Remote sensing data from CLARET: A prototype CART data set

The data set containing radiation, meteorological , and cloud sensor observations is documented. It was prepared for use by the Department of Energy's Atmospheric Radiation Measurement (ARM) Program and other interested scientists. These data are a precursor of the types of data that ARM Cloud And Radiation Testbed (CART) sites will provide. The data are from the Cloud Lidar And Radar Exploratory Test (CLARET) conducted by the Wave Propagation Laboratory during autumn 1989 in the Denver-Boulder area of Colorado primarily for the purpose of developing new cloud-sensing techniques on cirrus. After becoming aware of the experiment, ARM scientists requested archival of subsets of the data to assist in the developing ARM program. Five CLARET cases were selected: two with cirrus, one with stratus, one with mixed-phase clouds, and one with clear skies. Satellite data from the stratus case and one cirrus case were analyzed for statistics on cloud cover and top height. The main body of the selected data are available on diskette from the Wave Propagation Laboratory or Los Alamos National Laboratory

Visual Exploration and Object Recognition by Lattice Deformation

Mechanisms of explicit object recognition are often difficult to investigate and require stimuli with controlled features whose expression can be manipulated in a precise quantitative fashion. Here, we developed a novel method (called “Dots”), for generating visual stimuli, which is based on the progressive deformation of a regular lattice of dots, driven by local contour information from images of objects. By applying progressively larger deformation to the lattice, the latter conveys progressively more information about the target object. Stimuli generated with the presented method enable a precise control of object-related information content while preserving low-level image statistics, globally, and affecting them only little, locally. We show that such stimuli are useful for investigating object recognition under a naturalistic setting – free visual exploration – enabling a clear dissociation between object detection and explicit recognition. Using the introduced stimuli, we show that top-down modulation induced by previous exposure to target objects can greatly influence perceptual decisions, lowering perceptual thresholds not only for object recognition but also for object detection (visual hysteresis). Visual hysteresis is target-specific, its expression and magnitude depending on the identity of individual objects. Relying on the particular features of dot stimuli and on eye-tracking measurements, we further demonstrate that top-down processes guide visual exploration, controlling how visual information is integrated by successive fixations. Prior knowledge about objects can guide saccades/fixations to sample locations that are supposed to be highly informative, even when the actual information is missing from those locations in the stimulus. The duration of individual fixations is modulated by the novelty and difficulty of the stimulus, likely reflecting cognitive demand

The employment of migrant nannies in the UK: negotiating social class in an open market for commoditised in-home care

Migrant women are important sources of labour in the commoditised in-home childcare sector in many regions of the UK. Jobs in this sector, which include nannies as well as au pairs, babysitters, housekeepers and mothers' helps, are often low paid and low status with pay and conditions being determined by employers' circumstances and whims. This article draws on primary data and secondary sources to illustrate the ways in which employers compare migrant nannies with British nannies and other childcare workers in terms of the social class and formal education levels of different groups, with the aim of explaining why migrants are perceived as high-quality candidates for what are often low-paid, low-status jobs. I argue that employers negotiate inter-class relations in this gendered form of employment by understanding their relationship with the migrant nannies they have employed in the context of broader global inequalities—these inequalities are then reproduced and reaffirmed in private homes and across UK culture and society

Long-term evolution of the coupled boundary layers (STRATUS) mooring recovery and deployment cruise report NOAA Research Vessel R H Brown • cruise RB-01-08 9 October - 25 October 2001

This report documents the work done on cruise RB-01-08 of the NOAA R/V Ron Brown. This was Leg 2 of R/V Ron Brown’s participation in Eastern Pacific Investigation of Climate (EPIC) 2001, a study of air-sea interaction, the atmosphere, and the upper ocean in the eastern tropical Pacific. The science party included groups from the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution (WHOI), NOAA Environmental Technology Laboratory (ETL), the University of Washington (UW), the University of California, Santa Barbara (UCSB), and the University Nacional Autonoma de Mexico (UNAM). The work done by these groups is summarized in this report. In addition, the routine underway data collected while aboard R/V Ron Brown is also summarized here.Funding was provided by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration under Grant Numbers NA96GPO429 and NA17RJ1223

Emergence of qualia from brain activity or from an interaction of proto-consciousness with the brain: which one is the weirder? Available evidence and a research agenda

This contribution to the science of consciousness aims at comparing how two different theories can explain the emergence of different qualia experiences, meta-awareness, meta-cognition, the placebo effect, out-of-body experiences, cognitive therapy and meditation-induced brain changes, etc. The first theory postulates that qualia experiences derive from specific neural patterns, the second one, that qualia experiences derive from the interaction of a proto-consciousness with the brain\u2019s neural activity. From this comparison it will be possible to judge which one seems to better explain the different qualia experiences and to offer a more promising research agenda

Current model capabilities for simulating black carbon and sulfate concentrations in the Arctic atmosphere: a multi-model evaluation using a comprehensive measurement data set

The concentrations of sulfate, black carbon (BC) and other aerosols in the Arctic are characterized by high values in late winter and spring (so-called Arctic Haze) and low values in summer. Models have long been struggling to capture this seasonality and especially the high concentrations associated with Arctic Haze. In this study, we evaluate sulfate and BC concentrations from eleven different models driven with the same emission inventory against a comprehensive pan-Arctic measurement data set over a time period of 2 years (2008–2009). The set of models consisted of one Lagrangian particle dispersion model, four chemistry transport models (CTMs), one atmospheric chemistry-weather forecast model and five chemistry climate models (CCMs), of which two were nudged to meteorological analyses and three were running freely. The measurement data set consisted of surface measurements of equivalent BC (eBC) from five stations (Alert, Barrow, Pallas, Tiksi and Zeppelin), elemental carbon (EC) from Station Nord and Alert and aircraft measurements of refractory BC (rBC) from six different campaigns. We find that the models generally captured the measured eBC or rBC and sulfate concentrations quite well, compared to previous comparisons. However, the aerosol seasonality at the surface is still too weak in most models. Concentrations of eBC and sulfate averaged over three surface sites are underestimated in winter/spring in all but one model (model means for January–March underestimated by 59 and 37 % for BC and sulfate, respectively), whereas concentrations in summer are overestimated in the model mean (by 88 and 44 % for July–September), but with overestimates as well as underestimates present in individual models. The most pronounced eBC underestimates, not included in the above multi-site average, are found for the station Tiksi in Siberia where the measured annual mean eBC concentration is 3 times higher than the average annual mean for all other stations. This suggests an underestimate of BC sources in Russia in the emission inventory used. Based on the campaign data, biomass burning was identified as another cause of the modeling problems. For sulfate, very large differences were found in the model ensemble, with an apparent anti-correlation between modeled surface concentrations and total atmospheric columns. There is a strong correlation between observed sulfate and eBC concentrations with consistent sulfate/eBC slopes found for all Arctic stations, indicating that the sources contributing to sulfate and BC are similar throughout the Arctic and that the aerosols are internally mixed and undergo similar removal. However, only three models reproduced this finding, whereas sulfate and BC are weakly correlated in the other models. Overall, no class of models (e.g., CTMs, CCMs) performed better than the others and differences are independent of model resolution