Variation in the responses of wild species of duck, gull, and wader to inoculation with a wild-bird-origin H6N2 low pathogenicity avian influenza virus

There is poor understanding of host responses to avian influenza virus (AIV) infection in wild birds, with most experimental studies using captive-bred birds and highly pathogenic AIVs that have an early endpoint. The objective of this study was to experimentally assess antibody responses and patterns of viral excretion in wild birds challenged with a low pathogenicity AIV. Ruddy turnstones (Arenaria interpres), silver gulls (Chroicocephalus novaehollandiae), and wandering whistling ducks (Dendrocygna arcuata) were challenged with a H6N2 virus, and blood, cloacal, and oropharyngeal (OP) swabs were analyzed from each bird over 28 days, with serology conducted on the ducks for a further 7 mo. Nineteen of 22 birds showed evidence of infection, with respiratory infection prevalent in the turnstones and gulls as mostly low titer viral excretion to 4 days postinoculation (DPI) with gastrointestinal replication detected in only one turnstone. In AIV naive ducks, there was gastrointestinal tropism with moderately high titer viral excretion via the cloaca to 6 DPI and low-grade OP viral excretion to 4 DPI. The hemagglutination inhibition antibody response was poor in the ducks, declining from 19 to 56 DPI, with higher titer responses in the gulls and turnstones. All infected birds responded with elevated nucleoprotein antibodies (in competitive enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay) by 7-10 DPI, and in the ducks these waned slowly after 42 DPI and were long-lived to at least 8 mo. The interspecies variability in response was consistent with a subtype that had adapted well in ducks, while the response of the turnstones may have been influenced by preexisting immunity to AIV. These findings provide insight into AIV infection dynamics in wild birds and highlight the need for further research

Study of the auto-ignition phenomenon of PRFs under HCCI conditions in a RCEM by means of spectroscopy

An investigation of the effects of contour conditions and fuel properties on the auto-ignition and combustion process under HCCI conditions is presented in this study. A parametric variation of initial temperature, intake pressure, compression ratio, oxygen concentration and equivalence ratio has been carried out for Primary Reference Fuels in a Rapid Compression Expansion Machine while applying spectroscopy. The results have also been contrasted with natural chemiluminescence measurements. Additionally, the experiments have been simulated in CHEMKIN and the results derived from the optical techniques have been compared with the results from the chemical kinetics of the process, validating the chemical kinetic mechanism and an additional sub-model of excited OH . Two different scenarios can be seen according to the results from the spectrograph. For very lean or very low-temperature combustions no peak of OH is seen at 310 nm of wavelength, proving that the luminosity came from the CO continuum rather than from the OH . However, for more intense combustions (richer equivalence ratios, higher temperatures or lower EGR rates) spectrography shows a clear peak of OH that has much longer time of life than the corresponding to the CO continuum. The main chemical reaction that causes this two scenarios has been identified as H þ HO2 ) 2OH. The increase of relevance of this reaction at high combustion temperatures causes a higher OH accumulation, which leads to a brighter OH emission. Finally, for low temperature combustions the CO continuum out-shines the OH radiation so the light emitted by this radical cannot be detected by means of natural chemiluminescence. 201The authors would like to thank different members of the LAV team of the ETH-Zurich for their contribution to this work. The authors are grateful to the Universitat Politecnica de Valencia for financing the Ph.D. studies of W. Vera-Tudela (FPI SP1 grant 30/05/2012) and his stay at ETH-Zurich (grant 30/12/2014). Finally, the authors would like to thank the Spanish Ministry of Education for financing the Ph.D. studies of Dario Lopez-Pintor (grant FPU13/02329) and his stay at ETH-Zurich (grant EST14/00626).Desantes Fernández, JM.; García Oliver, JM.; Vera-Tudela-Fajardo, WM.; López Pintor, D.; Schneider, B.; Boulouchos, K. (2016). Study of the auto-ignition phenomenon of PRFs under HCCI conditions in a RCEM by means of spectroscopy. Applied Energy. 179:389-400. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.apenergy.2016.06.134S38940017

Ignition and combustion development for high speed direct injection diesel engines under low temperature cold start conditions

Diesel engine cold start is an important issue for current technology at low (below 0 °C) temperatures and for future applications. The aim of this work is to develop a description of how, when and where does fuel spray ignition occur in a glow-plug assisted engine under simulated low temperature cold start conditions. In-cylinder pressure analysis is combined with high speed visualization in an optical engine. A pilot plus main injection strategy is used. Visualization results show that pilot ignition occurs in the vicinity of the glow plug, and strongly influences main combustion initiation. Main combustion starts from the pilot flame, and propagates to the rest of the combustion chamber showing a strong visible reaction zone. After end of main injection, the rapid leaning of the mixture suppresses the strong radiation, and OH radiation is observed to progress to the rest of the combustion chamber. The combustion process shows a strong scattering, which has been quantified by combustion parameters. At higher rail pressures scattering increases, which eventually inhibits combustion initiation. However, if ignition occurs at higher rail pressures, cycle performance is better.Authors thank the Spanish Ministry of Innovation and Science for the financial support through the project OPTICOMB (reference code: TRA2007-67961-C03-C01). Authors also thank Daniel Lerida Sanchez de las Heras for his outstanding work in the facility set-up and adaptation and for his support during the tests.Pastor Soriano, JV.; García Oliver, JM.; Pastor Enguídanos, JM.; Ramírez Hernández, JG. (2011). Ignition and combustion development for high speed direct injection diesel engines under low temperature cold start conditions. Fuel. 90(4):1556-1566. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.fuel.2011.01.008S1556156690

Generation of relativistic electron bunches in plasma synchrotron Gyrac-X for hard x-ray production

Experiment performed on plasma synchrotron Gyrac-X operating on synchrotron gyromagnetic autoresonance (SGA) is described. Gyrac-X is a compact plasma x-ray source in which kinetic energy of relativistic electrons obtained under SGA converts into x-ray by falling e-bunches on to a heavy metal target. The plasma synchrotron acts in a regime of a magnetic field pulse packet under constant level of microwave power. Experiments and numerical modeling of the process showed that such a regime allowed obtaining dense short lived relativistic electron bunches with average electron energy of 500 keV – 4.5 MeV. Parameters of the relativistic electron bunch (energy, density and volume) and dynamics of the electron bunches can be controlled by varying the parameters of the SGA process. Possibilities of x-ray intensity increase are also discussed

Influence of spray-glow plug configuration on cold start combustion for high-speed direct injection diesel engines

Glow plugs are currently the most employed solution to promote ignition in light-duty diesel engines during low temperature cold start. Improved knowledge about the mechanisms that control ignition and flame development under such conditions is necessary for design purposes, especially with current trends to reduce engine compression ratio. This paper aims to analyze the influence of the glow plug configuration (location and temperature) on cold start combustion. Experimental tests carried out in an optical engine with high speed visualization have confirmed that spray-glow plug configuration influences the whole combustion process through pilot ignition. Ignition of pilot injection is controlled by glow plug to spray distance, by glow plug temperature and by fuel and air motion after the end of injection. Nevertheless, glow plug temperature effect starts to be negligible above a certain value, since chemical ignition delay cannot be further reduced. © 2011 Elsevier Ltd.Pastor Soriano, JV.; Bermúdez, V.; García Oliver, JM.; Ramírez Hernández, JG. (2011). Influence of spray-glow plug configuration on cold start combustion for high-speed direct injection diesel engines. Energy. 36(9):5486-5496. doi:10.1016/j.energy.2011.07.028S5486549636

Post-Newtonian SPH calculations of binary neutron star coalescence. I. Method and first results

We present the first results from our Post-Newtonian (PN) Smoothed Particle Hydrodynamics (SPH) code, which has been used to study the coalescence of binary neutron star (NS) systems. The Lagrangian particle-based code incorporates consistently all lowest-order (1PN) relativistic effects, as well as gravitational radiation reaction, the lowest-order dissipative term in general relativity. We test our code on sequences of single NS models of varying compactness, and we discuss ways to make PN simulations more relevant to realistic NS models. We also present a PN SPH relaxation procedure for constructing equilibrium models of synchronized binaries, and we use these equilibrium models as initial conditions for our dynamical calculations of binary coalescence. Though unphysical, since tidal synchronization is not expected in NS binaries, these initial conditions allow us to compare our PN work with previous Newtonian results. We compare calculations with and without 1PN effects, for NS with stiff equations of state, modeled as polytropes with $\Gamma=3$. We find that 1PN effects can play a major role in the coalescence, accelerating the final inspiral and causing a significant misalignment in the binary just prior to final merging. In addition, the character of the gravitational wave signal is altered dramatically, showing strong modulation of the exponentially decaying waveform near the end of the merger. We also discuss briefly the implications of our results for models of gamma-ray bursts at cosmological distances.Comment: RevTeX, 37 pages, 17 figures, to appear in Phys. Rev. D, minor corrections onl

FLASH early science - Discovery of an intervening H I 21-cm absorber from an ASKAP survey of the GAMA 23 field

© 2020 The Author(s) We present early science results from the First Large Absorption Survey in H I (FLASH), a spectroscopically blind survey for 21-cm absorption lines in cold hydrogen (H I) gas at cosmological distances using the Australian Square Kilometre Array Pathfinder (ASKAP). We have searched for H I absorption towards 1253 radio sources in the GAMA 23 field, covering redshifts between z = 0.34 and 0.79 over a sky area of approximately 50 deg2. In a purely blind search, we did not obtain any detections of 21-cm absorbers above our reliability threshold. Assuming a fiducial value for the H I spin temperature of Tspin = 100 K and source covering fraction cf = 1, the total comoving absorption path-length sensitive to all Damped Lyman α Absorbers (DLAs; NH I ≥ 2 × 1020 cm−2) is ΔX = 6.6 ± 0.3 (Δz = 3.7 ± 0.2) and super-DLAs (NH I ≥ 2 × 1021 cm−2) is ΔX = 111 ± 6 (Δz= 63 ± 3). We estimate upper limits on the H I column density frequency distribution function that are consistent with measurements from prior surveys for redshifted optical DLAs, and nearby 21-cm emission and absorption. By cross-matching our sample of radio sources with optical spectroscopic identifications of galaxies in the GAMA 23 field, we were able to detect 21-cm absorption at z = 0.3562 towards NVSS J224500−343030, with a column density of NH I = (1.2 ± 0.1) × 1020 (Tspin/100 K) cm−2. The absorber is associated with GAMA J22450.05−343031.7, a massive early-type galaxy at an impact parameter of 17 kpc with respect to the radio source and which may contain a massive (MH I ≿ 3 × 109 M☉) gas disc. Such gas-rich early types are rare, but have been detected in the nearby Universe

Environmental monitoring : phase 5 final report (April 2019 - March 2020)

This report presents the results and interpretation for Phase 5 of an integrated environmental monitoring programme that is being undertaken around two proposed shale gas sites in England – Preston New Road, Lancashire and Kirby Misperton, North Yorkshire. The report should be read in conjunction with previous reports freely available through the project website1 . These provide additional background to the project, presentation of earlier results and the rationale for establishment of the different elements of the monitoring programme