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Peatland carbon balance and climate change: from the past to the future

Storage of atmospheric carbon in northern peatlands imparts a cooling effect upon global climate. Climate change may alter peatland carbon cycling, accelerating both decomposition and plant productivity, potentially driving positive or negative climate feedbacks. Experimental and palaeoecological methods are commonly used to investigate peatland responses to climate change, but results are often in disagreement. Whether positive or negative climate feedbacks will dominate in the future is uncertain. This thesis links experimental and palaeoecological approaches on a raised bog in Wales (Cors Fochno), testing the effects of ten-years of warming and increased drought frequency upon ecosystem functioning, and comparing climate responses with those that have occurred in the bog during the past ~1500 years. In the experimental plots, warming reduced both carbon accumulation and methane emissions, and when combined with drought caused the bog to become a net carbon emitter. Shrub abundance increased with warming, which was also seen in the palaeoecological record. Sphagnum abundance did not respond to experimental manipulations. During the past ~1500 years, changes in carbon accumulation corresponded with vegetational succession. Sustained water table drawdown and wildfires resulted in more decay-resilient plant communities. Climate manipulation altered the stabilisation of organic matter with depth. Temperature increases similar to those in the past millennium did not affect decay rates in the plots. Decay during the last ~1500 years resulted from vegetation changes, rather than from temperature changes. Climate change may cause positive feedbacks to dominate in the short term, but long-term shifts towards more decay resistant plant species may offset emissions and contribute to climate cooling. The climatic sensitivity of peatland palaeoecological proxies should be tested in modern settings before they are used to test climate models. As a result of anthropogenic disturbance, palaeoecological records are no longer a good analogue for contemporary and future peatland functioning

Do child care subsidies increase the labour force participation of women in Australia?

We hypothesise that child care subsidies increase the labour force participation of women within Australia. Our alternative hypothesis is that child care subsidies do not increase the labour force participation of women in Australia. This research pulls data from the Australian Bureau of Statistics, the Organisation for Economic Co-operations, Development and the Productivity Commission and Department of Education, Employment and Workplace Relations (DEEWR). Based on the regression analysis performed, we found that there was a notable positive relationship between the labour force participation rates of Australian females and child care subsidies by the Australian government. Nevertheless, it’s relevant to highlight that our data could be impacted by other considerations such as taxation changes coming out of the government and the apparent positive relationship between female employment and education over time

Searching for Intelligent Life in Gravitational Wave Signals Part I: Present Capabilities and Future Horizons

We show that the Laser Interferometer Gravitational Wave Observatory (LIGO) is a powerful instrument in the Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence (SETI). LIGO's ability to detect gravitational waves (GWs) from astrophysical sources, such as binary black hole mergers, also provides the potential to detect extraterrestrial mega-technology, such as Rapid and/or Massive Accelerating spacecraft (RAMAcraft). We show that LIGO is sensitive to RAMAcraft of 1 Jupiter mass accelerating to a fraction of the speed of light (e.g. 30\%) from $10 - 100\,$kpc or a Moon mass from $1-10\,$pc. While existing SETI searches can probe on the order of ten-thousand stars for human-scale technology (e.g. radio waves), LIGO can probe all 10$^{11}$ stars in the Milky Way for RAMAcraft. Moreover, thanks to the $f^{-1}$ scaling of RAMAcraft signals, our sensitivity to these objects will increase as low-frequency detectors are developed and improved, allowing for the detection of smaller masses further from Earth. In particular, we find that DECIGO and the Big Bang Observer (BBO) will be about 100 times more sensitive than LIGO, increasing the search volume by 10$^{6}$, while LISA and Pulsar Timing Arrays (PTAs) may improve sensitivities to objects with long acceleration periods. In this paper, we calculate the waveforms for linearly-accelerating RAMAcraft in a form suitable for LIGO, Virgo, and KAGRA searches and provide the range for a variety of masses and accelerations. We expect that the current and upcoming GW detectors will soon become an excellent complement to the existing SETI efforts.Comment: 20 pages, 12 figures, submitted to MNRAS, comments welcom

In situ monitoring of powder blending by non-invasive Raman spectrometry with wide area illumination

A 785 nm diode laser and probe with a 6 mm spot size were used to obtain spectra of stationary powders and powders mixing at 50 rpm in a high shear convective blender. Two methods of assessing the effect of particle characteristics on the Raman sampling depth for microcrystalline cellulose (Avicel), aspirin or sodium nitrate were compared: (i) the information depth, based on the diminishing Raman signal of TiO2 in a reference plate as the depth of powder prior to the plate was increased, and (ii) the depth at which a sample became infinitely thick, based on the depth of powder at which the Raman signal of the compound became constant The particle size, shape, density and/or light absorption capability of the compounds were shown to affect the "information" and "infinitely thick" depths of individual compounds. However, when different sized fractions of aspirin were added to Avicel as the main component, the depth values of aspirin were the same and matched that of the Avicel: 1.7 mm for the "information" depth and 3.5 mm for the "infinitely thick" depth. This latter value was considered to be the minimum Raman sampling depth when monitoring the addition of aspirin to Avicel in the blender. Mixing profiles for aspirin were obtained non-invasively through the glass wall of the vessel and could be used to assess how the aspirin blended into the main component, identify the end point of the mixing process (which varied with the particle size of the aspirin), and determine the concentration of aspirin in real time. The Raman procedure was compared to two other non-invasive monitoring techniques, near infrared (NIR) spectrometry and broadband acoustic emission spectrometry. The features of the mixing profiles generated by the three techniques were similar for addition of aspirin to Avicel. Although Raman was less sensitive than NIR spectrometry, Raman allowed compound specific mixing profiles to be generated by studying the mixing behaviour of an aspirin-aspartame-Avicel mixture

Closed-form sums for some perturbation series involving associated Laguerre polynomials

Infinite series sum_{n=1}^infty {(alpha/2)_n / (n n!)}_1F_1(-n, gamma, x^2), where_1F_1(-n, gamma, x^2)={n!_(gamma)_n}L_n^(gamma-1)(x^2), appear in the first-order perturbation correction for the wavefunction of the generalized spiked harmonic oscillator Hamiltonian H = -d^2/dx^2 + B x^2 + A/x^2 + lambda/x^alpha 0 0, A >= 0. It is proved that the series is convergent for all x > 0 and 2 gamma > alpha, where gamma = 1 + (1/2)sqrt(1+4A). Closed-form sums are presented for these series for the cases alpha = 2, 4, and 6. A general formula for finding the sum for alpha/2 = 2 + m, m = 0,1,2, ..., in terms of associated Laguerre polynomials, is also provided.Comment: 16 page

Randomised trial of glutamine, selenium, or both, to supplement parenteral nutrition for critically ill patients

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All the Brain\u27s a Stage for Serotonin: The Forgotten Story of Serotonin Diffusion across Cell Membranes

In the conventional model of serotonin neurotransmission, serotonin released by neurons in the midbrain raphe nuclei exerts its actions on forebrain neurons by interacting with a large family of post-synaptic receptors. The actions of serotonin are terminated by active transport of serotonin back into the releasing neuron, which is mediated by the serotonin reuptake transporter (SERT). Because SERT is expressed pre-synaptically and is widely thought to be the only serotonin transporter in the forebrain, the conventional model does not include serotonin transport into post-synaptic neurons. However, a large body of evidence accumulating since the 1970s has shown that serotonin, despite having a positive charge, can cross cell membranes through a diffusion-like process. Multiple low-affinity, high-capacity, sodium-independent transporters, widely expressed in the brain, allow the carrier-mediated diffusion of serotonin into forebrain neurons. The amount of serotonin crossing cell membranes through this mechanism under physiological conditions is considerable. Most prominent textbooks fail to include this alternative method of serotonin uptake in the brain, and even most neuroscientists are unaware of it. This failure has limited our understanding of a key regulator of serotonergic neurotransmission, impeded research on the potential intracellular actions of serotonin in post-synaptic neurons and glial cells, and may have impeded our understanding of the mechanism by which antidepressant medications reduce depressive symptoms

Saltmarsh blue carbon accumulation rates and their relationship with sea-level rise on a multi-decadal timescale in northern England

Feldwork and elemental and thermogravimetric analyses were conducted as a part of the NERC funded (NE/R010846/1) Carbon Storage in Intertidal Environments (C-SIDE) project (https://www.c-side.org/).Saltmarshes are widely thought to sequester carbon at rates significantly exceeding those found in terrestrial environments. This ability arises from the in-situ production of plant biomass and the effective trapping and storage of both autochthonous and allochthonous organic carbon. The role saltmarshes play in climate change mitigation, through accumulating ‘blue’ carbon, depends on both the rate at which carbon accumulates within sediments and the rapidity with which carbon is remineralised. It has been hypothesized that carbon accumulation rates, in turn, depend on the local rate of relative sea-level rise, with faster sea-level rise providing more accommodation space for carbon storage. This relationship has been investigated over long (millennial) and short (decadal) timescales but without accounting for the impact of higher quantities of labile carbon in more recently deposited sediment. This study addresses these three key aspects in a saltmarsh sediment study from Lindisfarne National Nature Reserve (NNR), northern England, where there is a comparatively pristine marsh. We quantify rates of carbon accumulation by combining a Bayesian age-depth model based on 210Pb and 137Cs activities with centimetre-resolution organic carbon density measurements. We also use thermogravimetric analyses to determine the relative proportions of labile and recalcitrant organic matter and calculate the net recalcitrant organic matter accumulation rate. Results indicate that during the 20th century more carbon accumulated at the Lindisfarne NNR saltmarsh during decades with relatively high rates of sea-level rise. The post-depositional loss of labile carbon down the core results in a weaker though still significant relationship between recalcitrant organic matter accumulation and sea-level change. Thus, increasing saltmarsh carbon accumulation driven by higher rates of sea-level rise is demonstrated over recent multi-decadal timescales.Peer reviewe