Water and nutrient fluxes as indicators for the sustainability of different land-use systems on the terra firme near Manaus - a project overview.

Comparision of the water and nutrient fluxes in different perennial land-se systems, either monocultures or mixed cropping systems, in order to determine the resource efficiency of perennial land-se systems. They were comparision of the monocultue systems with Theobroma grandiflorum (cupuacu) or Bactris gasipaes (pupunha), polyculture systems with cupuacu, pupunh, Bixa orellana (urucum) and Bertholletia excelsa (castanha-do-Para) and primary and secondary forest sites. In the first experimental year, the equipment was installed to measure raianfall, throughfall, stemflow and soil water fluxes. These data combined with measurements of nutrient concentrations inform about the element fluxes. for this purpose, laboratory facilities were implemented to analyze anions and cations in the different land-se systems. Additionally, the nutrient and organic matter content of the soils were studied. Firt results showed that the investigated tree species differ in their effect on the water distribution and nutrient accumulation within the different cropping systems

Oxygen-isotope effect on the in-plane penetration depth in underdoped Y_{1-x}Pr_xBa_2Cu_3O_{7-delta} as revealed by muon-spin rotation

The oxygen-isotope (^16O/^18O) effect (OIE) on the in-plane penetration depth $\lambda_{ab} (0)$ in underdoped Y_{1-x}Pr_xBa_2Cu_3O_{7-delta} was studied by muon-spin rotation. A pronounced OIE on $\lambda_{ab}^{-2}(0)$ was observed with a relative isotope shift of $\Delta\lambda^{-2}_{ab}/\lambda^{-2}_{ab}$=-5(2)% for x =0.3 and -9(2)% for x=0.4. It arises mainly from the oxygen-mass dependence of the in-plane effective mass $m_{ab}^{\ast}$. The OIE exponents of T_{c} and of $\lambda_{ab}^{-2}(0)$ exhibit a relation that appears to be generic for cuprate superconductors.Comment: 4 pages, 4 eps figures, RevTex

Nutrient and water dynamics in a multi-strata agroforestry system.

In the presentel project, the nutriente and water fluxes are studied ann used as indicators for the stability of the agroforestry systems. The effects of the trees on soil properties, water and nutrient dynamics highly differed between species. To evaluate the sustaninability on an agroforestry system it is important to stress the consideration of spatial variability in the studied parameters. This variability creates the possibility to develop agroforestry with a complementary use of water and nutriente resources. The cropping sysytem with the current management is not seen as viable solution for land use in Amazonia at the moment. However, the discovered features of single trees and the effects on crop production and sustainability so far described encourage futher efforts to improve multi-strata agroforestry as a land use system for the Amazon region

Analysis of White Dwarfs with Strange-Matter Cores

We summarize masses and radii for a number of white dwarfs as deduced from a combination of proper motion studies, Hipparcos parallax distances, effective temperatures, and binary or spectroscopic masses. A puzzling feature of these data is that some stars appear to have radii which are significantly smaller than that expected for a standard electron-degenerate white-dwarf equations of state. We construct a projection of white-dwarf radii for fixed effective mass and conclude that there is at least marginal evidence for bimodality in the radius distribution forwhite dwarfs. We argue that if such compact white dwarfs exist it is unlikely that they contain an iron core. We propose an alternative of strange-quark matter within the white-dwarf core. We also discuss the impact of the so-called color-flavor locked (CFL) state in strange-matter core associated with color superconductivity. We show that the data exhibit several features consistent with the expected mass-radius relation of strange dwarfs. We identify eight nearby white dwarfs which are possible candidates for strange matter cores and suggest observational tests of this hypothesis.Comment: 11 pages, 6 figures, accepted for publication in J. Phys. G: Nucl. Part. Phy

Climate change and equestrian empires in the Eastern Steppes: new insights from a high-resolution Lake Core in Central Mongolia

The repeated expansion of East Asian steppe cultures was a key driver of Eurasian history, forging new social, economic, and biological links across the continent. Climate has been suggested as important driver of these poorly understood cultural expansions, but paleo-climate records from the Mongolian Plateau often suffer from poor age control or ambiguous proxy interpretation. Here, we use a combination of geochemical analyses and comprehensive radiocarbon dating to establish the first robust and detailed record of paleo-hydrological conditions for Lake Telmen, Mongolia, covering the past ~4000 years. Our record shows that humid conditions coincided with solar minima, and hydrological modelling confirms the high sensitivity of the lake to paleo-climate changes. Careful comparisons with archaeological and historical records suggest that in the vast semi-arid grasslands of eastern Eurasia, solar minima led to reduced temperatures, less evaporation, and high biomass production, expanding the power base for pastoral economies and horse cavalry. Our findings suggest a crucial link between temperature dynamics in the Eastern Steppe and key social developments, such as the emergence of pastoral empires, and fuel concerns that global warming enhances water scarcity in the semi-arid regions of interior Eurasia.1. Introduction 2. Results 2.1 Sediment core chronology 2.2 Sedimentological and geochemical analyses 2.3 Isotope analyses, evaporation index (EI), and paleohydrology 3. Discussion 3.1 External forcing on the regional climate 3.2 Hydrological modelling 3.3 Climate impact on human history in Mongolia Method

Superconducting Magnetization above the Irreversibility Line in Tl2Ba2CuO6

Piezolever torque magnetometry has been used to measure the magnetization of superconducting Tl2Ba2CuO6. Three crystals with different levels of oxygen overdoping were investigated in magnetic fields up to 10 Tesla. In all cases, the magnetization above the irreversibility line was found to depart from the behaviour M ~ ln(Hc2/H) of a simple London-like vortex liquid. In particular, for a strongly overdoped (Tc = 15K) crystal, the remnant superconducting order above the irreversibility line is characterized by a linear diamagnetic response (M ~ H) that persists well above Tc and also up to the highest field employed.Comment: RevTeX, 11 pages, 7 encapsulated PostScript figures, submitted to Physical Review

Inference for bounded parameters

The estimation of signal frequency count in the presence of background noise has had much discussion in the recent physics literature, and Mandelkern [1] brings the central issues to the statistical community, leading in turn to extensive discussion by statisticians. The primary focus however in [1] and the accompanying discussion is on the construction of a confidence interval. We argue that the likelihood function and $p$-value function provide a comprehensive presentation of the information available from the model and the data. This is illustrated for Gaussian and Poisson models with lower bounds for the mean parameter

Spectral properties of the t-J model in the presence of hole-phonon interaction

We examine the effects of electron-phonon interaction on the dynamics of the charge carriers doped in two-dimensional (2D) Heisenberg antiferromagnet. The $t$-$J$ model Hamiltonian with a Fr\"ohlich term which couples the holes to a dispersionless (optical) phonon mode is considered for low doping concentration. The evolution of the spectral density function, the density of states, and the momentum distribution function of the holes with an increase of the hole-phonon coupling constant $g$ is studied numerically. As the coupling to a phonon mode increases the quasiparticle spectral weight decreases and a ``phonon satellite'' feature close to the quasi-particle peak becomes more pronounced. Furthermore, strong electron-phonon coupling smears the multi-magnon resonances (``string states'') in the incoherent part of the spectral function. The jump in the momentum distribution function at the Fermi surface is reduced without changing the hole pocket volume, thereby providing a numerical verification of Luttinger theorem for this strongly interacting system. The vertex corrections due to electron- phonon interaction are negligible in spite of the fact that the ratio of the phonon frequency to the effective bandwidth is not small.Comment: REVTeX, 20 pages, 9 figures, to be published in Phys. Rev. B (Nov. 1, 1996

SST-GATE: A dual mirror telescope for the Cherenkov Telescope Array

The Cherenkov Telescope Array (CTA) will be the world's first open observatory for very high energy gamma-rays. Around a hundred telescopes of different sizes will be used to detect the Cherenkov light that results from gamma-ray induced air showers in the atmosphere. Amongst them, a large number of Small Size Telescopes (SST), with a diameter of about 4 m, will assure an unprecedented coverage of the high energy end of the electromagnetic spectrum (above ~1TeV to beyond 100 TeV) and will open up a new window on the non-thermal sky. Several concepts for the SST design are currently being investigated with the aim of combining a large field of view (~9 degrees) with a good resolution of the shower images, as well as minimizing costs. These include a Davies-Cotton configuration with a Geiger-mode avalanche photodiode (GAPD) based camera, as pioneered by FACT, and a novel and as yet untested design based on the Schwarzschild-Couder configuration, which uses a secondary mirror to reduce the plate-scale and to allow for a wide field of view with a light-weight camera, e.g. using GAPDs or multi-anode photomultipliers. One objective of the GATE (Gamma-ray Telescope Elements) programme is to build one of the first Schwarzschild-Couder prototypes and to evaluate its performance. The construction of the SST-GATE prototype on the campus of the Paris Observatory in Meudon is under way. We report on the current status of the project and provide details of the opto-mechanical design of the prototype, the development of its control software, and simulations of its expected performance.Comment: In Proceedings of the 33rd International Cosmic Ray Conference (ICRC2013), Rio de Janeiro (Brazil). All CTA contributions at arXiv:1307.223