Cloud chamber laboratory investigations into scattering properties of hollow ice particles

Copyright 2015 The Authors. Published by Elsevier Ltd.This is an open access article under the CC-BY license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/). Date of Acceptance: 16/02/2015Measurements are presented of the phase function, P11, and asymmetry parameter, g, of five ice clouds created in a laboratory cloud chamber. At −7 °C, two clouds were created: one comprised entirely of solid columns, and one comprised entirely of hollow columns. Similarly at −15 °C, two clouds were created: one consisting of solid plates and one consisting of hollow plates. At −30 °C, only hollow particles could be created within the constraints of the experiment. The resulting cloud at −30 °C contained short hollow columns and thick hollow plates. During the course of each experiment, the cloud properties were monitored using a Cloud Particle Imager (CPI). In addition to this, ice crystal replicas were created using formvar resin. By examining the replicas under an optical microscope, two different internal structures were identified. The internal and external facets were measured and used to create geometric particle models with realistic internal structures. Theoretical results were calculated using both Ray Tracing (RT) and Ray Tracing with Diffraction on Facets (RTDF). Experimental and theoretical results are compared to assess the impact of internal structure on P11 and g and the applicability of RT and RTDF for hollow columns.Peer reviewe

Establishing the zero-carbon performance of compact urban dwellings

This paper presents an analysis of the zero-carbon performance of a case-study building which is representative of a growing number of new buildings that are being built on redevelopment sites in inner-city areas in the UK. Compact urban dwellings are apartment style buildings with a floor area of 50 m2 per dwelling, often based over two floors. The constraints of this type of building on achieving zero-carbon performance in the context of the Code for Sustainable Homes is discussed and the shortcomings of the code are demonstrated in terms of the target heat and electricity demand targets for the design of the building systems. A graphical representation of the simulation results is used to present the findings. It has been demonstrated that in specific urban contexts, zero-carbon performance as defined within the current UK compliance framework may be very difficult to achieve in practice given the assumptions used in the simulation here. Therefore, it is very likely that zero-carbon compact urban dwellings may require a net off-site import of electrical and/or thermal energy

An air source heat pump model for operation in cold humid environments

There is considerable interest in the use of heat pumps as a potential low-carbon alternative to fossil fuel-based domestic space heating and hot water systems. In many cases, heat pumps are combined with other energy sources such as solar thermal and/or electric resistive heating, to ensure that building thermal loads can be met, and in order to minimise carbon emissions from such integrated systems. Whilst meeting the comfort demands in the occupied space, relatively complex control strategies are required in comparison to simple thermostatic control typically implemented to control gas fired heating systems in domestic buildings. Well characterised models of the principal components of these systems are required to explore and identify the most appropriate strategies in simulation. However, models of air source heat pumps (ASHPs) operating in humid climates, such as the UK, are limited. This paper presents an experimental setup designed to capture the operation of the ASHP in conditions similar to those found throughout a typical heating season in the UK. Results from a number of tests on a 10kW ASHP are presented in terms of the coefficient of performance (COP) and the steady-state operation are used to develop a model using empirical curve fitting. The overall maximum time constant is also established. The resulting model calculates COP as a function of air humidity, air temperature on the evaporator side and water temperature on the condenser side

Assessing soil and stream water geochemistry in the Clyde Basin, Scotland, UK.

The Clyde Basin comprises the River Clyde catchment, west coast of Scotland, UK including the Glasgow conurbation, a major industrial centre in the past. Over recent years, the British Geological Survey has carried out regional-scale topsoil (5 – 20 cm) and surface water geochemical surveys across the Clyde Basin. The samples were analysed for total concentrations of approximately 50 parameters. The results show the influence of geology, land use, current and former mining activity, industry and urbanisation on the chemical quality of soil and surface water in the region

Mapping the water chemistry of the Clyde Basin drainage network

Mapping the chemistry of stream and river water across the Clyde Basin serves both to characterise the water quality and assess the dominant controls. Surveys of the Clyde drainage network, undertaken between 2003 and 2010, have generated data encompassing rural and urban streams, rivers, and estuarine water. Mapping displays the large spatial variability in chemical composition across the Basin and the varying influences of controls such as rainfall, land cover and geology. They also display the chemistry of the urban area within the context of the wider drainage network. This presentation highlights the upcoming production of an online atlas and database of surface-water chemistry which characterises the Clyde drainage network and provides a new resource for stakeholder organisation

Detecting volcanic sulfur dioxide plumes in the Northern Hemisphere using the Brewer spectrophotometer, other networks, and satellite observations

This paper demonstrates that SO 2 columnar amounts have significantly increased following the five largest volcanic eruptions of the past decade in the Northern Hemisphere. A strong positive signal was detected by all the existing networks either ground based (Brewer, EARLINET, AirBase) or from satellites (OMI, GOME-2). The study particularly examines the adequacy of the existing Brewer network to detect SO 2 plumes of volcanic origin in comparison to other networks and satellite platforms. The comparison with OMI and 45 GOME-2 SO 2 space-borne retrievals shows statistically significant agreement between the Brewer network data and the collocated satellite overpasses. It is shown that the Brewer instrument is capable of detecting significant columnar SO 2 increases following large volcanic eruptions, when SO 2 levels rise well above the instrumental noise of daily observations, estimated to be of the order of 2 DU. A model exercise from the MACC project shows that the large increases of SO 2 over Europe following the Bárðarbunga eruption in Iceland were not caused by local sources or ship emissions but are clearly linked to the eruption. We propose that by combining Brewer data with that from other networks and satellites, a useful tool aided by trajectory analyses and modeling could be created which can be used to forecast high SO 2 values both at ground level and in air flight corridors following future eruptions

Towards the integration of mouse databases - definition and implementation of solutions to two use-cases in mouse functional genomics.

BACKGROUND: The integration of information present in many disparate biological databases represents a major challenge in biomedical research. To define the problems and needs, and to explore strategies for database integration in mouse functional genomics, we consulted the biologist user community and implemented solutions to two user-defined use-cases. RESULTS: We organised workshops, meetings and used a questionnaire to identify the needs of biologist database users in mouse functional genomics. As a result, two use-cases were developed that can be used to drive future designs or extensions of mouse databases. Here, we present the use-cases and describe some initial computational solutions for them. The application for the gene-centric use-case, "MUSIG-Gen" starts from a list of gene names and collects a wide range of data types from several distributed databases in a "shopping cart"-like manner. The iterative user-driven approach is a response to strongly articulated requests from users, especially those without computational biology backgrounds. The application for the phenotype-centric use-case, "MUSIG-Phen", is based on a similar concept and starting from phenotype descriptions retrieves information for associated genes. CONCLUSION: The use-cases created, and their prototype software implementations should help to better define biologists' needs for database integration and may serve as a starting point for future bioinformatics solutions aimed at end-user biologists.RIGHTS : This article is licensed under the BioMed Central licence at http://www.biomedcentral.com/about/license which is similar to the 'Creative Commons Attribution Licence'. In brief you may : copy, distribute, and display the work; make derivative works; or make commercial use of the work - under the following conditions: the original author must be given credit; for any reuse or distribution, it must be made clear to others what the license terms of this work are

Construction and accessibility of a cross-species phenotype ontology along with gene annotations for biomedical research

Phenotype analyses, e.g. investigating metabolic processes, tissue formation, or organism behavior, are an important element of most biological and medical research activities. Biomedical researchers are making increased use of ontological standards and methods to capture the results of such analyses, with one focus being the comparison and analysis of phenotype information between species. We have generated a cross-species phenotype ontology for human, mouse and zebrafish that contains classes from the Human Phenotype Ontology, Mammalian Phenotype Ontology, and generated classes for zebrafish phenotypes. We also provide up-to-date annotation data connecting human genes to phenotype classes from the generated ontology. We have included the data generation pipeline into our continuous integration system ensuring stable and up-to-date releases. This article describes the data generation process and is intended to help interested researchers access both the phenotype annotation data and the associated cross-species phenotype ontology. The resource described here can be used in sophisticated semantic similarity and gene set enrichment analyses for phenotype data across species. The stable releases of this resource can be obtained from http://purl.obolibrary.org/obo/hp/uberpheno/