140 research outputs found
Putterlickia neglecta (Celastraceae), a new species from southern Africa
Putterlickia neglecta, a new species here described and illustrated, is known from South Africa (Mpumalanga and northeastern
KwaZulu-Natal), Swaziland and southern Mozambique. It is considered a near-endemic to the Maputaland Centre
of Endemism. Plants grow as a shrub or small tree in savanna and thicket, or in the understory of inland, coastal and dune
forests. Vegetatively it superficially resembles P. verrucosa, the species with which it has hitherto most often been confused.
Both species have stems with prominently raised lenticels, but P. neglecta differs from P. verrucosa in having sessile to
subsessile leaves with mostly entire, revolute leaf margins, flowers borne on pedicels 8â15 mm long, with petals up to 6 mm
long and spreading or slightly recurved. Putterlickia verrucosa has leaves with distinct petioles, spinulose-denticulate margins,
much smaller flowers borne on pedicels up to 4 mm long, with petals up to 2 mm long and erect or slightly spreading.
The relatively large flowers of P. neglecta resemble those of P. pyracantha, but the latter differs in having stems with obscure
or sunken lenticels, leaf margins entire or spinulose-denticulate and inflorescence axes as well as pedicels usually reddish. A
comparative table to distinguish among the five currently recognized species of Putterlickia is provided.http://www.mapress.com/phytotaxahb201
Supersymmetric effects in top quark decay into polarized W-boson
We investigate the one-loop supersymmetric QCD (SUSY-QCD) and electroweak
(SUSY-EW) corrections to the top quark decay into a b-quark and a longitudinal
or transverse W-boson. The corrections are presented in terms of the
longitudinal ratio \Gamma(t-->W_L b)/\Gamma(t--> W b) and the transverse ratio
\Gamma(t-->W_- b)/\Gamma(t--> W b). In most of the parameter space, both
SUSY-QCD and SUSY-EW corrections to these ratios are found to be less than 1%
in magnitude and they tend to have opposite signs. The corrections to the total
width \Gamma(t-->W b) are also presented for comparison with the existing
results in the literature. We find that our SUSY-EW corrections to the total
width differ significantly from previous studies: the previous studies give a
large correction of more than 10% in magnitude for a large part of the
parameter space while our results reach only few percent at most.Comment: Version in PRD (explanation and refs added
The spectrum of high-energy cosmic rays measured with KASCADE-Grande
The energy spectrum of cosmic rays between 10**16 eV and 10**18 eV, derived
from measurements of the shower size (total number of charged particles) and
the total muon number of extensive air showers by the KASCADE-Grande
experiment, is described. The resulting all-particle energy spectrum exhibits
strong hints for a hardening of the spectrum at approximately 2x10**16 eV and a
significant steepening at c. 8x10**16 eV. These observations challenge the view
that the spectrum is a single power law between knee and ankle. Possible
scenarios generating such features are discussed in terms of astrophysical
processes that may explain the transition region from galactic to extragalactic
origin of cosmic rays.Comment: accepted by Astroparticle Physics June 201
Exact Hypersurface-Homogeneous Solutions in Cosmology and Astrophysics
A framework is introduced which explains the existence and similarities of
most exact solutions of the Einstein equations with a wide range of sources for
the class of hypersurface-homogeneous spacetimes which admit a Hamiltonian
formulation. This class includes the spatially homogeneous cosmological models
and the astrophysically interesting static spherically symmetric models as well
as the stationary cylindrically symmetric models. The framework involves
methods for finding and exploiting hidden symmetries and invariant submanifolds
of the Hamiltonian formulation of the field equations. It unifies, simplifies
and extends most known work on hypersurface-homogeneous exact solutions. It is
shown that the same framework is also relevant to gravitational theories with a
similar structure, like Brans-Dicke or higher-dimensional theories.Comment: 41 pages, REVTEX/LaTeX 2.09 file (don't use LaTeX2e !!!) Accepted for
publication in Phys. Rev.
Evidence for a mixed mass composition at the `ankle' in the cosmic-ray spectrum
We report a first measurement for ultra-high energy cosmic rays of the
correlation between the depth of shower maximum and the signal in the water
Cherenkov stations of air-showers registered simultaneously by the fluorescence
and the surface detectors of the Pierre Auger Observatory. Such a correlation
measurement is a unique feature of a hybrid air-shower observatory with
sensitivity to both the electromagnetic and muonic components. It allows an
accurate determination of the spread of primary masses in the cosmic-ray flux.
Up till now, constraints on the spread of primary masses have been dominated by
systematic uncertainties. The present correlation measurement is not affected
by systematics in the measurement of the depth of shower maximum or the signal
in the water Cherenkov stations. The analysis relies on general characteristics
of air showers and is thus robust also with respect to uncertainties in
hadronic event generators. The observed correlation in the energy range around
the `ankle' at differs significantly from
expectations for pure primary cosmic-ray compositions. A light composition made
up of proton and helium only is equally inconsistent with observations. The
data are explained well by a mixed composition including nuclei with mass . Scenarios such as the proton dip model, with almost pure compositions, are
thus disfavoured as the sole explanation of the ultrahigh-energy cosmic-ray
flux at Earth.Comment: Published version. Added journal reference and DOI. Added Report
Numbe
Some aspects of the Liouville equation in mathematical physics and statistical mechanics
This paper presents some mathematical aspects of Classical Liouville theorem
and we have noted some mathematical theorems about its initial value problem.
Furthermore, we have implied on the formal frame work of Stochastic Liouville
equation (SLE)
A decentralized approach to model national and global food and land use systems
The achievement of several sustainable development goals and the Paris Climate Agreement depends on rapid progress towards sustainable food and land systems in all countries. We have built a flexible, collaborative modeling framework to foster the development of national pathways by local research teams and their integration up to global scale. Local researchers independently customize national models to explore mid-century pathways of the food and land use system transformation in collaboration with stakeholders. An online platform connects the national models, iteratively balances global exports and imports, and aggregates results to the global level. Our results show that actions toward greater sustainability in countries could sum up to 1 Mha net forest gain per year, 950 Mha net gain in the land where natural processes predominate, and an increased CO2 sink of 3.7 GtCO2e yrâ1 over the period 2020â2050 compared to current trends, while average food consumption per capita remains above the adequate food requirements in all countries. We show examples of how the global linkage impacts national results and how different assumptions in national pathways impact global results. This modeling setup acknowledges the broad heterogeneity of socio-ecological contexts and the fact that people who live in these different contexts should be empowered to design the future they want. But it also demonstrates to local decision-makers the interconnectedness of our food and land use system and the urgent need for more collaboration to converge local and global priorities
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