How well are Tropical Cyclones represented in reanalysis data sets?

Tropical cyclones (TCs) are identified and tracked in six recent reanalysis data sets and compared with those from the IBTrACS best track archive. Results indicate that nearly every cyclone present in IBTrACS over the period 1979-2012 can be found in all six reanalyses using a tracking and matching approach. However, TC intensities are significantly under-represented in the reanalyses compared to the observations. Applying a typical objective TC identification scheme, it is found that the largest uncertainties in TC identification occur for the weaker storms; this is exacerbated by uncertainties in the observations for weak storms and lack of consistency in operational procedures. For example, it is unclear whether certain types of storms, such as tropical depressions, subtropical cyclones and monsoon depressions, are included in the best track data for all reporting agencies. There are definite improvements in how well TCs are represented in more recent, higher resolution reanalyses; in particular MERRA2 is comparable with the NCEP-CFSR and JRA55 reanalyses, which perform significantly better than the older MERRA reanalysis

Voices from Beyond the School Gates: Students’ and Their Parents’ Lived Experience of School Exclusion

There have been growing concerns in England about increasing numbers of students, many of whom have Special Education Needs and Disabilities (SEND) or come from disadvantaged backgrounds, who experience education disaffection and failure (Farouk 2017; DfE 2017; Perraudin and McIntyre 2018; Edwards 2018). Moreover, there have been increasing calls for research that works collaboratively with students and other stakeholders (ie parents and school leaders) to address these issues (see Edwards and Brown 2020). This article explores students’ and their parents’ experiences in relation to school exclusion. Drawing on participant action research methods three former excluded students and their parents who successfully re-engaged their education were trained to carry out interviews with five recently excluded secondary school students and their parents. Findings from the interviews stand juxtaposed to political discourses that view exclusion as being influenced by poor parenting or student deviance. Rather, our findings illustrate a spiral of disillusionment, educational disengagement, fractured relationships between students, parents and teachers that emerges as our participants encountered a series of life events that coincided with the educational processes in schools. We consider these findings and, in line with Freire (1972; 2005), we propose a dialogic and relational intervention that enables excluded students to collaborate with their parents and school leaders to make meaningful changes to their own and their schools’ practices in order to help them re-engage with their education

Contribution of tropical cyclones to atmospheric moisture transport and rainfall over East Asia

The coastal region of East Asia (EA) is one of the regions with the most frequent impacts from tropical cyclones (TCs). In this study, rainfall and moisture transports related to TCs are measured over the EA, and the contribution of TCs to the regional water budget is compared with other contributors, especially the mean circulation of the EA summer monsoon (EASM). Based on ERA-Interim re-analysis (1979–2012), the trajectories of TCs are identified using an objective feature tracking method. Over 60% of TCs occur from July to October (JASO). During JASO, TC rainfall contributes 10-30% the of monthly total rainfall over the coastal region of EA; this contribution is highest over the south/southeast coast of China in September. TCs make a larger contribution to daily extreme rainfall (above the 95th percentile): 50-60% over the EA coast and as high as 70% over Taiwan island. Compared with the mean EASM, TCs transport less moisture over the EA. However, as the peak of the mean seasonal cycle of TCs lags two months behind that of the EASM, the moisture transported by TCs is an important source for the water budget over the EA region when the EASM withdraws. This moisture transport is largely performed by westward-moving TCs. These results improve our understanding of the water cycle of EA and provide a useful test bed for evaluating and improving seasonal forecasts and coupled climate models

Appointment scheduling and cost in first opinion small animal practice

Approximately half of first opinion, small animal consultations exceed their allocated time and there's a growing call in the UK for longer consults. The aim of this study was to investigate and describe allocated appointment length in first opinion, small animal practice in the UK. Almost half (49.8%) of consults were scheduled for 15 min, with a further 39.4% scheduled for 10 min. Nearly all participants (97.1%) reported flexibility when booking appointments, scheduling longer appointments for conditions predicted to require more time. However, the majority (68.1%) reported no additional cost charged to the client for a longer consult. Furthermore, 54.7% of the survey respondents offered nurse appointments free of charge. A restructured approach to consult scheduling for both Veterinary Surgeon and Registered Veterinary Nurse (RVN) consultations could help to improve workforce wellbeing, utilise the vast knowledge and skill sets of RVNs and improve financial metrics

How temporal patterns in rainfall determine the geomorphology and carbon fluxes of tropical peatlands

Tropical peatlands now emit hundreds of megatons of carbon dioxide per year because of human disruption of the feedbacks that link peat accumulation and groundwater hydrology. However, no quantitative theory has existed for how patterns of carbon storage and release accompanying growth and subsidence of tropical peatlands are affected by climate and disturbance. Using comprehensive data from a pristine peatland in Brunei Darussalam, we show how rainfall and groundwater flow determine a shape parameter (the Laplacian of the peat surface elevation) that specifies, under a given rainfall regime, the ultimate, stable morphology, and hence carbon storage, of a tropical peatland within a network of rivers or canals. We find that peatlands reach their ultimate shape first at the edges of peat domes where they are bounded by rivers, so that the rate of carbon uptake accompanying their growth is proportional to the area of the still-growing dome interior. We use this model to study how tropical peatland carbon storage and fluxes are controlled by changes in climate, sea level, and drainage networks. We find that fluctuations in net precipitation on timescales from hours to years can reduce long-term peat accumulation. Our mathematical and numerical models can be used to predict long-term effects of changes in temporal rainfall patterns and drainage networks on tropical peatland geomorphology and carbon storage

The Roles of Youth in Society: A Reconceptualization

The 1980s have been characterized as a decade of platforms for educational change. In 19S3 alone, five reports were released by national task forces and commissions, all expressing serious concern for the future of youth and society, and all proposing recommendations for ways in which educational policies and practices might be altered, to address such concerns

Berkeley Supernova Ia Program I: Observations, Data Reduction, and Spectroscopic Sample of 582 Low-Redshift Type Ia Supernovae

In this first paper in a series we present 1298 low-redshift (z\leq0.2) optical spectra of 582 Type Ia supernovae (SNe Ia) observed from 1989 through 2008 as part of the Berkeley SN Ia Program (BSNIP). 584 spectra of 199 SNe Ia have well-calibrated light curves with measured distance moduli, and many of the spectra have been corrected for host-galaxy contamination. Most of the data were obtained using the Kast double spectrograph mounted on the Shane 3 m telescope at Lick Observatory and have a typical wavelength range of 3300-10,400 Ang., roughly twice as wide as spectra from most previously published datasets. We present our observing and reduction procedures, and we describe the resulting SN Database (SNDB), which will be an online, public, searchable database containing all of our fully reduced spectra and companion photometry. In addition, we discuss our spectral classification scheme (using the SuperNova IDentification code, SNID; Blondin & Tonry 2007), utilising our newly constructed set of SNID spectral templates. These templates allow us to accurately classify our entire dataset, and by doing so we are able to reclassify a handful of objects as bona fide SNe Ia and a few other objects as members of some of the peculiar SN Ia subtypes. In fact, our dataset includes spectra of nearly 90 spectroscopically peculiar SNe Ia. We also present spectroscopic host-galaxy redshifts of some SNe Ia where these values were previously unknown. [Abridged]Comment: 34 pages, 11 figures, 11 tables, revised version, re-submitted to MNRAS. Spectra will be released in January 2013. The SN Database homepage (http://hercules.berkeley.edu/database/index_public.html) contains the full tables, plots of all spectra, and our new SNID template