2,133 research outputs found
Notch signaling augments the canonical Wnt pathway to specify the size of the otic placode
The inner ear derives from a patch of ectoderm defined by expression of the transcription factor Pax2. We recently showed that this Pax2^+ ectoderm gives rise not only to the otic placode but also to the surrounding cranial epidermis, and that Wnt signaling mediates this placode-epidermis fate decision. We now present evidence for reciprocal interactions between the Wnt and Notch signaling pathways during inner ear induction. Activation of Notch1 in Pax2+ ectoderm expands the placodal epithelium at the expense of cranial epidermis, whereas loss of Notch1 leads to a reduction in the size of the otic placode. We show that Wnt signaling positively regulates Notch pathway genes such as Jag1, Notch1 and Hes1, and we have used transgenic Wnt reporter mice to show that Notch signaling can modulate the canonical Wnt pathway. Gain- and loss-of-function mutations in the Notch and Wnt pathways reveal that some aspects of otic placode development - such as Pax8 expression and the morphological thickening of the placode - can be regulated independently by either Notch or Wnt signals. Our results suggest that Wnt signaling specifies the size of the otic placode in two ways, by directly upregulating a subset of otic genes, and by positively regulating components of the Notch signaling pathway, which then act to augment Wnt signaling
Statistical Study of the Reconnection Rate in Solar Flares Observed with YOHKOH/SXT
We report a statistical study of flares observed with the Soft X-ray
Telescope (SXT) onboard Yohkoh in the year of 2000. We measure physical
parameters of 77 flares, such as the temporal scale, the size, and the magnetic
flux density and find that the sizes of flares tend to be distributed more
broadly as the GOES class becomes weaker and that there is a lower limit of
magnetic flux density that depends on the GOES class. We also examine the
relationship between these parameters and find weak correlation between
temporal and spatial scales of flares. We estimate reconnection inflow
velocity, coronal Alfven velocity, and reconnection rate using above observed
values. The inflow velocities are distributed from a few km/s to several tens
km/s and the Alfven velocities in the corona are in the range from 10^3 to 10^4
km/s. Hence the reconnection rate is 10^-3 - 10^-2. We find that the
reconnection rate in a flare tends to decrease as the GOES class of the flare
increases. This value is within one order of magnitude from the theoretical
maximum value predicted by the Petschek model, although the dependence of the
reconnection rate on the magnetic Reynolds number tends to be stronger than
that in the Petschek model.Comment: 21 pages, 8 figures, accepted for publication in Ap
Irregular conformal blocks, with an application to the fifth and fourth Painlev\'e equations
We develop the theory of irregular conformal blocks of the Virasoro algebra.
In previous studies, expansions of irregular conformal blocks at regular
singular points were obtained as degeneration limits of regular conformal
blocks; however, such expansions at irregular singular points were not clearly
understood. This is because precise definitions of irregular vertex operators
had not been provided previously. In this paper, we present precise definitions
of irregular vertex operators of two types and we prove that one of our vertex
operators exists uniquely. Then, we define irregular conformal blocks with at
most two irregular singular points as expectation values of given irregular
vertex operators. Our definitions provide an understanding of expansions of
irregular conformal blocks and enable us to obtain expansions at irregular
singular points.
As an application, we propose conjectural formulas of series expansions of
the tau functions of the fifth and fourth Painlev\'e equations, using
expansions of irregular conformal blocks at an irregular singular point.Comment: 26 page
The ALMA Discovery of the Rotating Disk and Fast Outflow of Cold Molecular Gas in NGC 1275
We present ALMA Band 6 observations of the CO(2-1), HCN(3-2), and
HCO(3-2) lines in the nearby radio galaxy / brightest cluster galaxy
(BCG) of NGC 1275 with the spatial resolution of pc. In the previous
observations, CO(2-1) emission was detected as radial filaments lying in the
east-west direction. We resolved the inner filament and found that the filament
cannot be represented by a simple infalling stream both morphologically and
kinematically. The observed complex nature of the filament resembles the cold
gas structure predicted by recent numerical simulations of cold chaotic
accretion. A crude estimate suggests that the accretion rate of the cold gas
can be higher than that of hot gas. Within the central 100 pc, we detected a
rotational disk of the molecular gas whose mass is \sim10^{8} M_{\sun}. This
is the first evidence of the presence of massive cold gas disk on this spatial
scale for BCGs. The disk rotation axis is approximately consistent with the
axis of the radio jet on subpc scales. This probably suggests that the cold gas
disk is physically connected to the innermost accretion disk which is
responsible for jet launching. We also detected absorption features in the
HCN(3-2) and HCO(3-2) spectra against the radio continuum emission mostly
radiated by -pc size jet. The absorption features are blue-shifted
from the systemic velocity by 300-600~km~s, which suggests the
presence of outflowing gas from the active galactic nucleus (AGN). We discuss
the relation of the AGN feeding with cold accretion, the origin of blue-shifted
absorption, and estimate of black hole mass using the molecular gas dynamics.Comment: Version 2 (accepted version). 18 pages, 16 figures. Accepted for
publication in Ap
The Nuclear Activity of the Galaxies in the Hickson Compact Groups
In order to investigate the nuclear activity of galaxies residing in compact
groups of galaxies, we present results of our optical spectroscopic program
made at Okayama Astrophysical Observatory. We have performed optical
spectroscopy of 69 galaxies which belong to 31 Hickson Compact Groups (HCGs) of
Galaxies. Among them, three galaxies have discordant redshifts. Further,
spectral quality is too poor to classify other three galaxies. Therefore, we
describe our results for the remaining 63 galaxies.
Our main results are summarized below. (1) We have found in our sample; 28
AGN, 16 HII nuclei, and 19 normal galaxies which show no emission line. We used
this HCG sample for statistical analyses. (2) Comparing the frequency
distributions of activity types between the HCGs and the field galaxies whose
data are taken from Ho, Filippenko, & Sargent (382 field galaxies), we find
that the frequency of HII nuclei in the HCGs is significantly less than that in
the field. However, this difference may be due to selection bias that our HCG
sample contains more early-type galaxies than the field, because it is known
that HII nuclei are rarer in early-type galaxies than in later ones. (3)
Applying correction this morphological bias to the HCG sample, we find that
there is no statistically significant difference in the frequency of occurrence
of emission-line galaxies between the HCGs and the field. This implies that the
dense galaxy environment in the HCGs does not affect triggering both the AGN
activity and the nuclear starburst. We discuss some implications on the nuclear
activity in the HCG galaxies.Comment: 33 pages (3 aasms4 LaTeX files), 5 figures (5 Postscript files:
excluded Figure 1), Accepted for publication in The Astronomical Journa
Galactic Wind Signatures around High Redshift Galaxies
We carry out cosmological chemodynamical simulations with different strengths
of supernova (SN) feedback and study how galactic winds from star-forming
galaxies affect the features of hydrogen (HI) and metal (CIV and OVI)
absorption systems in the intergalactic medium at high redshift. We find that
the outflows tend to escape to low density regions, and hardly affect the dense
filaments visible in HI absorption. As a result, the strength of HI absorption
near galaxies is not reduced by galactic winds, but even slightly increases. We
also find that a lack of HI absorption for lines of sight (LOS) close to
galaxies, as found by Adelberger et al., can be created by hot gas around the
galaxies induced by accretion shock heating. In contrast to HI, metal
absorption systems are sensitive to the presence of winds. The models without
feedback can produce the strong CIV and OVI absorption lines in LOS within 50
kpc from galaxies, while strong SN feedback is capable of creating strong CIV
and OVI lines out to about twice that distance. We also analyze the mean
transmissivity of HI, CIV, and OVI within 1 h Mpc from star-forming
galaxies. The probability distribution of the transmissivity of HI is
independent of the strength of SN feedback, but strong feedback produces LOS
with lower transmissivity of metal lines. Additionally, strong feedback can
produce strong OVI lines even in cases where HI absorption is weak. We conclude
that OVI is probably the best tracer for galactic winds at high redshift.Comment: 16 pages, 16 figures, ApJ in press. Higher resolution version
available at http://www.ociw.edu/~dkawata/research/papers.htm
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