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1. The maintenance of habitat heterogeneity in agricultural landscapes has been promoted as a key strategy to conserve biodiversity. Animal response to grassland heterogeneity resulting from spatiotemporal variation in disturbance is well documented; however, the degree to which edaphic variation generates heterogeneity detectable by grassland wildlife has proven more difficult to study in natural settings. 2. We conducted a field experiment to study how soils directly affect vegetation structure and composition and indirectly affect bird and butterfly assemblages using plantings of tallgrass prairie species managed as agroenergy crops in Iowa, USA. The experimental design included four vegetation treatments of varying species richness replicated on three soil types. 3. Habitat characteristics varied widely among soils. Crops on sandy loam, the driest, most acidic soil with the lowest nutrient content, developed shorter, less dense vegetation with sparse litter accumulation and more bare ground compared to crops on loam and clay loam. 4. Birds and butterflies responded similarly to soil-induced variation in habitat characteristics. Their abundance and species richness were similar on all soils, but their assemblage compositions varied among soils in certain vegetation treatments. 5. In low-diversity grass crops, bird assemblages using sandy loam were dominated by species preferring open ground and sparse vegetation for foraging and nesting, whereas assemblages using loam and clay loam were dominated by birds preferring tall, dense vegetation with abundant litter. In high-diversity prairie crops, the species composition of forbs in bloom varied among soils and strongly influenced butterfly assemblages. 6. Synthesis and applications. Prairie agroenergy crops established with identical management practices developed variable habitat characteristics due to natural edaphic variation, and this heterogeneity influenced the spatial distribution of bird and butterfly assemblages due to differential habitat use among species. This finding suggests that if unfertilized prairie crops were grown for agroenergy by land managers large-scale, soil-induced habitat heterogeneity would promote wildlife diversity within and among fields, further increasing the habitat value of these crops compared to the fertilized, annual monocultures that currently dominate the agricultural landscape. Our study also highlights the need for managers to consider soil properties when selecting sites to restore grassland habitat for species of conservation concern. Soil, vegetation, bird, and butterfly dataData from Myers, M.C., J.T. Mason, B.J. Hoksch, C.A. Cambardella, J.D. Pfrimmer (2015) Birds and butterflies respond to soil-induced habitat heterogeneity in experimental plantings of tallgrass prairie species managed as agroenergy crops in Iowa, USA. Journal of Applied Ecology. This Excel file includes separate sheets containing the soil, vegetation, and bird and butterfly assemblage data analyzed in the paper. Four-letter column labels for species abundances are derived from the first two letters of the genus and species names (e.g. Chondestes grammacus = "chgr"). Species lists are available from the online Supporting Information. Please contact Mark Myers (mark.myers@uni.edu) with inquiries.JournalAppliedEcology_Myersetal_DryadData.xlsx

A virtual lab (MOOC) for students chemical, civil or mechanical engineering. Students are introduced with a fluidised bed reactor (multiphase flow). This expansion column represents a liquid-solid fluidisation process applied in drinking water treatment processes. The knowledge you will gain will help you develop and improve your competence profile of a highly qualified chemical engineer. Students are informed with short lectures (films) and a manual (document). Several assignments must be completed based on recorded laboratory experiments.

This dataset contains the underlying data for the study:Van Oort, P. A. J., B. G. H. Timmermans, H. Meinke, and M. K. Van Ittersum. "Key weather extremes affecting potato production in The Netherlands." European Journal of Agronomy 37, no. 1 (2012): 11-22.http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.eja.2011.09.002The possible impact of climate change on frequency and severity of weather extremes is hotly debated among climate scientists. Weather extremes can have a significant impact on agricultural production, but their effect is often unclear; this due to interaction with other factors that affect yield and due to lack of precise definitions of relevant weather extremes. We show that an empirical analysis of historical yields can help to identifying such rare, high impact climate events.A reconstructed time series of ware potato production in Flevoland (The Netherlands) over the last 60 years (1951–2010) enabled us to identify the two main yield affecting weather extremes. In around 10% of the years yield anomalies were larger than −20%. We found that these anomalies could be explained from two weather extremes (and no other), namely a wet start of the growing season and wet end of the growing season. We derived quantitative, meteorological definitions of these extremes. Climate change scenarios for 2050 show either no change or increased frequency of the two extremes. We demonstrate there is large uncertainty about past and future frequencies of the extremes, caused by a lack of sufficiently long historical weather records and uncertainties in climate change projections on precipitation. The approach to identify weather extremes presented here is generally applicable and shows the importance of long term crop and weather observations for investigating key climatic risks to production.

Hydrologic implications of the conversion of agricultural or conservation lands for annual vs. perennial bioenergy crop production are scarce. We converted three 22 year-old Conservation Reserve Program (CRP) grasslands and three 50+ year-old conventionally tilled corn-soybean rotation agricultural (AGR) lands to no-till corn, switchgrass (Panicum virgatum L.) or restored prairie. A seventh site was maintained in the preexisting CRP grassland dominated by smooth brome grass (Bromus inermis L.). We measured evapotranspiration (ET) using the eddy covariance method on all fields for over more than nine years (2009-2018). The ET data are presented for annual, growing season, and non-growing seasons. The difference in ET between corn and perennial crops is also presented for all seasons. In addition, aboveground net primary productivity (ANPP) during peak growing season is presented. Water vapor concentrations (LI-7500 IRGA, LI-COR Biosciences, Lincoln, NE, USA) and wind velocity (CSAT3 three-dimensional sonic anemometer, Campbell Scientific Inc. Logan, UT, USA) were sampled at 10 Hz frequency using open-path eddy covariance (EC) method in southwest Michigan at seven agricultural fields over 10 years (2009–2018). The data were analyzed using EdiRe software (University of Edinburgh, v 1.5.0.32, 2012) to compute half-hourly evapotranspiration (ET) from all fields. Missing or poor quality data were replaced using a standardized gap-filling algorithm. The study was conducted at the Kellogg Biological Station (KBS) Great Lakes Bioenergy Research Center (GLBRC) Scale-up fields.

1. Predicted changes in the frequency and intensity of extreme rainfall events in the UK have the potential to disrupt terrestrial ecosystem function. However, responses of different trophic levels to these changes in rainfall patterns, and the underlying mechanisms, are not well characterised. 2. This study aimed to investigate how changes in both the quantity and frequency of rainfall events will affect the outcome of interactions between plants, insect herbivores (above- and below- ground) and natural enemies. 3. Hordeum vulgare L. plants were grown in controlled conditions and in the field, and subjected to three precipitation scenarios: ambient (based on a local 10 year average rainfall); continuous drought (40% reduction compared to ambient); drought/ deluge (40% reduction compared to ambient at a reduced frequency). The effects of these watering regimes and wireworm (Agriotes species) root herbivory on the performance of the plants, aphid herbivores above-ground (Sitobion avenae, Metapolophium dirhodum and Rhopalosiphum padi), and natural enemies of aphids including ladybirds (Harmonia axyridis) were assessed from measurements of plant growth, insect abundance and mass, and assays of feeding behaviour. 4. Continuous drought decreased plant biomass, whereas reducing the frequency of watering events did not affect plant biomass but did alter plant chemical composition. In controlled conditions, continuous drought ameliorated the negative impact of wireworms on plant biomass. 5. Compared to the ambient treatment, aphid mass was increased by 15% when feeding on plants subjected to drought/ deluge; and ladybirds were 66% heavier when feeding on these aphids but this did not affect ladybird prey choice. In field conditions, wireworms feeding below-ground reduced the number of shoot-feeding aphids under ambient and continuous drought conditions but not under drought/ deluge. 6. Predicted changes in both the frequency and intensity of precipitation events under climate change have the potential to limit plant growth, but reduce wireworm herbivory, while simultaneously promoting above-ground aphid numbers and mass, with these effects transferring to the third trophic level. Understanding the effect of future changes in precipitation on species interactions is critical for determining their potential impact on ecosystem functioning and constructing accurate predictions under global change scenarios. Controlled environment and field experimental dataData file containing all data reported in the paper including plant, soil and insect data from controlled environment and field experiments. First spreadsheet in the data file contains a key to explain all abbreviations used throughout the file.Experimental data.xlsx

‘Productive Uses of Energy and gender in the Street Food Sector’, is a title of our four year project which is part of the DFID funded ENERGIA Gender and Energy Research programme. This research focuses on male and female owned micro enterprises preparing and selling food in Rwanda, Senegal and South Africa. This sector provides livelihoods for many women and men in these countries and this project provides the gender and energy nexus analysis. One of the primary goals of this project is to influence energy policy making and implementation in the focus countries.

Anaerobic fermentation technology allows the formation of medium chain carboxylates and alcohols via microbial chain elongation. This requires steering the reactor microbiomes to deliver the desired products. Here, CO2 supply is used to control ethanol-based chain elongation and to allow several other bioprocesses to occur simultaneously. Bioreactor performance data presented.

Description: This meta-data on development and management of community managed small-scale irrigation schemes in Ethiopia is presented in a spreadsheet as a table after reviewing 83 published articles. The dataset contains research focus, data collection and analysis method, spatial scale, irrigation typology, irrigation water sources, source of energy for water conveyance from the source, main research results, scheme management systems, identified problems and provided solutions from each research article when available. The spatial scale was categorized as national, regional, district, basin, watershed or scheme, based on the spatial coverage of the research done. The irrigation typology was categorized as large-scale, medium-scale and small-scale based on the Ethiopian classification. Surface water sources such as river, lake, reservoir and flash flood and ground water sources of wells and springs or a combination of more than one source were mentioned as the water sources for irrigation schemes. The sources of energy for water abstraction were categorized as gravity, pump or a combination of both. Year of irrigation scheme commencement, available irrigation scheme infrastructure, number of beneficiaries (households), and stakeholders in scheme management were also extracted when available in the literature. Spatial coverage: Data was collected from community managed small-scale irrigation schemes located in different parts of Ethiopia. Location of some irrigation schemes (in UTM) is indicated in the dataset spreadsheet.