and wildfire are both major drivers of forest growth and succession in interior Northwest forests. Estimating potential response of these landscapes to anticipated changes in climate helps researchers and land managers understand and mitigate impacts of climate change on important ecological...
Pectinmethylesterase (PME) activity in fresh cucumber
fruit was determined. The effects of several cationic
species, temperature, pH, and acetic acid on the activity
of cucumber PME was investigated. The efficacy of
blanching, infiltration with CaCl₂ or acetic acid, and
fermentation with 0 and 40 mM CaCl₂ on inhibition of
cucumber...
The response of sweet corn (Zea mays L. var. rugosa cultivar
Jubilee) to 12 populations and four nitrogen rates was studied in a
field experiment. Populations ranged from 43, 904 to 329,800
plants/ha with nitrogen levels ranging from 0 to 224 Kg/ha. A systematic
spacing design was used. Plant height,...
Environmental quality and the spatial distribution of economic activities affect each other in many ways. The primary purpose of this dissertation is to contribute to understanding the complex interrelationship and its policy implications. This dissertation consists of three essays.
The first essay examines the roles that locational amenities and increasing...
Adiabatic parcel models suggest specific relationships between cloud thickness and cloud properties. Such relationships govern cloud radiative forcing and thus cloud feedbacks in the climate system. Current remote sensing techniques work well at measuring these properties in low-level cloud systems that are overcast. Significant biases exist, however, when measuring cloud...
Low reproductive success has been typical of high elevation populations of the Hawaiian goose (Branta sandvicensis) or nēnē. Researchers identified predation and inadequate nutrition as limiting factors. Reproductive success remained low in most years despite on-going predator control programs. I used a supplemental feeding program over two breeding seasons in...
Swiss needle cast (SNC) is a foliage disease of Douglas-fir caused by Nothophaeocryptopus gaeumannii, an Ascomycete fungus (Mycosphaerellaceae) that causes growth reductions in Douglas-fir plantations across the Pacific Northwest. Epidemiology of the fungus is generally well known in plantation trees, but the relationship between disease expression and foliage nutrition and...
The most common test methods to evaluate alkali-silica reaction (ASR), the concrete prism test (CPT) and the accelerated mortar bar tests (AMBT), have limitations and are not entirely reliable in terms of predicting the performance of concrete with prevention measures under field conditions. In this study, the miniature concrete prism...
Currently, forecasts produced by the Oregon-Washington (OR-WA) Coastal Ocean Forecast System are constrained by assimilation of only surface observations. The 4-dimensional variational (4DVAR) data assimilation (DA) algorithm is utilized to combine the model and the data, with the time-independent forecast ("background'') error covariance B. In this study, two possible improvements...