A new study of an old sink of sulfur in hot molecular cores: the sulfur residue

Sulfur appears to be depleted by an order of magnitude or more from its elemental abundance in star-forming regions. In the last few years, numerous observations and experiments have been performed in order to to understand the reasons behind this depletion without providing a satisfactory explanation of the sulfur chemistry towards high-mass star-forming cores. Several sulfur-bearing molecules have been observed in these regions, and yet none are abundant enough to make up the gas-phase deficit. Where, then, does this hidden sulfur reside? This paper represents a step forward in our understanding of the interactions among the various S-bearing species. We have incorporated recent experimental and theoretical data into a chemical model of a hot molecular core in order to see whether they give any indication of the identity of the sulfur sink in these dense regions. Despite our model producing reasonable agreement with both solid-phase and gas-phase abundances of many sulfur-bearing species, we find that the sulfur residue detected in recent experiments takes up only ~6 per cent of the available sulfur in our simulations, rather than dominating the sulfur budget.Comment: 13 pages, 6 colourful figures, accepted by MNRA

The Impact of Motivation on Continued VFR into IMC: Another Perspective to an On-Going Problem

Continued flight under visual flight rules into instrument meteorological conditions remains the predominant cause for fatal accidents by percentage for general aviation aircraft operations. There are gaps in the research in determining how motivation might influence the decision-making process. Therefore, the purpose of this study was to determine how motivation and meteorological conditions might affect a pilot’s willingness to persist in flight into meteorological conditions. Four hundred and fifty-four general aviation pilots participated in a mixed factorial experiment to assess their willingness to persist in varying weather conditions. Participants were randomly assigned into one of three motivation groups (intrinsic, extrinsic, or no motivation) and were subjected to all three meteorological conditions (visual, marginal, and instrument) that were randomized in order of appearance. They were then asked to indicate their willingness to persist in each condition via a slider scale, scaled from 0 to 100. The results indicated the main effect of meteorological condition has a significant effect on willingness to persist, while the main effect of motivation did not. The interaction between meteorological condition and motivation resulted in a significant effect, particularly in the marginal meteorological condition

A Differential Deficit in Time- Versus Event-Based Prospective Memory in Parkinson\u27s Disease

Objective: The aim of the current study was to clarify the nature and extent of impairment in time- versusevent-based prospective memory in Parkinson’s disease (PD). Prospective memory is thought to involvecognitive processes that are mediated by prefrontal systems and are executive in nature. Given thatindividuals with PD frequently show executive dysfunction, it is important to determine whether theseindividuals may have deficits in prospective memory that could impact daily functions, such as takingmedications. Although it has been reported that individuals with PD evidence impairment in prospectivememory, it is still unclear whether they show a greater deficit for time- versus event-based cues. Method:Fifty-four individuals with PD and 34 demographically similar healthy adults were administered astandardized measure of prospective memory that allows for a direct comparison of time-based andevent-based cues. In addition, participants were administered a series of standardized measures ofretrospective memory and executive functions. Results: Individuals with PD demonstrated impairedprospective memory performance compared to the healthy adults, with a greater impairment demonstratedfor the time-based tasks. Time-based prospective memory performance was moderately correlatedwith measures of executive functioning, but only the Stroop Neuropsychological Screening Test emergedas a unique predictor in a linear regression. Conclusions: Findings are interpreted within the context ofMcDaniel and Einstein’s (2000) multiprocess theory to suggest that individuals with PD experienceparticular difficulty executing a future intention when the cue to execute the prescribed intention requireshigher levels of executive control

Planning the oral health workforce: time for innovation

Contains fulltext : 232783.pdf (Publisher’s version ) (Open Access)The levels and types of oral health problems occurring in populations change over time, while advances in technology change the way oral health problems are addressed and the ways care is delivered. These rapid changes have major implications for the size and mix of the oral health workforce, yet the methods used to plan the oral health workforce have remained rigid and isolated from planning of oral healthcare services and healthcare expenditures. In this paper, we argue that the innovation culture that has driven major developments in content and delivery of oral health care must also be applied to planning the oral health workforce if we are to develop 'fit for purpose' healthcare systems that meet the needs of populations in the 21st century. An innovative framework for workforce planning is presented focussed on responding to changes in population needs, service developments for meeting those needs and optimal models of care delivery

A rule based quality control method for hourly rainfall data and a 1 km resolution gridded hourly rainfall dataset for Great Britain: CEH-GEAR1hr

High-resolution gridded precipitation products are rare globally, particularly below a daily time-step, yet many hydrological applications require, or can be improved by, a higher temporal resolution of rainfall data. Here, we present a new 1 km resolution gridded hourly rainfall dataset for Great Britain (Gridded estimates of hourly areal rainfall for Great Britain (1990–2014) [CEH-GEAR1hr]) using data from over 1900 quality controlled rainfall gauges, which improves upon the current UK national gridded precipitation datasets at daily time-step. We extend and automate a quality control (QC) procedure to permit the use of hourly data for 1990–2014 and independently validate the QC using daily rainfall data and recorded historic events. Our two-tiered validation approach, at daily and hourly timescales, indicates that spurious extreme values are excluded from the resultant dataset, while legitimate values are preserved. We use a nearest neighbour interpolation scheme to derive gridded hourly rainfall values at 1 km resolution, to temporally disaggregate the CEH-GEAR daily gridded dataset and produce an hourly dataset with consistent daily totals. This provides a unique resource for hydrological applications in Great Britain. The CEH-GEAR1hr dataset, associated metadata and QC information, will be freely available from the Environmental Information Data Centre (EIDC) and hosted alongside the daily and monthly CEH-GEAR product

Remote Sensing of Antarctic Sea Ice with Coordinated Aircraft and Satellite Data Acquisitions

Remote sensing of Antarctic sea ice is required to characterize properties of the vast sea ice cover to understand its long-term increase in contrast to the decrease of Arctic sea ice. For this objective, the OIB/TanDEM-X Coordinated Science Campaign (OTASC) was successfully conducted in 2017 to obtain contemporaneous and collocated remote sensing data from NASA's Operation IceBridge (OIB) and the German Aerospace Center (DLR) TanDEM-X Synthetic Aperture Radar (SAR) system at X-band together with Sentinel-1 and RADARSAT-2 SARs at C-band in conjunction with WorldView satellite spectral sensors, surface measurements, and field observations. The Weddell Sea and the Ross Sea were two primary regions while SAR data were also collected over six other regions in the Southern Ocean. Satellite SAR data included both polarimetric and interferometric capabilities to infer snow and sea ice information in three dimensions (3D), while OIB/P-3 aircraft data include snow radar together with altimeter data for snow and sea ice observations in 3D over the Weddell Sea. Across the Ross Sea, IcePOD and AntNZ/York-University flights were carried out together with satellite SAR data acquisitions

Continuing evolution of Burkholderia mallei through genome reduction and large-scale rearrangements

Burkholderia mallei (Bm), the causative agent of the predominately equine disease glanders, is a genetically uniform species that is very closely related to the much more diverse species Burkholderia pseudomallei (Bp), an opportunistic human pathogen and the primary cause of melioidosis. To gain insight into the relative lack of genetic diversity within Bm, we performed whole-genome comparative analysis of seven Bm strains and contrasted these with eight Bp strains. The Bm core genome (shared by all seven strains) is smaller in size than that of Bp, but the inverse is true for the variable gene sets that are distributed across strains. Interestingly, the biological roles of the Bm variable gene sets are much more homogeneous than those of Bp. The Bm variable genes are found mostly in contiguous regions flanked by insertion sequence (IS) elements, which appear to mediate excision and subsequent elimination of groups of genes that are under reduced selection in the mammalian host. The analysis suggests that the Bm genome continues to evolve through random IS-mediated recombination events, and differences in gene content may contribute to differences in virulence observed among Bm strains. The results are consistent with the view that Bm recently evolved from a single strain of Bp upon introduction into an animal host followed by expansion of IS elements, prophage elimination, and genome rearrangements and reduction mediated by homologous recombination across IS elements