966 research outputs found
The effect of cave illumination on bats
Artificial light at night has large impacts on nocturnal wildlife such as bats, yet its effect varies with wavelength of light, context, and across species involved. Here, we studied in two experiments how wild bats of cave-roosting species (Rhinolophus mehelyi, R. euryale, Myotis capaccinii and Miniopterus schreibersii) respond to LED lights of different colours. In dual choice experiments, we measured the acoustic activity of bats in response to neutral-white, red or amber LED at a cave entrance and in a flight room – mimicking a cave interior. In the flight room, M. capaccinii and M. schreibersii preferred red to white light, but showed no preference for red over amber, or amber over white light. In the cave entrance experiment, all light colours reduced the activity of all emerging species, yet red LED had the least negative effect. Rhinolophus species reacted most strongly, matching their refusal to fly at all under any light treatment in the flight room. We conclude that the placement and light colour of LED light should be considered carefully in lighting concepts for caves both in the interior and at the entrance. In a cave interior, red LED light could be chosen – if needed at all – for careful temporary illumination of areas, yet areas important for bats should be avoided based on the precautionary principle. At cave entrances, the high sensitivity of most bat species, particularly of Rhinolophus spp., towards light sources almost irrespective of colour, calls for utmost caution when illuminating cave entrances
Black Hole Feedback On The First Galaxies
We study how the first galaxies were assembled under feedback from the accretion onto a central black hole (BH) that is left behind by the first generation of metal-free stars through self-consistent, cosmological simulations. X-ray radiation from the accretion of gas onto BH remnants of Population III (Pop III) stars, or from high-mass X-ray binaries (HMXBs), again involving Pop III stars, influences the mode of second generation star formation. We track the evolution of the black hole accretion rate and the associated X-ray feedback starting with the death of the Pop III progenitor star inside a minihalo and following the subsequent evolution of the black hole as the minihalo grows to become an atomically cooling galaxy. We find that X-ray photoionization heating from a stellar-mass BH is able to quench further star formation in the host halo at all times before the halo enters the atomic cooling phase. X-ray radiation from a HMXB, assuming a luminosity close to the Eddington value, exerts an even stronger, and more diverse, feedback on star formation. It photoheats the gas inside the host halo, but also promotes the formation of molecular hydrogen and cooling of gas in the intergalactic medium and in nearby minihalos, leading to a net increase in the number of stars formed at early times. Our simulations further show that the radiative feedback from the first BHs may strongly suppress early BH growth, thus constraining models for the formation of supermassive BHs.Astronom
The Formation and Fragmentation of Disks around Primordial Protostars
The very first stars to form in the Universe heralded an end to the cosmic
dark ages and introduced new physical processes that shaped early cosmic
evolution. Until now, it was thought that these stars lived short, solitary
lives, with only one extremely massive star, or possibly a very wide binary
system, forming in each dark matter minihalo. Here we describe numerical
simulations that show that these stars were, to the contrary, often members of
tight multiple systems. Our results show that the disks that formed around the
first young stars were unstable to gravitational fragmentation, possibly
producing small binary and higher-order systems that had separations as small
as the distance between the Earth and the Sun.Comment: This manuscript has been accepted for publication in Science. This
version has not undergone final editing. Please refer to the complete version
of record at http://www.sciencemag.org
Quantitative Determination of Temperature in the Approach to Magnetic Order of Ultracold Fermions in an Optical Lattice
We perform a quantitative simulation of the repulsive Fermi-Hubbard model using an ultracold gas trapped in an optical lattice. The entropy of the system is determined by comparing accurate measurements of the equilibrium double occupancy with theoretical calculations over a wide range of parameters. We demonstrate the applicability of both high-temperature series and dynamical mean-field theory to obtain quantitative agreement with the experimental data. The reliability of the entropy determination is confirmed by a comprehensive analysis of all systematic errors. In the center of the Mott insulating cloud we obtain an entropy per atom as low as 0.77k(B) which is about twice as large as the entropy at the Neel transition. The corresponding temperature depends on the atom number and for small fillings reaches values on the order of the tunneling energy
The formation of the first galaxies and the transition to low-mass star formation
The formation of the first galaxies at redshifts z ~ 10-15 signaled the
transition from the simple initial state of the universe to one of ever
increasing complexity. We here review recent progress in understanding their
assembly process with numerical simulations, starting with cosmological initial
conditions and modelling the detailed physics of star formation. In this
context we emphasize the importance and influence of selecting appropriate
initial conditions for the star formation process. We revisit the notion of a
critical metallicity resulting in the transition from primordial to present-day
initial mass functions and highlight its dependence on additional cooling
mechanisms and the exact initial conditions. We also review recent work on the
ability of dust cooling to provide the transition to present-day low-mass star
formation. In particular, we highlight the extreme conditions under which this
transition mechanism occurs, with violent fragmentation in dense gas resulting
in tightly packed clusters.Comment: 16 pages, 7 figures, appeared in the conference proceedings for IAU
Symposium 255: Low-Metallicity Star Formation: From the First Stars to Dwarf
Galaxies, a high resolution version (highly recommended) can be found at
http://www.ita.uni-heidelberg.de/~tgreif/files/greif08.pd
Open questions in the study of population III star formation
The first stars were key drivers of early cosmic evolution. We review the
main physical elements of the current consensus view, positing that the first
stars were predominantly very massive. We continue with a discussion of
important open questions that confront the standard model. Among them are
uncertainties in the atomic and molecular physics of the hydrogen and helium
gas, the multiplicity of stars that form in minihalos, and the possible
existence of two separate modes of metal-free star formation.Comment: 15 pages, 2 figures. To appear in the conference proceedings for IAU
Symposium 255: Low-Metallicity Star Formation: From the First Stars to Dwarf
Galaxie
Radiation Hydrodynamical Instabilities in Cosmological and Galactic Ionization Fronts
Ionization fronts, the sharp radiation fronts behind which H/He ionizing
photons from massive stars and galaxies propagate through space, were
ubiquitous in the universe from its earliest times. The cosmic dark ages ended
with the formation of the first primeval stars and galaxies a few hundred Myr
after the Big Bang. Numerical simulations suggest that stars in this era were
very massive, 25 - 500 solar masses, with H II regions of up to 30,000
light-years in diameter. We present three-dimensional radiation hydrodynamical
calculations that reveal that the I-fronts of the first stars and galaxies were
prone to violent instabilities, enhancing the escape of UV photons into the
early intergalactic medium (IGM) and forming clumpy media in which supernovae
later exploded. The enrichment of such clumps with metals by the first
supernovae may have led to the prompt formation of a second generation of
low-mass stars, profoundly transforming the nature of the first protogalaxies.
Cosmological radiation hydrodynamics is unique because ionizing photons coupled
strongly to both gas flows and primordial chemistry at early epochs,
introducing a hierarchy of disparate characteristic timescales whose relative
magnitudes can vary greatly throughout a given calculation. We describe the
adaptive multistep integration scheme we have developed for the self-consistent
transport of both cosmological and galactic ionization fronts.Comment: 6 pages, 4 figures, accepted for proceedings of HEDLA2010, Caltech,
March 15 - 18, 201
Five-year audit of adherence to an anaesthesia pre-induction checklist.
Although patient safety related to airway management has improved substantially over the last few decades, life-threatening events still occur. Technical skills, clinical expertise and human factors contribute to successful airway management. Checklists aim to improve safety by providing a structured approach to equipment, personnel and decision-making. This audit investigates adherence to our institution's airway checklist from 1 June 2016 to 31 May 2021. Inclusion criteria were procedures requiring airway management and we excluded all procedures performed solely under regional anaesthesia, sedation without airway management or paediatric and cardiovascular surgery. The primary outcome was the proportion of wholly performed pre-induction checklists. Secondary outcomes were the pattern of adherence over the 5 years well as details of airway management, including: airway management difficulties; time and location of induction; anaesthesia teams in operating theatres (including teams for different surgical specialities); non-operating theatre and emergency procedures; type of anaesthesia (general or combined); and urgency of the procedure. In total, 95,946 procedures were included. In 57.3%, anaesthesia pre-induction checklists were completed. Over the 5 years after implementation, adherence improved from 48.3% to 66.7% (p < 0.001). Anticipated and unanticipated airway management difficulties (e.g. facemask ventilation, supraglottic airway device or intubation) defined by the handling anaesthetist were encountered in 4.2% of all procedures. Completion of the checklist differed depending on the time of day (61.3% during the day vs. 35.0% during the night, p < 0.001). Completion also differed depending on location (66.8% in operating theatres vs. 41.0% for non-operating theatre anaesthesia, p < 0.001) and urgency of procedure (65.4% in non-emergencies vs. 35.4% in emergencies, p < 0.001). A mixed-effect model indicated that urgency of procedure is a strong predictor for adherence, with emergency cases having lower adherence (OR 0.58, 95%CI 0.49-0.68, p < 0.001). In conclusion, over 5 years, a significant increase in adherence to an anaesthesia pre-induction checklist was found, and areas for further improvement (e.g. emergencies, non-operating room procedures, night-time procedures) were identified
Local radiative feedback in the formation of the first protogalaxies
The formation of the first galaxies is influenced by the radiative feedback
from the first generations of stars. This feedback is manisfested by the
heating and ionization of the gas which lies within the H II regions
surrounding the first stars, as well as by the photodissociation of hydrogen
molecules within the larger Lyman-Werner (LW) bubbles that surround these
sources. Using a ray-tracing method in three-dimensional cosmological
simulations, we self-consistently track the formation of, and radiative
feedback from, individual stars in the course of the formation of a
protogalaxy. We compute in detail the H II regions of each of these sources, as
well as the regions affected by their molecule-dissociating radiation. We
follow the thermal, chemical, and dynamical evolution of the primordial gas, as
it becomes incorporated into the protogalaxy. While the IGM is, in general,
optically thick to LW photons only over physical distances of > 30 kpc at
redshifts z < 20, the high molecule fraction that is built up in relic H II
regions and their increasing volume-filling fraction renders even the local IGM
optically thick to LW photons over physical distances of the order of a few
kiloparsecs. We find that efficient accretion onto Population III relic black
holes may occur after ~ 60 Myr from the time of their formation, by which time
the photo-heated relic H II region gas can cool and re-collapse into the 10^6
M_solar minihalo which hosts the black hole. Also, Pop II.5 stars, postulated
to have masses of the order of 10 M_solar, can likely form from this
re-collapsing relic H II region gas. Overall, we find that the local radiative
feedback from the first generations of stars suppresses the star formation rate
by only a factor of, at most, a few.Comment: 29 pages, 7 figures; ApJ in pres
Direct observation of incommensurate magnetism in Hubbard chains
The interplay between magnetism and doping is at the origin of exotic
strongly correlated electronic phases and can lead to novel forms of magnetic
ordering. One example is the emergence of incommensurate spin-density waves
with a wave vector that does not match the reciprocal lattice. In one dimension
this effect is a hallmark of Luttinger liquid theory, which also describes the
low energy physics of the Hubbard model. Here we use a quantum simulator based
on ultracold fermions in an optical lattice to directly observe such
incommensurate spin correlations in doped and spin-imbalanced Hubbard chains
using fully spin and density resolved quantum gas microscopy. Doping is found
to induce a linear change of the spin-density wave vector in excellent
agreement with Luttinger theory predictions. For non-zero polarization we
observe a decrease of the wave vector with magnetization as expected from the
Heisenberg model in a magnetic field. We trace the microscopic origin of these
incommensurate correlations to holes, doublons and excess spins which act as
delocalized domain walls for the antiferromagnetic order. Finally, when
inducing interchain coupling we observe fundamentally different spin
correlations around doublons indicating the formation of a magnetic polaron
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