Clemson University

About: Clemson University is a education organization based out in Clemson, South Carolina, United States. It is known for research contribution in the topics: Population & Control theory. The organization has 20556 authors who have published 42518 publications receiving 1170779 citations. The organization is also known as: Clemson Agricultural College of South Carolina.

Responses of hardwood advance regeneration to seasonal prescribed fires in oak-dominated shelterwood stands

Abstract: Effects of seasonal prescribed fires of varying intensities on density, mortality, stem form, height, and height growth of hardwood advance regeneration were investigated. Three mixed-hardwood stands on productive upland sites were cut using a shelterwood technique, each forming a block of spring burn, summer burn, winter burn, and control treatments. Advance regeneration was inventoried from permanent plots before and after burning. Fires top-killed nearly all hardwood regeneration, forcing the rootstocks to sprout. Fire treatments reduced densities of all hardwood species relative to not burning, with spring and summer fires causing greater density reduction than winter burning. Among species, oak (Quercus spp. L.) and hickory (Carya spp. Nutt.) were more resilient sprouters than yellow-poplar (Liriodendron tulipifera L.) and red maple (Acer rubrum L.), especially as fire intensity increased. All prescribed fires improved oak stem form and stimulated height growth of hickory and oak. Overall, prescribed fires improved oak advance regeneration with spring burning providing the most benefit. This approach of following a shelterwood harvest with prescribed fire may be a viable method of regenerating oak-dominated stands on productive upland sites. Resume : Les effets du brslage dirigO, effectuO ‡ diffOrentes saisons et ‡ des intensitOs variables, sur la densitO, la mortalitO, la forme de la tige, la hauteur et la croissance en hauteur de la rOgOnOration feuillue prOOtablie ont OtO investiguOs. Trois peuplements de feuillus mOlangOs Otablis sur des sites riches situOs sur les plateaux furent coupOs selon la technique de la coupe progressive. Chaque peuplement constituait un bloc de traitements qui incluaient des brslages printanier, estival et hivernal ainsi quiun tOmoin. La rOgOnOration prOOtablie a OtO inventoriOe dans des parcelles permanentes avant et aprs le brslage. Le feu a tuO la cime de presque tous les semis de feuillus forAant leur systme racinaire ‡ drageonner. Le brslage a rOduit la densitO de toutes les espces feuillues comparativement ‡ liabsence de brslage. Les brslages printanier ou estival ont causO une plus forte rOduction que le brslage hivernal. Parmi les espces prOsentes, le chŒne ( Quercus spp. L.) et le caryer (Carya spp. Nutt.) avaient une meillleure capacitO de drageonner que le tulipier de Virginie (Liriodendron tulipifera L.) et liOrable rouge (Acer rubrum L.), particulirement lorsque liintensitO du feu augmentait. Dans tous les cas, le brslage dirigO a amOliorO la forme de la tige du chŒne et a stimulO la croissance en hauteur du caryer et du chŒne. Dans liensemble, le brslage dirigO a amOliorO la rOgOnOration prOOtablie du chŒne et le brslage effectuO au printemps a procurO le plus diavantages. Cette approche consistant ‡ utiliser le brslage dirigO aprs une coupe progressive pourrait siavOrer une mOthode viable pour rOgOnOrer les peuplements dominOs par le chŒne sur les sites riches des plateaux. (Traduit par la ROdaction)

Making Sales Technology Effective

Abstract: Firms invest billions of dollars in sales technologies (STs; e.g., customer relationship management, sales automation tools) to improve sales force effectiveness and efficiency. However, the results expected from ST investments are often not achieved. This article proposes relationship-forging tasks that are critical to the link between ST use and key aspects of salesperson performance (i.e., a salesperson's relationship-building performance with customers and administrative performance). The authors evaluate relationship-forging tasks in the context of a model that considers the antecedents and consequences of three different uses of ST: accessing, analyzing, and communicating information. In general, the results of a field study, which is analyzed using block-recursive structural equation modeling, support the relationship-forging theory and show that relationship-forging tasks predict 57% of the variance in a salesperson's relationship-building performance with customers. The findings also support hypotheses that using ST either to analyze or to communicate information has mediated positive effects on a salesperson's relationship-building performance with customers. However, a salesperson's use of ST to analyze information has negative influences on administrative performance, creating an unexpected trade-off for sales and marketing managers.

Firm performance and board composition: Some new evidence

Abstract: We investigate the effect of board composition on overall corporate performance while controlling for managerial ownership and other key variables. We recognize that both managerial ownership and board composition may be endogenous to performance, but our work differs from previous in two important respects. First, we measure performance using the market value to book value ratio of common stock equity rather than the more commonly used Tobin's q. Second, recognizing that overall estimates from the IV approach depend greatly on the choice of instruments, we perform sensitivity analysis by using a variety of instruments to proxy for board composition and managerial ownership. Both our OLS and IV estimates indicate a significant curvilinear relation between board composition and performance. However, we find that moderate differences in first-stage regressions, resulting in small changes to first-stage R2s, lead to widely differing overall results. Our results suggest that findings of studies using IV and similar techniques (e.g. two- and three-stage least squares) must be interpreted cautiously.

The nature of "dark" gamma-ray bursts

Abstract: Context. Thirteen years after the discovery of the first afterglows, the nature of dark gamma-ray bursts (GRB) still eludes explanation: while each long-duration GRB typically has an X-ray afterglow, optical/NIR emission is only seen for 40–60% of them. Aims. Here we use the afterglow detection statistics of the systematic follow-up observations performed with GROND since mid-2007 in order to derive the fraction of “dark bursts” according to different methods, and to distinguish between various scenarios for “dark bursts”. Methods. Observations were performed with the 7-channel “Gamma-Ray Optical and Near-infrared Detector” (GROND) at the 2.2 m MPI/ESO telescope. We used the afterglow detection rate in dependence on the delay time between GRB and the first GROND exposure. Results. For long-duration Swift bursts with a detected X-ray afterglow, we achieve a 90% (35/39) detection rate of optical/NIR afterglows whenever our observations started within less than 240 min after the burst. Complementing our GROND data with Swift/XRT spectra we construct broad-band spectral energy distributions and derive rest-frame extinctions.Conclusions. We detect 25–40% “dark bursts”, depending on the definition used. The faint optical afterglow emission of “dark bursts” is mainly due to a combination of two contributing factors: (i) moderate intrinsic extinction at moderate redshifts, and (ii) about 22% of “dark” bursts at redshift >5.