A new perspective on the global food security situation and highlights the need for seeking a common vision and implementing global planning to define the manner in which the human species will manage its food security. The basic question of ‘is there enough food’ is examined in general and then in some detail. The history of food production is reviewed in the hope that lessons can be learned from the past. But even after ten thousand years of experience we are not able to feed adequately about a third of our total population, despite what statistics can be made to tell us. Intensive agriculture has stripped out the nutrients that support plant growth and marginalised extensive tracts of land. The global solution to feed the growing population has been and continues to be – produce more food. Even during the last 30 years, about 95 percent of global research investments have focused mainly on increasing productivity. However about a third of the food produced, sufficient to feed over two billion hungry people, is lost or wasted in the food value chain. Climate change is another confounding factor that impinges on our discussions. Pests of all kinds continue to destroy food before and after it is harvested, even though the technology to protect it is available. A huge amount of food is wasted in value chains, particularly at the domestic level. Global food production systems are exposed to unprecedented biosecurity risks posed by invasive harmful organisms and this trend is likely to further exacerbate as current approach to biosecurity is based on the notional premise that lines on maps and the legislation that goes with them is sufficient to halt epidemics. Solutions include extending the number of cultivated plant and animal species to include those that can prosper in what are currently considered to be extreme environments.
One of the most remarkable – and controversial – sporting figures in British history, Chris Brasher piled unique achievement on unique achievement. It was Chris Brasher who, along with Chris Chataway, paced Roger Bannister to break the 4-minute mile. Then he won his own Olympic Gold Medal in the steeplechase at the 1956 Olympics. Probably best known now for founding the London Marathon, Chris went on to become one of the founders of the modern sports of fell-running and orienteering.. At the Observer, he also effectively invented modern sports feature writing. Plus, he also invented the now-ubiquitous Brasher walking boot, with the revolutionary aim of making heavy boots as comfortable as training shoes. Along the way he built up a highly successful sportswear chain, and even, in later life a stable of racehorses. But Chris Brasher was also a highly controversial individual: irascible, domineering – a good friend but a bad enemy – and above all a hugely competitive man who had to win in everything he did. Now, John Bryant, who knew Brasher well as a friend, has written the extraordinary story of this impossible and amazing man’s life. Whether you’re a sports journalist, a Lakeland fell-runner, a weekend rambler or one of the 50,000 competitors in the London Marathon, Chris Brasher changed your life.
Quantum Field Theory has become the universal language of most modern theoretical physics. This introductory textbook shows how this beautiful theory offers the correct mathematical framework to describe and understand the fundamental interactions of elementary particles. The book begins with a brief reminder of basic classical field theories, electrodynamics and general relativity, as well as their symmetry properties, and proceeds with the principles of quantisation following Feynman's path integral approach. Special care is used at every step to illustrate the correct mathematical formulation of the underlying assumptions. Gauge theories and the problems encountered in their quantisation are discussed in detail. The last chapters contain a full description of the Standard Model of particle physics and the attempts to go beyond it, such as grand unified theories and supersymmetry. Written for advanced undergraduate and beginning graduate students in physics and mathematics, the book could also serve as a reference for active researchers in the field.
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