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In the article the results of investigations of the Sokolniy VIII settlement located in the Zvenigovskiy district, Mari El Republic are presented. The topography of site, the history of its study, information about stratigraphy and spatial structure of archaeological material are considered. The characteristics of ceramic complex of site and technology of pottery making are discussed. The detail description of the stone inventory and the main types of tools are presented. At the Sokolniy VIII settlement any constructive components of the cultural layer except for one fireplace were not determined. This fact allows the authors to interpret the settlement as short time site. The most of the pottery shards belong to the Krasny Most ceramic type of the Late Neolithic in the forest Middle Volga basin and have the direct analogy in the materials of the reference site such as Krasniy Most II-III, Sosnovaya Gora III, Dubovskoe VIII. The technology of ceramics is characterized by the stablility of the main components. The silt organic clay was used as main raw source. As a temper grog and organic solution were added. The stone tool collection is impressive. The nuclei and morphological tools total consist of 45 items. The most of typological types of inventory have analogies to the artifacts from earlier studied assemblages. On the base of radiocarbon dating the period of the settlement exiting can be concerned to the last quarter of 5th millennium BC.

The paper presents study the 11-year dynamics of solar activity on the basis of new observational material on coronal holes (CHs) and sunspots in the period from May 13, 2010 to May 13, 2021. We used the Heliophysics Event Knowledgebase (HEK) to obtain information on CHs areas. For 11 years of observations, we processed about 18000 CHs. Slightly more than 8000 are polar, the rest are nonpolar CHs. The statistical volume of the presented material is quite extensive and gives grounds for the study of the dynamics of different types of CHs during the cycle. Our research has shown: in the 24th solar activity cycle, the South led for polar CHs and the North led for nonpolar ones. We established a relationship between the number and area of CHs and the phase of the solar cycle. The number and daily total area of polar CHs increases at the minima of solar activity and decreases at the maximum of the cycle. This is consistent with the general concept of polar CHs as the main source of the solar dipole magnetic field. An asymmetry in both the number and areas of polar coronal holes in the northern and southern hemispheres is observed. It is shown that the areas of nonpolar CHs change quasi-synchronously with sunspot activity, which suggests a physical connection between these two phenomena.

The framework of land degradation neutrality (LDN) and the concept of sustainable land management (SLM) are ways to instigate action required to address land degradation. Although land and water management approaches supporting SLM and the achievement of LDN exist, the transition to sustainable agricultural systems is hindered by various factors and the achievement of LDN is lagging behind. More information on such approaches is needed to sensitize decision-makers for fostering their implementation. The framework of land degradation neutrality (LDN) and the concept of sustainable land management (SLM) are ways to instigate action required to address land degradation. Although land and water management approaches supporting SLM and the achievement of LDN exist, the transition to sustainable agricultural systems is hindered by various factors and the achievement of LDN is lagging behind. More information on such approaches is needed to sensitize decision-makers for fostering their implementation. This study responds to this need by examining the alignment of the following land and water management approaches with SLM and LDN: agroecology, climate-smart agriculture, conservation agriculture, forest landscape restoration, integrated agriculture, regenerative agriculture, and rewilding. The alignment assessment used a formative methodological approach combining literature review and extensive expert consultations, and is structured along the SLM and LDN pillars of ecosystem health, food security, and human-wellbeing, each comprised by several criteria, as well as selected cross-cutting socioeconomic criteria that span all pillars. The results indicate that each of the approaches contributes to SLM and the achievement of LDN in different ways and to varying degrees, with none of the approaches embracing principles or practices that directly conflict with the criteria of SLM and LDN. A higher degree of alignment was identified for the ecosystem health and food security pillars, while most gaps in alignment concern criteria of the human wellbeing pillar along with certain cross-cutting criteria. The results of the assessment led to the identification of entry points for addressing gaps in alignment via supplementary activities that directly target the gaps during project planning and implementation, as well as through adhering to principles and established guidelines. Importantly, conclusions about the degree of alignment or about gaps in alignment of an approach with SLM and LDN criteria are conceptually indicative, but may change in actual practice depending on where and how projects are implemented. Notwithstanding, clarifying the approaches' contribution to SLM and the achievement of LDN can help overcome the lack of formal intergovernmental recognition of the approaches, prevent misinterpretation, and ensure their strategic inclusion in broader efforts to remedy land degradation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Observations in the near-infrared wavelength range have been regularly carried out at the Crimean Astrophysical Observatory (CrAO) on the Tower Solar Telescope (TST-2). It began in the late 1990s by putting into operation the Universal Spectrophotometer (USPh) at the TST-2 and it continues up to the present time. In 2020 the observation process was modernized - the mirror control electronics and software were replaced. Work is currently underway to create a catalog of solar disk images obtained before the modernization of TST-2. Here we present fragments of the catalog - several examples of a full solar disk in He i 1083 nm from the USPh/TST-2 instrument and a brief description of the future catalog.