The status of the crown-of-thorns starfish (Acanthaster planci) in the Great Barrier Reef, Australia, assessed from the sediment record of John Brewer, Green Island and Heron Island reefs

[Extract from 1988 report] Over the last 30 years the crown-of-thorns starfish (Acanthaster planci) has caused extensive damage to many reefs in the Great Barrier Reef Province. John Brewer Reef and Green Island Reef are among those worst affected by A. planci predation during this period. Surface sediment from these two reefs was exhaustively picked for A. planci skeletal elements and found to be greatly enhanced in element abundance when compared to that of Heron Island Reef which has historically maintained very low-density starfish populations. Carbon-14 accelerator mass spectrometry (AMS) dating indicates that skeletal elements from the surface sediment of John Brewer and Green Island Reefs are of contemporary age. Core sampling shows that subsurface sediment at John Brewer and Green Island Reefs contains A. planci element densities comparable to those found in the surface sediment at these localities. Physical and biological reworking of elements within the sediment precludes the recognition of individual outbreaks in core stratigraphy. AMS element dates and bulk sediment dates, obtained by conventional Carbon-14 radiometry, show that subsurface elements are generally prehistoric and conform to an age structure preserved in the sediment pile. Assessed on a time-averaged basis, the density and distribution of subsurface elements suggest that A. planci outbreaks are not a recent phenomenon, but have been an integral part of the ecosystem for at least 7,000 years on John Brewer Reef and 3,000 years on Green Island Reef

Cluster multi-point observations of the magnetotail plasma sheet.

This thesis presents observations of the terrestrial magnetotail plasma sheet made by the European Space Agency Cluster mission. The Cluster mission is composed of four identical spacecraft, the first such multi-spacecraft mission, and enables, for the first time, the disambiguation of time versus space phenomena. Using the data from 2003, when the spacecraft were at their smallest average separation to date, many small-scale processes, both microphysical and macrophysical, are investigated. In the first study presented, two small flux ropes, a possible signature of multiple X-line reconnection, are investigated. By the development and utilisation of various multi-spacecraft methods, the currents and magnetic forces internal and external to the flux ropes, as well as the internal structure of the flux ropes, are investigated. In addition, a theory of their early evolution is suggested. In the second study presented, various terms of the generalised Ohm's law for a plasma are determined, including, for the first time, the divergence of the full electron pressure tensor, during the passage past the spacecraft of an active reconnection X-line. It is found that the electric field contribution from the divergence of the electron pressure tensor is anti-correlated with the contribution from the Hall term in the direction normal to the neutral sheet. In addition, further signatures of reconnection are quantified, such as parallel electric field generation and Hall quadrupolar magnetic field and current systems. In the final study presented, the anti-correlation between the divergence of the electron pressure tensor and Hall terms is investigated further. It is found that the anti-correlation is general, appearing in the direction normal to the neutral sheet because of a cross tail current. In a simple magnetohydrostatic treatment, a force balance argument leads to the conclusion that the gradient of the anti-correlation is a function of the ratio of the electron to ion temperatures, as well as providing information regarding the spatial scales of the pressure tensors

Peripheral airway dysfunction in prematurity-associated obstructive lung disease identified by oscillometry

Introduction: Mechanisms underlying lung dysfunction after preterm birth are poorly understood. Studying phenotypes of prematurity-associated lung disease may aid understanding of underlying mechanisms. Preterm-born children with and without lung dysfunction and term controls were assessed using oscillometry before and after exercise, and after postexercise bronchodilation. Methods: Preterm-born children, born at gestation of 34 weeks or less, were classified into those with prematurity-associated obstructive lung disease (POLD; FEV1 90%). All children underwent cardiopulmonary exercise, and oscillometry assessment at baseline, postexercise, and after postexercise bronchodilator administration. Results: From 241 participants aged 7–12 years, complete data were available from 179: 15 children with POLD and 11 with pPRISm were compared with 93 preterm and 60 term controls. POLD group, when compared to both control groups, had impaired impedance, greater resistance, more negative (greater magnitude) reactance at low frequencies, and also had decreased compliance. pPRISm group demonstrated impaired reactance and compliance compared to term controls. No differences were noted between the preterm and term controls. Exercise had little impact on oscillometry values, but children with POLD had greatest improvements after postexercise bronchodilator administration, with decreased resistance and decreased magnitude of reactance, particularly at low frequencies. Conclusion: Preterm-born children with obstructive airway disease had the greatest oscillometry impairments and the largest improvements after postexercise bronchodilator compared to control groups. Oscillometry can potentially be used to identify preterm-born children with lung disease to institute treatment. © 2023 The Authors. Pediatric Pulmonology published by Wiley Periodicals LLC

Spatio-temporal genetic tagging of a cosmopolitan planktivorous shark provides insight to gene flow, temporal variation and site-specific re-encounters

Migratory movements in response to seasonal resources often influence population structure and dynamics. Yet in mobile marine predators, population genetic consequences of such repetitious behaviour remain inaccessible without comprehensive sampling strategies. Temporal genetic sampling of seasonally recurring aggregations of planktivorous basking sharks, Cetorhinus maximus, in the Northeast Atlantic (NEA) affords an opportunity to resolve individual re-encounters at key sites with population connectivity and patterns of relatedness. Genetic tagging (19 microsatellites) revealed 18% of re-sampled individuals in the NEA demonstrated inter/multi-annual site-specific re-encounters. High genetic connectivity and migration between aggregation sites indicate the Irish Sea as an important movement corridor, with a contemporary effective population estimate (Ne) of 382 (CI = 241–830). We contrast the prevailing view of high gene flow across oceanic regions with evidence of population structure within the NEA, with early-season sharks off southwest Ireland possibly representing genetically distinct migrants. Finally, we found basking sharks surfacing together in the NEA are on average more related than expected by chance, suggesting a genetic consequence of, or a potential mechanism maintaining, site-specific re-encounters. Long-term temporal genetic monitoring is paramount in determining future viability of cosmopolitan marine species, identifying genetic units for conservation management, and for understanding aggregation structure and dynamics

Leptonic and Semileptonic Decays of Charm and Bottom Hadrons

We review the experimental measurements and theoretical descriptions of leptonic and semileptonic decays of particles containing a single heavy quark, either charm or bottom. Measurements of bottom semileptonic decays are used to determine the magnitudes of two fundamental parameters of the standard model, the Cabibbo-Kobayashi-Maskawa matrix elements $V_{cb}$ and $V_{ub}$. These parameters are connected with the physics of quark flavor and mass, and they have important implications for the breakdown of CP symmetry. To extract precise values of $|V_{cb}|$ and $|V_{ub}|$ from measurements, however, requires a good understanding of the decay dynamics. Measurements of both charm and bottom decay distributions provide information on the interactions governing these processes. The underlying weak transition in each case is relatively simple, but the strong interactions that bind the quarks into hadrons introduce complications. We also discuss new theoretical approaches, especially heavy-quark effective theory and lattice QCD, which are providing insights and predictions now being tested by experiment. An international effort at many laboratories will rapidly advance knowledge of this physics during the next decade.Comment: This review article will be published in Reviews of Modern Physics in the fall, 1995. This file contains only the abstract and the table of contents. The full 168-page document including 47 figures is available at http://charm.physics.ucsb.edu/papers/slrevtex.p

Forward pi^0 Production and Associated Transverse Energy Flow in Deep-Inelastic Scattering at HERA

Deep-inelastic positron-proton interactions at low values of Bjorken-x down to x \approx 4.10^-5 which give rise to high transverse momentum pi^0 mesons are studied with the H1 experiment at HERA. The inclusive cross section for pi^0 mesons produced at small angles with respect to the proton remnant (the forward region) is presented as a function of the transverse momentum and energy of the pi^0 and of the four-momentum transfer Q^2 and Bjorken-x. Measurements are also presented of the transverse energy flow in events containing a forward pi^0 meson. Hadronic final state calculations based on QCD models implementing different parton evolution schemes are confronted with the data.Comment: 27 pages, 8 figures and 3 table

Search for Doubly-Charged Higgs Boson Production at HERA

A search for the single production of doubly-charged Higgs bosons H^{\pm \pm} in ep collisions is presented. The signal is searched for via the Higgs decays into a high mass pair of same charge leptons, one of them being an electron. The analysis uses up to 118 pb^{-1} of ep data collected by the H1 experiment at HERA. No evidence for doubly-charged Higgs production is observed and mass dependent upper limits are derived on the Yukawa couplings h_{el} of the Higgs boson to an electron-lepton pair. Assuming that the doubly-charged Higgs only decays into an electron and a muon via a coupling of electromagnetic strength h_{e \mu} = \sqrt{4 \pi \alpha_{em}} = 0.3, a lower limit of 141 GeV on the H^{\pm\pm} mass is obtained at the 95% confidence level. For a doubly-charged Higgs decaying only into an electron and a tau and a coupling h_{e\tau} = 0.3, masses below 112 GeV are ruled out.Comment: 15 pages, 3 figures, 1 tabl

Measurement of the B0-anti-B0-Oscillation Frequency with Inclusive Dilepton Events

The $B^0$-$\bar B^0$ oscillation frequency has been measured with a sample of 23 million \B\bar B pairs collected with the BABAR detector at the PEP-II asymmetric B Factory at SLAC. In this sample, we select events in which both B mesons decay semileptonically and use the charge of the leptons to identify the flavor of each B meson. A simultaneous fit to the decay time difference distributions for opposite- and same-sign dilepton events gives $\Delta m_d = 0.493 \pm 0.012{(stat)}\pm 0.009{(syst)}$ ps$^{-1}$.Comment: 7 pages, 1 figure, submitted to Physical Review Letter

Low Q^2 Jet Production at HERA and Virtual Photon Structure

The transition between photoproduction and deep-inelastic scattering is investigated in jet production at the HERA ep collider, using data collected by the H1 experiment. Measurements of the differential inclusive jet cross-sections dsigep/dEt* and dsigmep/deta*, where Et* and eta* are the transverse energy and the pseudorapidity of the jets in the virtual photon-proton centre of mass frame, are presented for 0 < Q2 < 49 GeV2 and 0.3 < y < 0.6. The interpretation of the results in terms of the structure of the virtual photon is discussed. The data are best described by QCD calculations which include a partonic structure of the virtual photon that evolves with Q2.Comment: 20 pages, 5 Figure

Hadron Production in Diffractive Deep-Inelastic Scattering

Characteristics of hadron production in diffractive deep-inelastic positron-proton scattering are studied using data collected in 1994 by the H1 experiment at HERA. The following distributions are measured in the centre-of-mass frame of the photon dissociation system: the hadronic energy flow, the Feynman-x (x_F) variable for charged particles, the squared transverse momentum of charged particles (p_T^{*2}), and the mean p_T^{*2} as a function of x_F. These distributions are compared with results in the gamma^* p centre-of-mass frame from inclusive deep-inelastic scattering in the fixed-target experiment EMC, and also with the predictions of several Monte Carlo calculations. The data are consistent with a picture in which the partonic structure of the diffractive exchange is dominated at low Q^2 by hard gluons.Comment: 16 pages, 6 figures, submitted to Phys. Lett.