No preference in female sika deer for conspecific over heterospecific male sexual calls in a mate choice context

Mating signals can be used both in contexts of species recognition and mate quality assessment. This study examines species recognition abilities in oestrous females presented with male mating calls from both conspecifics and closely related allopatric heterospecifics. Red deer and sika deer are naturally allopatric polygynous species capable of hybridization during sympatry. Male mating calls are sexually selected and differ greatly between species. Previous work indicated that most but not all oestrous red deer hinds prefer male mating calls from conspecifics over heterospecific sika deer. Using two-speaker playback experiments, we extend this examination by measuring the preference responses of oestrous sika deer hinds to these stimuli. We predicted that oestrous sika deer hinds will show little flexibility in behavioural responses and prefer conspecific calls over heterospecific calls, similar to those of red deer hinds. In contrast, sika deer hinds showed high levels of flexibility and no difference in overall preference behaviours, suggesting that vocal behaviour does not provide a solid barrier to hybridization in this species. The asymmetry in heterospecific preference responses between these species is discussed in relation to possible causation and hybridization patterns observed in free-ranging populations

Do red deer hinds prefer stags that produce harsh roars in mate choice contexts?

Red deer stags give two types of roars during the breeding season, termed ‘common’ and ‘harsh’ roars. This study tested the hypothesis that the characteristic spectro-temporal structure of male harsh roars functions to directly attract females towards male callers during the breeding season. The results show that oestrous hinds look for longer towards speakers broadcasting sequences containing harsh roars, but do not preferentially approach or spend more time in close proximity to speakers broadcasting harsh roars over those broadcasting only common roars. While these observations confirm that the specific acoustic structure of male harsh roars functions to draw the attention of hinds, they are not consistent with the notion that these calls have an immediate impact on mate choice decisions by stimulating oestrous hinds to move towards male callers. Consequently, we suggest that intersexual selection through female mate choice is unlikely to be a major factor driving the evolution of male red deer harsh roars

Making ARPES Measurements on Corrugated Monolayer Crystals: Suspended Exfoliated Single-Crystal Graphene

Free-standing exfoliated monolayer graphene is an ultra-thin flexible membrane, which exhibits out of plane deformation or corrugation. In this paper, a technique is described to measure the band structure of such free-standing graphene by angle-resolved photoemission. Our results show that photoelectron coherence is limited by the crystal corrugation. However, by combining surface morphology measurements of the graphene roughness with angle-resolved photoemission, energy dependent quasiparticle lifetime and bandstructure measurements can be extracted. Our measurements rely on our development of an analytical formulation for relating the crystal corrugation to the photoemission linewidth. Our ARPES measurements show that, despite significant deviation from planarity of the crystal, the electronic structure of exfoliated suspended graphene is nearly that of ideal, undoped graphene; we measure the Dirac point to be within 25 meV of $E_F$ . Further, we show that suspended graphene behaves as a marginal Fermi-liquid, with a quasiparticle lifetime which scales as $(E - E_F)^{-1}$; comparison with other graphene and graphite data is discussed

Cooling down Levy flights

Let L(t) be a Levy flights process with a stability index \alpha\in(0,2), and U be an external multi-well potential. A jump-diffusion Z satisfying a stochastic differential equation dZ(t)=-U'(Z(t-))dt+\sigma(t)dL(t) describes an evolution of a Levy particle of an `instant temperature' \sigma(t) in an external force field. The temperature is supposed to decrease polynomially fast, i.e. \sigma(t)\approx t^{-\theta} for some \theta>0. We discover two different cooling regimes. If \theta<1/\alpha (slow cooling), the jump diffusion Z(t) has a non-trivial limiting distribution as t\to \infty, which is concentrated at the potential's local minima. If \theta>1/\alpha (fast cooling) the Levy particle gets trapped in one of the potential wells

Aumento da resistência mecanica a penetração em função da perda natural de umidade no solo.

Nosso objetivo foi verificar a variação de umidade e sua interferência sobre a resistência mecânica a penetração em um latossolo amarelo disrófico (Lad) sobre relevo plano em área de pastagem, sob condições de clima Amazônico, através de modelo estatísticos de regressão polinomial de 2º grau

Looking back to see the future: building nuclear power plants in Europe

The so-called ‘nuclear renaissance’ in Europe is promulgated by the execution of two large engineering projects involving the construction of two European Pressurized Reactors (EPRs) in Flamanville, France and Olkiluoto in Finland. As both projects have faced budget overruns and delays, this paper analyses their governance and history to derive lessons useful for the construction of future projects. Analysis indicates that the reasons for these poor outcomes are: overoptimistic estimations, first-of-a-kind (FOAK) issues and undervaluation of regulation requirements. These pitfalls have the potential to impact on many other engineering construction projects and highlight fruitful areas of further research into project performance

Dendrometria e avaliação da performance de clones de eucalipto (Eucalyptus grandis x E. urophylla) plantados na região central do Estado de Rondônia.

O objetivo deste trabalho foi selecionar os melhores modelos biométricos para predição da produtividade de híbridos E. grandis x E. urophylla visando caracterizar a performance destes clones em plantios homogêneos e disponibilizar uma ferramenta para prognose do volume de eucalipto em plantio homogêneo no estado de Rondônia.bitstream/CPAF-RO-2009-09/12207/1/bpd47_eucalipto.pd

Influência da desrama artificial sobre o crescimento da teca (Tectona grandis) no Estado de Rondônia.

O objetivo deste trabalho foi quantificar o efeito de diferentes intensidades de desrama no crescimento da teca, visando recomendar a melhor intensidade para a realização deste procedimento nos plantios do Estado de Rondônia.bitstream/item/47490/1/ct114-teca.pd

The electronic Space Weather upper atmosphere (eSWua) project at INGV: advancements and state of the art

The eSWua project is based on measurements performed by all the instruments installed by the upper atmosphere physics group of the Istituto Nazionale di Geofisica e Vulcanologia, Italy and on all the related studies. The aim is the realization of a hardware-software system to standardize historical and real-time observations for different instruments. &lt;br&gt;&lt;br&gt; An interactive Web site, supported by a well organized database, can be a powerful tool for the scientific and technological community in the field of telecommunications and space weather. The most common and useful database type for our purposes is the relational one, in which data are organized in tables for petabytes data archiving and the complete flexibility in data retrieving. &lt;br&gt;&lt;br&gt; The project started in June 2005 and will last till August 2007. In the first phase the major effort has been focused on the design of hardware and database architecture. The first two databases related to the DPS4 digisonde and GISTM measurements are complete concerning populating, tests and output procedures. Details on the structure and Web tools concerning these two databases are presented, as well as the general description of the project and technical features

Sistemas Agroflorestais - SAF's.

Esta cartilha foi feita com o objetivo de divulgar informações referentes à pesquisa sobre os sistemas agroflorestais, mais conhecidos como SAFs, que são utilizados como uma das soluções para a recuperação de áreas degradadas.bitstream/item/56008/1/doc135-sistemas-agroflorestais.pd