432 research outputs found
Diffusion and mixing in gravity-driven dense granular flows
We study the transport properties of particles draining from a silo using
imaging and direct particle tracking. The particle displacements show a
universal transition from super-diffusion to normal diffusion, as a function of
the distance fallen, independent of the flow speed. In the super-diffusive (but
sub-ballistic) regime, which occurs before a particle falls through its
diameter, the displacements have fat-tailed and anisotropic distributions. In
the diffusive regime, we observe very slow cage breaking and Peclet numbers of
order 100, contrary to the only previous microscopic model (based on diffusing
voids). Overall, our experiments show that diffusion and mixing are dominated
by geometry, consistent with fluctuating contact networks but not thermal
collisions, as in normal fluids
Strong anisotropy in surface kinetic roughening: analysis and experiments
We report an experimental assessment of surface kinetic roughening properties
that are anisotropic in space. Working for two specific instances of silicon
surfaces irradiated by ion-beam sputtering under diverse conditions (with and
without concurrent metallic impurity codeposition), we verify the predictions
and consistency of a recently proposed scaling Ansatz for surface observables
like the two-dimensional (2D) height Power Spectral Density (PSD). In contrast
with other formulations, this Ansatz is naturally tailored to the study of
two-dimensional surfaces, and allows to readily explore the implications of
anisotropic scaling for other observables, such as real-space correlation
functions and PSD functions for 1D profiles of the surface. Our results confirm
that there are indeed actual experimental systems whose kinetic roughening is
strongly anisotropic, as consistently described by this scaling analysis. In
the light of our work, some types of experimental measurements are seen to be
more affected by issues like finite space resolution effects, etc. that may
hinder a clear-cut assessment of strongly anisotropic scaling in the present
and other practical contexts
Conformational changes produced by ATP binding to the plasma membrane calcium pump
The aim of this work was to study the plasma membrane calcium pump (PMCA) reaction cycle by characterizing conformational changes associated with calcium, ATP, and vanadate binding to purified PMCA. This was accomplished by studying the exposure of PMCA to surrounding phospholipids by measuring the incorporation of the photoactivatable phosphatidylcholine analog 1-O-hexadecanoyl-2-O-[9-[[[2-[125I]iodo-4-(trifluoromethyl-3H-diazirin-3-yl)benzyl]oxy]carbonyl]nonanoyl]-sn-glycero-3-phosphocholine to the protein. ATP could bind to the different vanadate-bound states of the enzyme either in the presence or in the absence of Ca2+ with high apparent affinity. Conformational movements of the ATP binding domain were determined using the fluorescent analog 2′(3′)-O-(2,4,6-trinitrophenyl)adenosine 5′-triphosphate. To assess the conformational behavior of the Ca2+ binding domain, we also studied the occlusion of Ca2+, both in the presence and in the absence of ATP and with or without vanadate. Results show the existence of occluded species in the presence of vanadate and/or ATP. This allowed the development of a model that describes the transport of Ca2+ and its relation with ATP hydrolysis. This is the first approach that uses a conformational study to describe the PMCA P-type ATPase reaction cycle, adding important features to the classical E1-E2 model devised using kinetics methodology only.Fil: Mangialavori, Irene C.. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas. Oficina de Coordinación Administrativa Houssay. Instituto de Química y Fisicoquímica Biológicas; ArgentinaFil: Ferreira Gomes, Mariela S.. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas. Oficina de Coordinación Administrativa Houssay. Instituto de Química y Fisicoquímica Biológicas; ArgentinaFil: Saffioti, Nicolas A.. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas. Oficina de Coordinación Administrativa Houssay. Instituto de Química y Fisicoquímica Biológicas; ArgentinaFil: Gonzalez-Lebrero, Rodolfo Martin. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas. Oficina de Coordinación Administrativa Houssay. Instituto de Química y Fisicoquímica Biológicas; ArgentinaFil: Rossi, Rolando Carlos. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas. Oficina de Coordinación Administrativa Houssay. Instituto de Química y Fisicoquímica Biológicas; ArgentinaFil: Rossi, Juan Pablo Francisco. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas. Oficina de Coordinación Administrativa Houssay. Instituto de Química y Fisicoquímica Biológicas; Argentin
Consistent canonical quantization of general relativity in the space of Vassiliev knot invariants
We present a quantization of the Hamiltonian and diffeomorphism constraint of
canonical quantum gravity in the spin network representation. The novelty
consists in considering a space of wavefunctions based on the Vassiliev knot
invariants. The constraints are finite, well defined, and reproduce at the
level of quantum commutators the Poisson algebra of constraints of the
classical theory. A similar construction can be carried out in 2+1 dimensions
leading to the correct quantum theory.Comment: 4 pages, RevTex, one figur
On the Path Integral Loop Representation of (2+1) Lattice Non-Abelian Theory
A gauge invariant Hamiltonian representation for SU(2) in terms of a spin
network basis is introduced. The vectors of the spin network basis are
independent and the electric part of the Hamiltonian is diagonal in this
representation. The corresponding path integral for SU(2) lattice gauge theory
is expressed as a sum over colored surfaces, i.e. only involving the
attached to the lattice plaquettes. This surfaces may be interpreted as the
world sheets of the spin networks In 2+1 dimensions, this can be accomplished
by working in a lattice dual to a tetrahedral lattice constructed on a face
centered cubic Bravais lattice. On such a lattice, the integral of gauge
variables over boundaries or singular lines -- which now always bound three
coloured surfaces -- only contributes when four singular lines intersect at one
vertex and can be explicitly computed producing a 6-j or Racah symbol. We
performed a strong coupling expansion for the free energy. The convergence of
the series expansions is quite different from the series expansions which were
performed in ordinary cubic lattices. In the case of ordinary cubic lattices
the strong coupling expansions up to the considered truncation number of
plaquettes have the great majority of their coefficients positive, while in our
case we have almost equal number of contributions with both signs. Finally, it
is discused the connection in the naive coupling limit between this action and
that of the B-F topological field theory and also with the pure gravity action.Comment: 16 pages, REVTEX, 8 Encapsulated Postscript figures using psfig,
minor changes in text and reference
Effects of ocean acidification on invertebrate settlement at volcanic CO<inf>2</inf> vents
We present the first study of the effects of ocean acidification on settlement of benthic invertebrates and microfauna. Artificial collectors were placed for 1 month along pH gradients at CO2 vents off Ischia (Tyrrhenian Sea, Italy). Seventy-nine taxa were identified from six main taxonomic groups (foraminiferans, nematodes, polychaetes, molluscs, crustaceans and chaetognaths). Calcareous foraminiferans, serpulid polychaetes, gastropods and bivalves showed highly significant reductions in recruitment to the collectors as pCO2 rose from normal (336-341 ppm, pH 8.09-8.15) to high levels (886-5,148 ppm) causing acidified conditions near the vents (pH 7.08-7.79). Only the syllid polychaete Syllis prolifera had higher abundances at the most acidified station, although a wide range of polychaetes and small crustaceans was able to settle and survive under these conditions. A few taxa (Amphiglena mediterranea, Leptochelia dubia, Caprella acanthifera) were particularly abundant at stations acidified by intermediate amounts of CO2 (pH 7. 41-7.99). These results show that increased levels of CO2 can profoundly affect the settlement of a wide range of benthic organisms. © 2010 Springer-Verlag
Responses of marine benthic microalgae to elevated CO<inf>2</inf>
Increasing anthropogenic CO2 emissions to the atmosphere are causing a rise in pCO2 concentrations in the ocean surface and lowering pH. To predict the effects of these changes, we need to improve our understanding of the responses of marine primary producers since these drive biogeochemical cycles and profoundly affect the structure and function of benthic habitats. The effects of increasing CO2 levels on the colonisation of artificial substrata by microalgal assemblages (periphyton) were examined across a CO2 gradient off the volcanic island of Vulcano (NE Sicily). We show that periphyton communities altered significantly as CO2 concentrations increased. CO2 enrichment caused significant increases in chlorophyll a concentrations and in diatom abundance although we did not detect any changes in cyanobacteria. SEM analysis revealed major shifts in diatom assemblage composition as CO2 levels increased. The responses of benthic microalgae to rising anthropogenic CO2 emissions are likely to have significant ecological ramifications for coastal systems. © 2011 Springer-Verlag
Top-squark searches at the Tevatron in models of low-energy supersymmetry breaking
We study the production and decays of top squarks (stops) at the Tevatron
collider in models of low-energy supersymmetry breaking. We consider the case
where the lightest Standard Model (SM) superpartner is a light neutralino that
predominantly decays into a photon and a light gravitino. Considering the
lighter stop to be the next-to-lightest Standard Model superpartner, we analyze
stop signatures associated with jets, photons and missing energy, which lead to
signals naturally larger than the associated SM backgrounds. We consider both
2-body and 3-body decays of the top squarks and show that the reach of the
Tevatron can be significantly larger than that expected within either the
standard supergravity models or models of low-energy supersymmetry breaking in
which the stop is the lightest SM superpartner. For a modest projection of the
final Tevatron luminosity, L = 4 fb-1, stop masses of order 300 GeV are
accessible at the Tevatron collider in both 2-body and 3-body decay modes. We
also consider the production and decay of ten degenerate squarks that are the
supersymmetric partners of the five light quarks. In this case we find that
common squark masses up to 360 GeV are easily accessible at the Tevatron
collider, and that the reach increases further if the gluino is light.Comment: 32 pages, 9 figures; references adde
Возможность использования высокочастотного CuBr-лазера для создания скоростного лазерного монитора
Представлены оценки максимальных температур источников как внешней, так и собственной засветки, при которых будут иметь место искажения изображений, формируемых посредствам активных оптических систем. Показана возможность использования высокочастотного CuBr-лазера в качестве усилителя яркости лазерного монитора
sPlotOpen – An environmentally balanced, open-access, global dataset of vegetation plots
Assessing biodiversity status and trends in plant communities is critical for understanding, quantifying and predicting the effects of global change on ecosystems. Vegetation plots record the occurrence or abundance of all plant species co-occurring within delimited local areas. This allows species absences to be inferred, information seldom provided by existing global plant datasets. Although many vegetation plots have been recorded, most are not available to the global research community. A recent initiative, called ?sPlot?, compiled the first global vegetation plot database, and continues to grow and curate it. The sPlot database, however, is extremely unbalanced spatially and environmentally, and is not open-access. Here, we address both these issues by (a) resampling the vegetation plots using several environmental variables as sampling strata and (b) securing permission from data holders of 105 local-to-regional datasets to openly release data. We thus present sPlotOpen, the largest open-access dataset of vegetation plots ever released. sPlotOpen can be used to explore global diversity at the plant community level, as ground truth data in remote sensing applications, or as a baseline for biodiversity monitoring. Main types of variable contained: Vegetation plots (n = 95,104) recording cover or abundance of naturally co-occurring vascular plant species within delimited areas. sPlotOpen contains three partially overlapping resampled datasets (c. 50,000 plots each), to be used as replicates in global analyses. Besides geographical location, date, plot size, biome, elevation, slope, aspect, vegetation type, naturalness, coverage of various vegetation layers, and source dataset, plot-level data also include community-weighted means and variances of 18 plant functional traits from the TRY Plant Trait Database. Spatial location and grain: Global, 0.01?40,000 m². Time period and grain: 1888-2015, recording dates. Major taxa and level of measurement: 42,677 vascular plant taxa, plot-level records.Fil: Sabatini, Francesco Maria. Martin-universität Halle-wittenberg; Alemania. German Centre For Integrative Biodiversity Research (idiv) Halle-jena-leipzig; AlemaniaFil: Lenoir, Jonathan. Université de Picardie Jules Verne; FranciaFil: Hattab, Tarek. Université de Montpellier; FranciaFil: Arnst, Elise Aimee. Manaaki Whenua - Landcare Research; Nueva ZelandaFil: Chytrý, Milan. Masaryk University; República ChecaFil: Giorgis, Melisa Adriana. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas. Centro Científico Tecnológico Conicet - Córdoba. Instituto Multidisciplinario de Biología Vegetal. Universidad Nacional de Córdoba. Facultad de Ciencias Exactas Físicas y Naturales. Instituto Multidisciplinario de Biología Vegetal; ArgentinaFil: Vanselow, Kim André. University of Erlangen-Nuremberg; AlemaniaFil: Vásquez Martínez, Rodolfo. Jardín Botánico de Missouri Oxapampa; PerúFil: Vassilev, Kiril. Bulgarian Academy of Sciences; BulgariaFil: Vélez-Martin, Eduardo. ILEX Consultoria Científica; BrasilFil: Venanzoni, Roberto. University of Perugia; ItaliaFil: Vibrans, Alexander Christian. Universidade Regional de Blumenau; BrasilFil: Violle, Cyrille. Paul Valéry Montpellier University; FranciaFil: Virtanen, Risto. German Centre for Integrative Biodiversity Research; AlemaniaFil: von Wehrden, Henrik. Leuphana University of Lüneburg; AlemaniaFil: Wagner, Viktoria. University of Alberta; CanadáFil: Walker, Donald A.. University of Alaska; Estados UnidosFil: Waller, Donald M.. University of Wisconsin-Madison; Estados UnidosFil: Wang, Hua-Feng. Hainan University; ChinaFil: Wesche, Karsten. Senckenberg Museum of Natural History Görlitz; Alemania. Technische Universität Dresden; AlemaniaFil: Whitfeld, Timothy J. S.. University of Minnesota; Estados UnidosFil: Willner, Wolfgang. University of Vienna; AustriaFil: Wiser, Susan K.. Manaaki Whenua. Landcare Research; Nueva ZelandaFil: Wohlgemuth, Thomas. Swiss Federal Institute for Forest, Snow and Landscape Research; SuizaFil: Yamalov, Sergey. Russian Academy of Sciences; RusiaFil: Zobel, Martin. University of Tartu; EstoniaFil: Bruelheide, Helge. German Centre for Integrative Biodiversity Research; Alemani
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