Comparison of controlled droplet and conventional application of postemergence herbicides

Eleven field experiments were conducted at Kingaroy in south-eastern Queensland to compare the effectiveness of controlled droplet application (CDA) with a conventional hydraulic application system. The postemergence herbicides evaluated for broadleaf weed control in summer leguminous and cereal crops were acifluorfen,atrazine, bentazone, dicamba and dinoseb

Fe nano-particle coatings for high temperature wear resistance

Oxidational wear continues to present an economic challenge for the replacement of components subject to high temperature fretting and sliding contacts in applications such as gas turbine engines. At elevated temperatures, low friction oxide ‘glaze’ layers can form and act as an interface between the contact and the substrate material. Whilst desirable, the glaze is formed from wear debris and often consumes the underlying substrate material. In order to induce rapid formation of low friction oxide layers without a severe ‘running-in’ period, nano particles of Fe in the range 5-10nm were deposited on ground flat ended pin and plate 080M40 substrates using a terminated gas condensation PVD process, to a thickness of 600nm. Coatings were tested in a reciprocating geometry at a fixed stroke length of 0.4mm, frequency of 31Hz and 40N normal load (1MPa contact stress) and at ambient, 300°C and 540°C. At ambient temperature the coated surfaces exhibited higher friction but lower wear compared to the uncoated substrates, whereas at elevated temperatures, the coated surfaces exhibited slightly lower steady state dynamic friction coefficients, and minimal changes in wear depth after a short incubation period. SEM of the worn surfaces indicated that hard oxide plateaus were responsible for the load bearing contact area at elevated temperatures. Cross sectional FIB, TEM and SIMS confirmed that at elevated temperatures, the nano-particle coating induced rapid formation of a nano-crystalline porous surface oxide film of mixed composition which protected the substrate from severe wear during the running-in period

Management of Avena ludoviciana and Phalaris paradoxa with barley and less herbicide in subtropical Australia

The competitive advantage of barley compared with wheat was quantified for suppressing seed production of Avena ludoviciana Durieu. (wild oats) andPhalaris paradoxa L. (paradoxa grass), and for improving herbicide effectiveness on these major winter grass weeds of the subtropical grain region of Australia. Eight field experiments were broadcast with weed seed before sowing wheat or barley, in which the emerged weeds were then treated with 4 herbicide doses (0, 25, 50, 100% of recommended rates). Yield reduction from untreated weeds was on average 4 times greater in wheat than in barley, with greater losses from A. ludoviciana than P. paradoxa. Barley did not affect weed emergence, but suppressed weed tiller density and, to a lesser extent, the number of weed seeds per tiller. Seed production was, on average, 4340 and 5105 seeds/m2 for A. ludoviciana and P. paradoxa, respectively, in untreated wheat compared with 555 and 50 seeds/m2 in untreated barley. Weed seed production following treatment with 25% herbicide rate in barley was similar or less than that after treatment with 100% herbicide rate in wheat. Overall, 25% herbicide rate was optimal for both conserving yield and minimising weed seed production in barley. For wheat, maximum yield was achieved with 50% herbicide but weed seed production was lowest with 100% herbicide rate. This indicates that weeds can be effectively controlled in barley with considerably less herbicide than required in wheat, highlighting the importance of including barley as a part of weed management strategies that aim to reduce herbicide inputs

Microbial oxidation of arsenite in a subarctic environment: diversity of arsenite oxidase genes and identification of a psychrotolerant arsenite oxidiser

Background: Arsenic is toxic to most living cells. The two soluble inorganic forms of arsenic are arsenite (+3) and arsenate (+5), with arsenite the more toxic. Prokaryotic metabolism of arsenic has been reported in both thermal and moderate environments and has been shown to be involved in the redox cycling of arsenic. No arsenic metabolism (either dissimilatory arsenate reduction or arsenite oxidation) has ever been reported in cold environments (i.e. < 10°C). Results: Our study site is located 512 kilometres south of the Arctic Circle in the Northwest Territories, Canada in an inactive gold mine which contains mine waste water in excess of 50 mM arsenic. Several thousand tonnes of arsenic trioxide dust are stored in underground chambers and microbial biofilms grow on the chamber walls below seepage points rich in arsenite-containing solutions. We compared the arsenite oxidisers in two subsamples (which differed in arsenite concentration) collected from one biofilm. 'Species' (sequence) richness did not differ between subsamples, but the relative importance of the three identifiable clades did. An arsenite-oxidising bacterium (designated GM1) was isolated, and was shown to oxidise arsenite in the early exponential growth phase and to grow at a broad range of temperatures (4-25°C). Its arsenite oxidase was constitutively expressed and functioned over a broad temperature range. Conclusions: The diversity of arsenite oxidisers does not significantly differ from two subsamples of a microbial biofilm that vary in arsenite concentrations. GM1 is the first psychrotolerant arsenite oxidiser to be isolated with the ability to grow below 10°C. This ability to grow at low temperatures could be harnessed for arsenic bioremediation in moderate to cold climates

Creating a self-induced dark spontaneous-force optical trap for neutral atoms

This communication describes the observation of a new type of dark spontaneous-force optical trap (dark SPOT) obtained without the use of a mask blocking the central part of the repumper laser beam. We observe that loading a magneto-optical trap (MOT) from a continuous and intense flux of slowed atoms and by appropriately tuning the frequency of the repumper laser is possible to achieve basically the same effect of the dark SPOT, using a simpler apparatus. This work characterizes the new system through measurements of absorption and fluorescence imaging of the atomic cloud and presents a very simple model to explain the main features of our observations. We believe that this new approach may simplify the current experiments to produce quantum degenerated gases.Comment: 13 pages, 8 figures, Submitted to Optics Communications (30/10/2003), accepted for publication (Feb/2004

Plasma Turbulence in the Local Bubble

Turbulence in the Local Bubble could play an important role in the thermodynamics of the gas that is there. The best astronomical technique for measuring turbulence in astrophysical plasmas is radio scintillation. Measurements of the level of scattering to the nearby pulsar B0950+08 by Philips and Clegg in 1992 showed a markedly lower value for the line-of-sight averaged turbulent intensity parameter $$than is observed for other pulsars, consistent with radio wave propagation through a highly rarefied plasma. In this paper, we discuss the observational progress that has been made since that time. At present, there are four pulsars (B0950+08, B1133+16, J0437-4715, and B0809+74) whose lines of sight seem to lie mainly within the local bubble. The mean densities and line of sight components of the interstellar magnetic field along these lines of sight are smaller than nominal values for pulsars, but not by as much expected. Three of the four pulsars also have measurements of interstellar scintillation. The value of the parameter$$ is smaller than normal for two of them, but is completely nominal for the third. This inconclusive status of affairs could be improved by measurements and analysis of ``arcs'' in ``secondary spectra'' of pulsars.Comment: Submitted to Space Science Reviews as contribution to Proceedings of ISSI (International Space Science Institute) workshop "From the Heliosphere to the Local Bubble". Refereed version accepted for publicatio

Techniques for the endovascular management of complications following lower limb percutaneous transluminal angioplasty

AbstractObjectives: to determine the incidence of early complications following percutaneous transluminal angioplasty and to describe their management and outcome. Materials: five hundred and fifty consecutive patients undergoing angioplasty of 648 limbs, containing 1053 anatomical segments during a two year period were reviewed retrospectively. Results: early complications affected 109 segments (10%) in 92 limbs (14%) of 84 patients (15%). Of the 109 segments affected by early complications, 106 (97%) were managed by endovascular techniques with surgery being required on only three (3%) occasions. There were no deaths attributable to angioplasty. Conclusions: although early complications occur in 14% of limbs undergoing percutaneous transfemoral angioplasty, the majority (97%) can be managed by endovascular techniques.Eur J Vasc Endovasc Surg 25, 125–130 (2003

Statistics of Coulomb blockade peak spacings for a partially open dot

We show that randomness of the electron wave functions in a quantum dot contributes to the fluctuations of the positions of the conductance peaks. This contribution grows with the conductance of the junctions connecting the dot to the leads. It becomes comparable with the fluctuations coming from the randomness of the single particle spectrum in the dot while the Coulomb blockade peaks are still well-defined. In addition, the fluctuations of the peak spacings are correlated with the fluctuations of the conductance peak heights.Comment: 13 pages, 1 figur

Finite temperature effects in Coulomb blockade quantum dots and signatures of spectral scrambling

The conductance in Coulomb blockade quantum dots exhibits sharp peaks whose spacings fluctuate with the number of electrons. We derive the temperature-dependence of these fluctuations in the statistical regime and compare with recent experimental results. The scrambling due to Coulomb interactions of the single-particle spectrum with the addition of an electron to the dot is shown to affect the temperature-dependence of the peak spacing fluctuations. Spectral scrambling also leads to saturation in the temperature dependence of the peak-to-peak correlator, in agreement with recent experimental results. The signatures of scrambling are derived using discrete Gaussian processes, which generalize the Gaussian ensembles of random matrices to systems that depend on a discrete parameter -- in this case, the number of electrons in the dot.Comment: 14 pages, 4 eps figures included, RevTe

Density functional theory of spin-polarized disordered quantum dots

Using density functional theory, we investigate fluctuations of the ground state energy of spin-polarized, disordered quantum dots in the metallic regime. To compare to experiment, we evaluate the distribution of addition energies and find a convolution of the Wigner-Dyson distribution, expected for noniteracting electrons, with a narrower Gaussian distribution due to interactions. The tird moment of the total distribution is independent of interactions, and so is predicted to decrease by a factor of 0.405 upon application of a magnetic field which transforms from the Gaussian orthogonal to the Gaussian unitary ensemble.Comment: 13 pages, 2 figure