389 research outputs found
Chemical Changes in Soil and Soil Solution after Calcium Silicate Addition to a Northern Hardwood Forest
Liming has been used to mitigate effects of acidic deposition in forest ecosystems. This study was designed to examine the effects of calcium (Ca) supply on the spatial patterns and the relations between soil and soil solution chemistry in a base-poor forest watershed. Watershed 1 at the Hubbard Brook Experimental Forest in New Hampshire, USA was experimentally treated with wollastonite (CaSiO3) in October, 1999. Exchangeable Ca (Ex-Ca), soil pHs (in 0.01 M CaCl2), effective cation exchange capacity (CECe), and effective base saturation (BSe) increased, while exchangeable acidity (Ex-Acid) decreased in organic soil horizons in 2000 and 2002. Mineral soils experienced either small increases in Ex-Ca, pHs, CECe, BSe, small decreases in Ex-Acid or no changes. Thus, most of the added Ca remained in the forest floor during the study period. Prior to the treatment the BSe decreased with increasing elevation in organic and mineral soil horizons. This spatial pattern changed significantly in the forest floor after the treatment, suggesting that soils at higher elevations were more responsive to the chemical addition than at lower elevations. Soil solutions draining the forest floor responded to the treatment by increases in concentrations of Ca, dissolved silica, pH, and acid neutralizing capacity (ANC), and a decrease in inorganic monomeric Al (Ali). Treatment effects diminished with increasing soil depth and decreasing elevation. Positive correlations between Ca/total monomeric Al (Alm) in soil solution and Ex-Ca/Ex-Al ratios in soil indicated that changes in the chemistry of soils significantly influenced the chemistry of soil water, and that Ca derived from the dissolution of wollastonite mitigated the mobilization of Al within the experimental watershed
Aging Studies for the Large Honeycomb Drift Tube System of the Outer Tracker of HERA-B
The HERA-B Outer Tracker consists of drift tubes folded from polycarbonate
foil and is operated with Ar/CF4/CO2 as drift gas. The detector has to stand
radiation levels which are similar to LHC conditions. The first prototypes
exposed to radiation in HERA-B suffered severe radiation damage due to the
development of self-sustaining currents (Malter effect). In a subsequent
extended R&D program major changes to the original concept for the drift tubes
(surface conductivity, drift gas, production materials) have been developed and
validated for use in harsh radiation environments. In the test program various
aging effects (like Malter currents, gain loss due to anode aging and etching
of the anode gold surface) have been observed and cures by tuning of operation
parameters have been developed.Comment: 14 pages, 6 figures, to be published in the Proceedings of the
International Workshop On Aging Phenomena In Gaseous Detectors, 2-5 Oct 2001,
Hamburg, German
The Outer Tracker Detector of the HERA-B Experiment Part I: Detector
The HERA-B Outer Tracker is a large system of planar drift chambers with
about 113000 read-out channels. Its inner part has been designed to be exposed
to a particle flux of up to 2.10^5 cm^-2 s^-1, thus coping with conditions
similar to those expected for future hadron collider experiments. 13
superlayers, each consisting of two individual chambers, have been assembled
and installed in the experiment. The stereo layers inside each chamber are
composed of honeycomb drift tube modules with 5 and 10 mm diameter cells.
Chamber aging is prevented by coating the cathode foils with thin layers of
copper and gold, together with a proper drift gas choice. Longitudinal wire
segmentation is used to limit the occupancy in the most irradiated detector
regions to about 20 %. The production of 978 modules was distributed among six
different laboratories and took 15 months. For all materials in the fiducial
region of the detector good compromises of stability versus thickness were
found. A closed-loop gas system supplies the Ar/CF4/CO2 gas mixture to all
chambers. The successful operation of the HERA-B Outer Tracker shows that a
large tracker can be efficiently built and safely operated under huge radiation
load at a hadron collider.Comment: 28 pages, 14 figure
The Outer Tracker Detector of the HERA-B Experiment. Part II: Front-End Electronics
The HERA-B Outer Tracker is a large detector with 112674 drift chamber
channels. It is exposed to a particle flux of up to 2x10^5/cm^2/s thus coping
with conditions similar to those expected for the LHC experiments. The
front-end readout system, based on the ASD-8 chip and a customized TDC chip, is
designed to fulfil the requirements on low noise, high sensitivity, rate
tolerance, and high integration density. The TDC system is based on an ASIC
which digitizes the time in bins of about 0.5 ns within a total of 256 bins.
The chip also comprises a pipeline to store data from 128 events which is
required for a deadtime-free trigger and data acquisition system. We report on
the development, installation, and commissioning of the front-end electronics,
including the grounding and noise suppression schemes, and discuss its
performance in the HERA-B experiment
Long-term Trends from Ecosystem Research at the Hubbard Brook Experimental Forest
The Hubbard Brook Experimental Forest was established by the U.S. Forest Service in 1955 as a major center for hydrologic research in the Northeast. The Hubbard Brook Ecosystem Study originated 8 years later with the idea of using the small watershed approach to study element flux and cycling and the response of forest ecosystems to disturbance. Since that time, the research program at Hubbard Brook has expanded to include various physical, chemical and biological measurements collected by researchers from a number of cooperating institutions. Collaborative, long-term data are the keystone of the Hubbard Brook Ecosystem Study and have provided invaluable insight into how ecosystems respond to disturbances such as air pollution, climate change, forest disturbance, and forest management practices. This report highlights long- term ecological trends at Hubbard Brook, provides explanations for some of the trends, and lists references from the scientific literature for further reading
Intraoperative blood pressure changes as a risk factor for anastomotic leakage in colorectal surgery
Anastomotic leakage is a serious complication after colorectal surgery. Pre- and intraoperative factors may contribute to failure of colorectal anastomosis. In this study we have tried to determine risk factors for anastomotic leakage, with special emphasis on intraoperative blood pressure changes. During a 24-month period, patients receiving a colorectal anastomosis were prospectively evaluated. For each patient preoperative characteristics, intraoperative adverse events and surgical outcome data were collected. Blood pressure changes were calculated as a relative decrease (> 25% and > 40%) from preoperative baseline values. During the study period, 285 patients underwent colorectal surgery with an anastomosis. Fifteen patients developed an anastomotic leakage (5.3%). All patients who developed a leakage had a left-sided procedure (P 40% decrease in diastolic blood pressure (P = 0.049)] were identified as univariate risk factors for anastomotic leakage. The development of an anastomotic leakage after colorectal surgery is related to surgical, patient and anaesthetic risk factors. A high preoperative diastolic blood pressure and profound intraoperative hypotension combined with complex surgery, marked by a blood loss of a parts per thousand yen250 mL and the occurrence of intraoperative adverse events, is associated with an increased risk of developing anastomotic leakag
Current opinions and recommendations of paediatric healthcare professionals - The importance of tablets:Emerging orally disintegrating versus traditional tablets
The appropriate prescribing of paediatric dosage forms is paramount in providing the desired therapeutic effect alongside successful medication adherence with the paediatric population. Often it is the opinion of the healthcare practitioner that dictates which type of dosage form would be most appropriate for the paediatric patient, with liquids being both the most commonly available and most commonly used. Orally disintegrating tablets (ODTs) are an emerging dosage form which provide many benefits over traditional dosage forms for paediatric patients, such as rapid disintegration within the oral cavity, and the reduction in the risk of choking. However the opinion and professional use of healthcare practitioners regarding ODT's is not known. This study was designed to assess the opinions of several types of healthcare professionals (n = 41) regarding ODTs, using a survey across two hospital sites. Results reaffirmed the popularity of liquids for prescribing in paediatrics, with 58.0% of participants preferring this dosage form. ODTs emerged as the second most popular dosage form (30.0%), with healthcare practitioners indicating an increasing popularity amongst patients in the hospital setting, belief with 63.0% of practitioners agreeing that many liquid formulations could be substituted with a suitable ODT. The desired properties of an ideal ODT were also identified by healthcare practitioners preferring a small, fast disintegrating tablet (90.2% and 95.1% respectively), with the taste, disintegration time and flavour being the three most important attributes identified (29.5%, 28.7% and 21.7% respectively). This study provided a pragmatic approach in assessing healthcare professional's opinions on ODTs, highlighting the ideas and thoughts of practitioners who are on the frontline of paediatric prescribing and treatment and gave an indication to their preference for ODT properties
Inclusive Production Cross Sections from 920 GeV Fixed Target Proton-Nucleus Collisions
Inclusive differential cross sections and
for the production of \kzeros, \lambdazero, and
\antilambda particles are measured at HERA in proton-induced reactions on C,
Al, Ti, and W targets. The incident beam energy is 920 GeV, corresponding to
GeV in the proton-nucleon system. The ratios of differential
cross sections \rklpa and \rllpa are measured to be and , respectively, for \xf . No significant dependence upon the
target material is observed. Within errors, the slopes of the transverse
momentum distributions also show no significant
dependence upon the target material. The dependence of the extrapolated total
cross sections on the atomic mass of the target material is
discussed, and the deduced cross sections per nucleon are
compared with results obtained at other energies.Comment: 17 pages, 7 figures, 5 table
Measurement of inclusive production in hadronic decays
An analysis is presented of inclusive \pi^0 production in Z^0 decays measured with the DELPHI detector. At low energies, \pi^0 decays are reconstructed by \linebreak using pairs of converted photons and combinations of converted photons and photons reconstructed in the barrel electromagnetic calorimeter (HPC). At high energies (up to x_p = 2 \cdot p_{\pi}/\sqrt{s} = 0.75) the excellent granularity of the HPC is exploited to search for two-photon substructures in single showers. The inclusive differential cross section is measured as a function of energy for {q\overline q} and {b \bar b} events. The number of \pi^0's per hadronic Z^0 event is N(\pi^0)/ Z_{had}^0 = 9.2 \pm 0.2 \mbox{(stat)} \pm 1.0 \mbox{(syst)} and for {b \bar b}~events the number of \pi^0's is {\mathrm N(\pi^0)/ b \overline b} = 10.1 \pm 0.4 \mbox{(stat)} \pm 1.1 \mbox{(syst)} . The ratio of the number of \pi^0's in b \overline b events to hadronic Z^0 events is less affected by the systematic errors and is found to be 1.09 \pm 0.05 \pm 0.01. The measured \pi^0 cross sections are compared with the predictions of different parton shower models. For hadronic events, the peak position in the \mathrm \xi_p = \ln(1/x_p) distribution is \xi_p^{\star} = 3.90^{+0.24}_{-0.14}. The average number of \pi^0's from the decay of primary \mathrm B hadrons is found to be {\mathrm N} (B \rightarrow \pi^0 \, X)/\mbox{B hadron} = 2.78 \pm 0.15 \mbox{(stat)} \pm 0.60 \mbox{(syst)}
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