EARLINET evaluation of the CATS Level 2 aerosol backscatter coefficient product

We present the evaluation activity of the European Aerosol Research Lidar Network (EARLINET) for the quantitative assessment of the Level 2 aerosol backscatter coefficient product derived by the Cloud-Aerosol Transport System (CATS) aboard the International Space Station (ISS; Rodier et al., 2015). The study employs correlative CATS and EARLINET backscatter measurements within a 50¿km distance between the ground station and the ISS overpass and as close in time as possible, typically with the starting time or stopping time of the EARLINET performed measurement time window within 90¿min of the ISS overpass, for the period from February 2015 to September 2016. The results demonstrate the good agreement of the CATS Level 2 backscatter coefficient and EARLINET. Three ISS overpasses close to the EARLINET stations of Leipzig, Germany; Évora, Portugal; and Dushanbe, Tajikistan, are analyzed here to demonstrate the performance of the CATS lidar system under different conditions. The results show that under cloud-free, relative homogeneous aerosol conditions, CATS is in good agreement with EARLINET, independent of daytime and nighttime conditions. CATS low negative biases are observed, partially attributed to the deficiency of lidar systems to detect tenuous aerosol layers of backscatter signal below the minimum detection thresholds; these are biases which may lead to systematic deviations and slight underestimations of the total aerosol optical depth (AOD) in climate studies. In addition, CATS misclassification of aerosol layers as clouds, and vice versa, in cases of coexistent and/or adjacent aerosol and cloud features, occasionally leads to non-representative, unrealistic, and cloud-contaminated aerosol profiles. Regarding solar illumination conditions, low negative biases in CATS backscatter coefficient profiles, of the order of 6.1¿%, indicate the good nighttime performance of CATS. During daytime, a reduced signal-to-noise ratio by solar background illumination prevents retrievals of weakly scattering atmospheric layers that would otherwise be detectable during nighttime, leading to higher negative biases, of the order of 22.3¿%.Peer ReviewedPostprint (published version

Soft supersymmetry-breaking terms from supergravity and superstring models

We review the origin of soft supersymmetry-breaking terms in N=1 supergravity models of particle physics. We first consider general formulae for those terms in general models with a hidden sector breaking supersymmetry at an intermediate energy scale. The results for some simple models are given. We then consider the results obtained in some simple superstring models in which particular assumptions about the origin of supersymmetry breaking are made. These are models in which the seed of supersymmetry breaking is assumed to be originated in the dilaton/moduli sector of the theory.Comment: 24 pages, to appear in the book `Perspectives on Supersymmetry', World Scientific, Editor G. Kane; some comments and references adde

A Cellular Automaton Model for the Traffic Flow in Bogota

In this work we propose a car cellular automaton model that reproduces the experimental behavior of traffic flows in Bogot\'a. Our model includes three elements: hysteresis between the acceleration and brake gaps, a delay time in the acceleration, and an instantaneous brake. The parameters of our model were obtained from direct measurements inside a car on motorways in Bogot\'a. Next, we simulated with this model the flux-density fundamental diagram for a single-lane traffic road and compared it with experimental data. Our simulations are in very good agreement with the experimental measurements, not just in the shape of the fundamental diagram, but also in the numerical values for both the road capacity and the density of maximal flux. Our model reproduces, too, the qualitative behavior of shock waves. In addition, our work identifies the periodic boundary conditions as the source of false peaks in the fundamental diagram, when short roads are simulated, that have been also found in previous works. The phase transition between free and congested traffic is also investigated by computing both the relaxation time and the order parameter. Our work shows how different the traffic behavior from one city to another can be, and how important is to determine the model parameters for each city.Comment: 14 pages and 13 figures (gzipped tar file). Submitted to Int.J.Mod.Phys.C. Minor changes, specially at references and typoes, plus a clearer summary of the CA rule

Proposal for a Supersymmetric Standard Model

The fact that neutrinos are massive suggests that the minimal supersymmetric standard model (MSSM) might be extended in order to include three gauge-singlet neutrino superfields with Yukawa couplings of the type $H_2 L \nu^c$. We propose to use these superfields to solve the $\mu$ problem of the MSSM without having to introduce an extra singlet superfield as in the case of the next-to-MSSM (NMSSM). In particular, terms of the type $\nu^c H_1 H_2$ in the superpotential may carry out this task spontaneously through sneutrino vacuum expectation values. In addition, terms of the type $(\nu^c)^3$ avoid the presence of axions and generate effective Majorana masses for neutrinos at the electroweak scale. On the other hand, these terms break lepton number and R-parity explicitly implying that the phenomenology of this model is very different from the one of the MSSM or NMSSM. For example, the usual neutralinos are now mixed with the neutrinos. For Dirac masses of the latter of order $10^{-4}$ GeV, eigenvalues reproducing the correct scale of neutrino masses are obtained.Comment: 9 pages, latex, title modified. Final version published in PR

Ammonia emissions from livestock production in Chile: an inventory and uncertainty analysis

Indexación: Web of Science; Scielo.The objective of this work was to quantify the country's NH3 emissions from livestock production. This calculation was based on the mass flow of total ammoniacal nitrogen (TAN). The analysis was performed for all 15 geographical regions in Chile. The definition of livestock subcategories was based on data from the Chilean Agriculture and Forestry Census as well as technical reports published by the Chilean National Statistics Institute. Significant differences were observed among the sources of livestock emissions in Chile's regions, and there was high variability depending on the degree of livestock confinement. In 2013, the total calculated emissions were 69.1 kt NH3/year (± 31.1). The O’Higgins Region had the highest NH3 emissions in Chile, representing 45% of the total. In terms of livestock production, 45% of the emissions were generated by pigs, 22% by poultry, 16% by cattle, 11% by equines and 4% by sheep. Emissions from the TAN that was available during manure and slurry management and the degree of animal confinement were the primary sources of uncertainty. This uncertainty could be greatly reduced by developing regional emission factors and by including the degree of animal confinement in Chile's national statistics such as the Agriculture, Livestock and Forestry Census.http://www.scielo.cl/scielo.php?pid=S0718-95162016005000005&script=sci_abstrac