388 research outputs found
A Mid-Infrared Imaging Survey of Embedded Young Stellar Objects in the Rho Ophiuchi Cloud Core
Results of a comprehensive, new, ground-based mid-infrared imaging survey of
the young stellar population of the Rho Ophiuchi cloud are presented. Data were
acquired at the Palomar 5-m and at the Keck 10-m telescopes with the MIRLIN and
LWS instruments, at 0.25 arcsec and 0.25 arcsec resolutions, respectively. Of
172 survey objects, 85 were detected. Among the 22 multiple systems observed,
15 were resolved and their individual component fluxes determined. A plot of
the frequency distribution of the detected objects with SED spectral slope
shows that YSOs spend ~400,000 yr in the Flat Spectrum phase, clearing out
their remnant infall envelopes. Mid-infrared variability is found among a
significant fraction of the surveyed objects, and is found to occur for all SED
classes with optically thick disks. Large-amplitude near-infrared variability,
also found for all SED classes with optically thick disks, seems to occur with
somewhat higher frequency at the earlier evolutionary stages. Although a
general trend of mid-infrared excess and NIR veiling exists proceeding through
SED classes, with Class I objects generally exhibiting K-veilings > 1, Flat
Spectrum objects with K-veilings > 0.58, and Class III objects with K-veilings
=0, Class II objects exhibit the widest range of K-band veiling values, 0-4.5.
However, the highly variable value of veiling that a single source can exhibit
in any of the SED classes in which active disk accretion can take place is
striking, and is direct observational evidence for highly time-variable
accretion activity in disks. Finally, by comparing mid-infrared vs.
near-infrared excesses in a subsample with well-determined effective
temperatures and extinction values, disk clearing mechanisms are explored. The
results are consistent with disk clearing proceeding from the inside-out.Comment: 18 pages + 5 tables + 7 figure
Economic Downturns, Urban Growth and Suburban Fertility in a Mediterranean Context
Despite the wealth of micro–macro data on short-term demographic dynamics, the impact of metropolitan growth and economic downturns on local fertility is still under-investigated in advanced economies. Recent studies in low-fertility contexts have assumed suburban birth rates as being systematically higher than urban and rural rates. This assumption (hereafter, known as the ‘suburban fertility hypothesis’) was grounded on stylized facts and spatial regularities that imply a significant role of both macro (contextual) and micro (behavioral) factors positively influencing fertility in suburban locations. To verify such a hypothesis from a macro (contextual) perspective, the present study compares the general fertility rate of urban, suburban, and rural settlements of the Athens’ metropolitan region (Greece) at various observation years between 1860 and 2020. Long-term Athens’ growth represented a sort of ‘quasi-experiment’ for Mediterranean Europe, linking sequential urban stages and distinctive waves of economic expansion and recession. Using multivariate exploratory analysis and global/local econometric models, a dominant ‘rural’ fertility regime was recorded for 1860 and 1884. A characteristic ‘urban’ fertility regime was, instead, found over a relatively long, intermediate period between 1956 and 1990. Higher fertility in suburban settlements (10 km away from downtown Athens, on average) was, finally, observed since 2000. Considering a sufficiently long-time interval, the existence of multiple fertility regimes along the distance gradient has demonstrated how fertility dynamics are intrinsically bonded with metropolitan growth, economic downturns, and social transformations in Mediterranean Europe
Phytochemical and antimicrobial screening of fruits and leaves of Zizyphus lotus L. collected in North West of Algeria
The present study was conducted on medicinal plant, called Zizyphus lotus L. (Rhamnaceae) which is known as Sedra in Mascara city (North West of Algeria). This plant is very well-known in the traditional medicine to cure gastro-intestinal tract, liver and other different respiratory infections. It is communally used for its anti-inflammatory, analgesic, anti-ulcer and antidiabetic properties. In this context, this study was aimed at investigating the in vitro antimicrobial activity of ethereal extract fruits and leaves of Zizyphus lotus, collected in the locality of Bouhanifia (Mascara city). Phytochemical screening of ethereal extract revealed the presence of free quinons, entraquinons, flavonoids and tannins, alkaloids. Fruits and leaves polyphenolic amount was 563.17 and 542.93μgEGA/mgMS respectively, and 47.62 and 45.19 μgEGA/mg MS for flavonoids and 213.74 μgEQ/gdm and 170.66 μgEQ/dm. Evaluation of the antimicrobial activity of the ethereal extract showed significant activity on the different tested bacteria.
Data reduction for the AMBER instrument
We present here the general formalism and data processing steps used in the data reduction pipeline of the AMBER instrument. AMBER is a three-telescope interferometric beam combiner in J, H and K bands installed at ESO\'s Very Large Telescope Interferometer. The fringes obtained on the 3 pairs of telescopes are spatially coded and spectrally dispersed. These are monitored on a 512x512 infrared camera at frame rates up to 100 frames per second, and this paper presents the algorithm used to retrieve the complex coherent visibility of the science target and the subsequent squared visibility, dierential phase and phase closure on the 3 bases and in the 3 spectral bands available in AMBER
Quiescent H2 Emission From Pre-Main Sequence Stars in Chamaeleon I
We report the discovery of quiescent emission from molecular hydrogen gas
located in the circumstellar disks of six pre-main sequence stars, including
two weak-line T Tauri stars (TTS), and one Herbig AeBe star, in the Chamaeleon
I star forming region. For two of these stars, we also place upper limits on
the 2->1 S(1)/1->0 S(1) line ratios of 0.4 and 0.5. Of the 11 pre-main sequence
sources now known to be sources of quiescent near-infrared hydrogen emission,
four possess transitional disks, which suggests that detectable levels of H
emission and the presence of inner disk holes are correlated. These H
detections demonstrate that these inner holes are not completely devoid of gas,
in agreement with the presence of observable accretion signatures for all four
of these stars and the recent detections of [Ne II] emission from three of
them. The overlap in [Ne II] and H detections hints at a possible
correlation between these two features and suggests a shared excitation
mechanism of high energy photons. Our models, combined with the kinematic
information from the H lines, locate the bulk of the emitting gas at a few
tens of AU from the stars. We also find a correlation between H detections
and those targets which possess the largest H equivalent widths,
suggesting a link between accretion activity and quiescent H emission. We
conclude that quiescent H emission from relatively hot gas within the disks
of TTS is most likely related to on-going accretion activity, the production of
UV photons and/or X-rays, and the evolutionary status of the dust grain
populations in the inner disks.Comment: 12 pages, emulateapj, Accepted by Ap
Near infrared imaging of the cometary globule CG12
Cometary globule 12 is a relatively little investigated medium- and low mass
star forming region 210 pc above the Galactic plane. NIR J, H, and Ks imaging
and stellar photometry is used to analyse the stellar content and the structure
of CG 12. Several new members and member candidates of the CG 12 stellar
cluster were found. The new members include in particular a highly embedded
source with a circumstellar disk or shell and a variable star with a
circumstellar disk which forms a binary with a previously known A spectral type
cluster member. The central source of the known collimated molecular outflow in
CG 12 and an associated "hourglass"-shaped object due to reflected light from
the source were also detected. HIRES-enhanced IRAS images are used together
with SOFI J,H,Ks imaging to study the two associated IRAS point sources,
13546-3941 and 13547-3944. Two new 12 micrometer sources coinciding with NIR
excess stars were detected in the direction of IRAS 13546-3941. The IRAS
13547-3944 emission at 12 and 25 micrometers originates in the Herbig AeBe star
h4636n and the 60 and 100 micrometer emission from an adjacent cold source.Comment: Accepted Astronomy and Astrophysics Oct. 15 200
Approximating nonequilibrium processes using a collection of surrogate diffusion models
The surrogate process approximation (SPA) is applied to model the
nonequilibrium dynamics of a reaction coordinate (RC) associated with the
unfolding and refolding processes of a deca-alanine peptide at 300 K. The RC
dynamics, which correspond to the evolution of the end-to-end distance of the
polypeptide, are produced by steered molecular dynamics (SMD) simulations and
approximated using overdamped diffusion models. We show that the collection of
(estimated) SPA models contain structural information "orthogonal" to the RC
monitored in this study. Functional data analysis ideas are used to correlate
functions associated with the fitted SPA models with the work done on the
system in SMD simulations. It is demonstrated that the shape of the
nonequilibrium work distributions for the unfolding and refolding processes of
deca-alanine can be predicted with functional data analysis ideas using a
relatively small number of simulated SMD paths for calibrating the SPA
diffusion models.Comment: 13 pages, 7 figure
The Stellar Population of the Chamaeleon I Star-Forming Region
I present a new census of the stellar population in the Chamaeleon I
star-forming region. Using optical and near-IR photometry and followup
spectroscopy, I have discovered 50 new members of Chamaeleon I, expanding the
census of known members to 226 objects. Fourteen of these new members have
spectral types later than M6, which doubles the number of known members that
are likely to be substellar. I have estimated extinctions, luminosities, and
effective temperatures for the known members, used these data to construct an
H-R diagram for the cluster, and inferred individual masses and ages with the
theoretical evolutionary models of Baraffe and Chabrier. The distribution of
isochronal ages indicates that star formation began 3-4 and 5-6 Myr ago in the
southern and northern subclusters, respectively, and has continued to the
present time at a declining rate. The IMF in Chamaeleon I reaches a maximum at
a mass of 0.1-0.15 M_sun, and thus closely resembles the IMFs in IC 348 and the
Orion Nebula Cluster. In logarithmic units where the Salpeter slope is 1.35,
the IMF is roughly flat in the substellar regime and shows no indication of
reaching a minimum down to a completeness limit of 0.01 M_sun. The low-mass
stars are more widely distributed than members at other masses in the northern
subcluster, but this is not the case in the southern subcluster. Meanwhile, the
brown dwarfs have the same spatial distribution as the stars out to a radius of
3 deg (8.5 pc) from the center of Chamaeleon I
N,N-Dialkyl-2-phenylindol-3-ylglyoxylamides. A new class of Potent and Selective Ligands at the Peripheral Benzodiazepine Receptor.
We report the synthesis and the affinity data at both the peripheral (PBR) and the central benzodiazepine receptors of a series of N,N-dialkyl-2-phenylindol-3-ylglyoxylamide derivatives III, designed as conformationally constrained analogues of 2-phenylindole-3-acetamides II such as FGIN-1-27. Most of the new compounds showed a high specificity and affinity for PBR, with Ki in the nanomolar to subnanomolar range. The most potent ligands (4−7, 9, 13−27) stimulated steroid biosynthesis in rat C6 glioma cells with a potency similar to or higher than that of classical ligands. The SARs of this new class of compounds are discussed
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