913 research outputs found
Parasites, Lightning, and the Vegetation Mosaic in Wilderness Landscapes
The vegetation mosaic in any landscape is a function of environmental variation and historic disturbances, whether caused by humans or other factors. Many studies have focused on species composition in relation to environmental gradients, and secondary succession is one of the oldest themes in ecology (Fig. 4.0. Usually the study areas selected for research of this nature have been dispersed in agrourban landscapes and have included woodlots, small tracts of prairie, or other relatively small, homogeneous stands of vegetation. Although the ecological significance of the spatial positioning of the communities or patches in the agrourban matrix has been largely ignored, there seems to be a growing interest in determining how the number, variety, and juxtaposition of the patches influence the frequency and spread of disturbance as well as other landscape characteristics, including wildlife habitat, biotic diversity, nutrient retention, and productivity (Pickett and White 1985; Forman and Godron 1986)
High-Energy Aspects of Solar Flares: Overview of the Volume
In this introductory chapter, we provide a brief summary of the successes and
remaining challenges in understanding the solar flare phenomenon and its
attendant implications for particle acceleration mechanisms in astrophysical
plasmas. We also provide a brief overview of the contents of the other chapters
in this volume, with particular reference to the well-observed flare of 2002
July 23Comment: This is the introductory article for a monograph on the physics of
solar flares, inspired by RHESSI observations. The individual articles are to
appear in Space Science Reviews (2011
Unified description of magic numbers of metal clusters in terms of the 3-dimensional q-deformed harmonic oscillator
Magic numbers predicted by a 3-dimensional q-deformed harmonic oscillator
with Uq(3)>SOq(3) symmetry are compared to experimental data for atomic
clusters of alkali metals (Li, Na, K, Rb, Cs), noble metals (Cu, Ag, Au),
divalent metals (Zn, Cd), and trivalent metals (Al, In), as well as to
theoretical predictions of jellium models, Woods-Saxon and wine bottle
potentials, and to the classification scheme using the 3n+l pseudo quantum
number. In alkali metal clusters and noble metal clusters the 3-dimensional
q-deformed harmonic oscillator correctly predicts all experimentally observed
magic numbers up to 1500 (which is the expected limit of validity for theories
based on the filling of electronic shells), while in addition it gives
satisfactory results for the magic numbers of clusters of divalent metals and
trivalent metals, thus indicating that Uq(3), which is a nonlinear extension of
the U(3) symmetry of the spherical (3-dimensional isotropic) harmonic
oscillator, is a good candidate for being the symmetry of systems of several
metal clusters. The Taylor expansions of angular momentum dependent potentials
approximately producing the same spectrum as the 3-dimensional q-deformed
harmonic oscillator are found to be similar to the Taylor expansions of the
symmetrized Woods-Saxon and wine-bottle symmetrized Woods-Saxon potentials,
which are known to provide successful fits of the Ekardt potentials.Comment: 23 pages including 7 table
Exocomets from a Solar System Perspective
Exocomets are small bodies releasing gas and dust which orbit stars other
than the Sun. Their existence was first inferred from the detection of variable
absorption features in stellar spectra in the late 1980s using spectroscopy.
More recently, they have been detected through photometric transits from space,
and through far-IR/mm gas emission within debris disks. As (exo)comets are
considered to contain the most pristine material accessible in stellar systems,
they hold the potential to give us information about early stage formation and
evolution conditions of extra Solar Systems. In the Solar System, comets carry
the physical and chemical memory of the protoplanetary disk environment where
they formed, providing relevant information on processes in the primordial
solar nebula. The aim of this paper is to compare essential compositional
properties between Solar System comets and exocomets. The paper aims to
highlight commonalities and to discuss differences which may aid the
communication between the involved research communities and perhaps also avoid
misconceptions. Exocomets likely vary in their composition depending on their
formation environment like Solar System comets do, and since exocomets are not
resolved spatially, they pose a challenge when comparing them to high fidelity
observations of Solar System comets. Observations of gas around main sequence
stars, spectroscopic observations of "polluted" white dwarf atmospheres and
spectroscopic observations of transiting exocomets suggest that exocomets may
show compositional similarities with Solar System comets. The recent
interstellar visitor 2I/Borisov showed gas, dust and nuclear properties similar
to that of Solar System comets. This raises the tantalising prospect that
observations of interstellar comets may help bridge the fields of exocomet and
Solar System comets.Comment: 25 pages, 3 figures. To be published in PASP. This paper is the
product of a workshop at the Lorentz Centre in Leiden, the Netherland
FGF receptor genes and breast cancer susceptibility: results from the Breast Cancer Association Consortium
Background:Breast cancer is one of the most common malignancies in women. Genome-wide association studies have identified FGFR2 as a breast cancer susceptibility gene. Common variation in other fibroblast growth factor (FGF) receptors might also modify risk. We tested this hypothesis by studying genotyped single-nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) and imputed SNPs in FGFR1, FGFR3, FGFR4 and FGFRL1 in the Breast Cancer Association Consortium.
Methods:Data were combined from 49 studies, including 53 835 cases and 50 156 controls, of which 89 050 (46 450 cases and 42 600 controls) were of European ancestry, 12 893 (6269 cases and 6624 controls) of Asian and 2048 (1116 cases and 932 controls) of African ancestry. Associations with risk of breast cancer, overall and by disease sub-type, were assessed using unconditional logistic regression.
Results:Little evidence of association with breast cancer risk was observed for SNPs in the FGF receptor genes. The strongest evidence in European women was for rs743682 in FGFR3; the estimated per-allele odds ratio was 1.05 (95 confidence interval=1.02-1.09, P=0.0020), which is substantially lower than that observed for SNPs in FGFR2.
Conclusion:Our results suggest that common variants in the other FGF receptors are not associated with risk of breast cancer to the degree observed for FGFR2. © 2014 Cancer Research UK
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Evidence that breast cancer risk at the 2q35 locus is mediated through IGFBP5 regulation.
GWAS have identified a breast cancer susceptibility locus on 2q35. Here we report the fine mapping of this locus using data from 101,943 subjects from 50 case-control studies. We genotype 276 SNPs using the 'iCOGS' genotyping array and impute genotypes for a further 1,284 using 1000 Genomes Project data. All but two, strongly correlated SNPs (rs4442975 G/T and rs6721996 G/A) are excluded as candidate causal variants at odds against >100:1. The best functional candidate, rs4442975, is associated with oestrogen receptor positive (ER+) disease with an odds ratio (OR) in Europeans of 0.85 (95% confidence interval=0.84-0.87; P=1.7 × 10(-43)) per t-allele. This SNP flanks a transcriptional enhancer that physically interacts with the promoter of IGFBP5 (encoding insulin-like growth factor-binding protein 5) and displays allele-specific gene expression, FOXA1 binding and chromatin looping. Evidence suggests that the g-allele confers increased breast cancer susceptibility through relative downregulation of IGFBP5, a gene with known roles in breast cell biology
A plesiosaur containing an ichthyosaur embryo as stomach contents from the Sundance Formation of the Bighorn Basin, Wyoming
Herein we report the discovery of an ichthyosaur embryo from the Upper Member of the Sundance Formation (Oxfordian) of the Bighorn Basin, Wyoming. The specimen is the first known ichthyosaur embryo from the Upper Jurassic, and is the first Jurassic ichthyosaur embryo from North America. The embryo was discovered in close association with the abdomen of an articulated partial plesiosaur skeleton, and several lines of evidence support the interpretation of the embryo as plesiosaur stomach contents. The small size and extremely poor ossification of the embryo indicate that the animal was probably not a neonate. Although the taxonomic affinities of the fossil are unknown, the large ichthyosaurian (sensu stricto) Opthalmosaurus natans is the only known ichthyosaur from the Sundance Formation, and the embryo may belong to that taxon
Recent Advances in Understanding Particle Acceleration Processes in Solar Flares
We review basic theoretical concepts in particle acceleration, with
particular emphasis on processes likely to occur in regions of magnetic
reconnection. Several new developments are discussed, including detailed
studies of reconnection in three-dimensional magnetic field configurations
(e.g., current sheets, collapsing traps, separatrix regions) and stochastic
acceleration in a turbulent environment. Fluid, test-particle, and
particle-in-cell approaches are used and results compared. While these studies
show considerable promise in accounting for the various observational
manifestations of solar flares, they are limited by a number of factors, mostly
relating to available computational power. Not the least of these issues is the
need to explicitly incorporate the electrodynamic feedback of the accelerated
particles themselves on the environment in which they are accelerated. A brief
prognosis for future advancement is offered.Comment: This is a chapter in a monograph on the physics of solar flares,
inspired by RHESSI observations. The individual articles are to appear in
Space Science Reviews (2011
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