JWST-TST DREAMS : quartz clouds in the atmosphere of WASP-17b

Funding: D.G. acknowledges funding from the UKRI STFC Consolidated grant No. ST/V000454/1. H.R.W. was funded by UK Research and Innovation (UKRI) under the UK government's Horizon Europe funding guarantee (grant No. EP/Y006313/1). A.G. acknowledges support from the Robert R. Shrock Graduate Fellowship. J.G. acknowledges funding from SERB research grant No. SRG/2022/000727. R.J.M. is supported by NASA through the NASA Hubble Fellowship grant No. HST-HF2-51513.001, awarded by the Space Telescope Science Institute, which is operated by the Association of Universities for Research in Astronomy, Inc., for NASA, under contract NAS 5-26555. We acknowledge the MIT SuperCloud and Lincoln Laboratory Supercomputing Center for providing high performance computing resources that have contributed to the research results reported within this paper. Resources supporting this work were provided by the NASA High-End Computing (HEC) Program through the NASA Advanced Supercomputing (NAS) Division at Ames Research Center. N.E.B. acknowledges support from NASA's Interdisciplinary Consortia for Astrobiology Research (grant No. NNH19ZDA001N-ICAR) under award number 19-ICAR19_2-0041.Clouds are prevalent in many of the exoplanet atmospheres that have been observed to date. For transiting exoplanets, we know if clouds are present because they mute spectral features and cause wavelength-dependent scattering. While the exact composition of these clouds is largely unknown, this information is vital to understanding the chemistry and energy budget of planetary atmospheres. In this work, we observe one transit of the hot Jupiter WASP-17b with JWST's MIRI LRS and generate a transmission spectrum from 5-12 μm. These wavelengths allow us to probe absorption due to the vibrational modes of various predicted cloud species. Our transmission spectrum shows additional opacity centered at 8.6 μm, and detailed atmospheric modeling and retrievals identify this feature as SiO2(s) (quartz) clouds. The SiO2(s) clouds model is preferred at 3.5-4.2σ versus a cloud-free model and at 2.6σ versus a generic aerosol prescription. We find the SiO2(s) clouds are comprised of small ~0.01 μm particles, which extend to high altitudes in the atmosphere. The atmosphere also shows a depletion of H2O, a finding consistent with the formation of high-temperature aerosols from oxygen-rich species. This work is part of a series of studies by our JWST Telescope Scientist Team (JWST-TST), in which we will use Guaranteed Time Observations to perform Deep Reconnaissance of Exoplanet Atmospheres through Multi-instrument Spectroscopy (DREAMS).Peer reviewe

A developmentalist’s view of inheritance

Recent years have witnessed the emergence of extensive new data suggesting a different view of inheritance from the view that has dominated biology for over a century. It suggests that what is transmitted across generations are the developmental means to construct phenotypes predicted to match anticipated environmental conditions. Those ‘developmental means’ include genes, but also other resources that parents bequeath to descendants, as well as activities parents engage in to construct the environmental context in which their offspring develop. If there are similarities between the traits of parents and offspring it is because, within lineages, phenotypes are reliably re-constructed across generations. Extra-genetic inheritance processes do an important job in evolution, but that job is, in the main, distinct from that of genetic inheritance. They are best regarded – not as noise, fine-tuning or baroque “add ons” (Wray et al. 2014) – but as essential tools for short-term, rapid-response adaptation. The true function of heredity is to make an informed forecast.Peer reviewe

Co-production in community-based substance use disorder treatment services : a scoping review

Purpose of review The personal and social harms from unmanaged substance use disorders (SUD) are substantial. Too few people with SUD are engaged in treatment, partly due to the acceptability and accessibility of services. Co-production – sharing power and decision-making between professionals and people with lived experience (PWLE) – could address barriers to improve uptake and outcomes of SUD treatment. This scoping review examined recent (18 months) literature on co-production in community SUD treatment services. Recent findings Co-production has been used to address barriers to care and co-design new interventions and services, especially for marginalised populations and groups with complex needs. Methods, processes, and the degree of meaningful involvement of PWLE varied across projects. Most work occurred in higher income countries and the impacts on PWLE were rarely explored. Summary Co-production is feasible and can inform the development of more patient-centred SUD treatment services. Projects should be grounded in theory and power differentials in decision-making addressed to ensure equitable and meaningful participation throughout the process. There is a need to explore co-production in the design and evaluation of general SUD treatment, sustainability, impacts on participants, and evaluation of long-term outcomes.Peer reviewe

Terrestrial evidence for volcanogenic sulfate-driven cooling event ~30 kyr before the Cretaceous-Paleogene mass extinction

Funding: The study was funded by UK Natural Environment Research Council grant NE/S002324/1 awarded to R.M.J., S.K.L., G.D.P., and B.E.v.D. L.K.O. is supported by the Netherlands Earth System Science Centre (grant no. 024.002.001). T.R.L. is supported by the National Science Foundation (NSF-FRES-2317666).Alongside the Chicxulub meteorite impact, Deccan volcanism is considered a primary trigger for the Cretaceous- Paleogene (K-Pg) mass extinction. Models suggest that volcanic outgassing of carbon and sulfur - potent environmental stressors - drove global temperature change, but the relative timing, duration, and magnitude of such change remains uncertain. Here, we use the organic paleothermometer MBT'5me and the carbon-isotope composition of two K-Pg-spanning lignites from the western Unites States, to test models of volcanogenic air temperature change in the ~100 kyr before the mass extinction. Our records show long-term warming of ~3°C, probably driven by Deccan CO2 emissions, and reveal a transient (<10 kyr) ~5°C cooling event, coinciding with the peak of the Poladpur "pulse" of Deccan eruption ~30 kyr before the K-Pg boundary. This cooling was likely caused by the aerosolization of volcanogenic sulfur. Temperatures returned to pre-event values before the mass extinction, suggesting that, from the terrestrial perspective, volcanogenic climate change was not the primary cause of K-Pg extinction.Peer reviewe

PyTICS : an iterative method for photometric light-curve intercalibration using comparison stars

Funding: RV acknowledges support from STFC studentship ST/Y509589/1. JVHS acknowledges support from Science and Technology Facilities Council (STFC) grant ST/V000861/1.Intensive reverberation mapping monitoring programs combine ground-based photometric observations from different telescopes, requiring intercalibration of light-curves to reduce systematic instrumental differences. We present a new iterative algorithm to calibrate photometric time-series data of active galactic nuclei (AGNs) using 100s of comparison stars on the same images, building upon the established method of ensemble photometry. The algorithm determines telescope-specific and epoch-specific correction parameters, and simultaneously computes a multicomponent noise model to account for underestimated uncertainties based on the scatter in the comparison star data, effectively identifying problematic epochs, telescopes, and stars. No assumptions need to be made about the AGN variability shape, and the algorithm can, in principle, be applied to any astronomical object. We demonstrate our method on light-curves taken with ten 1-m telescopes from the Las Cumbres Observatory (LCO) robotic telescope network. Comparing our results to other intercalibration tools, we find that the algorithm can more accurately quantify the uncertainties in the data. We describe additional corrections that can be made for particularly bluer AGNs like Fairall 9, arising due to systematic effects dependent on star colour.Peer reviewe

Distinct intraseasonal oscillation modes over the tropical Indo-Pacific oceans

Funding: This work was supported by the National Key Program for Developing Basic Science (Grants 2022YFF0801702 and 2022YFE0106600), the National Natural Science Foundation of China (Grants 42175060 and 42175021), the Jiangsu Province Science Foundation (Grant BK20250200302). The authors are thankful for the support of the Jiangsu Provincial Innovation Center for Climate Change.In boreal winter, the Madden-Julian Oscillation (MJO) is the dominant mode of tropical intraseasonal oscillation (ISO), which bridges weather and climate. In addition to the dominant eastward propagating MJO mode, this study identifies the existence of the westward propagating and stationary oscillating ISO modes according to the spatio-temporal evolution of large-scale precipitation. At the pentad timescale, each ISO mode tends to suppress the occurrence of the other two. The diagnostic of column-integrated moist static energy (MSE) tendency anomalies reveals the dominant contribution from horizontal MSE advection to each ISO mode. Synthesis results indicate that vertical zonal wind shear anomalies exhibit opposite distributions between the propagating and stationary oscillating ISO events over the tropical Indo-Pacific Oceans. Subsequent simulations prove that the easterly (westerly) wind shear anomalies could suppress the eastward (westward) propagating convection of the ISO, thus favoring a stationary oscillating ISO.Peer reviewe

Relaxation of natural selection in the evolution of the giant lungfish genomes

Funding: This work was supported by the University of Ferrara (Italy) and funded by the MIUR PRIN 2017 grant 201794ZXTL to G.B. S.F., G.B., and R.B. are deeply grateful to Jane Hughes and Dan Schmidt for their hospitality at the Griffith University, Queensland, and for their friendship.Nonadaptive hypotheses on the evolution of eukaryotic genome size predict an expansion when the process of purifying selection becomes weak. Accordingly, species with huge genomes, such as lungfish, are expected to show a genome-wide relaxation signature of selection compared with other organisms. However, few studies have empirically tested this prediction using genomic data in a comparative framework. Here, we show that 1) the newly assembled transcriptome of the Australian lungfish, Neoceratodus forsteri, is characterized by an excess of pervasive transcription, or transcriptional leakage, possibly due to suboptimal transcriptional control, and 2) a significant relaxation signature in coding genes in lungfish species compared with other vertebrates. Based on these observations, we propose that the largest known animal genomes evolved in a nearly neutral scenario where genome expansion is less efficiently constrained.Peer reviewe

The maximality of T in Thompson's group V

Funding: The fourth author was partially funded by NSF DMS-2005297.We show that R. Thompson’s group T is a maximal subgroup of the group V. The argument provides examples of foundational calculations which arise when expressing elements of V as products of transpositions of basic clopen sets in the Cantor space ℭ.Peer reviewe

Pierrot and his world : art, theatricality, and the marketplace in France, 1697-1945

Pierrot, a theatrical stock character known by his distinctive costume of loose white tunic and trousers, is a ubiquitous figure in French art and culture. This richly illustrated book offers an account of Pierrot's recurrence in painting, printmaking, photography and film, tracing this distinctive type from the art of Antoine Watteau to the cinema of Occupied France. As a visual type, Pierrot thrives at the intersection of theatrical and marketplace practices. From Watteau's Pierrot (c. 1720) and Édouard Manet's The Old Musician (1862) to Nadar and Adrien Tournachon's Pierrot the Photographer (1855) and the landmark film Children of Paradise (1945), Pierrot has given artists a medium through which to explore the marketplace as a form for both social life and creative practice. Simultaneously a human figure and a theatrical mask, Pierrot elicits artistic reflection on the representation of personality in the marketplace

Development and innovation in a new distributed medical programme : Scottish Graduate Entry Medicine (ScotGEM)

Funding: The author(s) declare that financial support was received for the research and/or publication of this article. We thank the University of Dundee for funding the article processing charge.Introduction: Addressing the shortage of primary-care physicians, especially in remote and rural areas, is a crucial target in many countries. This article introduces the Scottish Graduate Entry Medicine (ScotGEM) programme: a compressed, tailor-made curriculum designed to equip and enthuse its graduates to practice generalist and rural medicine in Scotland, within the ethos of socially accountable medicine. Methods: This curriculum paper describes ScotGEM in sufficient detail for the reader to translate elements to their own context. It then collates findings from evaluations, research projects and many critical discussions about the programme. This work is used to describe and evaluate the curriculum design and delivery, with a focus on the distributed aspects. Results: Three key innovations of the curriculum are explored in detail: the Generalist Clinical Mentor (GCM) role; the year-long primary care Longitudinal Integrated Clerkship (LIC); and the Agents of Change curriculum. There are early signs that ScotGEM is encouraging generalist, rural careers within Scotland. There is also growing evidence of the benefits ScotGEM faculty and students bring to the clinical workforce in the distributed settings. Discussion: Distributed programmes require additional organization for students and faculty. Partnerships can be challenging but immensely rewarding. Healthcare partners in rural areas need to be involved early in planning and strong relationships fostered with local “champions.”Peer reviewe