Broad-band high-resolution rotational spectroscopy for laboratory astrophysics

We present a new experimental set-up devoted to the study of gas phase molecules and processes using broad-band high spectral resolution rotational spectroscopy. A reactor chamber is equipped with radio receivers similar to those used by radio astronomers to search for molecular emission in space. The whole range of the Q (31.5-50 GHz) and W bands (72-116.5 GHz) is available for rotational spectroscopy observations. The receivers are equipped with 16 × 2.5 GHz fast Fourier transform spectrometers with a spectral resolution of 38.14 kHz allowing the simultaneous observation of the complete Q band and one-third of the W band. The whole W band can be observed in three settings in which the Q band is always observed. Species such as CH3CN, OCS, and SO2 are detected, together with many of their isotopologues and vibrationally excited states, in very short observing times. The system permits automatic overnight observations, and integration times as long as 2.4 × 105 s have been reached. The chamber is equipped with a radiofrequency source to produce cold plasmas, and with four ultraviolet lamps to study photochemical processes. Plasmas of CH4, N2, CH3CN, NH3, O2, and H2, among other species, have been generated and the molecular products easily identified by the rotational spectrum, and via mass spectrometry and optical spectroscopy. Finally, the rotational spectrum of the lowest energy conformer of CH3CH2NHCHO (N-ethylformamide), a molecule previously characterized in microwave rotational spectroscopy, has been measured up to 116.5 GHz, allowing the accurate determination of its rotational and distortion constants and its search in space.We thank the European Research Council for funding support under Synergy Grant ERC-2013-SyG, G.A. 610256 (NANOCOSMOS). IT, VJH, and JLD acknowledge additional partial support from the Spanish State Research Agency (AEI) through grant FIS2016-77726-C3-1-P. JAMG, LM, and GS acknowledge additional partial support from the Spanish State Research Agency (AEI) through grant MAT2017-85089-C2-1R. We thank David López Romero for his help during the process of installation, commissioning, and cleaning of the chamber. We would like to thank Kremena Makasheva for the useful comments and suggestions during the experiments with Hexamethyldisiloxane. We would also like to thank Rosa Lebrón, Jesús Quintanilla, and Cristina Soria for providing us with the sample of N-ethylformamide. Sandra I. Ramírez acknowledges support from the FONCICYT under grant number 291842. Celina Bermúdez thanks the Spanish Ministerio de Ciencia Innovación y Universidades for the Juan de la Cierva grant FJCI-2016-27983

Una Federación de Laboratorios Remotos VISIR a través del Proyecto PILAR

Este documento describe cómo un nuevo proyecto Erasmus+, PILAR (Plataform Integration of Laboratories base don the Architecture of visiR), está siendo desarrollado y cómo la puesta en marcha del partenariado y del proyecto está reforzando la red VISIR (Virtual Instrument Systems in Reality) y el Grupo de Interés Especial de VISIR bajo el Consorcio de Laboratorios online (GOLC - Global Online Laboratory Consortium) de la Asociación Internacional de Ingeniería Online (IAOE - International Association of Online Engineering. La Universidad Española para la Educación a Distancia (UNED) coordina este proyecto que tiene como objetivo federar los sistemas existentes (o nuevos) con el fin de utilizar los recursos de manera más efectiva y eficiente, haciendo transparente para el usuario final la elección de los recursos compartidos.info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio

First report on dung beetles in intra-Amazonian savannahs in Roraima, Brazil

This is the first study to address the dung beetle (Coleoptera: Scarabaeidae: Scarabaeinae) diversity in intra-Amazonian savannahs in the state of Roraima, Brazil. Our aim was to survey the dung beetle fauna associated with these savannahs (regionally called 'lavrado'), since little is known about the dung beetles from this environment. We conducted three field samples using pitfall traps baited with human dung in savannah areas near the city of Boa Vista during the rainy seasons of 1996, 1997, and 2008. We collected 383 individuals from ten species, wherein six have no previous record in intra-Amazonian savannahs. The most abundant species were Ontherus appendiculatus (Mannerheim, 1829), Canthidium aff. humerale (Germar, 1813), Dichotomius nisus (Olivier, 1789), and Pseudocanthon aff. xanthurus (Blanchard, 1846). We believe that knowing the dung beetles diversity associated with the intra-Amazonian savannahs is ideal for understanding the occurrence and distribution of these organisms in a highly threatened environment, it thus being the first step towards conservation strategy development

Automated segmentation of multifocal basal ganglia T2*-weighted MRI hypointensities

AbstractMultifocal basal ganglia T2*-weighted (T2*w) hypointensities, which are believed to arise mainly from vascular mineralization, were recently proposed as a novel MRI biomarker for small vessel disease and ageing. These T2*w hypointensities are typically segmented semi-automatically, which is time consuming, associated with a high intra-rater variability and low inter-rater agreement. To address these limitations, we developed a fully automated, unsupervised segmentation method for basal ganglia T2*w hypointensities. This method requires conventional, co-registered T2*w and T1-weighted (T1w) volumes, as well as region-of-interest (ROI) masks for the basal ganglia and adjacent internal capsule generated automatically from T1w MRI. The basal ganglia T2*w hypointensities were then segmented with thresholds derived with an adaptive outlier detection method from respective bivariate T2*w/T1w intensity distributions in each ROI. Artefacts were reduced by filtering connected components in the initial masks based on their standardised T2*w intensity variance. The segmentation method was validated using a custom-built phantom containing mineral deposit models, i.e. gel beads doped with 3 different contrast agents in 7 different concentrations, as well as with MRI data from 98 community-dwelling older subjects in their seventies with a wide range of basal ganglia T2*w hypointensities. The method produced basal ganglia T2*w hypointensity masks that were in substantial volumetric and spatial agreement with those generated by an experienced rater (Jaccard index=0.62±0.40). These promising results suggest that this method may have use in automatic segmentation of basal ganglia T2*w hypointensities in studies of small vessel disease and ageing