Assessment of anthropogenic influences on copper complexation by aquatic dissolved organic matter using synchronous fluorescence

Anthropogenic influences on the characteristics of aquatic dissolved organic matter (DOM) were evaluated in this work using synchronous fluorescence (SyF) scan spectroscopy. Samples from the Iraí and the Iguaçu Rivers were collected during the summer and winter at points located upstream and downstream from a heavily urbanized area in Brazil, respectively. DOM from all samples was titrated with Cu2+ and monitored by SyF quenching. A 1:1 non linear model was used for data treatment in, at least, five distinct regions of the spectra. Results revealed that during the rainy summer, DOM from both rivers exhibited simple organic structures such as aromatic amino acids or conjugated aliphatics as the major constituents, probably arising from non-point sources. However, during the dry winter it became clear that raw sewage discharges arising from the urbanized area contributed to an increase of fluorescent organic matter that is unable to complex copper

An in-line clean system for the solid-phase extraction of emerging contaminants in natural waters

A solid-phase in-line extraction system for water samples containing low levels of emerging contaminants is described. The system was specially developed for large volume samples (up to 4 L) using commercial solid-phase extraction (SPE) cartridges. Four sets containing PTFE-made connectors, brass adapters and ball valves were used to fit SPE cartridges and sample bottles to a 4-port manifold attached to a 20 L carboy. A lab-made vacuum device was connected to the manifold cap. The apparatus is robust and less expensive than the typical available system. Its also provides less experimental handling, avoiding cross contamination and sample losses.21621

The optical/X-ray connection: ICM iron content and galaxy optical luminosity in 20 galaxy clusters

X-ray observations of galaxy clusters have shown that the intra-cluster gas has iron abundances of about one third of the solar value. These observations also show that part (if not all) of the intra-cluster gas metals were produced within the member galaxies. We present a systematic analysis of 20 galaxy clusters to explore the connection between the iron mass and the total luminosity of early-type and late-type galaxies, and of the brightest cluster galaxies (BCGs). From our results, the intra-cluster medium (ICM) iron mass seems to correlate better with the luminosity of the BCGs than with that of the red and blue galaxy populations. As the BCGs cannot produce alone the observed amount of iron, we suggest that ram-pressure plus tidal stripping act together to enhance, at the same time, the BCG luminosities and the iron mass in the ICM. Through the analysis of the iron yield, we have also estimated that SN Ia are responsible for more than 50% of the total iron in the ICM. This result corroborates the fact that ram-pressure contributes to the gas removal from galaxies to the inta-cluster medium, being very efficient for clusters in the temperature range 2 < kT (keV)< 10Comment: Accepted for publication in MNRAS (11 pg, 9 figures and 3 tables

The galaxy environment in GAMA G3C groups using the Kilo Degree Survey Data Release 3

We aim to investigate the galaxy environment in GAMA Galaxy Groups Catalogue (G3C) using a volume-limited galaxy sample from the Kilo Degree Survey Data Release 3. The k-Nearest Neighbour technique is adapted to take into account the probability density functions (PDFs) of photometric redshifts in our calculations. This algorithm was tested on simulated KiDS tiles, showing its capability of recovering the relation between galaxy colour, luminosity and local environment. The characterization of the galaxy environment in G3C groups shows systematically steeper density contrasts for more massive groups. The red galaxy fraction gradients in these groups is evident for most of group mass bins. The density contrast of red galaxies is systematically higher at group centers when compared to blue galaxy ones. In addition, distinct group center definitions are used to show that our results are insensitive to center definitions. These results confirm the galaxy evolution scenario which environmental mechanisms are responsible for a slow quenching process as galaxies fall into groups and clusters, resulting in a smooth observed colour gradients in galaxy systems.Comment: 14 pages, Accepted to MNRA

Two spectroscopically confirmed galaxy structures at z=0.61 and 0.74 in the CFHTLS Deep~3 field

Adami et al. (2010) have detected several cluster candidates at z>0.5 as part of a systematic search for clusters in the Canada France Hawaii Telescope Legacy Survey, based on photometric redshifts. We focus here on two of them, located in the D3 field: D3-6 and D3-43. We have obtained spectroscopy with Gemini/GMOS and measured redshifts for 23 and 14 galaxies in the two structures. These redshifts were combined with those available in the literature. A dynamical and a weak lensing analysis were also performed, together with the study of X-ray Chandra archive data. Cluster D3-6 is found to be a single structure of 8 spectroscopically confirmed members at an average redshift z=0.607, with a velocity dispersion of 423 km/s. It appears to be a relatively low mass cluster. D3-43-S3 has 46 spectroscopically confirmed members at an average redshift z=0.739. It can be decomposed into two main substructures, having a velocity dispersion of about 600 and 350 km/s. An explanation to the fact that D3-43-S3 is detected through weak lensing (only marginally, at the ~3sigma level) but not in X-rays could be that the two substructures are just beginning to merge more or less along the line of sight. We also show that D3-6 and D3-43-S3 have similar global galaxy luminosity functions, stellar mass functions, and star formation rate (SFR) distributions. The only differences are that D3-6 exhibits a lack of faint early type galaxies, a deficit of extremely high stellar mass galaxies compared to D3-43-S3, and an excess of very high SFR galaxies. This study shows the power of techniques based on photometric redshifts to detect low to moderately massive structures, even at z~0.75.Comment: Accepted in A&A, final version, shortened abstrac