Mango
Mangoes are juicy stone fruit from numerous species of tropical trees belonging to the flowering plant genus Mangifera, cultivated for their edible fruit. The majority of these species are found in nature as wild mangoes; the genus belongs to the cashew family Anacardiaceae. Mangoes are native to South Asia, from where the "common mango" or "Indian mango", Mangifera indica, has been distributed worldwide to become one of the most cultivated fruits in the tropics. Other Mangifera species are grown on a more localized basis, it is the national fruit of India and Pakistan, the national tree of Bangladesh. It is the unofficial national fruit of the Philippines; the English word "mango" originated from the Malayalam word māṅṅa via Dravidian mankay and Portuguese manga during the spice trade period with South India in the 15th and 16th centuries. Mango is mentioned by Hendrik van Rheede, the Dutch commander of the Malabar region in his 1678 book, Hortus Malabaricus, about plants having economic value.
When mangoes were first imported to the American colonies in the 17th century, they had to be pickled because of lack of refrigeration. Other fruits were pickled and came to be called "mangoes" bell peppers, in the 18th century, the word "mango" became a verb meaning "to pickle". Mango trees grow to 35–40 m tall, with a crown radius of 10 m; the trees are long-lived. In deep soil, the taproot descends to a depth of 6 m, with profuse, wide-spreading feeder roots and anchor roots penetrating into the soil; the leaves are evergreen, simple, 15–35 cm long, 6–16 cm broad. The flowers are produced in terminal panicles 10–40 cm long. Over 500 varieties of mangoes are known, many of which ripen in summer, while some give a double crop; the fruit takes four to five months from flowering to ripen. The ripe fruit varies in size, color and eating quality. Cultivars are variously yellow, red, or green, carry a single flat, oblong pit that can be fibrous or hairy on the surface, which does not separate from the pulp.
The fruits may be somewhat round, oval, or kidney-shaped, ranging from 5–25 centimetres in length and from 140 grams to 2 kilograms in weight per individual fruit. The skin is leather-like, waxy and fragrant, with color ranging from green to yellow, yellow-orange, yellow-red, or blushed with various shades of red, pink or yellow when ripe. Ripe intact mangoes give off a distinctive resinous, sweet smell. Inside the pit 1–2 mm thick is a thin lining covering a single seed, 4–7 cm long. Mangoes have recalcitrant seeds which do not survive drying. Mango trees grow from seeds, with germination success highest when seeds are obtained from mature fruits. Mangoes have been cultivated in South Asia for thousands of years and reached Southeast Asia between the fifth and fourth centuries BCE. By the 10th century CE, cultivation had begun in East Africa; the 14th-century Moroccan traveler Ibn Battuta reported it at Mogadishu. Cultivation came to Brazil, the West Indies, Mexico, where an appropriate climate allows its growth.
The mango is now cultivated in warmer subtropical climates. Mangoes are grown in Andalusia, Spain, as its coastal subtropical climate is one of the few places in mainland Europe that permits the growth of tropical plants and fruit trees; the Canary Islands are another notable Spanish producer of the fruit. Other cultivators include North America and Central America, the Caribbean, Hawai'i, south and central Africa, China, South Korea, Pakistan and Southeast Asia. Though India is the largest producer of mangoes, it accounts for less than 1% of the international mango trade. Many commercial cultivars are grafted on to the cold-hardy rootstock of Gomera-1 mango cultivar from Cuba, its root system is well adapted to a coastal Mediterranean climate. Many of the 1,000+ mango cultivars are cultivated using grafted saplings, ranging from the "turpentine mango" to the Bullock's Heart. Dwarf or semidwarf varieties can be grown in containers. A wide variety of diseases can afflict mangoes. There are many hundreds of named mango cultivars.
In mango orchards, several cultivars are grown in order to improve pollination. Many desired cultivars are monoembryonic and must be propagated by grafting or they do not breed true. A common monoembryonic cultivar is'Alphonso', an important export product, considered as "the king of mangoes". Cultivars that excel in one climate may fail elsewhere. For example, Indian cultivars such as'Julie', a prolific cultivar in Jamaica, require annual fungicide treatments to escape the lethal fungal disease anthracnose in Florida. Asian mangoes are resistant to anthracnose; the current world market is dominated by the cultivar'Tommy Atkins', a seedling of'Haden' that first fruited in 1940 in southern Florida and was rejected commercially by Florida researchers. Growers and importers worldwide have embraced the cultivar for its exc
Acacus Mountains
The Acacus Mountains or Tadrart Akakus form a mountain range in the desert of the Ghat District in western Libya, part of the Sahara. They are situated east of the city of Ghat and stretch north from the border with Algeria, about 100 kilometres; the area has a rich array of prehistoric rock art. Tadrart is the feminine form of "mountain" in the Berber languages; the area is known for its rock art and was inscribed as a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 1985 because of the importance of these paintings and carvings. The paintings date from 12,000 BCE to 100 reflect cultural and natural changes in the area. There are paintings and carvings of animals such as giraffes, elephants and camels, but of men and horses. People are depicted for example while making music and dancing. Tadrart Acacus is the site of the earliest appearance of processed milk lipids on ceramics, which have been radiocarbon-dated to 7,500 BP. During Muammar Gaddafi’s rule from 1969 through 2011, the Department of Antiquities was badly neglected.
Since 2005, the search for petroleum hidden underground has placed the rock art itself in danger. Seismic hammers are used to send shock waves underneath to locate oil deposits, have noticeable effects on nearby rocks, including the ones that house the Tadrart Acacus rock art. Looting of ancient artifacts reached a level of crisis. In response UNESCO called for a major awareness campaign, to heighten awareness of Libya's archaeological and cultural heritage and to alert Libyans that their heritage is "being looted by thieves and destroyed by developers."In 2012 following his departure, efforts were made to train staff through a $2.26 million UNESCO project, with the Libyan and Italian governments. The project included conservation and education. Along with Tadrart Acacus, Libya has four other UNESCO World Heritage sites: Cyrene, Leptis Magna and Ghadames. UNESCO advised that "a centre should be established at Ghat or Uweynat to train the staff in charge of the protection and management of the property and to host a museum, expected to play an important in terms of awareness raising."UNESCO State of Conservation reports from 2011, 2012 and 2013 show that at least ten of the rock-art sites have been the object of deliberate and considerable destruction since at least April 2009.
The ambiguity surrounding property boundaries of the World Heritate Site and therefore the property management combined with lack of local understanding of its cultural values were contributing factors in the ongoing vandalism. Conflicts in the area since 2011 led to increased vandalism. In May 2013 UNESCO undertook a technical mission to assess the state of conservation the Tadrart Acacus site and to "build-up a strategic plan to enforce the protection and management of this unique cultural and natural context."On 14 April 2014 two kinds of vandals were reported, those who thoughtlessly carve their own names beside the ancient rock art and those who deliberately use chemical products to remove the rock drawings. On April 20, 2014, the French special correspondent Jacques-Marie Bourget was informed by a local journalist from Ghat, Aziz Al-Hachi, that the UNESCO Rock-Art World Heritage Site of Tadrart Acacus was being destroyed with sledgehammers and scrub brushes; the Tadrart Acacus have a large variation of landscapes, from different-coloured dunes to arches, isolated rocks and deep wadis.
Major landmarks include the arches of Tin Khlega. Although this area is one of the most arid in the Sahara, there is vegetation, such as the medicinal Calotropis procera, there are a number of springs and wells in the mountains. List of Stone Age art Tadrart Rouge, the southern prologation of the Tadrart Range in Algeria Uan Muhuggiag Tassili n'Ajjer Tadrart Rouge Di Lernia, Savino e Zampetti, Daniela La Memoria dell'Arte. Le pitture rupestri dell'Acacus tra passato e futuro, All'Insegna del Giglio. M. "Nonalimentary tooth use in prehistory: an Example from Early Holocene in Central Sahara" American Journal of Physical Anthropology 120: pp. 225–232. "Twelve thousand years of human adaptation in Fezzan" in G. Barker and Gilbertson, D. D; the Archaeology of Drylands: Living at the Margin London, Routledge, pp. 160–79. "Some Insights on the Aterian in the Libyan Sahara: Chronology and Archaeology" African Archaeological Review 15: pp. 261–286. Journal of Archaeological Science 35: 1619-1642. Journal of Arid Environments 72: 1950-1967.
UNESCO Fact Sheet Italian-Libyan Archaeological Mission
Naples
Naples is the regional capital of Campania and the third-largest municipality in Italy after Rome and Milan. In 2017, around 967,069 people lived within the city's administrative limits while its province-level municipality has a population of 3,115,320 residents, its continuously built-up metropolitan area is the second or third largest metropolitan area in Italy and one of the most densely populated cities in Europe. First settled by Greeks in the second millennium BC, Naples is one of the oldest continuously inhabited urban areas in the world. In the ninth century BC, a colony known as Parthenope or Παρθενόπη was established on the Island of Megaride refounded as Neápolis in the sixth century BC; the city was an important part of Magna Graecia, played a major role in the merging of Greek and Roman society and a significant cultural centre under the Romans. It served as the capital of the Duchy of Naples of the Kingdom of Naples and of the Two Sicilies until the unification of Italy in 1861.
Between 1925 and 1936, Naples was expanded and upgraded by Benito Mussolini's government but subsequently sustained severe damage from Allied bombing during World War II, which led to extensive post-1945 reconstruction work. Naples has experienced significant economic growth in recent decades, helped by the construction of the Centro Direzionale business district and an advanced transportation network, which includes the Alta Velocità high-speed rail link to Rome and Salerno and an expanded subway network. Naples is the third-largest urban economy in Italy, after Rome; the Port of Naples is one of the most important in Europe and home of the Allied Joint Force Command Naples, the NATO body that oversees North Africa, the Sahel and Middle East. Naples' historic city centre is the largest in Europe and a UNESCO World Heritage Site, with a wide range of culturally and significant sites nearby, including the Palace of Caserta and the Roman ruins of Pompeii and Herculaneum. Naples is known for its natural beauties such as Posillipo, Phlegraean Fields and Vesuvius.
Neapolitan cuisine is synonymous with pizza – which originated in the city – but it includes many lesser-known dishes. The best-known sports team in Naples is the Serie A club S. S. C. Napoli, two-time Italian champions who play at the San Paolo Stadium in the southwest of the city, in the Fuorigrotta quarter. Naples has been inhabited since the Neolithic period; the earliest Greek settlements were established in the Naples area in the second millennium BC. Sailors from the Greek island of Rhodes established a small commercial port called Parthenope on the island of Megaride in the ninth century BC. By the eighth century BC, the settlement had expanded to include Monte Echia. In the sixth century BC the new urban zone of Neápolis was founded on the plain becoming one of the foremost cities of Magna Graecia; the city grew due to the influence of the powerful Greek city-state of Syracuse, became an ally of the Roman Republic against Carthage. During the Samnite Wars, the city, now a bustling centre of trade, was captured by the Samnites.
During the Punic Wars, the strong walls surrounding Neápolis repelled the invading forces of the Carthaginian general Hannibal. Naples was respected by the Romans as a paragon of Hellenistic culture. During the Roman era, the people of Naples maintained their Greek language and customs, while the city was expanded with elegant Roman villas and public baths. Landmarks such as the Temple of Dioscures were built, many emperors chose to holiday in the city, including Claudius and Tiberius. Virgil, the author of Rome's national epic, the Aeneid, received part of his education in the city, resided in its environs, it was during this period. Januarius, who would become Naples' patron saint, was martyred there in the fourth century AD; the last emperor of the Western Roman Empire, Romulus Augustulus, was exiled to Naples by the Germanic king Odoacer in the fifth century AD. Following the decline of the Western Roman Empire, Naples was captured by the Ostrogoths, a Germanic people, incorporated into the Ostrogothic Kingdom.
However, Belisarius of the Byzantine Empire recaptured Naples in 536, after entering the city via an aqueduct. In 543, during the Gothic Wars, Totila took the city for the Ostrogoths, but the Byzantines seized control of the area following the Battle of Mons Lactarius on the slopes of Vesuvius. Naples was expected to keep in contact with the Exarchate of Ravenna, the centre of Byzantine power on the Italian Peninsula. After the exarchate fell, a Duchy of Naples was created. Although Naples' Greco-Roman culture endured, it switched allegiance from Constantinople to Rome under Duke Stephen II, putting it under papal suzerainty by 763; the years between 818 and 832 were tumultuous in regard to Naples' relations with the Byzantine Emperor, with numerous local pretenders feuding for possession of the ducal throne. Theoctistus was appointed without imperial approval. However, the disgruntled general populace chased him from the city, instead elected Stephen III, a man who minted coins with his own initials, r
Precipitation
In meteorology, precipitation is any product of the condensation of atmospheric water vapor that falls under gravity. The main forms of precipitation include drizzle, sleet, snow and hail. Precipitation occurs when a portion of the atmosphere becomes saturated with water vapor, so that the water condenses and "precipitates", thus and mist are not precipitation but suspensions, because the water vapor does not condense sufficiently to precipitate. Two processes acting together, can lead to air becoming saturated: cooling the air or adding water vapor to the air. Precipitation forms as smaller droplets coalesce via collision with other rain drops or ice crystals within a cloud. Short, intense periods of rain in scattered locations are called "showers."Moisture, lifted or otherwise forced to rise over a layer of sub-freezing air at the surface may be condensed into clouds and rain. This process is active when freezing rain occurs. A stationary front is present near the area of freezing rain and serves as the foci for forcing and rising air.
Provided necessary and sufficient atmospheric moisture content, the moisture within the rising air will condense into clouds, namely stratus and cumulonimbus. The cloud droplets will grow large enough to form raindrops and descend toward the Earth where they will freeze on contact with exposed objects. Where warm water bodies are present, for example due to water evaporation from lakes, lake-effect snowfall becomes a concern downwind of the warm lakes within the cold cyclonic flow around the backside of extratropical cyclones. Lake-effect snowfall can be locally heavy. Thundersnow is possible within lake effect precipitation bands. In mountainous areas, heavy precipitation is possible where upslope flow is maximized within windward sides of the terrain at elevation. On the leeward side of mountains, desert climates can exist due to the dry air caused by compressional heating. Most precipitation is caused by convection; the movement of the monsoon trough, or intertropical convergence zone, brings rainy seasons to savannah climes.
Precipitation is a major component of the water cycle, is responsible for depositing the fresh water on the planet. 505,000 cubic kilometres of water falls as precipitation each year. Given the Earth's surface area, that means the globally averaged annual precipitation is 990 millimetres, but over land it is only 715 millimetres. Climate classification systems such as the Köppen climate classification system use average annual rainfall to help differentiate between differing climate regimes. Precipitation may occur on other celestial bodies, e.g. when it gets cold, Mars has precipitation which most takes the form of frost, rather than rain or snow. Precipitation is a major component of the water cycle, is responsible for depositing most of the fresh water on the planet. 505,000 km3 of water falls as precipitation each year, 398,000 km3 of it over the oceans. Given the Earth's surface area, that means the globally averaged annual precipitation is 990 millimetres. Mechanisms of producing precipitation include convective and orographic rainfall.
Convective processes involve strong vertical motions that can cause the overturning of the atmosphere in that location within an hour and cause heavy precipitation, while stratiform processes involve weaker upward motions and less intense precipitation. Precipitation can be divided into three categories, based on whether it falls as liquid water, liquid water that freezes on contact with the surface, or ice. Mixtures of different types of precipitation, including types in different categories, can fall simultaneously. Liquid forms of precipitation include drizzle. Rain or drizzle that freezes on contact within a subfreezing air mass is called "freezing rain" or "freezing drizzle". Frozen forms of precipitation include snow, ice needles, ice pellets and graupel; the dew point is the temperature to which a parcel must be cooled in order to become saturated, condenses to water. Water vapor begins to condense on condensation nuclei such as dust and salt in order to form clouds. An elevated portion of a frontal zone forces broad areas of lift, which form clouds decks such as altostratus or cirrostratus.
Stratus is a stable cloud deck which tends to form when a cool, stable air mass is trapped underneath a warm air mass. It can form due to the lifting of advection fog during breezy conditions. There are four main mechanisms for cooling the air to its dew point: adiabatic cooling, conductive cooling, radiational cooling, evaporative cooling. Adiabatic cooling occurs when air expands; the air can rise due to convection, large-scale atmospheric motions, or a physical barrier such as a mountain. Conductive cooling occurs when the air comes into contact with a colder surface by being blown from one surface to another, for example from a liquid water surface to colder land. Radiational cooling occurs due to the emission of infrared radiation, either by the air or by the surface underneath. Evaporative cooling occurs when moisture is added to the air through evaporation, which forces the air temperature to cool to its wet-bulb temperature, or until it reaches saturation; the main ways water vapor is added to the air are: wind convergence into areas of upward motion, precipitation or virga falling from above, daytime heating evaporating water from the surface of oceans, water bodies or wet lan
Tropical cyclone
A tropical cyclone is a rotating storm system characterized by a low-pressure center, a closed low-level atmospheric circulation, strong winds, a spiral arrangement of thunderstorms that produce heavy rain. Depending on its location and strength, a tropical cyclone is referred to by different names, including hurricane, tropical storm, cyclonic storm, tropical depression, cyclone. A hurricane is a tropical cyclone that occurs in the Atlantic Ocean and northeastern Pacific Ocean, a typhoon occurs in the northwestern Pacific Ocean. "Cyclone" refers to their winds moving in a circle, whirling round their central clear eye, with their winds blowing counterclockwise in the Northern Hemisphere and clockwise in the Southern Hemisphere. The opposite direction of circulation is due to the Coriolis effect. Tropical cyclones form over large bodies of warm water, they derive their energy through the evaporation of water from the ocean surface, which recondenses into clouds and rain when moist air rises and cools to saturation.
This energy source differs from that of mid-latitude cyclonic storms, such as nor'easters and European windstorms, which are fueled by horizontal temperature contrasts. Tropical cyclones are between 100 and 2,000 km in diameter; the strong rotating winds of a tropical cyclone are a result of the conservation of angular momentum imparted by the Earth's rotation as air flows inwards toward the axis of rotation. As a result, they form within 5° of the equator. Tropical cyclones are unknown in the South Atlantic due to a strong wind shear and a weak Intertropical Convergence Zone; the African easterly jet and areas of atmospheric instability which give rise to cyclones in the Atlantic Ocean and Caribbean Sea, along with the Asian monsoon and Western Pacific Warm Pool, are features of the Northern Hemisphere and Australia. Coastal regions are vulnerable to the impact of a tropical cyclone, compared to inland regions; the primary energy source for these storms is warm ocean waters, therefore these forms are strongest when over or near water, weaken quite over land.
Coastal damage may be caused by strong winds and rain, high waves, storm surges, the potential of spawning tornadoes. Tropical cyclones draw in air from a large area—which can be a vast area for the most severe cyclones—and concentrate the precipitation of the water content in that air into a much smaller area; this continual replacement of moisture-bearing air by new moisture-bearing air after its moisture has fallen as rain, which may cause heavy rain and river flooding up to 40 kilometres from the coastline, far beyond the amount of water that the local atmosphere holds at any one time. Though their effects on human populations are devastating, tropical cyclones can relieve drought conditions, they carry heat energy away from the tropics and transport it toward temperate latitudes, which may play an important role in modulating regional and global climate. Tropical cyclones are areas of low pressure in the troposphere, with the largest pressure perturbations occurring at low altitudes near the surface.
On Earth, the pressures recorded at the centers of tropical cyclones are among the lowest observed at sea level. The environment near the center of tropical cyclones is warmer than the surroundings at all altitudes, thus they are characterized as "warm core" systems; the near-surface wind field of a tropical cyclone is characterized by air rotating around a center of circulation while flowing radially inwards. At the outer edge of the storm, air may be nearly calm; as air flows radially inward, it begins to rotate cyclonically in order to conserve angular momentum. At an inner radius, air begins to ascend to the top of the troposphere; this radius is coincident with the inner radius of the eyewall, has the strongest near-surface winds of the storm. Once aloft, air flows away from the storm's center; the mentioned processes result in a wind field, nearly axisymmetric: Wind speeds are low at the center, increase moving outwards to the radius of maximum winds, decay more with radius to large radii.
However, the wind field exhibits additional spatial and temporal variability due to the effects of localized processes, such as thunderstorm activity and horizontal flow instabilities. In the vertical direction, winds are strongest near the surface and decay with height within the troposphere. At the center of a mature tropical cyclone, air sinks rather than rises. For a sufficiently strong storm, air may sink over a layer deep enough to suppress cloud formation, thereby creating a clear "eye". Weather in the eye is calm and free of clouds, although the sea may be violent; the eye is circular in shape, is 30–65 km in diameter, though eyes as small as 3 km and as large as 370 km have been observed. The cloudy outer edge of the eye is called the "eyewall"; the eyewall expands outward with height, resembling an arena foo
Continental climate
Continental climates have a significant annual variation in temperature. They tend to occur in the middle latitudes, where prevailing winds blow overland, temperatures are not moderated by bodies of water such as oceans or seas. Continental climates occur in the Northern Hemisphere, which has the kind of large landmasses on temperate latitudes required for this type of climate to develop. Most of northern and northeastern China and southeastern Europe and southeastern Canada, the central and upper eastern United States have this type of climate. In continental climates, precipitation tends to be moderate in amount, concentrated in the warmer months. Only a few areas—in the mountains of the Pacific Northwest of North America and in Iran, northern Iraq, adjacent Turkey, Afghanistan and Central Asia—show a winter maximum in precipitation. A portion of the annual precipitation falls as snowfall, snow remains on the ground for more than a month. Summers in continental climates can feature frequent hot temperatures.
The timing of intermediate spring-like or autumn-like temperatures in this zone vary depending on latitude and/or elevation. For example, spring may arrive as soon as early March in the southern parts of this zone or as late as May in the north. Annual precipitation in this zone is between 600 millimetres and 1,200 millimetres, most of it in the form of snow during winter, it has cold winters and warm summers. Most such areas fit Dwb. Dry summer continental climates exist in high altitude areas near Mediterranean climates. In some cases, the semi-arid climate classification of BSk can be considered to be continental as long as it has cold winters; the definition of this climate regarding temperature is as follows: the mean temperature of the coldest month must be below −3 °C and there must be at least four months whose mean temperatures are at or above 10 °C. Continental climates exist where cold air masses infiltrate during the winter and warm air masses form in summer under conditions of high sun and long days.
Places with continental climates are as a rule are either far from any moderating effect of oceans or are so situated that prevailing winds tend to head offshore. Such regions get quite warm in the summer, achieving temperatures characteristic of tropical climates but are colder than any other climates of similar latitude in the winter. In the Koppen climate system, these climates grade off toward temperate climates equator-ward where winters are less severe and semi-arid climates where precipitation becomes inadequate for tall-grass prairies. In Europe these climates may grade off into oceanic climates in which the influence of cool oceanic air masses is more marked toward the west; the subarctic climate, with cold and dry winters, but with at least one month above 10 °C, might be considered a sub-type of the continental climate. Canada: throughout much of Southern Canada from the Rocky Mountains to Atlantic Canada. Major cities: Whistler. Marie. While there are no major cities in South America that fall in to the classification of a continental climate, there are some remote places that have this climate.
Due to the influence of the Ocean, including cities such as Punta Arenas and Ushuaia, have an average winter temperature above 0°C, so are classified as an oceanic climate. Argentina: Moderately high elevations in the central Andes west of Mendoza, Argentina towards the Argentine Patagonia's internal areas (e.g.
