Mass Loss In M67 Giants: Evidence From Isochrone Fitting

We present a study of the stellar content of the open cluster M67. We have computed new evolutionary sequences of stellar models with solar abundance that cover all phases of evolution from the Zero-Age Main Sequence to the bright end of the Asymptotic Giant Branch (AGB). We examine the fit between the calculated and the observed red giant branch (RGB) in particular, and discuss factors that most influence its quality. The distinct color gap between the RGB and the clump giants is compared with the temperature gap between the He-burning tracks and the computed 5 Gyr isochrone. This purely differential approach strongly indicates that the clump giants have M \lta 0.70\msun\ , implying an amount of mass loss ($\approx 0.6$ \msun) well in excess of that found in globular cluster stars. Observational constraints on mass loss processes favor the interpretation that mass loss in cool low-mass giant stars increases with metallicity.Comment: 21pp., plain TeX astro-ph/yymmnn

Last Among Equals: Hawaiian Statehood and American Politics

Humanities Open Book Program, a joint initiative of the National Endowment for the Humanities and the Andrew W. Mellon FoundationLast Among Equals is the first detailed account of Hawaii's quest for statehood. It is a story of struggle and accommodation, of how Hawaii was gradually absorbed into the politcal, economic, and ideological structures of American life. It also recounts the complex process that came into play when the states of the Union were confronted with the difficulty of granting admission to a non-contiguous territory with an overwhelmingly non-Caucasian population. More than any previous study of modern Hawaii, this book explains why Hawaii's legitimate claims to equality and autonomy as a state were frustrated for more than half a century. Last Among Equals is sure to remain a standard reference for modern Hawaiian and American political historians. As important, it will require a reevaluation of two commonly held myths: that of racial harmony in Hawaii and that of automatic equality under the Constitution of the United States

LISTY TURNEY: JĘZYKOZNAWCZE DOWODY FAŁSZERSTW

During the 23rd March - 4th April 2007 crisis over the detention of British military personnel by the Iranian authorities, press interest in the UK centred 1) on the “truth” of the Iranian assertion that the British boats had illegally entered Iranian waters and 2) on the authenticity of the statements the captives made on Iranian television and in the letters written by one of them: Faye Turney, the only woman in the group. It is the purpose of this paper, admittedly after the event, to introduce some linguistic input into the debate on the authenticity of the texts by searching in the letters themselves for evidence of idiosyncratic usages which appear to be non-native and, from those, infer the existence of a covert author, distinct from the overt writer. This paper is, therefore, a short forensic linguistic case study which demonstrates the hypothesis that the texts are corrupt, with a non-native, covert author - almost certainly a Farsi speaker – fraudulently claiming to be both the writer and the originator of the letters. W okresie kryzysu związanego z zatrzymaniem personelu brytyjskiego przez władze irańskie trwającego w dniach od 23 marca do 4 kwietnia 2007 roku, zainteresowanie brytyjskiej prasy skupiło się na tym czy rzeczywiście Irańczycy miali rację twierdząc, że brytyjskie statki nielegalnie wpłynęły na irańskie wody oraz na autentyczności oświadczeń emitowanych w irańskiej telewizji, a składanych przez osoby zatrzymane oraz w listach sporządzonych przez jedyną kobietę w grupie Faye Turney. Celem niniejszego artykułu jest przedstawienie dowodów językoznawczych w tej sprawie, w celu wykazania cech idiosynkratycznych autora tekstu, który wydaje się być niemal na pewno osobą niebędącą rodzimym użytkownikiem języka, w którym sporządzono listy, co z kolei sugeruje, że listy napisane zostały przez tzw. jawnego autora, ale pod wpływem autora ukrytego. Zatem, ten artykuł stanowi analizę przypadku z zakresu językoznawstwa sądowego, który wykazuje, że sporządzenie tekstów zostało wymuszone, przez nierodzimego użytkownika języka, autora ukrtytego, niemal na pewno posługującego się językiem Farsi

The effect of organic farming systems on aspects of the environment - desk study OF0123

Key Conclusions 1. The crop rotations of organic systems maintain landscape diversity and biodiversity whilst the maintenance of field boundaries on organic units produces benefits to a wide range of organisms. 2. Inorganic nitrogen fertilisation and herbicide treatments of conventionally managed grassland has reduced the floral diversity of permanent pastures and maintained the low diversity of re-seeded pastures, greatly reducing their value as wildlife habitats. 3. Pesticide use is responsible for the removal of food sourcesfor birds and mammals in the form of weeds and invertebrates, as well as removing whole populations of potentially beneficial insects. 4. The majority of water pollution incidents from farms are caused during storage and spreading of cattle and pig slurries. A higher proportion of organic cattle and virtually all organic pigs are kept on solid manure systems and therefore are les of a risk. 5. The nitrogen balance of individual 'conventional' and 'organic' systems will depend greatly on the circumstances and management practices of the individual farms. Consequently it is not possible to generalise that one system is always better than the other in terms of nitrate leaching risk. With this qualification the literature does indicate that generally, organic systems offer less risk of nitrate leaching. 6. Organic systems are less likely to cause loss of phosphate into surface and ground waters. Both leaching and loss in eroded soil are likely to be reduced. 7. Organic management practicess such as rotations, the regular use of manures and non-use of pesticides usually increase soil organic matter contents. 8. Organic practices are likely to increase earthworm numbers compared to conventional systems. The increased numbers are universally acknowledged to benefit soil fertility although such effects are difficult to quantify. 9. Soil erosion is less of a problem on organic units. 10. Accumulations of copper and zinc in soils are much reduced in organic systems because organic pig and poultry producers do not supplement feeds with these metals as growth promoters. Copper fungicides are more widely used on organic farms and their use should be carefully monitored to prevent harmful effects. 11. The practices adopted by organic farmers can reduce emissions of nitrous oxide and methane. Ammonia emissions will not necessarily be less in organic than in conventional farming. 12. Organic farmers adopt practices which benefit the landscape. They maintain and introduce features largely because they are required by the Organic Standards to do so. They introduce such management practices because they are technically necessary for successful organic production

An experimental test of all theories with predictive power beyond quantum theory

According to quantum theory, the outcomes of future measurements cannot (in general) be predicted with certainty. In some cases, even with a complete physical description of the system to be measured and the measurement apparatus, the outcomes of certain measurements are completely random. This raises the question, originating in the paper by Einstein, Podolsky and Rosen, of whether quantum mechanics is the optimal way to predict measurement outcomes. Established arguments and experimental tests exclude a few specific alternative models. Here, we provide a complete answer to the above question, refuting any alternative theory with significantly more predictive power than quantum theory. More precisely, we perform various measurements on distant entangled photons, and, under the assumption that these measurements are chosen freely, we give an upper bound on how well any alternative theory could predict their outcomes. In particular, in the case where quantum mechanics predicts two equally likely outcomes, our results are incompatible with any theory in which the probability of a prediction is increased by more than ~0.19. Hence, we can immediately refute any already considered or yet-to-be-proposed alternative model with more predictive power than this.Comment: 13 pages, 4 figure

Spatial Misalignment in time series studies of air pollution and health data

Time series studies of environmental exposures often involve comparing daily changes in a toxicant measured at a point in space with daily changes in an aggregate measure of health. Spatial misalignment of the exposure and response variables can bias the estimation of health risk and the magnitude of this bias depends on the spatial variation of the exposure of interest. In air pollution epidemiology, there is an increasing focus on estimating the health effects of the chemical components of particulate matter. One issue that is raised by this new focus is the spatial misalignment error introduced by the lack of spatial homogeneity in many of the particulate matter components. Current approaches to estimating short-term health risks via time series modeling do not take into account the spatial properties of the chemical components and therefore could result in biased estimation of those risks. We present a spatial-temporal statistical model for quantifying spatial misalignment error and show how adjusted heath risk estimates can be obtained using a regression calibration approach and a two-stage Bayesian model. We apply our methods to a database containing information on hospital admissions, air pollution, and weather for 20 large urban counties in the United States