248 research outputs found
The small-scale structure of photospheric convection retrieved by a deconvolution technique applied to Hinode/SP data
Solar granules are bright patterns surrounded by dark channels called
intergranular lanes in the solar photosphere and are a manifestation of
overshooting convection. Observational studies generally find stronger upflows
in granules and weaker downflows in intergranular lanes. This trend is,
however, inconsistent with the results of numerical simulations in which
downflows are stronger than upflows through the joint action of gravitational
acceleration/deceleration and pressure gradients. One cause of this discrepancy
is the image degradation caused by optical distortion and light diffraction and
scattering that takes place in an imaging instrument. We apply a deconvolution
technique to Hinode/SP data in an attempt to recover the original solar scene.
Our results show a significant enhancement in both, the convective upflows and
downflows, but particularly for the latter. After deconvolution, the up- and
downflows reach maximum amplitudes of -3.0 km/s and +3.0 km/s at an average
geometrical height of roughly 50 km, respectively. We found that the velocity
distributions after deconvolution match those derived from numerical
simulations. After deconvolution the net LOS velocity averaged over the whole
FOV lies close to zero as expected in a rough sense from mass balance.Comment: 32 pages, 13 figures, accepted for publication in Ap
Polymorphic Structure of the Tumor Necrosis Factor (TNF) Locus: An NcoI Polymorphism in the First Intron of the Human TNF-ß Gene Correlates with A Variant Amino Acid in Position 26 and a Reduced Level of TNF-ß Production
T lymphocytes from patients with primary biliary cirrhosis produce reduced amounts of lymphotoxin, tumor necrosis factor and interferon-gamma upon mitogen stimulation
Primary biliary cirrhosis (PBC) is considered an autoimmune disease characterized by destruction of small intrahepatic
bile ducts by lymphocytes. Altered functions of these lymphocytes might reflect an abnormal immune response leading
to tissue damage. We investigated lymphokine secretion by mitogen-stimulated T lymphocytes from the liver biopsies
of patients with PBC and for comparison also peripheral blood. In PBC, diminished synthesis of lymphotoxin (TNFP),
tumor necrosis factor (TNFa) and interferon-y (IFIVy) was found both in T-cell lines from liver tissue and in peripheral
blood. The reduction was most prominent for TNFP in early histological stages of PBC, and appeared to be a stable
phenomenon when T cells were tested after long-term tissue culture. Analysis of mRNA levels indicates a possible link
between reduced TNFP production and a defect in interleukin-2 transcription. The data suggest that diminished
lymphokine production in patients with PBC may play ;In important role in the immanopathogenesis of this disease
First high-resolution images of the Sun in the 2796 \AA{} Mg II k line
We present the first high-resolution solar images in the Mg II k 2796 \AA{}
line. The images, taken through a 4.8 \AA{} broad interference filter, were
obtained during the second science flight of SUNRISE in June 2013 by the SuFI
instrument. The Mg II k images display structures that look qualitatively very
similar to images taken in the core of Ca II H. The Mg II images exhibit
reversed granulation (or shock waves) in the internetwork regions of the quiet
Sun, at intensity contrasts that are similar to those found in Ca II H. Very
prominent in Mg II are bright points, both in the quiet Sun and in plage
regions, particularly near disk center. These are much brighter than at other
wavelengths sampled at similar resolution. Furthermore, Mg II k images also
show fibril structures associated with plage regions. Again, the fibrils are
similar to those seen in Ca II H images, but tend to be more pronounced,
particularly in weak plage.Comment: Accepted for publication in The Astrophysical Journal Letter
Nanoscale Imaging Reveals a Tetraspanin-CD9 Coordinated Elevation of Endothelial ICAM-1 Clusters
Endothelial barriers have a central role in inflammation as they allow or deny the passage of leukocytes from the vasculature into the tissue. To bind leukocytes, endothelial cells form adhesive clusters containing tetraspanins and ICAM-1, so-called endothelial adhesive platforms (EAPs). Upon leukocyte binding, EAPs evolve into docking structures that emanate from the endothelial surface while engulfing the leukocyte. Here, we show that TNF-α is sufficient to induce apical protrusions in the absence of leukocytes. Using advanced quantitation of atomic force microscopy (AFM) recordings, we found these structures to protrude by 160 ± 80 nm above endothelial surface level. Confocal immunofluorescence microscopy proved them positive for ICAM-1, JAM-A, tetraspanin CD9 and f-actin. Microvilli formation was inhibited in the absence of CD9. Our findings indicate that stimulation with TNF-α induces nanoscale changes in endothelial surface architecture and that—via a tetraspanin CD9 depending mechanism—the EAPs rise above the surface to facilitate leukocyte capture
Moving Magnetic Features around a Pore
Spectropolarimetric observations from Sunrise II/IMaX obtained in June 2013
are used for a statistical analysis to determine the physical properties of
moving magnetic features (MMFs) observed near a pore. MMFs of the same and
opposite polarity with respect to the pore are found to stream from its border
at an average speed of 1.3 km s and 1.2 km s respectively, with
mainly same-polarity MMFs found further away from the pore. MMFs of both
polarities are found to harbor rather weak, inclined magnetic fields.
Opposite-polarity MMFs are blue-shifted, while same-polarity MMFs do not show
any preference for up- or downflows. Most of the MMFs are found to be of
sub-arcsecond size and carry a mean flux of 1.2 Mx.Comment: 8 pages, 4 figures, accepted for publication in ApJ
Maximum Entropy Limit of Small-scale Magnetic Field Fluctuations in the Quiet Sun
The observed magnetic field on the solar surface is characterized by a very
complex spatial and temporal behavior. Although feature-tracking algorithms
have allowed us to deepen our understanding of this behavior, subjectivity
plays an important role in the identification and tracking of such features. In
this paper, we continue studies Gorobets, A. Y., Borrero, J. M., & Berdyugina,
S. 2016, ApJL, 825, L18 of the temporal stochasticity of the magnetic field on
the solar surface without relying either on the concept of magnetic features or
on subjective assumptions about their identification and interaction. We
propose a data analysis method to quantify fluctuations of the line-of-sight
magnetic field by means of reducing the temporal field's evolution to the
regular Markov process. We build a representative model of fluctuations
converging to the unique stationary (equilibrium) distribution in the long time
limit with maximum entropy. We obtained different rates of convergence to the
equilibrium at fixed noise cutoff for two sets of data. This indicates a strong
influence of the data spatial resolution and mixing-polarity fluctuations on
the relaxation process. The analysis is applied to observations of magnetic
fields of the relatively quiet areas around an active region carried out during
the second flight of the Sunrise/IMaX and quiet Sun areas at the disk center
from the Helioseismic and Magnetic Imager on board the Solar Dynamics
Observatory satellite.Comment: 11 pages, 5 figures, The Astrophysical Journal Supplement Series
(accepted
Morphological properties of slender Ca II H fibrils observed by SUNRISE II
We use seeing-free high spatial resolution Ca II H data obtained by the
SUNRISE observatory to determine properties of slender fibrils in the lower
solar chromosphere. In this work we use intensity images taken with the SUFI
instrument in the Ca II H line during the second scientific flight of the
SUNRISE observatory to identify and track elongated bright structures. After
the identification, we analyze theses structures in order to extract their
morphological properties. We identify 598 slender Ca II H fibrils (SCFs) with
an average width of around 180 km, a length between 500 km and 4000 km, an
average lifetime of ~400 s, and an average curvature of 0.002 arcsec^-1. The
maximum lifetime of the SCFs within our time series of 57 minutes is ~2000 s.
We discuss similarities and differences of the SCFs with other small-scale,
chromospheric structures such as spicules of type I and II, or Ca II K fibrils.Comment: Accepted for publication in The Astrophysical Journal Supplement
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