Low-energy electron diffraction study of potassium adsorbed on single-crystal graphite and highly oriented pyrolytic graphite

Potassium adsorption on graphite has been a model system for the understanding of the interaction of alkali metals with surfaces. The geometries of the s232d structure of potassium on both single-crystal graphite (SCG) and highly oriented pyrolytic graphite (HOPG) were investigated for various preparation conditions for graphite temperatures between 55 and 140 K. In all cases, the geometry was found to consist of K atoms in the hollow sites on top of the surface. The K-graphite average perpendicular spacing is 2.79±0.03 Å, corresponding to an average C-K distance of 3.13±0.03 Å, and the spacing between graphite planes is consistent with the bulk spacing of 3.35 Å. No evidence was observed for a sublayer of potassium. The results of dynamical LEED studies for the clean SCG and HOPG surfaces indicate that the surface structures of both are consistent with the truncated bulk structure of graphite

Comparative performance of paleoclimate field and index reconstructions derived from climate proxies and noise-only predictors

The performance of climate field reconstruction (CFR) and index reconstruction methods is evaluated using proxy and non-informative predictor experiments. The skill of both reconstruction methods is determined using proxy data targeting the western region of North America. The results are compared to those targeting the same region, but derived from non-informative predictors comprising red-noise time series reflecting the full temporal autoregressive structure of the proxy network. All experiments are performed as probabilistic ensembles, providing estimated Monte Carlo distributions of reconstruction skill. Results demonstrate that the CFR skill distributions from proxy data are statistically distinct from and outperform the corresponding skill distributions generated from non-informative predictors; similar relative performance is demonstrated for the index reconstructions. In comparison to the CFR results using proxy information, the index reconstructions exhibit similar skill in calibration, but somewhat less skill in validation and a tendency to underestimate the amplitude of the validation period mean

C60 adsorption on an aperiodically modulated Cu surface

Copper deposited on the ve-fold surface of icosahedral Al-Pd-Mn forms domains of a structure whose surface has a one-dimensional aperiodic modulation. It is shown that C60 deposited on this aperiodic film has highly reduced mobility as compared to C60 deposited on periodic Cu surfaces. This fnding is explained in terms of the recently proposed structural model of this system

Nucleation and growth of a quasicrystalline monolayer: Bi adsorption on the five-fold surface of i-Al70Pd21Mn9

Scanning tunnelling microscopy has been used to study the formation of a Bi monolayer deposited on the five-fold surface of i-Al70Pd21Mn9. Upon deposition of low sub-monolayer coverages, the nucleation of pentagonal clusters of Bi adatoms of edge length 4.9 A is observed. The clusters have a common orientation leading to a film with five-fold symmetry. By inspection of images where both the underlying surface and the Bi atoms are resolved, the pentagonal clusters are found to nucleate on pseudo-Mackay clusters truncated such that a Mn atom lies centrally in the surface plane. The density of these sites is sufficient to form a quasiperiodic framework, and subsequent adsorption of Bi atoms ultimately leads to the formation of a quasicrystalline monolayer. The initial nucleation site is different to that proposed on the basis of recent density functional theory calculations.Comment: 6 pages, 5 figure

Formation of a quasicrystalline Pb monolayer on the ten-fold surface of the decagonal Al-Ni-Co quasicrystal

Lead has been deposited on the ten-fold surface of decagonal Al72Ni11Co17 to form an epitaxial quasicrystalline single-element monolayer. The overlayer grows through nucleation of nanometer-sized irregular islands and the coverage saturates at 1 ML. The overlayer is well-ordered quasiperiodically as evidenced by LEED and Fourier transforms of STM images. Annealing the film to 600 K improves the structural quality, but causes the evaporation of some material such that the film develops pores. Electronic structure measurements using X-ray photoemission spectroscopy indicate that the chemical interaction of the Pb atoms with the substrate is weak.Comment: 12 pages, 5 figure

Estimation of suspended sediment concentration by acoustic equations for soil sediment

The acoustic backscattering systems, ABS, for sediment measurement are based on the determining of the backscattering and attenuation properties of the particles in suspension. The relevant acoustic quantities are the form function, f, which describes the backscattering characteristics, and thenormalized total scattering cross-section, , which describes the attenuating characteristics of the particles in suspension. Formulations are required for these parameters of suspension sediment particles with size and acoustic frequency. Several studies have been conducted to determine theconcentration of sediments such as glass spheres or sand. However, the acoustic properties of natural sediments vary and depend on many parameters such as particle size, shape, mineralogy and distribution of those parameters in sample. Therefore, this study was conducted to determine the possibility of soil sediment concentration with the f and equations, which were obtained for glass spheres and sandy sediments under laboratory and river conditions. The results show that theacoustic method, especially with glass scattering equation, works fairly well to calculate soil sediment for low concentration range at laboratory and river conditions

An ABC transporter containing a forkhead-associated domain interacts with a serine-threonine protein kinase and is required for growth of Mycobacterium tuberculosis in mice

Forkhead-associated (FHA) domains are modular phosphopeptide recognition motifs with a striking preference for phosphothreonine-containing epitopes. FHA domains have been best characterized in eukaryotic signaling pathways but have been identified in six proteins in Mycobacterium tuberculosis, the causative organism of tuberculosis. One of these, coded by gene Rv1747, is an ABC transporter and the only one to contain two such modules. A deletion mutant of Rv1747 is attenuated in a mouse intravenous injection model of tuberculosis where the bacterial load of the mutant is 10-fold lower than that of the wild type in both lungs and spleen. In addition, growth of the mutant in mouse bone marrow-derived macrophages and dendritic cells is significantly impaired. In contrast, growth of this mutant in vitro was indistinguishable from that of the wild type. The mutant phenotype was lost when the mutation was complemented by the wild-type allele, confirming that it was due to mutation of Rv1747. Using yeast two-hybrid analysis, we have shown that the Rv1747 protein interacts with the serine-threonine protein kinase PknF. This interaction appears to be phospho-dependent since it is abrogated in a kinase-dead mutant and by mutations in the presumed activation loop of PknF and in the first FHA domain of Rv1747. These results demonstrate that the protein coded by Rv1747 is required for normal virulent infection by M. tuberculosis in mice and, since it interacts with a serine-threonine protein kinase in a kinase-dependent manner, indicate that it forms part of an important phospho-dependent signaling pathway

Unprecedented 21st century drought risk in the American Southwest and Central Plains

In the Southwest and Central Plains of Western North America, climate change is expected to increase drought severity in the coming decades. These regions nevertheless experienced extended Medieval-era droughts that were more persistent than any historical event, providing crucial targets in the paleoclimate record for benchmarking the severity of future drought risks. We use an empirical drought reconstruction and three soil moisture metrics from 17 state-of-the-art general circulation models to show that these models project significantly drier conditions in the later half of the 21st century compared to the 20th century and earlier paleoclimatic intervals. This desiccation is consistent across most of the models and moisture balance variables, indicating a coherent and robust drying response to warming despite the diversity of models and metrics analyzed. Notably, future drought risk will likely exceed even the driest centuries of the Medieval Climate Anomaly (1100–1300 CE) in both moderate (RCP 4.5) and high (RCP 8.5) future emissions scenarios, leading to unprecedented drought conditions during the last millennium

A reconstruction of global hydroclimate and dynamical variables over the Common Era

Hydroclimate extremes critically affect human and natural systems, but there remain many unanswered questions about their causes and how to interpret their dynamics in the past and in climate change projections. These uncertainties are due, in part, to the lack of long-term, spatially resolved hydroclimate reconstructions and information on the underlying physical drivers for many regions. Here we present the first global reconstructions of hydroclimate and associated climate dynamical variables over the past two thousand years. We use a data assimilation approach tailored to reconstruct hydroclimate that optimally combines 2,978 paleoclimate proxy-data time series with the physical constraints of an atmosphere—ocean climate model. The global reconstructions are annually or seasonally resolved and include two spatiotemporal drought indices, near-surface air temperature, an index of North Atlantic variability, the location of the intertropical convergence zone, and monthly Niño indices. This database, called the Paleo Hydrodynamics Data Assimilation product (PHYDA), will provide a critical new platform for investigating the causes of past climate variability and extremes, while informing interpretations of future hydroclimate projections

Model-dependent spatial skill in pseudoproxy experiments testing climate field reconstruction methods for the Common Era

The spatial skill of four climate field reconstruction (CFR) methods is investigated using pseudoproxy experiments (PPEs) based on five last millennium and historical simulations from the Coupled and Paleo Model Intercomparison Projects Phases 5 and 3 (CMIP5/PMIP3) data archives. These simulations are used for the first time in a PPE context, the frameworks of which are constructed to test a recently assembled multiproxy network and multiple CFR techniques. The experiments confirm earlier findings demonstrating consistent methodological performance across the employed methods and spatially dependent reconstruction errors in all of the derived CFRs. Spectral biases in the reconstructed fields demonstrate that CFR methods can alone alter the ratio of spectral power at all locations in the field, independent of whether there are any spectral biases inherent in the underlying pseudoproxy series. The patterns of spectral biases are model dependent and indicate the potential for regions in the derived CFRs to be biased by changes in either low or high-frequency spectral power. CFR methods are also shown to alter the pattern of mean differences in the tropical Pacific during the Medieval Climate Anomaly and the Little Ice Age, with some model experiments indicating that CFR methodologies enhance the statistical likelihood of achieving larger mean differences between independent 300-year periods in the region. All of the characteristics of CFR performance are model dependent, indicating that CFR methods must be evaluated across multiple models and that conclusions from PPEs should be carefully connected to the spatial statistics of real-world climatic fields