Rayleigh scattering in the transmission spectrum of HAT-P-18b

We have performed ground-based transmission spectroscopy of the hot Jupiter HAT-P-18b using the ACAM instrument on the William Herschel Telescope (WHT). Differential spectroscopy over an entire night was carried out at a resolution of $R \approx 400$ using a nearby comparison star. We detect a bluewards slope extending across our optical transmission spectrum which runs from 4750 to 9250\AA. The slope is consistent with Rayleigh scattering at the equilibrium temperature of the planet (852K). We do not detect enhanced sodium absorption, which indicates that a high-altitude haze is masking the feature and giving rise to the Rayleigh slope. This is only the second discovery of a Rayleigh scattering slope in a hot Jupiter atmosphere from the ground, and our study illustrates how ground-based observations can provide transmission spectra with precision comparable to the Hubble Space Telescope.Comment: 11 pages, 9 figures, accepted for publication in MNRA

Relationship between the Linear Ringing Frequencies in 3He-A and 3He-B near the Polycritical Point

New measurements of parallel ringing in a quasi-ideal geometry for 3He-B near the temperature and pressure of the polycritical point suggest fB2/fA2∼5/2, where fB and fA are the linear parallel-ringing frequencies at a given temperature near Tc. This result approaches the prediction of theory using the Anderson-Brinkman-Morel and Balian-Werthamer states to describe 3He-A and 3He-B, respectively, and hence the results of Osheroff at melting pressure, but disagrees with earlier observations at pressures near the polycritical point

Experiments on Dynamic Parallel Magnetism in Superfluid 3He

Observations are reported of the ringing of parallel magnetization in superfluid 3He when an incremental magnetic field parallel to a steady field is suddenly turned off

Relaxation of the Wall-Pinned Magnetization Ringing Mode in Superfluid 3He-B

Observations of the wall-pinned mode in 3He-B allow new magnetic relaxation phenomena to be studied. Excepting the quantitative value of the zero-time ringing frequency, comparison of experiment with theory is satisfactory, including a linear dependence of the square of the ringing period on time and a square-root singularity near Tc in the relaxation parameter

Nonlinear Parallel Ringing of Magnetization in Superfluid 3He

Experiments based on an analogy to the ac Josephson effect have shown in both 3He-A and 3He-B that a pairing theory of the superfluidity of 3He is essentially correct. Additional observations of parallel ringing are not in agreement with the simple pendulum models used to describe nonlinear dynamic magnetic effects

K2 Variable Catalogue II: Machine Learning Classification of Variable Stars and Eclipsing Binaries in K2 Fields 0-4

We are entering an era of unprecedented quantities of data from current and planned survey telescopes. To maximise the potential of such surveys, automated data analysis techniques are required. Here we implement a new methodology for variable star classification, through the combination of Kohonen Self Organising Maps (SOM, an unsupervised machine learning algorithm) and the more common Random Forest (RF) supervised machine learning technique. We apply this method to data from the K2 mission fields 0-4, finding 154 ab-type RR Lyraes (10 newly discovered), 377 Delta Scuti pulsators, 133 Gamma Doradus pulsators, 183 detached eclipsing binaries, 290 semi-detached or contact eclipsing binaries and 9399 other periodic (mostly spot-modulated) sources, once class significance cuts are taken into account. We present lightcurve features for all K2 stellar targets, including their three strongest detected frequencies, which can be used to study stellar rotation periods where the observed variability arises from spot modulation. The resulting catalogue of variable stars, classes, and associated data features are made available online. We publish our SOM code in Python as part of the open source PyMVPA package, which in combination with already available RF modules can be easily used to recreate the method.Comment: Accepted for publication in MNRAS, 16 pages, 13 figures. Updated with proof corrections. Full catalogue tables available at https://www2.warwick.ac.uk/fac/sci/physics/research/astro/people/armstrong/ or at the CD

Efficient transcription through an intron requires the binding of an Sm-type U1 snRNP with intact stem loop II to the splice donor

The mechanism behind the positive action of introns upon transcription and the biological significance of this positive feedback remains unclear. Functional ablation of splice sites within an HIV-derived env cDNA significantly reduced transcription that was rescued by a U1 snRNA modified to bind to the mutated splice donor (SD). Using this model we further characterized both the U1 and pre-mRNA structural requirements for transcriptional enhancement. U1 snRNA rescued as a mature Sm-type snRNP with an intact stem loop II. Position and sequence context for U1-binding is crucial because a promoter proximal intron placed upstream of the mutated SD failed to rescue transcription. Furthermore, U1-rescue was independent of promoter and exon sequence and is partially replaced by the transcription elongation activator Tat, pointing to an intron-localized block in transcriptional elongation. Thus, transcriptional coupling of U1 snRNA binding to the SD may licence the polymerase for transcription through the intron

Propeller-activated resonances and the fate of short-period cataclysmic variables

We show that the combination of a weak magnetic propeller and accretion disc resonances can effectively halt accretion in short-period cataclysmic variables (CVs) for large fractions of their lifetimes. This may help to explain the discrepancy between the observed and predicted orbital period distributions of CVs at short periods. Orbital resonances cause the disc to become eccentric, allowing material to fall back on to the donor star or out of the system. A weak magnetic field on a rapidly spinning primary star propels disc material outwards, allowing it to access these resonances. Numerical and analytic calculations show that this state can be long lived (∼1011 yr). This is because the magnetic propeller is required only to maintain access to the resonances, and not to push matter out of the Roche lobe, so that the spin-down time-scale is much longer than that for a classical propeller mode