The 25 October 2010 Mentawai tsunami earthquake (M_w 7.8) and the tsunami hazard presented by shallow megathrust ruptures

The 25 October 2010 Mentawai, Indonesia earthquake (M_w 7.8) ruptured the shallow portion of the subduction zone seaward of the Mentawai islands, off-shore of Sumatra, generating 3 to 9 m tsunami run-up along southwestern coasts of the Pagai Islands that took at least 431 lives. Analyses of teleseismic P, SH and Rayleigh waves for finite-fault source rupture characteristics indicate ∼90 s rupture duration with a low rupture velocity of ∼1.5 km/s on the 10° dipping megathrust, with total slip of 2–4 m over an ∼100 km long source region. The seismic moment-scaled energy release is 1.4 × 10^(−6), lower than 2.4 × 10^(−6) found for the 17 July 2006 Java tsunami earthquake (M_w 7.8). The Mentawai event ruptured up-dip of the slip region of the 12 September 2007 Kepulauan earthquake (M_w 7.9), and together with the 4 January 1907 (M 7.6) tsunami earthquake located seaward of Simeulue Island to the northwest along the arc, demonstrates the significant tsunami generation potential for shallow megathrust ruptures in regions up-dip of great underthrusting events in Indonesia and elsewhere

Evaluation of a population-based prevention program against influenza among Swiss elderly people.

Influenza is a major cause of morbidity and mortality and occurs in epidemics in the winter. This study is an evaluation of a population-based prevention program against Influenza, implemented during autumn 2000 by the Health Department of the Canton of Vaud. A pre-intervention/post-intervention design was used. In June 2000 and March 2001, 4007 questionnaires were sent to two different stratified random samples of people aged 65 and over living in the Canton of Vaud, Switzerland. Univariate, bivariate and multivariate analyses were performed. Vaccination coverage among people older than 65 was 58.0% in 1999 (95% CI: 56.2%-59.8%) and 58.4% (95% CI: 56.6%-60.2%) in 2000. A 6.5% significant increase in vaccination coverage was seen in the group of people aged 65 to 69 (p = 0.008). In the pre-intervention survey immunisation rates were 22.6% among people who had not consulted a physician, 59.2% among those who had consulted a physician once, and 73.2% among those who consulted twice or more (p = 0.001). These rates were respectively 30.8%, 58.0% and 75.1% (p = 0.001) in the post-intervention survey. No global increase in Influenza vaccination coverage in the elderly population could be observed following a community based intervention in a Swiss Canton. However, the enhanced vaccination rates noted in the 65-69 years old group and in people who did not receive medical care are compatible with an effect of the campaign. Further increase in vaccination coverage may be obtained by diversification and repetition of such promotion campaigns

The suitability of infrared temperature measurements for continuous temperature monitoring in gilts

The aim of this study was to evaluate whether an infrared thermometer, a pyrometer, could detect the body surface temperature in the orbital area of gilts without contacting them. Furthermore, it was tested whether an increase in the gilts' temperatures could be detected. Therefore, fever was induced. During 11 trials, 43 German Landrace gilts were injected with either a Porcilis AR-T DF (Intervet International B.V., Boxmeer, Netherlands) vaccine or 2 ml of 0.9 % NaCl. A commercial temperature logger (TRIX-8, LogTag Recorders, Auckland, New Zealand) was placed in the vagina to record temperature data every 3 min. The pyrometer (optris cs, Optris, Berlin, Germany) was aimed at where the orbital area of the gilts would be. While they were drinking, temperature measurements were done in that site by the pyrometer. Time periods from 0.25 to 6 h were analysed. Considering the 0.25-h period, a positive correlation (ρ=0.473) between temperatures of the logger and the pyrometer was found for 15 of 39 gilts. The longer the chosen measuring period was, the fewer animals showed a significant correlation between the two temperatures. In contrast to the vaginal logger, the pyrometer cannot detect an increase in the body temperature in all fever-induced gilts. In conclusion, a pyrometer cannot detect the body surface temperature reliably. An increase in the body surface temperature over a short time period (on average 5 h) could not be detected by the pyrometer. The temperature increase measured using the pyrometer was too low and time-delayed compared to the temperature detected by the vaginal logger

Evaluating the potential of dietary crude protein manipulation in reducing ammonia emissions from cattle and pig manure: A meta-analysis

Dietary manipulation of animal diets by reducing crude protein (CP) intake is a strategic NH3 abatement option as it reduces the overall nitrogen input at the very beginning of the manure management chain. This study presents a comprehensive meta-analysis of scientific literature on NH3 reductions following a reduction of CP in cattle and pig diets. Results indicate higher mean NH3 reductions of 17 ± 6% per %-point CP reduction for cattle as compared to 11 ± 6% for pigs. Variability in NH3 emission reduction estimates reported for different manure management stages and pig categories did not indicate a significant influence. Statistically significant relationships exist between CP reduction, NH3 emissions and total ammoniacal nitrogen content in manure for both pigs and cattle, with cattle revealing higher NH3 reductions and a clearer trend in relationships. This is attributed to the greater attention given to feed optimization in pigs relative to cattle and also due to the specific physiology of ruminants to efficiently recycle nitrogen in situations of low protein intake. The higher NH3 reductions in cattle highlights the opportunity to extend concepts of feed optimization from pigs and poultry to cattle production systems to further reduce NH3 emissions from livestock manure. The results presented help to accurately quantify the effects of NH3 abatement following reduced CP levels in animal diets distinguishing between animal types and other physiological factors. This is useful in the development of emission factors associated with reduced CP as an NH3 abatement option

Mesons from global Anti-de Sitter space

In the context of gauge/gravity duality, we study both probe D7-- and probe D5--branes in global Anti-de Sitter space. The dual field theory is N=4 theory on R x S^3 with added flavour. The branes undergo a geometrical phase transition in this geometry as function of the bare quark mass m_q in units of 1/R with R the S^3 radius. The meson spectra are obtained from fluctuations of the brane probes. First, we study them numerically for finite quark mass through the phase transition. Moreover, at zero quark mass we calculate the meson spectra analytically both in supergravity and in free field theory on R x S^3 and find that the results match: For the chiral primaries, the lowest level is given by the zero point energy or by the scaling dimension of the operator corresponding to the fluctuations, respectively. The higher levels are equidistant. Similar results apply to the descendents. Our results confirm the physical interpretation that the mesons cannot pair-produce any further when their zero-point energy exceeds their binding energy.Comment: 43 pages, 8 figures, references edited, few typos corrected, updated to match the published versio

Household food insecurity positively associated with increased hospital charges for infants

Objective: To test whether household food insecurity (HFI) was associated with total annual hospitalization charges, annual days hospitalized, and charges per day, among low-income infants (months) with any non-neonatal hospital stays. Methods: Administrative inpatient hospital charge data were matched to survey data from infants\u27 caregivers interviewed 1998-2005 in emergency departments in Boston and Little Rock. All study infants had been hospitalized at least once since birth; infants whose diagnoses were not plausibly related to nutrition were excluded from both groups. Log-transformed hospitalization charges were analyzed, controlling for site fixed effects. Results: 24% of infants from food-insecure households and 16% from food-secure households were hospitalized \u3e2 times (P=0.02). Mean annual inpatient hospital charges ($6,707 vs$5,735; P Conclusion: HFI was positively associated with annual inpatient charges among hospitalized low income infants. Average annual inpatient charges were almost $2,000 higher (inflation adjusted) for infants living in food-insecure households. Reducing or eliminating food insecurity could reduce health services utilization and expenditures for infants in low-income families, most of whom are covered by public health insurance

Constraining melt geometries beneath the Afar Depression, Ethiopia from teleseismic receiver functions: the anisotropic H-κ stacking technique

Understanding the nature of the crust has long been a goal for seismologists when imaging the Earth. This is particularly true in volcanic regions where imaging melt storage and migration can have important implications for the size and nature of an eruption. Receiver functions and the H-κ stacking (Hκ) technique are often used to constrain crustal thickness (H) and the ratio of P to S wave velocities (κ). In this paper, I show that it is essential to consider anisotropy when performing Hκ. I show that in a medium with horizontally transverse isotropy a strong variation in κ with back azimuth is present, which characterizes the anisotropic medium. In a vertically transverse isotropic medium, no variation in κ with back azimuth is observed, but κ is increased across all back azimuths. Thus, estimates of κ are more difficult to relate to composition than previously thought. I extend these models to melt-induced anisotropy and show that similar patterns are observed, but with more significant variations and increases in κ. Based on these observations, I develop a new anisotropic H-κ stacking technique which inverts Hκ data for melt fraction, aspect ratio, and orientation of melt inclusions. I apply this to data for the Afar Depression and show that melt is stored in interconnected stacked sills in the lower crust, which likely supply the recent volcanic eruptions and dike intrusions. This new technique can be applied to any anisotropic medium where it can provide constraints on the average crustal anisotropy

Holographic Flavor Transport in Arbitrary Constant Background Fields

We use gauge-gravity duality to compute a new transport coefficient associated with a number Nf of massive N=2 supersymmetric hypermultiplet fields propagating through an N=4 SU(Nc) super-Yang-Mills theory plasma in the limits of large Nc and large 't Hooft coupling, with Nf << Nc. We introduce a baryon number density as well as arbitrary constant electric and magnetic fields, generalizing previous calculations by including a magnetic field with a component parallel to the electric field. We can thus compute all components of the conductivity tensor associated with transport of baryon number charge, including a component never before calculated in gauge-gravity duality. We also compute the contribution that the flavor degrees of freedom make to the stress-energy tensor, which exhibits divergences associated with the rates of energy and momentum loss of the flavor degrees of freedom. We discuss two currents that are free from these divergences, one of which becomes anomalous when the magnetic field has a component parallel to the electric field and hence may be related to recent study of charge transport in the presence of anomalies.Comment: 27 page