5,824 research outputs found
The formation of galaxy disks in a hierarchical universe
The formation of galactic discs and the efficiency of star formation within
them are issues central to our understanding of galaxy formation. We have
developed a detailed and versatile model of disc formation which combines the
strengths of previous studies of isolated discs with those of hierarchical
galaxy formation models. Disc structure is inferred from the distribution of
angular momentum in hot halo gas and the hierarchical build-up of dark matter,
leading to theoretically generated systems where the evolution of surface
density, rotation, velocity dispersion, stability and metallicity is predicted
for annular regions of width 20-100 pc. The model will be used to establish
whether the accepted theory of large-scale structure formation in the universe
is consistent with observed trends in the properties of disc galaxies.
This first paper explicitly examines the importance of embedding such
calculations within a merging hierarchy of dark matter haloes, finding that
this leads to dramatically different formation histories compared to models in
which discs grow in isolation. Different models of star formation are explored,
and are found to have only a secondary influence on the properties of the
resulting galaxy discs, the main governing factor being the infalling gas
supply from the hot halo.Comment: 13 pages, 9 figures, accepted by MNRA
Country curing hams
"Many people like the flavor of ham that has been cured country style. Its characteristic flavor is quite different from mild-cured commercial hams."--First page.M.A. Alexander (Department of Animal Science), William C. Stringer (Department of Food Science and Nutrition, College of Agriculture)Revised 7/85/5
Application of satellite remote-sensing data to land selection and management
A pilot project conducted to demonstrate the utility and economy of satellite data in preparing thematic maps of a wilderness area emphasizing those resources of greatest interest to the potential owner is described. Vegetation maps delineating potential commercial timber and maps of suggested mineral prospecting areas of seven scattered regions were prepared by interpretation of LANDSAT images, coupled with a limited amount of ground truth. Images acquired both in winter and summer seasons were registered to township maps and used in making interpretations of the areal extent of commercial timber potentials. The amount of snow cover visible through the forest canopies was found to be a useful indicator of timber potentials. Identification was made of characteristic topographic features which are typical of flood plain deposits or of the well developed trellis drainage patterns which can indicate the strike of structural grain of underlying Cretaceous sedimentary rocks. The presence of igneous and mixed igneous and metamorphic rocks were indicated by combinations of spectral differences and anomalous interruptions of local radial drainage patterns
Endo-cannibalism in the making of a recent British ancestor
Following his death in 1975, the ashes of Wally Hope, founder of Stonehenge People's Free Festival, were scattered in the centre of Stonehenge. When a child tasted the ashes the rest of the group followed this lead. In the following decades, as the festival increasingly became the site of contest about British heritage and culture, the story of Wally's ashes was told at significant times. His name continues to be invoked at gatherings today. This paper discusses these events as 'the making of an ancestor', and explores wider contexts in which they might be understood. These include Druidic involvement in the revival of cremation, Amazonian bone-ash endo-cannibalism, and popular means of speaking of and to dead relatives. In addition to considering the role of 'ancestors' in contemporary Britain, the paper contributes to considerations of 'ancestry' as a different way of being dead, of a particular moment in the evolution of an alternative religious neo-tribal movement, of the meanings of 'cannibalism', and of the ways in which human remains might be treated by the bereaved and by various other interested parties
Simultaneous computation of dynamical and equilibrium information using a weighted ensemble of trajectories
Equilibrium formally can be represented as an ensemble of uncoupled systems
undergoing unbiased dynamics in which detailed balance is maintained. Many
non-equilibrium processes can be described by suitable subsets of the
equilibrium ensemble. Here, we employ the "weighted ensemble" (WE) simulation
protocol [Huber and Kim, Biophys. J., 1996] to generate equilibrium trajectory
ensembles and extract non-equilibrium subsets for computing kinetic quantities.
States do not need to be chosen in advance. The procedure formally allows
estimation of kinetic rates between arbitrary states chosen after the
simulation, along with their equilibrium populations. We also describe a
related history-dependent matrix procedure for estimating equilibrium and
non-equilibrium observables when phase space has been divided into arbitrary
non-Markovian regions, whether in WE or ordinary simulation. In this
proof-of-principle study, these methods are successfully applied and validated
on two molecular systems: explicitly solvated methane association and the
implicitly solvated Ala4 peptide. We comment on challenges remaining in WE
calculations
Analytic and numerical realisations of a disk galaxy
Recent focus on the importance of cold, unshocked gas accretion in galaxy
formation -- not explicitly included in semi-analytic studies -- motivates the
following detailed comparison between two inherently different modelling
techniques: direct hydrodynamical simulation and semi-analytic modelling. By
analysing the physical assumptions built into the Gasoline simulation, formulae
for the emergent behaviour are derived which allow immediate and accurate
translation of these assumptions to the Galform semi-analytic model. The
simulated halo merger history is then extracted and evolved using these
equivalent equations, predicting a strikingly similar galactic system. This
exercise demonstrates that it is the initial conditions and physical
assumptions which are responsible for the predicted evolution, not the choice
of modelling technique. On this level playing field, a previously published
Galform model is applied (including additional physics such as chemical
enrichment and feedback from active galactic nuclei) which leads to starkly
different predictions.Comment: 15 pages, 15 figure
Earliest Directly-Dated Human Skull-Cups
The use of human braincases as drinking cups and containers has extensive historic and ethnographic documentation, but archaeological examples are extremely rare. In the Upper Palaeolithic of western Europe, cut-marked and broken human bones are widespread in the Magdalenian (∼15 to 12,000 years BP) and skull-cup preparation is an element of this tradition
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