457 research outputs found
Oidium longipes, a new powdery mildew fungus on petunia in the USA: A potential threat to ornamental and vegetable solanaceous crops
This is the first North American report of Oidium longipes, an anamorphic powdery mildew species described recently in Europe. It was found on vegetatively propagated petunia grown in a commercial greenhouse in New Jersey, USA, where it caused a rapidly spreading disease. The pathogen might have originated offshore and may have already been distributed in the United States through horticultural trade. During field surveys in Europe, it was found on petunia in Hungary and Austria as well; this is the first report of O. longipes from these two countries. A detailed light microscopy study of American and European specimens of O. longipes, including freshly collected samples and authentic herbarium specimens, revealed that its conidiophore morphology is more variable than illustrated in the original species description or in subsequent works. Microcycle conidiation, a process not yet known to occur in powdery mildews, was repeatedly observed in O. longipes. The rDNA internal transcribed spacer (ITS) sequences were identical in colonies containing different conidiophore types as well as in a total of five specimens collected from petunia in the United States, Austria, Hungary, Germany, and Switzerland. A phylogenetic analysis of the ITS sequences revealed that the closest known relative of O. longipes is O. lycopersici, known to infect tomato only in Australia. Cross-inoculation tests showed that O. longipes from petunia heavily infected tobacco cv. Xanthi, while the tomato and eggplant cultivars tested were moderately susceptible to this pathogen. These results indicate that its spread represents a potential danger to a number of solanaceous crops. Our ad hoc field surveys conducted in 2006 and 2007 did not detect it outside New Jersey in the United States; all the other powdery mildew–infected petunias, collected in New York and Indiana, were infected by Podosphaera xanthii. In Europe, most of the powdery mildew–infected petunias examined in this study were infected by P. xanthii or Golovinomyces orontii. Our multiple inoculation tests revealed that the same petunia plants and even the same leaves can be infected concomitantly by O. longipes, O. neolycopersici, G. orontii, and P. xanthii. Thus, it is at present unclear to what extent O. longipes contributes to the powdery mildew epidemics that develop year after year on solanaceous plants in many parts of the world
Strangeness Enhancement in Heavy Ion Collisions - Evidence for Quark-Gluon-Matter ?
The centrality dependence of (multi-)strange hadron abundances is studied for
Pb(158 AGeV)Pb reactions and compared to p(158 GeV)Pb collisions. The
microscopic transport model UrQMD is used for this analysis. The predicted
Lambda/pi-, Xi-/pi- and Omega-/pi- ratios are enhanced due to rescattering in
central Pb-Pb collisions as compared to peripheral Pb-Pb or p-Pb collisions. A
reduction of the constituent quark masses to the current quark masses m_s \sim
230 MeV, m_q \sim 10 MeV, as motivated by chiral symmetry restoration, enhances
the hyperon yields to the experimentally observed high values. Similar results
are obtained by an ad hoc overall increase of the color electric field strength
(effective string tension of kappa=3 GeV/fm). The enhancement depends strongly
on the kinematical cuts. The maximum enhancement is predicted around
midrapidity. For Lambda's, strangeness suppression is predicted at
projectile/target rapidity. For Omega's, the predicted enhancement can be as
large as one order of magnitude. Comparisons of Pb-Pb data to proton induced
asymmetric (p-A) collisions are hampered due to the predicted strong asymmetry
in the various rapidity distributions of the different (strange) particle
species. In p-Pb collisions, strangeness is locally (in rapidity) not
conserved. The present comparison to the data of the WA97 and NA49
collaborations clearly supports the suggestion that conventional (free)
hadronic scenarios are unable to describe the observed high (anti-)hyperon
yields in central collisions. The doubling of the strangeness to nonstrange
suppression factor, gamma_s \approx 0.65, might be interpreted as a signal of a
phase of nearly massless particles.Comment: published version, discussion on strange mesons and new table added,
extended discussion on strange baryon yields. Latex, 20 pages, including 5
eps-figure
Clocking hadronization in relativistic heavy ion collisions with balance functions
A novel state of matter has been hypothesized to exist during the early stage
of relativistic heavy ion collisions, with normal hadrons not appearing until
several fm/c after the start of the reaction. To test this hypothesis,
correlations between charges and their associated anticharges are evaluated
with the use of balance functions. It is shown that late-stage hadronization is
characterized by tightly correlated charge/anticharge pairs when measured as a
function of relative rapidity.Comment: 5 pages, 3 figure
Possible Evidence of Disoriented Chiral Condensates from the Anomaly in Omega and AntiOmega Abundances at the SPS
No conventional picture of nucleus-nucleus collisions has yet been able to
explain the abundance of Omega and AntiOmega in central collisions between Pb
nuclei at 158 A GeV at the CERN SPS. We argue that such a deviation from
predictions of statistical thermal models and numerical simulations is evidence
that they are produced as topological defects in the form of skyrmions arising
from the formation of disoriented chiral condensates. The estimated domain size
falls in the right range to be consistent with the so far non-observation of
DCC from the distribution of neutral pions.Comment: paper presented at the ICPAQGP-2001, Jaipur, Indi
Strangeness enhancement from strong color fields at RHIC
In ultra-relativistic heavy ion collisions, early stage multiple scatterings
may lead to an increase of the color electric field strength. Consequently,
particle production - especially heavy quark (and di-quark) production - is
greatly enhanced according to the Schwinger mechanism. We test this idea via
the Ultra-relativistic Quantum Molecular Dynamics model (UrQMD) for Au+Au
collisions at the full RHIC energy ( AGeV). Relative to p+p
collisions, a factor of 60, 20 and 7 enhancement respectively, for
(), (), and , () is predicted for a model
with increased color electric field strength
Strange hyperon and antihyperon production from quark and string-rope matter
Hyperon and antihyperon production is investigated using two microscopical
models: {\bf (1)} the fast hadronization of quark matter as given by the ALCOR
model; {\bf (2)} string formation and fragmentation as in the HIJING/B model.
We calculate the particle numbers and momentum distributions for Pb+Pb
collisions at CERN SPS energies in order to compare the two models with each
other and with the available experimental data. We show that these two
theoretical approaches give similar yields for the hyperons, but strongly
differ for antihyperons.Comment: 11 pages, Latex, 3 EPS figures, contribution to the Proceedings of
the 4th International Conference on Strangeness in Quark Matter (SQM'98),
Padova, Italy, 20-24 July 199
Rapidly Changing Range Limits in a Warming World: Critical Data Limitations and Knowledge Gaps for Advancing Understanding of Mangrove Range Dynamics in the Southeastern USA
Climate change is altering species’ range limits and transforming ecosystems. For example, warming temperatures are leading to the range expansion of tropical, cold-sensitive species at the expense of their cold-tolerant counterparts. In some temperate and subtropical coastal wetlands, warming winters are enabling mangrove forest encroachment into salt marsh, which is a major regime shift that has significant ecological and societal ramifications. Here, we synthesized existing data and expert knowledge to assess the distribution of mangroves near rapidly changing range limits in the southeastern USA. We used expert elicitation to identify data limitations and highlight knowledge gaps for advancing understanding of past, current, and future range dynamics. Mangroves near poleward range limits are often shorter, wider, and more shrublike compared to their tropical counterparts that grow as tall forests in freeze-free, resource-rich environments. The northern range limits of mangroves in the southeastern USA are particularly dynamic and climate sensitive due to abundance of suitable coastal wetland habitat and the exposure of mangroves to winter temperature extremes that are much colder than comparable range limits on other continents. Thus, there is need for methodological refinements and improved spatiotemporal data regarding changes in mangrove structure and abundance near northern range limits in the southeastern USA. Advancing understanding of rapidly changing range limits is critical for foundation plant species such as mangroves, as it provides a basis for anticipating and preparing for the cascading effects of climate-induced species redistribution on ecosystems and the human communities that depend on their ecosystem services
In-medium modifications of the interaction in photon-induced reactions
Differential cross sections of the reactions
and have been measured for several
nuclei (H,C, and Pb) at an incident-photon energy of
=400-460 MeV at the tagged-photon facility at MAMI-B using the TAPS
spectrometer. A significant nuclear-mass dependence of the
invariant-mass distribution is found in the channel. This
dependence is not observed in the channel and is
consistent with an in-medium modification of the interaction in the
==0 channel. The data are compared to -induced measurements and to
calculations within a chiral-unitary approach
A comprehensive description of multiple observables in heavy-ion collisions at SPS
Combining and expanding on work from previous publications, a model for the
evolution of ultrarelativistic heavy-ion collisions at the CERN SPS for 158
AGeV beam energy is presented. Based on the assumption of thermalization and a
parametrization of the space-time expansion of the produced matter, this model
is able to describe a large set of observables including hadronic momentum
spectra, correlations and abundancies, the emission of real photons, dilepton
radiation and the suppression pattern of charmonia. Each of these obervables
provides unique capabilities to study the reaction dynamics and taken together
they form a strong and consistent picture of the evolving system. Based on the
emission of hard photons, we argue that a strongly interacting, hot and dense
system with temperatures above 250 MeV has to be created early in the reaction.
Such a system is bound to be different from hadronic matter and likely to be a
quark-gluon plasma, and we find that this assumption is in line with the
subsequent evolution of the system that is reflected in other observables.Comment: 21 pages, 10 figures, submitted to J. Phys.
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