Interest In Environmental Sciences Research Articles

TRISTAR: an expert system for vegetation processes

Abstract: The TRISTAR expert system (TRIangular STrAtegic Rules for British herbaceous vegetation) is a PC‐based consultancy tool designed to help bridge the gap between academic plant ecology and practical vegetation management. It is a ‘what if facility, for use by students, naturalists, conservationists, planners, administrators; indeed anyone with an interest in environmental science and management, conservation or reconstruction of herbaceous vegetation. The system is written in Leonardo 3 (Creative Logic Limited, Uxbridge, UK). Release I of TRISTAR deals with the fundamental environmental and management processes which control the composition of British herbaceous vegetation. The system takes a specification of initial steady‐state vegetation, asks the user to specify an altered environmental and/or management scenario, and predicts the composition of a new steady‐state vegetation in terms of plant‐strategic types. The high‐level approach through plant strategies makes it possible to construct a very robust rulebase despite a lack of hard information in many areas of understanding.

Environmental measurement in schools: electronics in field studies

Increasing interest in environmental science as a school subject has led to the appearance of ‘environmental meters’ designed to measure conductivity, light level, oxygen concentration, pH, sound level, and temperature. Their uses and abuses are discussed and an insight given into the principles of measurement involved. Criteria for choosing suitable equipment are suggested and where possible cheaper alternatives are mentioned.

Challenge of the affluent twenty-first century: A Japanese response

Abstract The Science and Technology Agency of the Japanese Government conducted a Delphi method forecast survey from June 1970 to April 1971 on Japan's science and technology. Some 4000 researchers and technical experts took part. The results showed that: Japan is likely to experience the next period of technological innovation during the later 1980s; Japanese experts tend to be more optimistic than their lay counterparts; subjects with a strong social need, when connected with public sectors of the economy, are likely to experience earlier technological achievement; and the Japanese have an unusually strong interest in environmental science and technology.