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Introduction: New York State makes explicit policy provisions to protect the sexual rights of minor-aged women, women labeled with intellectual disability, and immigrant women. In this qualitative policy analysis, we used the principles of Nussbaum's (2000) Capabilities Approach to examine whether marginalized women are actually able to exercise these rights. Method: In Fall 2019 and Spring 2020, we interviewed 39 service providers in Buffalo, New York, to learn about the policies affecting diverse marginalized women's sexual rights and sexual health resources. After verifying the accuracy of providers' perceptions by triangulating these with the policies' texts, we thematically analyzed providers' comments to identify patterns in how policies shaped women's sexual rights. Results: We identified three categories of policy-based barriers: those that regulate women's sexual rights by design; those that interfered with sexual rights by accident; and policies that obstructed sexual rights by default, largely because marginalized women and/or sexuality were not considered. We provide examples of how each policy-based barrier affects each group of marginalized women. Conclusions: Despite living in a state that formally recognizes their sexual rights, the actual sexual capabilities of minor girls, women labeled with ID, and immigrant women are attenuated by social policies. We consider the broad implications of the three types of policy-based barriers and offer specific recommendations for reducing these such that marginalized women are actually able to exercise their sexual rights. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article discusses the need to preserve primary historical documents relating to African American history. The author acknowledges that many African American organizations, particularly those operating in the inner-cities, are focused on providing for basic needs within their communities rather than documenting the history of those communities. The author describes the significance of the historic preservation efforts at the Buffalo State College Afro-American Collection in Buffalo, New York. The resources available to other universities interested in preserving the history of African American communities are described.

“This is a Black Paper,” declared BUILD’s statement criticizing the Buffalo Public School system for providing inferior education to black children in Buffalo, New York. Written in 1967 by the community organization, BUILD (which stood for Build Unity, Independence, Liberty, and Dignity), “BUILD Black Paper Number One” was a call for change. Like other black communities in late 1960s America, black Buffalo was caught up in the fervor of the Civil Rights and Black Power Movements. A “Rust Belt” city, Buffalo was hit hard by deindustrialization, which, coupled with unemployment, segregated housing and unequal education, adversely affected its black community. In 1967, a riot exploded in Buffalo’s predominantly black East Side. This article analyzes statements made by black Buffalonians and argues that Black Power thrived in Buffalo in the late 1960s, through community organizations which attempted to address urban issues that negatively affected African Americans in a postindustrial city. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The scholarly modeling of property tax has always posed a challenge, with two primary concerns to be addressed: first, maintaining sustainability in the collection, which is primarily a concern for local governments; and second, ensuring fair distribution, which is of greater concern for citizens. In today's practices, assessment-based property tax increases unmatched expenses in bubble economies. There is a substitution problem in rapid falls, the tendency to not decrease the assessments gives way to black holes and opens the door to ghost cities. This paper proposes alternative approaches, aside from market/land value or last sold price, aimed at improving sustainability and fairness rates. The dataset examined is based on 93.7K records and 88 attributes for assessed value of properties within the City of Buffalo, the United States of America. Since the label (Total Value) is a numerical and continuous value, regression models are selected, where ensemble machine learning methods categorically work well with larger datasets, combined with weak learners, like decision trees. Stacked Ensemble led the least error for regression with 0.98 R², followed by Gradient Boosting. Results show a 79% dominance of uncontrollable attributes, such as Land Value, Neighborhood, and Sale (last sold) Price, compared to controllable attributes, such as Total Living Area, Construction Grade, Second Story Area, and many others. This article suggests having a more balanced split between uncontrollable and controllable attributes would contribute to both sustainability and fair distribution. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Addicks and Barker reservoirs were built in the 1940s to protect downtown Houston from flooding and have generally worked very well until 2017 when Hurricane Harvey devastated much of Houston and surroundings with up to 40 inches (102 cm) of rainfall causing flooding of 154,000 homes in over 22 watersheds in Houston/Harris County alone. However, the story of how Addicks and Barker flooded upstream residential areas from a hydrologic standpoint is a harsh lesson in flood infrastructure policy and funding. This failure to protect both downstream properties in Buffalo Bayou and upstream areas behind the dams ended up with tens of thousands of flooded homes and properties, with many having flood waters for over 10 days. This paper explores the main causes for the flooding and addresses the hydrologic issues upstream in both reservoirs. The main causes of flooding were not just related to a massive rainfall event, but also explosive urban expansion of land use upstream of reservoirs, altered and updated reservoir design issues, and lack of governmental action in the years leading up to the disaster. Potential long‐term solutions to the flooding and design problems are addressed in this article as well. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Adopted in 2017, the Buffalo Green Code was lauded as a comprehensive urban vision for Buffalo, New York. This form-based code would simplify Buffalo's land use regulations by prescribing what could be built and where, and provide a unified framework for its future. Yet, despite the claims of comprehensiveness, the code left two pressing challenges of the city unaddressed: urban integration of vacant lots and lack of affordable housing. The paper argues that, given these omissions, the code fails to provide a grounded vision, while universalizing reductive fabric-making notions unsuitable for much of the city. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper highlights the potential of Indigenous Buffalo knowledge as a valuable resource for adapting to the impacts of climate change. Buffalo, particularly in regions where they have been traditionally reared, have played a crucial role in Indigenous cultures and livelihoods. Indigenous communities have developed an intimate understanding of buffalo behaviour, ecological interactions, and their relationship with changing environmental conditions. This traditional Buffalo knowledge encompasses observations, practices, and Indigenous knowledge systems passed down through generations, providing insights into adaptive strategies that can be applied in the face of climate change. Following decolonial and relational theoretical frameworks, we used deep listening to learn how traditional Buffalo knowledge contributed to climate change adaptation strategies in Indigenous communities; how does integrating traditional Buffalo knowledge into climate change adaptation policies and practices contribute to the resilience of vulnerable communities? What challenges and opportunities are associated with incorporating traditional Buffalo knowledge into mainstream climate change adaptation efforts? [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Nowadays, the intrusion prevention model in network applications is essential in protecting data from malicious users. The intrusion prevention model involves detecting and removing malicious events in the network. Although different prevention models have been developed in the past, there are still some issues with preventing malicious events and providing continuous monitoring. Hence, a novel hybrid prevention model named the Buffalo-based Elman neural model was proposed in this paper. Here, the input dataset, such as NSL-KDD and CICIDS, is trained and pre-processed to remove the noise features from the dataset. Also, feature extraction and attack classification are done to extract features from the dataset and neglect the malicious features. Moreover, continuous monitoring is provided in the network with the help of a login strategy. The designed model is implemented in a python environment, and the model's outcomes are validated. Finally, a comparative analysis is made by comparing the outcomes of the proposed model with other existing prevention models in terms of Accuracy, F-measure, error rate, execution time, recall, and precision. Comparative analysis shows that the designed intrusion prevention model achieved better outcomes than existing models. For NSL-KDD and CICIDS data, the proposed model achieved 98.4% and 99.7% accuracy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Objectives: This paper examines the extent to which hotspots of shooting violence changed following the emergence of COVID-19. Methods: This analysis uses Andresenʼs Spatial Point Pattern test on 1500 by 1500 foot grid cells, correcting for multiple comparisons, on a 10-year sample of geocoded shooting data from Buffalo New York. Results: This work finds zero micro-grid cells are not statistically different from pre to post COVID stay at home orders and instead that the observed rise in shootings in the sample appears to be a consistent proportional increase across the city. Conclusions: These findings provide law enforcement with useful information about how to respond to the recent rise in shooting violence, but additional work is needed to better understand what, among a number of competing theories, is driving the increase. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Evaluate and compare the rates of persistent tympanic membrane (TM) perforations between short-term vs long-term tympanostomy tubes. In addition, to determine which demographic, anatomical, and physical factors affect ear drum healing after tympanostomy tube (TT) removal and simultaneous paper patch myringoplasty (PPM) in children. Retrospective chart review. Charts were reviewed from the Women and Children's of Buffalo hospital and our pediatric otolaryngology practice electronic medical record. Data was retrieved from patients less than 18 years old who underwent surgical removal of a TT and concomitant PPM between January 2005 and January 2017. 343 ear drums were studied that underwent tympanostomy tube removal and paper patch myringoplasty. 45/343 (13%) of ears had a persistent perforation after PPM. The rate of persistent perforation with short-term tubes and long-term tubes was significantly different (6.6% and 20% respectively). Patient characteristics significantly associated with persistent perforations were: age at time of tube removal and number of tubes that patient received. Ear drum characteristics that significantly impacted persistent perforation included: size of ear drum perforation, and presence of tympanosclerosis. Length of intubation, ear drum atrophy, retraction, granulation tissue, middle ear effusion and thickened ear drum were not found to be significant factors. Overall, we found an 87% perforation closure rate after surgical removal of the TT and PPM. Persistent perforations occurred significantly more often in patients with long-term tubes than short term tubes. Our data also suggests that several patient and ear drum characteristics may be important factors that contribute to persistent perforation after tympanostomy tube placement and removal. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The effort to categorize nature dates at least to Aristotle and is still ongoing. The study of categories is termed "ontology"-a field Whose use in the philosophy' of social science has most recently been revived. Last April 1998, the State University of New York at Buffalo hosted a conference on "Applied Ontology: A Marvin Farber Conference in Law and Institutions in Society." The following papers were selected from the group of papers presented at the conference. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper reviews goals, content materials, and other essential elements of a new, experimental philosophy course on the built environment of cities now being developed in Buffalo, New York. Applying traditional philosophical methods, the course adds experiential components and expands philosophy’s scope in ways that promote deep learning about the city. A model unit on the work of Frederick Law Olmsted receives special attention here, as Olmsted’s work in Buffalo and elsewhere invites philosophical treatment—analysis, critical examination, and so on—from scholars, students, and city residents alike. We shall see that the distinctive character of philosophy can encourage teaching in new areas where philosophical study might promote learning and understanding, thus inspiring curricular innovation and a wide range of powerful student learning experiences. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article offers information about the Second Creativity and Innovation Management (CIM) Community Meeting that was held at Buffalo State College in Buffalo, New York. The conference featured six keynote speakers including Professor Tudor Rickards, Ming-Huei Chen, and Michael Mumford. The article includes information about the papers that were presented at the conference and the next CIM Community Meeting.

Neighbourhoods in urban and suburban areas experienced changes in terms of physical, social, economic, and demographics. Neighbourhood Hardship Index (NHI) had been used to measure neighbourhood socio-economic condition, using various census variables. Suburban neighbourhoods which underwent a change lead to stratification into striving outer suburbs and declining inner suburbs. The context of this study was suburban neighbourhoods in Buffalo Metropolitan Area (BMA), New York. This paper aimed at highlighting spatial variability of neighbourhood change in inner- and outer-suburban neighbourhoods of BMA between 2010-2015. This study examined factors that significantly contribute to neighbourhood change. Also, this study examined whether there a difference in the change of neighbourhood hardship index between inner- and outer-suburban neighbourhoods. Composite NHI was developed from economic, demographic, and housing variables. Neighbourhood change was measured by comparing the composite NHI 2010 with that of 2015. The findings depicted a variation of change in hardships index across suburban neighbourhoods. Neighbourhoods with higher hardship index were primarily located in inner suburbs. Policy implications call for concerted efforts to tackle the decline in the economy, education, demography to promote equity across neighbourhoods in suburban areas. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

As English Romanticism rejects Neoclassicism, so Antebellum Black Romanticism rejects the slavery-friendly White Unionism embodied in the Compromise of 1850. In Millard Fillmore's Buffalo, the Black Romantic barber-poet James Monroe Whitfield damned Daniel Webster as a traitor to Abolition ("The Arch-Apostate") and Buffalo's Reverend John C. Lord as a hireling Unionist priest ("How Long"). For White Unionists, Scripture blesses the slaveholding Davidic kingdom of the present, founded in compromise and positive law. For Black Romantics like Whitfield, Scripture blesses the liberated republic of the future, founded in Milton's prophetic tradition and in an Abolitonist higher law. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Shrinking cities are older urban settlements that played prominent roles in the industrial economies of developed nations, but have experienced substantial depopulation, economic contraction and undesirable physical change since at least the middle of the 20th century. To counter the problems that necessarily accompany massive depopulation, shrinking cities have aggressively used structural demolition as a right-sizing strategy. Right-sizing is both a policy objective and the set of strategies used to restructure the built environment of a shrinking city to meet its current needs, by aligning the supply of community assets (eg infrastructure, housing, services) with current and future demand. In practice, it appears that many shrinking cities equate right-sizing exclusively with large-scale demolition. The result is that demolition is implemented in a standalone fashion, which fails to meaningfully stem the tides of shrinkage and vacancy. This paper draws on a framework of strategic demolition for shrinking cities to analyse a well-publicised, 'signature' demolition programme in Buffalo, NY, USA. The critical analysis shows that Buffalo failed to take recommended actions that were within its reach, which likely contributed to perceptions that its signature programme was unsuccessful. The case study has several implications for planning and policy in shrinking cities. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

US cities with shrinking populations have faced tremendous challenges in conserving their built heritage. Often, conservation work involves adaptively reusing existing buildings. Most reuse activity is fuelled by the developer and market-driven rehabilitation of historic properties through tax credits and other incentives. Places of worship like churches, however, are difficult to rehabilitate, and cities lose this urban heritage after years of vacancy and neglect, and eventual demolition. In many shrinking cities, particularly those now welcoming new immigrants and refugees, serendipitous conservation of vacant churches through faith-to-faith conversion can be an asset to local planners and preservationists in their fight to save urban heritage from demolition. This paper examines two former Roman Catholic Churches in the City of Buffalo: one converted into an Islamic mosque, and another into a Buddhist temple, to argue that faith-to-faith conversions can be a viable tool for other US cities experiencing similar threats to their urban heritage. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Teacher Candidates at Buffalo State College are often white middle class females who have few experiences with diverse populations. In an effort to facilitate learning of knowledge, skills, and dispositions that will help them go beyond teaching tolerance to becoming exemplary teachers in the diverse classrooms they will encounter as they enter the profession, the focus on cultural responsive teaching and multicultural education within the elementary social studies methods course has been expanded to include a rigorous reflective writing assignment. The CREED paper, electronic discussions, as well as class presentations address culturally responsive pedagogy (CRP) and multicultural education. This study was conducted to determine the perceived effectiveness of the new assignment and related class presentations and discussions in preparing teacher candidates for the actuality of teaching in diverse classrooms. Fifty teacher candidates engaged in a semester of study and reflection that culminated with the CREED writing assignment. Focus group discussions and perception surveys were implemented at the conclusion of each semester to determine perceptions of competency and needed course revisions related to CRP. The results revealed a discomfort among the participants when reflecting on their own biases, but a strong commitment to making the necessary changes in order to teach in a culturally responsive manner. Additionally, the teacher candidates acknowledged a need for more information and strategies as well as experiences in schools with diverse populations of students to become culturally responsive teachers who will be able to embrace diversity in their own future classrooms. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The unequal-area facility layout problem (UA-FLP) is the problem of locating rectangular facilities on a rectangular floor space such that facilities do not overlap while optimizing some objective. The objective considered in this paper is minimizing the total distance materials travel between facilities. The UA-FLP considered in this paper considers facilities with fixed dimension and was motivated by the investigation of layout options for a production area at the Toyota Motor Manufacturing West Virginia (TMMWV) plant in Buffalo, WV, USA. This paper presents a mathematical model and a genetic algorithm for locating facilities on a continuous plant floor. More specifically, a genetic algorithm, which consists of a boundary search heuristic (BSH), a linear program, and a dual simplex method, is developed for an UA-FLP. To test the performance of the proposed technique, several test problems taken from the literature are used in the analysis. The results show that the proposed heuristic performs well with respect to solution quality and computational time. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article reports on the distribution of a newspaper to students in the English class of Evening School in Buffalo, New York, which is attended by foreign-speaking men and women. The newspapers are used to teach students about the meaning and pronunciation of familiar words in articles chosen in advance for silent reading and are afterwards questioned on understanding of the content.

The designation of Modern architecture has been a contested process for several decades, particularly for low-income housing. Preservationists have often argued against any changes to, or demolition of, these kinds of sites because in most cases the buildings are associated with a well-known Modern architect or are emblematic of a particularly novel or groundbreaking use of form and/or material. That association often overrides history and public sentiment, particularly when the building or site has failed its primary function. This paper uses the case of Paul Rudolph's Shoreline Apartments in Buffalo, New York, to argue that landmark designation of Modern architecture, particularly for in-use housing projects, needs to take a holistic look at the project in its entirety, not just its architectural merit, design intent, or associations with a master architect. Ignoring all aspects of such properties can have huge implications for the field of historic preservation and how it is perceived among and within urban communities. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A new method is proposed for the dynamic obstacle avoidance problem of unmanned surface vehicles (USVs) under the international regulations for preventing collisions at sea (COLREGs), which applies the particle swarm optimization algorithm (PSO) to the dynamic window approach (DWA) to reduce the optimal trajectory finding the time and improve the timeliness of obstacle avoidance. Meanwhile, a fuzzy control algorithm is designed to dynamically adjust the weight coefficients of the velocity and obstacle distance terms in the cost function of the DWA algorithm to adapt to the changes in the environment. The proposed dynamic obstacle avoidance method is experimentally validated, in which proposed PSO combined with the DWA algorithm (PSO-CCDWA) results in a 42.1%, 11.2% and 28.0% reduction in the navigation time of the USVs in three encounter-situations of COLREGs than that of the classical DWA algorithm (CCDWA) conforming to the conventional COLREGs, respectively. The fuzzy control combined with the DWA algorithm (FUZZY-CCDWA) reduces the distance traveled by 15.8%, 0.9% and 2.8%, respectively, over the CCDWA algorithm in the three encounter scenarios. Finally, the effectiveness of the proposed dynamic obstacle avoidance method is further verified in a practical navigation experiment of a USV named "Buffalo". [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Presents issues discussed during the 1999 International Conference on Rehabilitation Science held at the University of Buffalo in New York. Graduate programs and research studies on rehabilitation science; Fund sources for study program development and scholarship grants; Importance of technology in the rehabilitation of disabled patients.

Some complex geographic events are associated with multiple point locations. Such events include, but are not limited to, those describing linkages between and among places. The term multi-location event is used in the paper to refer to these geographical phenomena. Through formalization of the multi-location event problem, this paper situates the analysis of multi-location events within the broad context of point pattern analysis techniques. Two alternative approaches (vector autocorrelation analysis and cluster correspondence analysis) to the spatial dependence of paired-location events (i.e., two-location events) are explored, with a discussion of their appropriateness to general multi-location event problems. The research proposes a framework of cluster correspondence analysis for the detection of local non-stationarities in the spatial process generating multi-location events. A new algorithm for local analysis of cluster correspondence is proposed. It is implemented on a large-scale dataset of vehicle theft and recovery location pairs in Buffalo, New York. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

To tackle persistent boundary-spanning problems with limited resources, some cities engage in collaborative innovation, combining expertise, effort, and creativity within and outside city hall to overcome limitations of conventional practices and siloed work. This article illustrates how collaborative innovation works in practice by examining specifics of how the Buffalo Clean Sweep Initiative, unique in longevity, scope, and scale, overcame common challenges and managed typical trade-offs. We describe, based on analyses of interviews and focus groups with city staff, community partners, and residents, how problem-solving, making an impact, and learning together helped Buffalo, New York, improve quality-of-life in its poorest neighborhoods. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Energy management systems are the most significant field in the potential electric vehicles (EVs). Also, EVs are widely used because of their pollution-free nature worldwide and their specific feature of flexibility. However, the EV charging system's significant challenges are power loss and high power consumption. Therefore, a robust load-balancing strategy is required to address the EV charging system's issues. Therefore, a novel intelligent hybrid Buffalo-based Recurrent Energy Management System (BREMS) has been proposed to reduce the power consumption of EVs and mitigate power losses. Here, two primary functions have been done. Initially, hydro and solar sources are modeled with the help of energy storage components and a power grid to enhance the system's efficiency. Then, the optimization fitness module is initiated to the hidden layer of the neural framework to monitor the loaded grids and distributes the loads to imbalanced grids. Implementation and designing processes have been done on the MATLAB platform. The simulation outcomes of the proposed design have been compared with conventional models in terms of power loss, cost of energy, utilization of power, and execution time. The comparative assessment shows that the presented system obtained better outcomes than other models. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

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Identifying key causal genes is critical for unraveling the genetic basis of complex economic traits, yet it remains a formidable challenge. The advent of large-scale sequencing data and computational algorithms, such as transcriptome-wide association studies (TWASs), offers a promising avenue for identifying potential causal genes. In this study, we harnessed the power of TWAS to identify genes potentially responsible for milk production traits, including daily milk yield (MY), fat percentage (FP), and protein percentage (PP), within a cohort of 100 buffaloes. Our approach began by generating the genotype and expression profiles for these 100 buffaloes through whole-genome resequencing and RNA sequencing, respectively. Through comprehensive genome-wide association studies (GWAS), we pinpointed a total of seven and four single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) significantly associated with MY and FP traits, respectively. By using TWAS, we identified 55, 71, and 101 genes as significant signals for MY, FP, and PP traits, respectively. To delve deeper, we conducted protein–protein interaction (PPI) analysis, revealing the categorization of these genes into distinct PPI networks. Interestingly, several TWAS-identified genes within the PPI network played a vital role in milk performance. These findings open new avenues for identifying potentially causal genes underlying important traits, thereby offering invaluable insights for genomics and breeding in buffalo populations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Subclinical mastitis (SCM) being hidden, goes unnoticed until diagnosed in the lab and is therefore the most studied type of mastitis engaging researchers to look for efficient therapeutic or preventive modalities. The in-vitro efficacy of aqueous, methanolic and hydro-methanolic extracts of Curcuma longa was studied against isolates of S. aureus from SCM cases of buffaloes. The stock solution at the concentrations of 50 (HM-50), 100 (HM-100), 150 (HM-150), 200 (HM-200) and 250 (HM-250) mg/mL was used to prepare the disc. Enrofloxacin disc was used as standard. The highest zone of inhibition (8.2 mm, and 10.1 mm) was noted with the concentration 250 mg/disc of aqueous and methanolic extracts of Curcuma longa, respectively. The hydro-methanolic extract failed to yield zone of inhibition against S. aureus at all five concentrations. It can be concluded that the antimicrobial potential of aqueous and methanolic extract of Curcuma longa can be used in the treatment or prevention of mastitis. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study investigates the sense of place (SoP) as a function of spatial characteristics of Buffalo, New York's Elmwood Village, an award-winning American neighbourhood for its perceived strong SoP. The primary aim is to provide empirical proof of this claimed strength of the neighbourhood's SoP at the building, street and neighbourhood scales and to offer a multi-dimensional understanding of SoP by investigating its four sub-indicators, namely place attachment, place identity, place dependence and nature bonding. By studying the perceptual dynamics with a survey method, place identity and place attachment were identified as the most important determinants of SoP at the neighbourhood scale, while place identity and place dependence took the lead at smaller scales. The study of spatial dynamics showed that SoP can be improved to varied degrees for each of the four sub-indicators based on variances in building and street characteristics. For instance, residing in single-family houses or houses with three-and-more bedrooms may result in higher SoP; or place identity may be affected by the open sky coverage or vegetation coverage, etc. Elmwood Village has demonstrated the power of SoP at all scales, and the neighbourhood itself undoubtedly holds a special place in the hearts of its residents. Overall, planners and designers should concentrate on which spatial qualities and scales should be prioritised in future improvement plans to maintain and/or build SoP. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study focuses on anti-trauma mats designed for buffaloes' comfort, using as raw materials rubber powder from end-of-life tyres (ELTs) and an isocyanate-based polyurethane resin binder. The first part of the study focused on mat formulation. Whilst it was possible to select a unique combination of raw materials and design features, it was necessary to investigate the relationship between three critical parameters affecting mat consistency and therefore buffalo comfort: binder quantity, mat thickness, and desired final mat density (bulk). In order to quantitatively assess the variation in hardness, various combinations were investigated within well-defined ranges based on the relevant literature. The results obtained from nine selected combinations indicate that increases in the three critical parameters do not induce a real phase transition in the final product consistency, although the hardness suggests an increasing trend. The mats consistently exhibited a moderately soft/hard consistency, offering environmental benefits in terms of increased rubber usage and potentially reduced chemical binder, depending on the desired thickness. The selected mixture showed excellent resistance to heavy chemical loads, suggesting reliability for frequent cleaning operations. The second part of the study involved field trials of the mats with calves. This involved monitoring their weight gain and appetite levels over a 90-day period. The results showed excellent growth performance compared to uncoated grids (i.e., weight gain was approximately 20% higher at the end of the observation period); this was similar to that achieved with the use of straw bedding. However, compared to straw bedding, the mats (i) exhibit long-term durability, with no signs of wear from washing or trampling over the months of the trial, (ii) allow for quick and efficient cleaning, and (iii) enable companies to save on labour, material (straw), and waste disposal costs, while maintaining (or even improving) the same welfare levels associated with the use of straw. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Three doctoral students, Chih‐Wei, Patrice, and Sarah, at varying levels in the doctoral programs, share reflections and experiences from the 2019 Adult Education Research Conference (AERC) in Buffalo, NY. These experiences are both individual and collective. While our individual experiences vary, we value AERC as a community of practice for knowledge sharing and support and find that the conference's intimate environment encourages interactions among all participants. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Bison or buffalo were once the dominant herbivore that impacted the ecology and landscape of North American grassland and forest ecosystems from Alaska to Mexico prior to European colonization. By the early 20th century they were almost extirpated in the wild with two exceptions; in the areas that eventually became Yellowstone and Wood Buffalo national parks. Since then, private individuals, NGOs, government agencies and indigenous peoples have collaborated to restore these populations, but significant hurdles remain to achieving full ecological recovery of the species; a vision which was articulated in a landmark paper in Conservation Biology in 2008 (Sanderson et al 2008 - The Ecological Future of the North American Bison: Conceiving Long-Term, Large-Scale Conservation of Wildlife). Unfortunately, bison have been virtually erased from most people's consciousness and imagination for over a century now, making restoration efforts for the largest land mammal on the continent particularly challenging. Despite this, several locations have had remarkable success in re-establishing wild, free-ranging bison populations in Canada, the US and Mexico over the past two decades. Bison populations have recently been re-established in Banff National Park, Alaska, and Yakutia (Siberia) and there are plans to restore populations on tribal and indigenous lands in both Canada and the US in the next 10 years. The signing of the Buffalo Treaty in 2014 was the impetus for many of the current restoration efforts on tribal and indigenous lands and indigenous groups are heavily involved in shared stewardship of these transboundary bison populations. While commercially raised bison have very different goals and vastly outnumber their wild counterparts, who are managed for ecological restoration and conservation, both groups have several shared values relating to the long-term goal of maintaining and increasing the overall number of bison in North America as well as maintaining their wild character. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper investigates the impact of street network connectivity on pedestrian volume. Street network connectivity measured in most current studies captures only the metric characteristics of streets or physical connectivity. A whole different type of connectivity, visual connectivity, is largely ignored. Described in basic terms, higher physical connectivity means shorter travel time to reach the same number of destinations while higher visual connectivity means fewer turns to see the same number of destinations. Despite the correlation of these two connectivity constructs, studying both physical and visual connectivity is essential to better understand the role of street network on pedestrian activity. Using pedestrian counts of 302 street segments in Buffalo, New York, structural equation modelling highlights the multiple relationships between street network connectivity, built environment characteristics, and pedestrian volumes. Our findings suggest that both the conventional metric-based measure of physical connectivity and geometric-based measure of visual connectivity have significant positive impacts on pedestrian volumes, together with job density and land use mix. This outcome can encourage practitioners to pay attention to both the geometry of street network and its metric characteristics in order to create a pedestrian-friendly environment. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Mobile crowdsensing offers a new platform that recruits a suitable set of users to collectively complete an information collection/sensing task through users' equipped devices. As a special case, video crowdsensing is to collect different video segments of the same event that are taken separately by the built-in cameras of mobile devices, and then combine them into a complete video. Mobile crowdsensing has attracted considerable attention recently due to the rich information that can be provided by videos. However, because of the limited caching space, a suitable video replacement policy is necessary. In this paper, we propose a Budgeted Video replaCement policy in mobile Video crowdsensing (BVCV), which first determines a video segment's value according to its caching situation and natural attributes. Then, we formulate the video caching problem as a budgeted maximum coverage problem, which is a well-known NP-hard problem. Finally, we propose a practical greedy solution and also infer the approximate ratio, which could be regarded as the lower bound of BVCV to the optimal solution. Our experiments with the real mobility datasets (StudentLife dataset, Buffalo/phonelab-wifi dataset) show that, the proposed budgeted video replacement policy achieves a longer successfully delivered video length, compared with other general replacement policies. • We propose a budgeted video replacement policy in mobile video crowdsensing. • We formulate the video caching problem as a budgeted maximum coverage problem. • We propose a practical greedy solution and also infer the approximate ratio. • We conduct simulations based on two real-world traces. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: Hypoxaemia occurs in approximately 30% of children during anaesthesia for flexible bronchoscopy. High-flow nasal oxygen (HFNO) can prolong safe apnoea time and be used in children with abnormal airways. During flexible bronchoscopy, there is limited evidence if HFNO confers advantages over current standard practice in avoiding hypoxaemia. The aim is to investigate feasibility of HFNO use during anaesthesia for flexible bronchoscopy to reduce frequency of rescue oxygenation and hypoxaemia. Methods: BUFFALO is a bi-centre, unmasked, randomised controlled, parallel group, protocol for a pilot trial comparing HFNO techniques to standard practice during anaesthesia. Children (n = 81) aged > 37 weeks to 16 years presenting for elective bronchoscopy who fulfil inclusion but not exclusion criteria will be randomised prior to the procedure to HFNO or standard care oxygenation post induction of anaesthesia. Maintenance of anaesthesia with HFNO requires total venous anaesthesia (TIVA) and with standard, either inhalational or TIVA at discretion of anaesthetist in charge of the patient. Outcomes will include the feasibility of recruitment and adherence to trial procedures, acceptability of the intervention of the protocol and completion rates of data collection methods. Discussion: Findings of this trial will determine feasibility to plan for a larger multicentre randomised clinical trial and support the feasibility of the proposed study procedures. Trial registration: BUFFALO trial was registered with Australia and New Zealand Clinical Trials Registry (TRN12621001635853) on 29 November 2021 and commenced recruitment in May 2022. https://www.anzctr.org.au/. The primary manuscript will be submitted for publication in a peer-reviewed journal. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]