The Eighth Data Release of the Sloan Digital Sky Survey: First Data from SDSS-III

The Sloan Digital Sky Survey (SDSS) started a new phase in August 2008, with new instrumentation and new surveys focused on Galactic structure and chemical evolution, measurements of the baryon oscillation feature in the clustering of galaxies and the quasar Ly alpha forest, and a radial velocity search for planets around ~8000 stars. This paper describes the first data release of SDSS-III (and the eighth counting from the beginning of the SDSS). The release includes five-band imaging of roughly 5200 deg^2 in the Southern Galactic Cap, bringing the total footprint of the SDSS imaging to 14,555 deg^2, or over a third of the Celestial Sphere. All the imaging data have been reprocessed with an improved sky-subtraction algorithm and a final, self-consistent photometric recalibration and flat-field determination. This release also includes all data from the second phase of the Sloan Extension for Galactic Understanding and Evolution (SEGUE-2), consisting of spectroscopy of approximately 118,000 stars at both high and low Galactic latitudes. All the more than half a million stellar spectra obtained with the SDSS spectrograph have been reprocessed through an improved stellar parameters pipeline, which has better determination of metallicity for high metallicity stars.Comment: Astrophysical Journal Supplements, in press (minor updates from submitted version

Expression and Function of Serotonin 2A and 2B Receptors in the Mammalian Respiratory Network

Neurons of the respiratory network in the lower brainstem express a variety of serotonin receptors (5-HTRs) that act primarily through adenylyl cyclase. However, there is one receptor family including 5-HT2A, 5-HT2B, and 5-HT2C receptors that are directed towards protein kinase C (PKC). In contrast to 5-HT2ARs, expression and function of 5-HT2BRs within the respiratory network are still unclear. 5-HT2BR utilizes a Gq-mediated signaling cascade involving calcium and leading to activation of phospholipase C and IP3/DAG pathways. Based on previous studies, this signal pathway appears to mediate excitatory actions on respiration. In the present study, we analyzed receptor expression in pontine and medullary regions of the respiratory network both at the transcriptional and translational level using quantitative RT-PCR and self-made as well as commercially available antibodies, respectively. In addition we measured effects of selective agonists and antagonists for 5-HT2ARs and 5-HT2BRs given intra-arterially on phrenic nerve discharges in juvenile rats using the perfused brainstem preparation. The drugs caused significant changes in discharge activity. Co-administration of both agonists revealed a dominance of the 5-HT2BR. Given the nature of the signaling pathways, we investigated whether intracellular calcium may explain effects observed in the respiratory network. Taken together, the results of this study suggest a significant role of both receptors in respiratory network modulation

Erratum: “The eighth data release of the Sloan Digital Sky Survey: first data from SDSS-III” (2011, ApJS, 193, 29)

Section 3.5 of Aihara et al. (2011) described various sources of systematic error in the astrometry of the imaging data of the Sloan Digital Sky Survey (SDSS). In addition to these sources of error, there is an additional and more serious error, which introduces a large systematic shift in the astrometry over a large area around the north celestial pole. The region has irregular boundaries but in places extends as far south as declination δ ≈ 41◦. The sense of the shift is that the positions of all sources in the affected area are offset by roughly 250 mas in a northwest direction. We have updated the SDSS online documentation to reflect these errors, and to provide detailed quality information for each SDSS field

SDSS-III: Massive Spectroscopic Surveys of the Distant Universe, the Milky Way Galaxy, and Extra-Solar Planetary Systems

Building on the legacy of the Sloan Digital Sky Survey (SDSS-I and II), SDSS-III is a program of four spectroscopic surveys on three scientific themes: dark energy and cosmological parameters, the history and structure of the Milky Way, and the population of giant planets around other stars. In keeping with SDSS tradition, SDSS-III will provide regular public releases of all its data, beginning with SDSS DR8 (which occurred in Jan 2011). This paper presents an overview of the four SDSS-III surveys. BOSS will measure redshifts of 1.5 million massive galaxies and Lya forest spectra of 150,000 quasars, using the BAO feature of large scale structure to obtain percent-level determinations of the distance scale and Hubble expansion rate at z<0.7 and at z~2.5. SEGUE-2, which is now completed, measured medium-resolution (R=1800) optical spectra of 118,000 stars in a variety of target categories, probing chemical evolution, stellar kinematics and substructure, and the mass profile of the dark matter halo from the solar neighborhood to distances of 100 kpc. APOGEE will obtain high-resolution (R~30,000), high signal-to-noise (S/N>100 per resolution element), H-band (1.51-1.70 micron) spectra of 10^5 evolved, late-type stars, measuring separate abundances for ~15 elements per star and creating the first high-precision spectroscopic survey of all Galactic stellar populations (bulge, bar, disks, halo) with a uniform set of stellar tracers and spectral diagnostics. MARVELS will monitor radial velocities of more than 8000 FGK stars with the sensitivity and cadence (10-40 m/s, ~24 visits per star) needed to detect giant planets with periods up to two years, providing an unprecedented data set for understanding the formation and dynamical evolution of giant planet systems. (Abridged)Comment: Revised to version published in The Astronomical Journa

Reaching the Service Recovery Paradox : Using the Anchoring Effect to Reduce Required Monetary Compensation

Aim: When service failures occur, companies must use service recovery actions to recover customer satisfaction. The service recovery paradox refers to the paradox which occurs when a customer is more satisfied after successful service recovery, than they would have been if no failure had occurred. The purpose of this thesis is to examine the effectiveness of using the anchoring effect to lower the threshold value for service recovery paradox occurrence in a specific service failure scenario in the hotel industry. I.e., using the anchoring effect, this thesis aims to reduce monetary compensation required for the service recovery paradox to occur in the specific scenario. Method: 225 respondents were given a survey based on a scenario of a service failure in the hotel industry. The method used was a between-subject experimental design survey, manipulating anchor size, with 5 conditions; SEK 200, SEK 450, SEK 700, SEK 950, and no anchor, to see if the different conditions affected requested compensation whilst customer satisfaction remained constant. Gender and age of the participants was also measured to see if the requested compensation rates depended on these variables. Results: Results showed that it was possible to reduce monetary compensationrequired to reach the SRP by using anchoring values. The control group, which was given the scenario without any anchors, rendered a higher requested compensation than all groups which were given anchors. Furthermore, results showed that the mean compensation required to reach the SRP for the scenario decreased as the anchor values decreased, which indicates that the lower the anchor is set the lower the claim for requested monetary compensation becomes. Finally, the results indicated that age was a relevant variable whilst gender was not a relevant variable regarding compensation requirements. Contribution: Reaching the SRP can sometimes be expensive, especially when it comes to major service failures such as double-booked hotel rooms as is analysed in this thesis. The main contribution of this thesis is to provide an instrument for managers with which they might reach the SRP at lower costs. The results from this research can be directly implemented by managers in similar situations in the hotel industry and may also be used as a foundation for reaching the SRP in other industries as well as other scenarios. Suggestions for future research: As this survey only analyses Swedish participants, results may not be directly applicable to hotels in other cultures. Future research should, thus, focus on examining whether results vary depending on geographic and cultural factors. Other aspects that should be further investigated are what causes the differences in answers between different age groups and if gender displays any differences in other cultures, as it does not seem relevant with Swedish participants. Furthermore, the same surveys, with adjustments, could be used to conduct similar research on other scenarios and in other industries. Finally, researching whether anchoring levels below the lowest anchor used in this thesis, SEK 200, could further lower the required compensation would provide a more complete framework for this research

Reaching the Service Recovery Paradox : Using the Anchoring Effect to Reduce Required Monetary Compensation

Aim: When service failures occur, companies must use service recovery actions to recover customer satisfaction. The service recovery paradox refers to the paradox which occurs when a customer is more satisfied after successful service recovery, than they would have been if no failure had occurred. The purpose of this thesis is to examine the effectiveness of using the anchoring effect to lower the threshold value for service recovery paradox occurrence in a specific service failure scenario in the hotel industry. I.e., using the anchoring effect, this thesis aims to reduce monetary compensation required for the service recovery paradox to occur in the specific scenario. Method: 225 respondents were given a survey based on a scenario of a service failure in the hotel industry. The method used was a between-subject experimental design survey, manipulating anchor size, with 5 conditions; SEK 200, SEK 450, SEK 700, SEK 950, and no anchor, to see if the different conditions affected requested compensation whilst customer satisfaction remained constant. Gender and age of the participants was also measured to see if the requested compensation rates depended on these variables. Results: Results showed that it was possible to reduce monetary compensationrequired to reach the SRP by using anchoring values. The control group, which was given the scenario without any anchors, rendered a higher requested compensation than all groups which were given anchors. Furthermore, results showed that the mean compensation required to reach the SRP for the scenario decreased as the anchor values decreased, which indicates that the lower the anchor is set the lower the claim for requested monetary compensation becomes. Finally, the results indicated that age was a relevant variable whilst gender was not a relevant variable regarding compensation requirements. Contribution: Reaching the SRP can sometimes be expensive, especially when it comes to major service failures such as double-booked hotel rooms as is analysed in this thesis. The main contribution of this thesis is to provide an instrument for managers with which they might reach the SRP at lower costs. The results from this research can be directly implemented by managers in similar situations in the hotel industry and may also be used as a foundation for reaching the SRP in other industries as well as other scenarios. Suggestions for future research: As this survey only analyses Swedish participants, results may not be directly applicable to hotels in other cultures. Future research should, thus, focus on examining whether results vary depending on geographic and cultural factors. Other aspects that should be further investigated are what causes the differences in answers between different age groups and if gender displays any differences in other cultures, as it does not seem relevant with Swedish participants. Furthermore, the same surveys, with adjustments, could be used to conduct similar research on other scenarios and in other industries. Finally, researching whether anchoring levels below the lowest anchor used in this thesis, SEK 200, could further lower the required compensation would provide a more complete framework for this research

The demand-what-you-want strategy to service recovery : Achieving high customer satisfaction with low service failure compensation using anchoring and precision effects

Purpose Previous research suggests that the compensation offered to customers after a service failure has to be substantial to make customer satisfaction surpass that of an error-free service. However, with the right service recovery strategy, it might be possible to reduce compensation size while maintaining happy customers. The aim of the current study is to test whether an anchoring technique can be used to achieve this goal. Design/methodology/approach After experiencing a service failure, participants were told that there is a standard size of the compensation for service failures. The size of this standard was different depending on condition. Thereafter, participants were asked how much they would demand to be satisfied with their customer experience. Findings The compensation demand was relatively high on average (1,000–1,400 SEK, ≈ $120). However, telling the participants that customers typically receive 200 SEK as compensation reduced their demand to about 800 SEK (Experiment 1)—an anchoring effect. Moreover, a precise anchoring point (a typical compensation of 247 SEK) generated a lower demand than rounded anchoring points, even when the rounded anchoring point was lower (200 SEK) than the precise counterpart (Experiment 2)—a precision effect. Implications/value Setting a low compensation standard—yet allowing customers to actually receive compensations above the standard—can make customers more satisfied while also saving resources in demand-what-you-want service recovery situations, in particular when the compensation standard is a precise value

High resolution spectroscopy of the hyperfine structure splitting in97,99^{97,99}Tc

Resonance ionization mass spectrometry is an efficient tool for detecting trace amounts of long-lived radio-isotopes in environmental samples. For absolute quantification a tracer with identical atomic properties and chemical behavior is needed to prevent a possible dependency onto the absolute efficiency for the analytical method. For an application in$^{99}$Tc, the isotope$^{97}$Tc could serve as a potential tracer. Therefore the optical transitions of an efficient ionization scheme for technetium were investigated for the two odd mass isotopes$^{97,99}$Tc, both with a nuclear spin of I= $\frac {9}{2}$ . Using a pulsed, single mode laser with narrow bandwidth, the hyperfine structures (HFS) of two transitions were fully resolved. The observed isotope shift is small in comparison to the width of the hyperfine structure splitting. This is ideal for the application of$^{97}$Tc as tracer isotope for$^{99}$Tc quantification. The evaluation of the observed HFS splitting results in a first experimental value for the magnetic dipole for$^{97}$Tc of μ=+5.82(9) μ$_{N}$

Verification of the anti-5-HT_2BR antibody.

<p>(<b>A</b>) (<b>a</b>) The 5-HT_2BR belongs to the family of seven-transmembrane-domain receptors that are coupled to hetero-trimeric guanine-nucleotide-binding protein q (G_q). The transmembrane-domains are indicated by red cylinders (I–VII). We produced a novel monospecific polyclonal antibody against the 5-HT_2BR by selecting a specific amino acid sequence (Cys¹⁴⁶ - Gln¹⁶¹; NH₂-<i>CAISLDRYIAIKKPIQ</i>-COOH) of the second intracellular loop of the rat 5-HT_2BR-sequence. The peptide exhibits 100% homology in mouse. Red letters indicate mismatches in the human-sequence (L→V). (<b>b</b>) Immunoblot analysis of mouse (<b>1</b>) or rat (<b>2</b>) brainstem lysate revealed a specific band at about 48 kDa that corresponds with the predicted relative molecular mass of the 5-HT_2BR. (<b>B</b>) 5-HT_2BR expression in non-transfected (<b>a</b>) and transfected N1E-115 cells (<b>b</b>). The anti-5-HT_2BR antibody-dependent staining indicated a strong labeling of N1E-115 cells that had been transiently transfected with the rat 5-HT_2BR (<b>b</b>). Non-transfected cells expressing the mouse 5-HT_2BR showed a weak neuronal immunofluorescent signal that corresponds with a weak PCR signal (amplicon size 1114 bp) for the mouse 5-HT_2BR-mRNA (<i>Htr2b</i>) (<b>c</b>). Samples without reverse transcription (w/o RT) served as negative controls. (<b>C</b>) (<b>a</b>, <b>b</b>) Immunohistochemistry. Both pyramidal neurons of the cortex and motoneurons of the hypoglossal nucleus (XII) revealed a strong 5-HT_2BR immunoreactivity (-IR) (<b>a</b>) that was effectively blocked after pre-incubation of the antibody with a 50-fold molar excess of the peptide <i>CAISLDRYIAIKKPIQ</i> (+ peptide) that was used for immunization (<b>b</b>). Insets in (<b>a</b>) show labeled neurons at a higher magnification. Immunolabeling was performed using the PAP-method with diaminobenzidine as chromogen. (<b>c</b>) RT-PCR analysis of the rat cortex and hypoglossal nucleus. The 5-HT_2BR-specific mRNA (<i>Htr2b</i>) was detectable in neurons within both the rat cortex and the hypoglossal nucleus (XII) (amplicon size 380 bp).</p

Expression patterns of 5-HT_2A and 5-HT_2BRs within the medullary respiratory network.

<p>(<b>A</b>) 5-HT_2AR expression pattern in the pre-BötC. The plots (<b>B</b>, <b>C)</b> represent 5-HT_2AR immunoreactivity within the pre-BötC (<b>B</b>) and BötC (<b>C</b>). (<b>D</b>–<b>F</b>) shows the corresponding expression pattern for the 5-HT_2BR. The insets show labeled neurons at a higher magnification. Abbreviations: Bötzinger complex (BötC), nucleus ambiguus (NA), pre-Bötzinger complex (pre-BötC), principal nucleus of the inferior olive (IO_Pr), interpolar spinal trigeminal nucleus (Sp5l).</p