A reaction-diffusion model for the hydration/setting of cement

We propose a heterogeneous reaction-diffusion model for the hydration and setting of cement. The model is based on diffusional ion transport and on cement specific chemical dissolution/precipitation reactions under spatial heterogeneous solid/liquid conditions. We simulate the spatial and temporal evolution of precipitated micro structures starting from initial random configurations of anhydrous cement particles. Though the simulations have been performed for two dimensional systems, we are able to reproduce qualitatively basic features of the cement hydration problem. The proposed model is also applicable to general water/mineral systems.Comment: REVTeX (12 pages), 4 postscript figures, tarred, gzipped, uuencoded using `uufiles', coming with separate file(s). Figure 1 consists of 6 color plates; if you have no color printer try to send it to a black&white postscript-plotte

Gauging hadronic systems

We present a general method for incorporating the electromagnetic interaction into descriptions of hadronic processes based on four-dimensional scattering integral equations. The method involves the idea of gauging the scattering equations themselves, and results in electromagnetic amplitudes where an external photon is effectively coupled to every part of every strong interaction diagram in the model. Current conservation is therefore implemented in the theoretically correct fashion. To illustrate our gauging procedure we apply it to the three-nucleon problem whose strong interactions are described by standard three-body integral equations. In this way we obtain the expressions needed to calculate all possible electromagnetic processes of the three-nucleon system: the electromagnetic form factors of the three-body bound state, pd->pd gamma, gamma 3He-> pd, gamma 3He-> ppn, etc. As the photon is coupled everywhere in the strong interaction model, a unified description of the NNN-gamma NNN system is obtained. An interesting aspect of our results is the natural appearance of a subtraction term needed to avoid the overcounting of diagrams.Comment: 6 pages, revtex, epsf, 1 postscript figure, talk at the 15th Int. Conf. on Few-Body Problems in Physics, Groningen, Netherlands, 22-26 July 1997. To be published in Nucl. Phys.

Genetic diversity, infection prevalence, and possible transmission routes of Bartonella spp. in vampire bats

Bartonella spp. are globally distributed bacteria that cause endocarditis in humans and domestic animals. Recent work has suggested bats as zoonotic reservoirs of some human Bartonella infections; however, the ecological and spatiotemporal patterns of infection in bats remain largely unknown. Here we studied the genetic diversity, prevalence of infection across seasons and years, individual risk factors, and possible transmission routes of Bartonella in populations of common vampire bats (Desmodus rotundus) in Peru and Belize, for which high infection prevalence has previously been reported. Phylogenetic analysis of the gltA gene for a subset of PCR-positive blood samples revealed sequences that were related to Bartonella described from vampire bats from Mexico, other Neotropical bat species, and streblid bat flies. Sequences associated with vampire bats clustered significantly by country but commonly spanned Central and South America, implying limited spatial structure. Stable and nonzero Bartonella prevalence between years supported endemic transmission in all sites. The odds of Bartonella infection for individual bats was unrelated to the intensity of bat flies ectoparasitism, but nearly all infected bats were infested, which precluded conclusive assessment of support for vector-borne transmission. While metagenomic sequencing found no strong evidence of Bartonella DNA in pooled bat saliva and fecal samples, we detected PCR positivity in individual saliva and feces, suggesting the potential for bacterial transmission through both direct contact (i.e., biting) and environmental (i.e., fecal) exposures. Further investigating the relative contributions of direct contact, environmental, and vector-borne transmission for bat Bartonella is an important next step to predict infection dynamics within bats and the risks of human and livestock exposures

Swift/UVOT grism monitoring of NGC 5548 in 2013: an attempt at MgII reverberation mapping

Reverberation-mapping-based scaling relations are often used to estimate the masses of black holes from single-epoch spectra of AGN. While the radius-luminosity relation that is the basis of these scaling relations is determined using reverberation mapping of the H$\beta$ line in nearby AGN, the scaling relations are often extended to use other broad emission lines, such as MgII, in order to get black hole masses at higher redshifts when H$\beta$ is redshifted out of the optical waveband. However, there is no radius-luminosity relation determined directly from MgII. Here, we present an attempt to perform reverberation mapping using MgII in the well-studied nearby Seyfert 1, NGC 5548. We used Swift to obtain UV grism spectra of NGC 5548 once every two days from April to September 2013. Concurrent photometric UV monitoring with Swift provides a well determined continuum lightcurve that shows strong variability. The MgII emission line, however, is not strongly correlated with the continuum variability, and there is no significant lag between the two. We discuss these results in the context of using MgII scaling relations to estimate high-redshift black hole masses.Comment: 8 pages, 7 figures, accepted for publication in Ap

A Search for Nitrogen Enriched Quasars in the Sloan Digital Sky Survey Early Data Release

A search for nitrogen-rich quasars in the Sloan Digital Sky Survey Early Data Release (SDSS EDR) catalog has yielded 16 candidates, including five with very prominent emission, but no cases with nitrogen emission as strong as in Q0353-383. The quasar Q0353-383 has long been known to have extremely strong nitrogen intercombination lines at lambda 1486 and lambda 1750 Angstroms, implying an anomalously high nitrogen abundance of about 15 times solar. It is still the only one of its kind known. A preliminary search through the EDR using the observed property of the weak C IV emission seen in Q0353-383 resulted in a sample of 23 objects with unusual emission or absorption-line properties, including one very luminous redshift 2.5 star-forming galaxy. We present descriptions, preliminary emission-line measurements, and spectra for all the objects discussed here.Comment: 20 pages, 5 figures, submitted to AJ; final refereed versio

Predictors and immunological correlates of sublethal mercury exposure in vampire bats

Mercury (Hg) is a pervasive heavy metal that often enters the environment from anthropogenic sources such as gold mining and agriculture. Chronic exposure to Hg can impair immune function, reducing the ability of animals to resist or recover from infections. How Hg influences immunity and susceptibility remains unknown for bats, which appear immunologically distinct from other mammals and are reservoir hosts of many pathogens of importance to human and animal health. We here quantify total Hg (THg) in hair collected from common vampire bats (Desmodus rotundus), which feed on blood and are the main reservoir hosts of rabies virus in Latin America. We examine how diet, sampling site and year, and bat demography influence THg and test the consequences of this variation for eight immune measures. In two populations from Belize, THg concentrations in bats were best explained by an interaction between long-term diet inferred from stable isotopes and year. Bats that foraged more consistently on domestic animals exhibited higher THg. However, relationships between diet and THg were evident only in 2015 but not in 2014, which could reflect recent environmental perturbations associated with agriculture. THg concentrations were low relative to values previously observed in other bat species but still correlated with bat immunity. Bats with higher THg had more neutrophils, weaker bacterial killing ability and impaired innate immunity. These patterns suggest that temporal variation in Hg exposure may impair bat innate immunity and increase susceptibility to pathogens such as bacteria. Unexpected associations between low-level Hg exposure and immune function underscore the need to better understand the environmental sources of Hg exposure in bats and the consequences for bat immunity and susceptibility

Reverberation Mapping Results from MDM Observatory

We present results from a multi-month reverberation mapping campaign undertaken primarily at MDM Observatory with supporting observations from around the world. We measure broad line region (BLR) radii and black hole masses for six objects. A velocity-resolved analysis of the H_beta response shows the presence of diverse kinematic signatures in the BLR.Comment: To appear in the Proceedings of the IAU Symposium No. 267: Co-Evolution of Central Black Holes and Galaxies, Rio de Janeiro, 200

Nitrogen Enriched Quasars in the Sloan Digital Sky Survey First Data Release

The quasar Q0353-383 has long been known to have extremely strong nitrogen intercombination lines at 1486 and 1750 Angstroms, implying an anomalously high nitrogen abundance of ~15 times solar. A search for similar nitrogen-rich quasars in the Sloan Digital Sky Survey First Data Release catalog has yielded 20 candidates, including four with nitrogen emission as strong or stronger than that seen in Q0353-383. Our results indicate that only about 1 in 1700 of quasars have nitrogen abundances similar to Q0353-383, while up to 1 in 130 may be in the process of extreme nitrogen enrichment.Comment: Submitted to AJ - final refereed version; 18 pages, 5 figures, 3 table

Stellar Velocity Dispersion Measurements in High-Luminosity Quasar Hosts and Implications for the AGN Black Hole Mass Scale

We present new stellar velocity dispersion measurements for four luminous quasars with the NIFS instrument and the ALTAIR laser guide star adaptive optics system on the Gemini North 8-m telescope. Stellar velocity dispersion measurements and measurements of the supermassive black hole masses in luminous quasars are necessary to investigate the coevolution of black holes and galaxies, trace the details of accretion, and probe the nature of feedback. We find that higher-luminosity quasars with higher-mass black holes are not offset with respect to the MBH-sigma relation exhibited by lower-luminosity AGNs with lower-mass black holes, nor do we see correlations with galaxy morphology. As part of this analysis, we have recalculated the virial products for the entire sample of reverberation-mapped AGNs and used these data to redetermine the mean virial factor hfi that places the reverberation data on the quiescent M_BH-sigma relation. With our updated measurements and new additions to the AGN sample, we obtain = 4.31 +/- 1.05, which is slightly lower than, but consistent with, most previous determinations.Comment: Accepted for publication in ApJ. For a brief video highlighting the results of this paper, see: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Mxx80aOVw1