1,646 research outputs found
Adaptive latitudinal variation in Common Blackbird Turdus merula nest characteristics
Nest construction is taxonomically widespread, yet our understanding of adaptive
intraspecific variation in nest design remains poor. Nest characteristics are
expected to vary adaptively in response to predictable variation in spring temperatures
over large spatial scales, yet such variation in nest design remains largely
overlooked, particularly amongst open-cup-nesting birds. Here, we systematically
examined the effects of latitudinal variation in spring temperatures and precipitation
on the morphology, volume, composition, and insulatory properties of
open-cup-nesting Common Blackbirds’ Turdus merula nests to test the hypothesis
that birds living in cooler environments at more northerly latitudes would build
better insulated nests than conspecifics living in warmer environments at more
southerly latitudes. As spring temperatures increased with decreasing latitude, the
external diameter of nests decreased. However, as nest wall thickness also
decreased, there was no variation in the diameter of the internal nest cups. Only
the mass of dry grasses within nests decreased with warmer temperatures at lower
latitudes. The insulatory properties of nests declined with warmer temperatures at
lower latitudes and nests containing greater amounts of dry grasses had higher insulatory
properties. The insulatory properties of nests decreased with warmer temperatures
at lower latitudes, via changes in morphology (wall thickness) and
composition (dry grasses). Meanwhile, spring precipitation did not vary with latitude,
and none of the nest characteristics varied with spring precipitation. This suggests
that Common Blackbirds nesting at higher latitudes were building nests with
thicker walls in order to counteract the cooler temperatures. We have provided evidence
that the nest construction behavior of open-cup-nesting birds systematically
varies in response to large-scale spatial variation in spring temperatures
Vacuum Stability in Split Susy and Little Higgs Models
We study the stability of the effective higgs potential in the split
supersymmetry and Little Higgs models. In particular, we study the effects of
higher dimensional operators in the effective potential on the higgs mass
predictions. We find that the size and sign of the higher dimensional operators
can significantly change the higgs mass required to maintain vacuum stability
in Split Susy models. In the Little Higgs models the effects of higher
dimensional operators can be large because of a relatively lower cut-off scale.
Working with a specific model we find that a contribution from the higher
dimensional operator with coefficient of O(1) can destabilize the vacuum.Comment: Latex 22 pages, 3 figures. Added discussion, published versio
15K thermal buffer using liquid hydrogen
This work is supported by the European Space Agency (ESTEC contract 4000108532/12/NL/E and by Fundação para a Ciência e Tecnologia (PTDC/EMEMFE/101448/2008 and PEst-OE/FIS/UI0068/2011). PBS and DM acknowledge the latter institution for granting.authorsversionpublishe
Solar fuel photoanodes prepared by inkjet printing of copper vanadates
Widespread deployment of solar fuel generators requires the development of efficient and scalable functional materials, especially for photoelectrocatalysis of the oxygen evolution reaction. Metal oxides comprise the most promising class of photoanode materials, but no known material meets the demanding photoelectrochemical requirements. Copper vanadates have recently been identified as a promising class of photoanode materials with several phases exhibiting an indirect band gap near 2 eV and stable photoelectrocatalysis of the oxygen evolution reaction in a pH 9.2 electrolyte. By employing combinatorial inkjet printing of metal precursors and applying both calcination and rapid thermal processing, we characterize the phase behaviour of the entire CuO–V_2O_5 composition space for different thermal treatments via automated analysis of approximately 100 000 Raman spectra acquired using a novel Raman imaging technique. These results enable the establishment of structure–property relationships for optical absorption and photoelectrochemical properties, revealing that highly active photoelectrocatalysts containing α-Cu_2V_2O_7 or α-CuV_2O_6 can be prepared using scalable solution processing techniques. An additional discovery results from the formation of an off-stoichiometric β-Cu_2V_2O_7 material that exhibits high photoelectroactivity in the presence of a ferri/ferrocyanide redox couple with excellent stability in a pH 13 electrolyte, demonstrating that copper vanadates may be viable photoanodes in strong alkaline electrolytes
Trace-element composition of Chicxulub crater melt rock, K/T tektites and Yucatan basement
The Cretaceous/Tertiary (K/T) boundary Chicxulub impact is the best preserved large impact in the geologic record. The Chicxulub crater has been buried with no apparent erosion of its intracrater deposits, and its ejecta blanket is known and is well preserved at hundreds of localities globally. Although most of the molten material ejected from the crater has been largely altered, a few localities still preserve tektite glass. Availability of intra- and extracrater impact products as well as plausible matches to the targeted rocks allows the comparison of compositions of the different classes of impact products to those of the impacted lithologies. Determination of trace-element compositions of the K/T tektites, Chicxulub melt rock, and the targeted Yucatan silicate basement and carbonate/evaporite lithologies have been made using instrumental neutron activation analysis (INAA) and inductively coupled plasma mass spectrometry (ICP-MS). Some sample splits were studied with both techniques to ensure that inter-laboratory variation was not significant or could be corrected. The concentration of a few major and minor elements was also checked against microprobe results. Radiochemical neutron activation analysis (RNAA) was used to determine Ir abundances in some samples
Data Report: Major and trace element geochemistry of shipboard samples from Site 957, TAG hydrothermal field, Mid-Atlantic Ridge
Representative samples of drill core were collected from each of the five main areas drilled on the TAG (Trans-Atlantic Geotraverse) mound during Leg 158 (Humphris, Herzig, Miller, et al., 1996). In this report, we present the results of chemical analyses of 66 samples previously analyzed for Cu, Fe, Zn, Pb, Ag, and Cd by atomic absorption during Leg 158. Data are presented for an additional 38 elements plus total sulfur, loss on ignition, and the rare earth elements by a combination of optical emission spectrometry (ICP-ES), mass spectrometry (ICP-MS), and neutron activation (INAA). These data are discussed in detail in other chapters in this volume
Variations of Little Higgs Models and their Electroweak Constraints
We calculate the tree-level electroweak precision constraints on a wide class
of little Higgs models including: variations of the Littlest Higgs SU(5)/SO(5),
SU(6)/Sp(6), and SU(4)^4/SU(3)^4. By performing a global fit to the precision
data we find that for generic regions of the parameter space the bound on the
symmetry breaking scale f is several TeV, where we have kept the normalization
of f constant in the different models. For example, the ``minimal''
implementation of SU(6)/Sp(6) is bounded by f>3.0 TeV throughout most of the
parameter space, and SU(4)^4/SU(3)^4 is bounded by f^2 = f_1^2+f_2^2 > (4.2
TeV)^2. In certain models, such as SU(4)^4/SU(3)^4, a large f does not directly
imply a large amount of fine tuning since the heavy fermion masses that
contribute to the Higgs mass can be lowered below f for a carefully chosen set
of parameters. We also find that for certain models (or variations) there exist
regions of parameter space in which the bound on f can be lowered into the
range 1-2 TeV. These regions are typically characterized by a small mixing
between heavy and standard model gauge bosons, and a small (or vanishing)
coupling between heavy U(1) gauge bosons and the light fermions. Whether such a
region of parameter space is natural or not is ultimately contingent on the UV
completion.Comment: 32 pages, 13 figures; revised discussion of SU(4)^4/SU(3)^4 model,
bound on f is slightly highe
Dynamics of Warped Flux Compactifications
We discuss the four dimensional effective action for type IIB flux
compactifications, and obtain the quadratic terms taking warp effects into
account. The analysis includes both the 4-d zero modes and their KK
excitations, which become light at large warping. We identify an `axial' type
gauge for the supergravity fluctuations, which makes the four dimensional
degrees of freedom manifest. The other key ingredient is the existence of
constraints coming from the ten dimensional equations of motion. Applying these
conditions leads to considerable simplifications, enabling us to obtain the low
energy lagrangian explicitly. In particular, the warped K\"ahler potential for
metric moduli is computed and it is shown that there are no mixings with the KK
fluctuations and the result differs from previous proposals. The four
dimensional potential contains a generalization of the Gukov-Vafa-Witten term,
plus usual mass terms for KK modes.Comment: 37 pages. v2. References added, typos corrected. v3. Matches JHEP
versio
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