471 research outputs found
1942, the Pacific War, and the defence of New Zealand : a thesis presented in fulfilment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Philosophy in Defence and Strategic Studies at Massey University, New Zealand
During 1941-1942 New Zealand expended vast amounts of capital and labour building
in-depth defences against the perceived invasion threat from Japan that today is often
regarded, especially by academic historians, as non-existent. This thesis looks closely at
the background of such a Japanese threat and the subsequent realities. It examines the
failures of the existing, indeed traditional political alliance with the British ‘family of
nations’ and its associated myths against the Realpolitik of New Zealand’s enforced
absorption into the new American power block. The origins of today’s opinions are
teased out to examine their realities and the drivers of the New Zealand government’s
actions at the time are reviewed. These actions along with the experience, perceptions
and, above all, the circumstantial knowledge that formed the opinions drove the
decisions to act are established. The conclusion of this thesis is the threat to New
Zealand of being raided, isolated, even possibly invaded, was geopolitically and
militarily real at the time. The margins by which any of these possibilities were avoided
were narrow
Enhanced Retention In The Passive-Avoidance Task By 5-HT1A Receptor Blockade Is Not Associated With Increased Activity Of The Central Nucleus Of The Amygdala
The effect of blockade of S-HT1A receptors was investigated on (1) retention in a mildly aversive passive-avoidance task, and (2) spontaneous single-unit activity of central nucleus of the amygdala (CeA) neurons, a brain site implicated in modulation of retention. Systemic administration of the selective S-HT1A antagonist NAN-190 immediately after training markedly-and dose-dependently-facilitated retention in the passive-avoidance task; enhanced retention was time-dependent and was not attributable to variations in wattages of shock received by animals. Systemic administration of NAN-190 had mixed effects on spontaneous single-unit activity of CeA neurons recorded extracellularly in vivo; microiontophoretic application of S-HT, in contrast, consistently and potently suppressed CeA activity. The present findings-that S-HT1A receptor blockade by NAN-190 (1) enhances retention in the passive-avoidance task, and (2) does not consistently increase spontaneous neuronal activity of the CeA-provide evidence that a serotonergic system tonically inhibits modulation of retention in the passive-avoidance task through activation of the S-HT1A receptor subtype at brain sites located outside the CeA
Nebular Line Emission During the Epoch of Reionization
Nebular emission lines associated with galactic HII regions carry information
about both physical properties of the ionised gas and the source of ionising
photons as well as providing the opportunity of measuring accurate redshifts
and thus distances once a cosmological model is assumed. While nebular line
emission has been extensively studied at lower redshift there are currently
only few constraints within the epoch of reionisation (EoR, ), chiefly due
to the lack of sensitive near-IR spectrographs. However, this will soon change
with the arrival of the Webb Telescope providing sensitive near-IR spectroscopy
covering the rest-frame UV and optical emission of galaxies in the EoR. In
anticipation of Webb we combine the large cosmological hydrodynamical
simulation Bluetides with photoionisation modelling to predict the nebular
emission line properties of galaxies at . We find good agreement
with the, albeit limited, existing direct and indirect observational
constraints on equivalent widths though poorer agreement with luminosity
function constraints.Comment: 17 pages, accepted to MNRAS, significant modification from v1.0 data
available at https://stephenmwilkins.github.io/BluetidesEmissionLines_Public
Characterising and identifying galaxy protoclusters
We study the characteristics of galaxy protoclusters using the latest L-GALAXIES semi-analytic model. Searching for protoclusters on a scale of ∼10 cMpc gives an excellent compromise between the completeness and purity of their galaxy populations, leads to high distinction from the field in overdensity space, and allows accurate determination of the descendant cluster mass. This scale is valid over a range of redshifts and selection criteria. We present a procedure for estimating, given a measured galaxy overdensity, the protocluster probability and its descendant cluster mass for a range of modelling assumptions, particularly taking into account the shape of the measurement aperture. This procedure produces lower protocluster probabilities compared to previous estimates using fixed size apertures. The relationship between active galactic nucleus (AGN) and protoclusters is also investigated and shows significant evolution with redshift; at z ∼ 2, the fraction of protoclusters traced by AGN is high, but the fraction of all AGNs in protoclusters is low, whereas atz ≥ 5 the fraction of protoclusters containing AGN is low, but most AGNs are in protoclusters. We also find indirect evidence for the emergence of a passive sequence in protoclusters at z ∼ 2, and note that a significant fraction of all galaxies reside in protoclusters at z ≥ 2, particularly the most massive
Dust-obscured star-forming galaxies in the early universe
Motivated by recent observational constraints on dust reprocessed emission in star-forming galaxies at z ∼ 6 and above, we use the very large cosmological hydrodynamical simulation BLUETIDES to explore predictions for the amount of dust-obscured star formation in the early Universe (z > 8). BLUETIDES matches current observational constraints on both the UV luminosity function and galaxy stellar mass function and predicts that approximately 90 per cent of the star formation in high-mass (M* > 1010 M⊙) galaxies at z = 8 is already obscured by dust. The relationship between dust attenuation and stellar mass predicted by BLUETIDES is consistent with that observed at lower redshift. However, observations of several individual objects at z > 6 are discrepant with the predictions, though it is possible that their uncertainties may have been underestimated. We find that the predicted surface density of z ≥ 8 submm sources is below that accessible to current Herschel, SCUBA-2 and Atacama Large Millimetre Array (ALMA) submm surveys. However, as ALMA continues to accrue an additional surface area the population of z > 8 dust-obscured galaxies may become accessible in the near future
Learning the relationship between galaxies spectra and their star formation histories using convolutional neural etworks and cosmological simulations
We present a new method for inferring galaxy star formation histories (SFH) using machine learning methods coupled with two cosmological hydrodynamic simulations. We train Convolutional Neural Networks to learn the relationship between synthetic galaxy spectra and high resolution SFHs from the EAGLE and Illustris models. To evaluate our SFH reconstruction we use Symmetric Mean Absolute Percentage Error (SMAPE), which acts as a true percentage error in the low-error regime. On dust-attenuated spectra we achieve high test accuracy (median SMAPE = 10.5%). Including the effects of simulated observational noise increases the error (12.5%), however this is alleviated by including multiple realisations of the noise, which increases the training set size and reduces overfitting (10.9%). We also make estimates for the observational and modelling errors. To further evaluate the generalisation properties we apply models trained on one simulation to spectra from the other, which leads to only a small increase in the error (median SMAPE ∼15%). We apply each trained model to SDSS DR7 spectra, and find smoother histories than in the VESPA catalogue. This new approach complements the results of existing SED fitting techniques, providing star formation histories directly motivated by the results of the latest cosmological simulations
Serological diagnosis of North American paragonimiasis by western blot using Paragonimus kellicotti adult worm antigen
We studied the value of an IgG Western blot (WB) with Paragonimus kellicotti (Pk) antigen for diagnosis of North American paragonimiasis. The test was evaluated with sera from patients with Pk and Paragonimus westermani infections, with control sera from patients with other helminth infections, and sera from healthy Americans. All 11 proven Pk infection sera and two samples from suspected cases that were negative by P. westermani WB at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) contained antibodies to antigens at 34 kDa and at 21/23 kDa. Seven of 7 P. westermani sera contained antibodies to the 34 kDa antigen, but only 2 recognized the 21/23 kDa doublet. No control samples were reactive with these antigens. Antibody reactivity declined after praziquantel treatment. Thus, the P. kellicotti WB appears to be superior to P. westermani WB for diagnosing Pk infections, and it may be useful for assessing responses to treatment
A machine learning approach to mapping baryons on to dark matter haloes using the eagle and C-EAGLE simulations
High-resolution cosmological hydrodynamic simulations are currently limited to relatively small volumes due to their computational expense. However, much larger volumes are required to probe rare, overdense environments, and measure clustering statistics of the large scale structure. Typically, zoom simulations of individual regions are used to study rare environments, and semi-analytic models and halo occupation models applied to dark matter only (DMO) simulations are used to study the Universe in the large-volume regime. We propose a new approach, using a machine learning framework to explore the halo-galaxy relationship in the periodic EAGLE simulations, and zoom C-EAGLE simulations of galaxy clusters. We train a tree based machine learning method to predict the baryonic properties of galaxies based on their host dark matter halo properties. The trained model successfully reproduces a number of key distribution functions for an infinitesimal fraction of the computational cost of a full hydrodynamic simulation. By training on both periodic simulations as well as zooms of overdense environments, we learn the bias of galaxy evolution in differing environments. This allows us to apply the trained model to a larger DMO volume than would be possible if we only trained on a periodic simulation. We demonstrate this application using the (800 Mpc)3 P-Millennium simulation, and present predictions for key baryonic distribution functions and clustering statistics from the EAGLE model in this large volume
First Light and Reionisation Epoch Simulations (FLARES) - VI. The colour evolution of galaxies z=5-15
With its exquisite sensitivity, wavelength coverage, and spatial and spectral resolution, the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) is poised to revolutionize our view of the distant, high-redshift (z > 5) Universe. While Webb's spectroscopic observations will be transformative for the field, photometric observations play a key role in identifying distant objects and providing more comprehensive samples than accessible to spectroscopy alone. In addition to identifying objects, photometric observations can also be used to infer physical properties and thus be used to constrain galaxy formation models. However, inferred physical properties from broad-band photometric observations, particularly in the absence of spectroscopic redshifts, often have large uncertainties. With the development of new tools for forward modelling simulations, it is now routinely possible to predict observational quantities, enabling a direct comparison with observations. With this in mind, in this work, we make predictions for the colour evolution of galaxies at z = 5-15 using the First Light And Reionisation Epoch Simulations (flares) cosmological hydrodynamical simulation suite. We predict a complex evolution with time, driven predominantly by strong nebular line emission passing through individual bands. These predictions are in good agreement with existing constraints from Hubble and Spitzer as well as some of the first results from Webb. We also contrast our predictions with other models in the literature: While the general trends are similar, we find key differences, particularly in the strength of features associated with strong nebular line emission. This suggests photometric observations alone should provide useful discriminating power between different models and physical states of galaxies.Peer reviewe
First Light and Reionisation Epoch Simulations (FLARES) X: Environmental Galaxy Bias and Survey Variance at High Redshift
Upcoming deep galaxy surveys with JWST will probe galaxy evolution during the
epoch of reionisation (EoR, ) over relatively compact areas
(e.g. 300\,arcmin for the JADES GTO survey). It is therefore
imperative that we understand the degree of survey variance, to evaluate how
representative the galaxy populations in these studies will be. We use the
First Light And Reionisation Epoch Simulations (FLARES) to measure the galaxy
bias of various tracers over an unprecedentedly large range in overdensity for
a hydrodynamic simulation, and use these relations to assess the impact of bias
and clustering on survey variance in the EoR. Star formation is highly biased
relative to the underlying dark matter distribution, with the mean ratio of the
stellar to dark matter density varying by a factor of 100 between regions of
low and high matter overdensity (smoothed on a scale of 14\,cMpc). This
is reflected in the galaxy distribution -- the most massive galaxies are found
solely in regions of high overdensity. As a consequence of the above, galaxies
in the EoR are highly clustered, which can lead to large variance in survey
number counts. For mean number counts (1000), in a unit
redshift slice of angular area 300\,arcmin (1.4\,deg), the 2-sigma
range in is roughly a factor of four (two). We present relations between
the expected variance and survey area for different survey geometries; these
relations will be of use to observers wishing to understand the impact of
survey variance on their results.Comment: 14 pages, 17 figures. Paper 10 in the First Light and Reionisation
Epoch Simulations (FLARES) serie
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