Adult Female Spruce Bedworm, \u3ci\u3eChoristoneura Fumiferana\u3c/i\u3e (Lepidoptera: Tortricidae), Dry Weight in Relationship to Pupal Fresh Weight and Case Diameter

(excerpt) The weights of adult insects are often measured in production and population studies in order to estimate such variables as growth rates, food conversion efficiencies, fecundity, and others. For the eastern spruce budworm, Choristoneura fumiferana (Clemens), both pupal fresh weights and pupal case diameters have been measured as indicators of adult fecundity and adult dry weights (Miller 1957). However, there are no reports explicitly showing the relationship between these metric pupal variables and adult dry weights. This is the goal of this note

Debris cover and surface melt at a temperate maritime alpine glacier: Franz Josef Glacier, New Zealand

Melt rates on glaciers are strongly influenced by the presence of supraglacial debris, which can either enhance or reduce ablation relative to bare ice. Most recently, Franz Josef Glacier has entered into a phase of strong retreat and downwasting, with the increasing emergence of debris on the surface in the ablation zone. Previously at Franz Josef Glacier, melt has only been measured on bare ice. During February 2012, a network of 11 ablation stakes was drilled into locations of varying supraglacial debris thickness on the lower glacier. Mean ablation rates over 9 days varied over the range 1.2–10.1 cm d−1, and were closely related to debris thickness. Concomitant observations of air temperature allowed the application of a degree-day approach to the calculation of melt rates, with air temperature providing a strong indicator of melt. Degree-day factors (d f) varied over the range 1.1–8.1 mm d−1 °C−1 (mean of 4.4 mm d−1 °C−1), comparable with rates reported in other studies. Mapping of the current debris cover revealed 0.7 km2 of the 4.9 km2 ablation zone surface was debris-covered, with thicknesses ranging 1–50 cm. Based on measured debris thicknesses and d f, ablation on debris-covered areas of the glacier is reduced by a total of 41% which equates to a 6% reduction in melt overall across the entire ablation zone. This study highlights the usefulness of a short-term survey to gather representative ablation data, consistent with numerous overseas ablation studies on debris-covered glaciers

Earth-like sand fluxes on Mars

Strong and sustained winds on Mars have been considered rare, on the basis of surface meteorology measurements and global circulation models, raising the question of whether the abundant dunes and evidence for wind erosion seen on the planet are a current process. Recent studies showed sand activity, but could not determine whether entire dunes were moving—implying large sand fluxes—or whether more localized and surficial changes had occurred. Here we present measurements of the migration rate of sand ripples and dune lee fronts at the Nili Patera dune field. We show that the dunes are near steady state, with their entire volumes composed of mobile sand. The dunes have unexpectedly high sand fluxes, similar, for example, to those in Victoria Valley, Antarctica, implying that rates of landscape modification on Mars and Earth are similar

Vestibular Schwannoma growth during pregnancy: case report of neurofibromatosis type 2 in pregnancy

Background: Acoustic neuromas are a common sequela of neurofibromatosis type 2 and have been shown to grow at an increased rate during pregnancy. Case: 21-year-old female, gravida 1 para 0, with history of neurofibromatosis type 2 presented for prenatal care following new onset seizures and progressive deafness. She was found to have bilateral slow-growing acoustic neuromas. Over the course of her pregnancy, her acoustic neuroma began growing and she became completely deaf. She underwent surgical decompression during her pregnancy and had a late preterm vaginal delivery due to preeclampsia with severe features. She subsequently had further operative and medical treatment of her neuromas. Conclusion: Acoustic neuromas during pregnancy are exceedingly rare, but can be managed successfully with an interdisciplinary team approach tailored to the patients’ specific clinical presentation

Evaluating the Core and Full Protection Motivation Theory Nomologies for the Voluntary Adoption of Password Manager Applications

The protection motivation theory (PMT) is widely used in behavioral information security research, with multiple instantiations of the theoretical model applied in the literature. The purpose of this study is to perform a theoretical (conceptual) replication of both the core and full (PMT) nomologies in the context of voluntary password manager application use for individual home end-users. In our study, the full PMT model explained more variance than the core PMT model, but the relationships between multiple behavioral antecedents differed between the core and full PMT models, possibly due to differences in model complexity. Our findings suggest that researchers should justify the version of the PMT that they choose to use based on their research objectives with the understanding that the same variables may be significant in one version of the PMT but not significant in another version of the PMT

Effective field theories for baryons with two- and three-heavy quarks

Baryons made of two or three heavy quarks can be described in the modern language of non-relativistic effective field theories. These, besides allowing a rigorous treatment of the systems, provide new insight in the nature of the three-body interaction in QCD.Comment: 7 pages, 1 figure; published versio

Orbital operations study. Volume 2: Interfacing activities analysis. Part 2: Structural and mechanical group

The activities of the structural and mechanical activity group of the orbital operations study project are discussed. Element interfaces, alternate approaches, design concepts, operational procedures, functional requirements, design influences, and approach selection are presented. The following areas are considered: (1) mating, (2) orbital assembly, (3) separation, EOS payload deployment, and EOS payload retraction

On Perfect Weighted Coverings with Small Radius

We extend the results of our previous paper [8] to the nonlinear case: The Lloyd polynomial of the covering has at least R distinct roots among 1, ... , n, where R is the covering radius. We investigate PWC with diameter 1, finding a partial characterization. We complete an investigation begun in [8] on linear PMC with distance 1 and diameter 2