Modelling temperature-dependent larval development and\ud subsequent demographic Allee effects in adult populations of the alpine butterfly Parnassius smintheus

Climate change has been attributed as a driver of changes to ecological systems worldwide and understanding the effects of climate change at individual, population, community, and ecosystem levels has become a primary concern of ecology. One avenue toward understanding the impacts of climate change on an ecosystem is through the study of environmentally sensitive species. Butterflies are sensitive to climatic changes due to their reliance on environmental cues such as temperature and photoperiod, which regulate the completion of life history stages. As such, the population dynamics of butterflies may offer insight into the impacts of climate change on the health of an ecosystem. In this paper we study the effects of rearing temperature on the alpine butterfly Parnassius smintheus (Rocky Mountain Apollo), both directly through individual phenological changes and indirectly through adult reproductive success at the population level. Our approach is to formulate a mathematical model of individual development parameterized by experimental data and link larval development to adult reproductive success. A Bernoulli process model describes temperature-dependent larval phenology, and a system of ordinary differential equations is used to study impacts on reproductive success. The phenological model takes field temperature data as its input and predicts a temporal distribution of adult emergence, which in turn controls the dynamics of the reproductive success model. We find that warmer spring and summer temperatures increase reproductive success, while cooler temperatures exacerbate a demographic Allee effect, suggesting that observed yearly fluctuations in P. smintheus population size may be driven by inter-annual temperature variability. Model predictions are validated against mark-recapture field data from 2001 and 2003 − 2009

Building a functional, integrated GIS/remote sensing resource analysis and planning system

To be an effective tool for resource analysis and planning, a geographic information system (GIS) needs to be integrated with a digital remote sensing capability. To be truly functional, the paired system must be driven by grass roots local needs. A case study couched in a Soil Conservation District in northern Utah is presented. Agency representatives determined that the most fundamental data sets to be entered into the GIS system analysis system in the first round were: land use/land cover; geomorphic/soil unit data; hydrologic unit data; and digital terrain. The least expensive and best ways to obtain these data were determined. Data were acquired and formatted to enter the state's PRIME/ARC-INFO GIS, and are being interrogated for resource management decisions related to such issues as agricultural preservation, urban expansion, soil erosion control, and dam siting

Carbon dioxide and water exchange rates by a wheat crop in NASA's biomass production chamber: Results from an 86-day study (January to April 1989)

Gas exchange measurements were taken for a 20 sq m wheat stand grown from seed to harvest in NASA's Biomass Production Chamber. Respiration of the wheat stand caused the CO2 concentrations to rise an average of 440 ppm during the 4-h dark period each day, or 7.2 umol/sq m/sec. Dark period respiration was sensitive to temperature changes and could be increased 70 to 75 percent by raising the temperature from 16 C to 24 C. Stand photosynthesis (measured from the rate of CO2 drawdown immediately after the lights came on each day) peaked at 27 umol/sq m/sec at 25 days after planting and averaged 15 umol/sq m/sec throughout the study. By combining the average light period photosynthesis and average dark period respiration, a net of 860 g or 470 liters of CO2 were fixed per day. Stand photosynthetic rates showed a linear increase with increasing irradiance (750 umol/sq m/sec PPF the highest level tested), with an average light compensation point after day 30 of 190 umol/sq m/sec. Stand photosynthesis decreased slightly when CO2 levels were decreased from 2200 to 800 ppm, but dropped sharply when CO2 was decreased below 700 to 800 ppm. Water production from stand transpiration peaked at 120 L/day near 25 days and averaged about 90 L/day, or 4.5 L/sq m/day throughout the study

Aspherical Core-Collapse Supernovae in Red Supergiants Powered by Nonrelativistic Jets

We explore the observational characteristics of jet-driven supernovae by simulating bipolar-jet-driven explosions in a red supergiant progenitor. We present results of four models in which we hold the injected kinetic energy at a constant $10^{51}$ ergs across all jet models but vary the specific characteristics of the jets to explore the influence of the nature of jets on the structure of the supernova ejecta. We evolve the explosions past shock-breakout and into quasi-homologous expansion of the supernova envelope into a red supergiant wind. The oppositely-directed, nickel-rich jets give a large-scale asymmetry that may account for the non-spherical excitation and substructure of spectral lines such as H$\alpha$ and He I 10830\AA. Jets with a large fraction of kinetic to thermal energy punch through the progenitor envelope and give rise to explosions that would be observed to be asymmetric from the earliest epochs, inconsistent with spectropolarimetric measurements of Type II supernovae. Jets with higher thermal energy fractions result in explosions that are roughly spherical at large radii but are significantly elongated at smaller radii, deep inside the ejecta, in agreement with the polarimetric observations. We present shock breakout light curves that indicate that strongly aspherical shock breakouts are incompatible with recent {\it GALEX} observations of shock breakout from red supergiant stars. Comparison with observations indicates that jets must deposit their kinetic energy efficiently throughout the ejecta while in the hydrogen envelope. Thermal energy-dominated jets satisfy this criterion and yield many of the observational characteristics of Type II supernovae.Comment: 21 pages, 19 figures, submitted to ApJ on 4 Nov 200

Multidimensional Simulations of Rotating Pair Instability Supernovae

We study the effects of rotation on the dynamics, energetics and Ni-56 production of Pair Instability Supernova explosions by performing rotating two-dimensional ("2.5-D") hydrodynamics simulations. We calculate the evolution of eight low metallicity (Z = 10^-3, 10^-4 Zsun) massive (135-245 Msun) PISN progenitors with initial surface rotational velocities 50% that of the critical Keplerian value using the stellar evolution code MESA. We allow for both the inclusion and the omission of the effects of magnetic fields in the angular momentum transport and in chemical mixing, resulting in slowly-rotating and rapidly-rotating final carbon-oxygen cores, respectively. Increased rotation for carbon-oxygen cores of the same mass and chemical stratification leads to less energetic PISN explosions that produce smaller amounts of Ni-56 due to the effect of the angular momentum barrier that develops and slows the dynamical collapse. We find a non-monotonic dependence of Ni-56 production on rotational velocity in situations when smoother composition gradients form at the outer edge of the rotating cores. In these cases, the PISN energetics are determined by the competition of two factors: the extent of chemical mixing in the outer layers of the core due to the effects of rotation in the progenitor evolution and the development of angular momentum support against collapse. Our 2.5-D PISN simulations with rotation are the first presented in the literature. They reveal hydrodynamic instabilities in several regions of the exploding star and increased explosion asymmetries with higher core rotational velocity.Comment: 31 pages, 23 figures, accepted for publication in the Ap

Time Dependent Pairing Equations for Seniority One Nuclear Systems

When the time dependent Hartree-Fock-Bogoliubov intrinsic equations of motion are solved in the case of seniority one nuclear systems, the unpaired nucleon remains on the same orbital. The blocking effect hinders the possibility to skip from one orbital to another. This unpleasant feature is by-passed with a new set of pairing time dependent equations that allows the possibility that the unpaired nucleon changes its single-particle level. These equations generalize the time dependent Hartree-Fock-Bogoliubov equations of motion by including the Landau-Zener effect. The derivation of these new equations is presented in details. These equations are applied in the case of a superasymmetric fission process, that is, in order to explain the fine structure the 14C emission from 233Ra. A new version of the Woods-Saxon model extended for two-center potentials is used in this context.Comment: 12 pages, 6 figure

Enhanced noise at high bias in atomic-scale Au break junctions

Heating in nanoscale systems driven out of equilibrium is of fundamental importance, has ramifications for technological applications, and is a challenge to characterize experimentally. Prior experiments using nanoscale junctions have largely focused on heating of ionic degrees of freedom, while heating of the electrons has been mostly neglected. We report measurements in atomic-scale Au break junctions, in which the bias-driven component of the current noise is used as a probe of the electronic distribution. At low biases ($<$ 150~mV) the noise is consistent with expectations of shot noise at a fixed electronic temperature. At higher biases, a nonlinear dependence of the noise power is observed. We consider candidate mechanisms for this increase, including flicker noise (due to ionic motion), heating of the bulk electrodes, nonequilibrium electron-phonon effects, and local heating of the electronic distribution impinging on the ballistic junction. We find that flicker noise and bulk heating are quantitatively unlikely to explain the observations. We discuss the implications of these observations for other nanoscale systems, and experimental tests to distinguish vibrational and electron interaction mechanisms for the enhanced noise.Comment: 30 pages, 7 figure

Drug Predictive Cues Activate Aversion-Sensitive Striatal Neurons That Encode Drug Seeking

Drug-associated cues have profound effects on an addict’s emotional state and drug-seeking behavior. Although this influence must involve the motivational neural system that initiates and encodes the drug-seeking act, surprisingly little is known about the nature of such physiological events and their motivational consequences. Three experiments investigated the effect of a cocaine-predictive stimulus on dopamine signaling, neuronal activity, and reinstatement of cocaine seeking. In all experiments, rats were divided into two groups (paired and unpaired), and trained to self-administer cocaine in the presence of a tone that signaled the immediate availability of the drug. For rats in the paired group, self-administration sessions were preceded by a taste cue that signaled delayed drug availability. Assessments of hedonic responses indicated that this delay cue became aversive during training. Both the self-administration behavior and the immediate cue were subsequently extinguished in the absence of cocaine. After extinction of self-administration behavior, the presentation of the aversive delay cue reinstated drug seeking. In vivo electrophysiology and voltammetry recordings in the nucleus accumbens measured the neural responses to both the delay and immediate drug cues after extinction. Interestingly, the presentation of the delay cue simultaneously decreased dopamine signaling and increased excitatory encoding of the immediate cue. Most importantly, the delay cue selectively enhanced the baseline activity of neurons that would later encode drug seeking. Together these observations reveal how cocaine cues can modulate not only affective state, but also the neurochemical and downstream neurophysiological environment of striatal circuits in a manner that promotes drug seeking