27,773 research outputs found
Causes of exotic bird establishment across oceanic islands
The probability that exotic species will successfully establish viable populations varies between regions, for reasons that are currently unknown. Here, we use data for exotic bird introductions to 41 oceanic islands and archipelagos around the globe to test five hypotheses for this variation: the effects of introduction effort, competition, predation, human disturbance and habitat diversity (island biogeography). Our analyses demonstrate the primary importance of introduction effort for avian establishment success across regions, in concordance with previous analyses within regions. However, they also reveal a strong negative interaction across regions between establishment success and predation; exotic birds are more likely to fail on islands with species-rich mammalian predator assemblages
Automorphisms of Partially Commutative Groups II: Combinatorial Subgroups
We define several "standard" subgroups of the automorphism group Aut(G) of a
partially commutative (right-angled Artin) group and use these standard
subgroups to describe decompositions of Aut(G). If C is the commutation graph
of G, we show how Aut(G) decomposes in terms of the connected components of C:
obtaining a particularly clear decomposition theorem in the special case where
C has no isolated vertices.
If C has no vertices of a type we call dominated then we give a semi-direct
decompostion of Aut(G) into a subgroup of locally conjugating automorphisms by
the subgroup stabilising a certain lattice of "admissible subsets" of the
vertices of C. We then characterise those graphs for which Aut(G) is a product
(not necessarily semi-direct) of two such subgroups.Comment: 7 figures, 63 pages. Notation and definitions clarified and typos
corrected. 2 new figures added. Appendix containing details of presentation
and proof of a theorem adde
Lithium-ion battery thermal-electrochemical model-based state estimation using orthogonal collocation and a modified extended Kalman filter
This paper investigates the state estimation of a high-fidelity spatially
resolved thermal- electrochemical lithium-ion battery model commonly referred
to as the pseudo two-dimensional model. The partial-differential algebraic
equations (PDAEs) constituting the model are spatially discretised using
Chebyshev orthogonal collocation enabling fast and accurate simulations up to
high C-rates. This implementation of the pseudo-2D model is then used in
combination with an extended Kalman filter algorithm for differential-algebraic
equations to estimate the states of the model. The state estimation algorithm
is able to rapidly recover the model states from current, voltage and
temperature measurements. Results show that the error on the state estimate
falls below 1 % in less than 200 s despite a 30 % error on battery initial
state-of-charge and additive measurement noise with 10 mV and 0.5 K standard
deviations.Comment: Submitted to the Journal of Power Source
String Breaking in Four Dimensional Lattice QCD
Virtual quark pair screening leads to breaking of the string between
fundamental representation quarks in QCD. For unquenched four dimensional
lattice QCD, this (so far elusive) phenomenon is studied using the recently
developed truncated determinant algorithm (TDA). The dynamical configurations
were generated on an Athlon 650 MHz PC. Quark eigenmodes up to 420 MeV are
included exactly in these TDA studies performed at low quark mass on large
coarse (but O() improved) lattices. A study of Wilson line correlators in
Coulomb gauge extracted from an ensemble of 1000 two-flavor dynamical
configurations reveals evidence for flattening of the string tension at
distances R approximately 1 fm.Comment: 16 pages, 5 figures, Latex (deleted extraneous eps figure file
The effect of acute caffeine ingestion on upper and lower body anaerobic exercise performance
Chemistry on the inside: green chemistry in mesoporous materials
An overview of the rapidly expanding area of tailored mesoporous solids is presented. The synthesis of a wide range of the materials is covered, both inorganically and organically modified. Their applications, in particular those relating to green chemistry, are also highlighted. Finally, potential future directions for these materials are discussed
The Populations of Comet-Like Bodies in the Solar system
A new classification scheme is introduced for comet-like bodies in the Solar
system. It covers the traditional comets as well as the Centaurs and
Edgeworth-Kuiper belt objects. At low inclinations, close encounters with
planets often result in near-constant perihelion or aphelion distances, or in
perihelion-aphelion interchanges, so the minor bodies can be labelled according
to the planets predominantly controlling them at perihelion and aphelion. For
example, a JN object has a perihelion under the control of Jupiter and aphelion
under the control of Neptune, and so on. This provides 20 dynamically distinct
categories of outer Solar system objects in the Jovian and trans-Jovian
regions. The Tisserand parameter with respect to the planet controlling
perihelion is also often roughly constant under orbital evolution. So, each
category can be further sub-divided according to the Tisserand parameter. The
dynamical evolution of comets, however, is dominated not by the planets nearest
at perihelion or aphelion, but by the more massive Jupiter. The comets are
separated into four categories -- Encke-type, short-period, intermediate and
long-period -- according to aphelion distance. The Tisserand parameter
categories now roughly correspond to the well-known Jupiter-family comets,
transition-types and Halley-types. In this way, the nomenclature for the
Centaurs and Edgeworth-Kuiper belt objects is based on, and consistent with,
that for comets.Comment: MNRAS, in press, 11 pages, 6 figures (1 available as postscript, 5 as
gif). Higher resolution figures available at
http://www-thphys.physics.ox.ac.uk/users/WynEvans/preprints.pd
Mass-radius relation for magnetized strange quark stars
We review the stability of magnetized strange quark matter (MSQM) within the
phenomenological MIT bag model, taking into account the variation of the
relevant input parameters, namely, the strange quark mass, baryon density,
magnetic field and bag parameter. A comparison with magnetized asymmetric quark
matter in -equilibrium as well as with strange quark matter (SQM) is
presented. We obtain that the energy per baryon for MSQM decreases as the
magnetic field increases, and its minimum value at vanishing pressure is lower
than the value found for SQM, which implies that MSQM is more stable than
non-magnetized SQM. The mass-radius relation for magnetized strange quark stars
is also obtained in this framework.Comment: 7 pages, 6 figures. To be published in the Proceedings of 4th
International Workshop on Relativistic Astrophysical and Astronomy IWARA0
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