Effects of mechanically separated dairy cow slurry on grazing performance

No abstract available

Impact of slurry application method on phosphorus loss in runoff from grassland soils during periods of high soil moisture content

peer-reviewedPrevious studies have reported that the trailing shoe application technique reduces phosphorus (P) in the runoff postslurry application when compared to the traditional splash-plate application technique. However, the effectiveness of the trailing-shoe technique as a means of reducing P losses has not been evaluated when slurry is applied during periods of high soil moisture levels and lower herbage covers. To address this issue, three treatments were examined in a 3 × 4 factorial design split-plot experiment, with treatments comprising three slurry treatments: control (no slurry), splashplate and trailing-shoe, and four slurry application dates: 7 December, 18 January, 1 March and 10 April. Dairy cow slurry was applied at a rate of 20 m3/ha, while simulated runoff was generated 2, 9 and 16 days later and analysed for a range of P fractions. Dissolved reactive P concentrations in runoff at day two was 41% lower when slurry was applied using the trailing-shoe technique, compared to the splash-plate technique (P < 0.05). In addition, P concentrations in runoff were higher (P < 0.05) from slurry applied in December and March compared to slurry applied in January or April, coinciding with periods of higher soil moisture contents. While the latter highlights that ‘calendar’-based non-spreading periods might not always achieve the desired consequences, the study demonstrated that further field-scale investigations into the trailing shoe as a mitigation measure to reduced P loss from agricultural soils is warranted

Long optical plateau in the afterglow of the short GRB 150424A with extended emission: Evidence for energy injection by a magnetar?

Short-duration gamma-ray bursts (GRBs) with extended emission form a subclass of short GRBs, comprising about 15% of the short-duration sample. Afterglow detections of short GRBs are also rare (about 30%) because of their lower luminosity. Aims. We present a multiband data set of the short burst with extended emission, GRB 150424A, comprising of GROND observations, complemented with data from Swift/UVOT, Swift/XRT, HST, Keck/LRIS, and data points from the literature. The GRB 150424A afterglow shows an extended plateau phase, lasting about 8 h. The analysis of this unique GRB afterglow might shed light on the understanding of afterglow plateau emission, the nature of which is still under debate. Methods. We present a phenomenological analysis made by applying fireball closure relations and interpret the findings in the context of the fireball model. We discuss the plausibility of a magnetar as a central engine, which would be responsible for additional and prolonged energy injection into the fireball. Results. We find convincing evidence for energy injection into the afterglow of GRB 150424A. We find that a magnetar spin-down as the source for a prolonged energy injection requires that at least 4% of the spin-down energy is converted into radiation. © ESO, 2017.H.J.v.E. was supported by the Alexander von Humboldt foundation at the time of this work. D.A.K. acknowledges financial support from MPE, from TLS, from the Spanish research project AYA 2014-58381-P, and from Juan de la Cierva Incorporacion fellowships IJCI-2015-26153 and IJCI-2014-21669. P.S., T.W.C., J.F.G., M.T. acknowledge support through the Sofja Kovalevskaja Award from the Alexander von Humboldt Foundation of Germany. S.K. and A.N.G. acknowledge support by DFG grant K1 766/16-1. S.S. acknowledges support by the Thuringer Ministerium fur Bildung, Wissenschaft und Kultur under FKZ 12010-514. Part of the funding for GROND (both hardware as well as personnel) was generously granted from the Leibniz-Prize to G. Hasinger (DFG grant HA 1850/28-1).Peer Reviewe

Milagrito: a TeV air-shower array

Milagrito, a large, covered water-Cherenkov detector, was the world's first air-shower-particle detector sensitive to cosmic gamma rays below 1 TeV. It served as a prototype for the Milagro detector and operated from February 1997 to May 1998. This paper gives a description of Milagrito, a summary of the operating experience, and early results that demonstrate the capabilities of this technique.Comment: 38 pages including 24 figure

Meeting reports: Research on Coupled Human and Natural Systems (CHANS): Approach, Challenges, and Strategies

Understanding the complexity of human–nature interactions is central to the quest for both human well-being and global sustainability. To build an understanding of these interactions, scientists, planners, resource managers, policymakers, and communities increasingly are collaborating across wide-ranging disciplines and knowledge domains. Scientists and others are generating new integrated knowledge on top of their requisite specialized knowledge to understand complex systems in order to solve pressing environmental and social problems (e.g., Carpenter et al. 2009). One approach to this sort of integration, bringing together detailed knowledge of various disciplines (e.g., social, economic, biological, and geophysical), has become known as the study of Coupled Human and Natural Systems, or CHANS (Liu et al. 2007a, b). In 2007 a formal standing program in Dynamics of Coupled Natural and Human Systems was created by the U.S. National Science Foundation. Recently, the program supported the launch of an International Network of Research on Coupled Human and Natural Systems (CHANS-Net.org). A major kick-off event of the network was a symposium on Complexity in Human–Nature Interactions across Landscapes, which brought together leading CHANS scientists at the 2009 meeting of the U.S. Regional Association of the International Association for Landscape Ecology in Snowbird, Utah. The symposium highlighted original and innovative research emphasizing reciprocal interactions between human and natural systems at multiple spatial, temporal, and organizational scales. The presentations can be found at ‹http://chans- net.org/Symposium_2009.aspx›. The symposium was accompanied by a workshop on Challenges and Opportunities in CHANS Research. This article provides an overview of the CHANS approach, outlines the primary challenges facing the CHANS research community, and discusses potential strategies to meet these challenges, based upon the presentations and discussions among participants at the Snowbird meeting

Search for the doubly heavy baryon Ξbc+\it{\Xi}_{bc}^{+} decaying to J/ψΞc+J/\it{\psi} \it{\Xi}_{c}^{+}

A first search for the $\it{\Xi}_{bc}^{+}\to J/\it{\psi}\it{\Xi}_{c}^{+}$ decay is performed by the LHCb experiment with a data sample of proton-proton collisions, corresponding to an integrated luminosity of $9\,\mathrm{fb}^{-1}$ recorded at centre-of-mass energies of 7, 8, and $13\mathrm{\,Te\kern -0.1em V}$. Two peaking structures are seen with a local (global) significance of $4.3\,(2.8)$ and $4.1\,(2.4)$ standard deviations at masses of $6571\,\mathrm{Me\kern -0.1em V\!/}c^2$ and $6694\,\mathrm{Me\kern -0.1em V\!/}c^2$, respectively. Upper limits are set on the $\it{\Xi}_{bc}^{+}$ baryon production cross-section times the branching fraction relative to that of the $B_{c}^{+}\to J/\it{\psi} D_{s}^{+}$ decay at centre-of-mass energies of 8 and $13\mathrm{\,Te\kern -0.1em V}$, in the $\it{\Xi}_{bc}^{+}$ and in the $B_{c}^{+}$ rapidity and transverse-momentum ranges from 2.0 to 4.5 and 0 to $20\,\mathrm{Ge\kern -0.1em V\!/}c$, respectively. Upper limits are presented as a function of the $\it{\Xi}_{bc}^{+}$ mass and lifetime.Comment: All figures and tables, along with machine-readable versions and any supplementary material and additional information, are available at https://cern.ch/lhcbproject/Publications/p/LHCb-PAPER-2022-005.html (LHCb public pages