Changes in Tropical Clouds and Atmospheric Circulation Associated with Rapid Adjustment Induced by Increased Atmospheric CO2 A Multiscale Modeling Framework Study

The radiative heating increase due to increased CO2 concentration is the primary source for the rapid adjustment of atmospheric circulation and clouds. In this study, we investigate the rapid adjustment resulting from doubling of CO2 and its physical mechanism using a multiscale modeling framework (MMF). The MMF includes an advanced higher-order turbulence closure in its cloud-resolving model component and simulates realistic shallow and deep cloud climatology and boundary layer turbulence. The rapid adjustment over the tropics is characterized by 1) reduced ascent and descent strengths over the ocean, 2) increased lower tropospheric stability (LTS) over the subsidence region, 3) shoaling of planetary boundary layers over the ocean, 4) increased deep convection over lands and shift of cloud coverage from the ocean to lands, and 5) reduced sensible (SH) and latent heat (LH) fluxes over the oceanic deep convective regions. Unlike conventional general circulation models and another MMF, a reduction in the global-mean shortwave cloud radiative cooling is not simulated, due to the increase in low clouds at lower altitudes over the ocean, resulting from reduced cloud-top entrainment due to strengthened inversion. Changes in regional circulation play a key role in cloud changes and shift of cloud coverage to lands. Weaker energy transport resulting from water vapor and cloud CO2 masking effects reduces the upward motion and convective clouds in the oceanic regions. The ocean-land transports are linked to the partitioning of surface SH and LH fluxes that increases humidity over lands and enhances deep convection over the tropical lands

Large Magnetoresistance over an Extended Temperature Regime in Monophosphides of Tantalum and Niobium

We report extremely large magnetoresistance (MR) in an extended temperature regime from 1.5 K to 300 K in non-magnetic binary compounds TaP and NbP. TaP exhibits linear MR around $1.8\times 10^4$ at 2 K in a magnetic field of 9 Tesla, which further follows its linearity up to $1.4\times 10^5$ in a magnetic field of 56 Tesla at 1.5 K. At room temperature the MR for TaP and NbP follows a power law of the exponent about $1.5$ with the values larger than $300\%$ in a magnetic field of 9 Tesla. Such large MR in a wide temperature regime is not likely only due to a resonance of the electron-hole balance, but indicates a complicated mechanism underneath.Comment: 13 pages, 4 figures; submitted in May 20, 2015; accepted for publicatio

Exotic Superconducting Properties in Topological Nodal Semimetal PbTaSe2_2

We report the electronic properties of superconductivity in the topological nodal-line semimetal PbTaSe$_2$. Angle-resolved photoemission measurements accompanied by band calculations confirmed the nodal-line band structure in the normal state of single crystalline PbTaSe$_2$. Resistivity, magnetic-susceptibility and specific heat measurements have also been performed on high-quality single crystals. We observed upward features and large anisotropy in upper critical field ($H_{c2}$) measured in-plane (H//\textbf{ab}) and out-plane (H//\textbf{c}), respectively. Especially, $H_{c2}$ measured in H//\textbf{ab} shows sudden upward features rather than a signal of saturation in ultralow temperatures. The specific heat measurements under magnetic field reveal a full superconducting gap with no gapless nodes. These behaviors in this clean noncentrosymmetric superconductor is possibly related to the underlying exotic physics, providing important clue for realization of topological superconductivity.Comment: 6 pages, 5 figures,1 table;Accepted for publication on PR

Differences in the Hydrological Cycle and Sensitivity Between Multiscale Modeling Frameworks with and Without a HigherOrder Turbulence Closure

Current conventional global climate models (GCMs) produce a weak increase in globalmean precipitation with anthropogenic warming in comparison with the lower tropospheric moisture increases. The motive of this study is to understand the differences in the hydrological sensitivity between two multiscale modeling frameworks (MMFs) that arise from the different treatments of turbulence and low clouds in order to aid to the understanding of the model spread among conventional GCMs. We compare the hydrological sensitivity and its energetic constraint from MMFs with (SPCAMIPHOC) or without (SPCAM) an advanced higherorder turbulence closure. SPCAMIPHOC simulates higher global hydrological sensitivity for the slow response but lower sensitivity for the fast response than SPCAM. Their differences are comparable to the spreads of conventional GCMs. The higher sensitivity in SPCAMIPHOC is associated with the higher ratio of the changes in latent heating to those in net atmospheric radiative cooling, which is further related to a stronger decrease in the Bowen ratio with warming than in SPCAM. The higher sensitivity of cloud radiative cooling resulting from the lack of low clouds in SPCAM is another major factor in contributing to the lower precipitation sensitivity. The two MMFs differ greatly in the hydrological sensitivity over the tropical lands, where the simulated sensitivity of surface sensible heat fluxes to surface warming and CO2 increase in SPCAMIPHOC is weaker than in SPCAM. The difference in divergences of dry static energy flux simulated by the two MMFs also contributes to the difference in land precipitation sensitivity between the two models

Ultraquantum magnetoresistance in Kramers Weyl semimetal candidate β\beta-Ag2Se

The topological semimetal $\beta$-Ag2Se features a Kramers Weyl node at the origin in momentum space and a quadruplet of spinless Weyl nodes, which are annihilated by spin-orbit coupling. We show that single crystalline $\beta$-Ag2Se manifests giant Shubnikov-de Haas oscillations in the longitudinal magnetoresistance which stem from a small electron pocket that can be driven beyond the quantum limit by a field less than 9 T. This small electron pocket is a remainder of the spin-orbit annihilatedWeyl nodes and thus encloses a Berry-phase structure. Moreover, we observed a negative longitudinal magnetoresistance when the magnetic field is beyond the quantum limit. Our experimental findings are complemented by thorough theoretical band structure analyses of this Kramers Weyl semimetal candidate, including first-principle calculations and an effective k*p model.Comment: A new version based on arXiv:1502.0232

Precise-Orientation-Beamforming Scheme for Wireless Communications between Buoys

Utilizing wireless sensor network (WSN) to monitor the marine environment is one of the major techniques in oceanographic monitoring, and how to increase the limited communication distance between the buoys in WSN has become a hot research issue. In this paper, a new technique called precise-orientation-beamforming (POB) which uses the beamforming algorithm to increase the communication distance between buoys is presented. As was widely applied in the radar and sonar, the beamforming method was not used to extend the communication distance between buoys so far. The POB method overcomes the unstable position of buoys caused by waves by implementing the orientation filter. The whole process includes two steps: First, the real-time attitude of the antenna array is calculated by the orientation filter. With the known relative direction of the destination node to the antenna array, the second step is to control phased array antenna beamforming parameters, directing the beam at the destination node. The POB scheme has been simulated under the condition of regular waves. The results reveal that POB provides significant power gains and improves the distance between two communicating nodes effectively

Reaction Chemistry and Kinetics of Corn Stalk Pyrolysis without and with Ga/HZSM-5

The bifunctional Ga/HZSM-5 catalyst has been proven having the capability to increase the selectivity of aromatics production during catalytic pyrolysis of furan and woody biomass. However, the reaction chemistry and kinetics of pyrolysis of herbaceous biomass promoted by Ga/HZSM-5 is rarely reported. Pyrolysis–gas chromatography/mass spectrometry (Py–GC/MS) analysis and non-isothermal thermogravimetric analysis at four heating rates were carried out to investigate the decomposition behavior and pyrolysis kinetics of corn stalk without and with Ga/HZSM-5. The effective activation energies for corn stalk pyrolysis were calculated by using the Friedman isoconversional method. The Py–GC/MS analysis results indicated that the Ga/HZSM-5 catalyst had a high selectivity toward producing the aromatic chemicals of xylene, toluene and benzene, whereas the major products from non-catalytic pyrolysis of corn stalk were oxygenated compounds. The presence of Ga/HZSM-5 could significantly reduce the effective activation energies of corn stalk pyrolysis from 159.9–352.4 kJ mol−1 to 41.6–99.8 kJ mol−1 in the conversion range of 0.10–0.85