Nitrogen cycling and bacterial production

I. Bacterial abundance and production in Nueces and Guadalupe Estuaries, Texas -- II. Ammonium regeneration and utilization in Nueces Estuary, Texas -- III. Comparison of benthic ammonium flux with ammonium regeneration in the water column of Nueces and Guadalupe Estuaries, Texas -- IV. Denitrification in Nueces and Guadalupe Estuaries, Texas -- V. Ammonium regeneration and utilization in Guadalupe Estuary, Texas.Marine Scienc

Immuniteit: De noodzaak van zelfherkenning voor zelfbescherming

REDE uitgesproken bij de openbare aanvaarding van het ambt van gewoon hoogleraar in de celbiologie, histologie en microscopische anatomie, in het bijzonder de histofysiologie van het immuunsysteem, aan de Erasmus Universiteit te Rotterdam op woensdag 25 november 198

A fixed-base simulation study of two STOL aircraft flying curved, descending instrument approach paths

A real-time, fixed-base simulation study has been conducted to determine the curved, descending approach paths (within passenger-comfort limits) that would be acceptable to pilots, the flight-director-system logic requirements for curved-flight-path guidance, and the paths which can be flown within proposed microwave landing system (MLS) coverage angles. Two STOL aircraft configurations were used in the study. Generally, no differences in the results between the two STOL configurations were found. The investigation showed that paths with a 1828.8 meter turn radius and a 1828.8 meter final-approach distance were acceptable without winds and with winds up to at least 15 knots for airspeeds from 75 to 100 knots. The altitude at roll-out from the final turn determined which final-approach distances were acceptable. Pilots preferred to have an initial straight leg of about 1 n. mi. after MLS guidance acquisition before turn intercept. The size of the azimuth coverage angle necessary to meet passenger and pilot criteria depends on the size of the turn angle: plus or minus 60 deg was adequate to cover all paths execpt ones with a 180 deg turn

Accelerating BST Methods for Model Reduction with Graphics Processors

Model order reduction of dynamical linear time-invariant system appears in many scientific and engineering applications. Numerically reliable SVD-based methods for this task require O(n3) floating-point arithmetic operations, with n being in the range 103 − 105 for many practical applications. In this paper we investigate the use of graphics processors (GPUs) to accelerate model reduction of large-scale linear systems via Balanced Stochastic Truncation, by off-loading the computationally intensive tasks to this device. Experiments on a hybrid platform consisting of state-of-the-art general-purpose multi-core processors and a GPU illustrate the potential of this approach

A flight investigation with a STOL airplane flying curved, descending instrument approach paths

A flight investigation using a De Havilland Twin Otter airplane was conducted to determine the configurations of curved, 6 deg descending approach paths which would provide minimum airspace usage within the requirements for acceptable commercial STOL airplane operations. Path configurations with turns of 90 deg, 135 deg, and 180 deg were studied; the approach airspeed was 75 knots. The length of the segment prior to turn, the turn radius, and the length of the final approach segment were varied. The relationship of the acceptable path configurations to the proposed microwave landing system azimuth coverage requirements was examined

Denitrification, Nutrient Regeneration and Carbon Mineralization in Sediments of Galveston Bay, Texas, USA

Rates of benthic denitrification, oxygen consumption and nutrient regeneration were measured during winter, spring and summer in Galveston Bay (Texas, USA) sediments. Denitrification ranged from 0 to 47 µmol N2 m-2 h-1 with maximal rates generally occurring in the summer and the upper estuary. Oxygen consumption rates ranged from 38 µmol O2 m-2 h-1 in the winter to 353 µmol O2 m-2 h-1 in the summer and were correlated with denitrification rates. Variations in bay water temperature accounted for 52 % of the variability associated with denitrification rates whereas only 28% of the variability could be attributed to organic carbon content and 15% to salinity, indicating a predominance of temporal over spatial factors in controlling estuarine rates of denitrification. In the spring and summer, denitrification was responsible for the majority (73 and 80%, respectively) of the total benthic inorganic nitrogen efflux while in the winter, nitrogen fluxes were dominated (80 %) by ammonium. At salinities less than 6%0, cation exchange interactions may have played an important role in retaining ammonium in the sediment, producing the higher rates of denitrification found in the upper estuary. Dissolved inorganic carbon flux was used as a measure of total organic carbon mineralization. The average molar C:N of the remineralized substrate (5.2) was lower than the average C:N of the sediments (12.6) indicating preferential remineralization of nitrogen relative to carbon. Molar C:O ratios suggested that anaerobic carbon mineralization and the storage of its reduced end-products is more prevalent in the lower estuary and in the winter. Denitrifiers were responsible for 37 and 13 % of the total benthic carbon mineralization in the upper and lower estuary, respectively. Denitrification appears to be a greater contributor to total carbon mineralization than previously considered. Nearly one-third of the total sediment oxygen consumption was attributed to nitrification. Galveston Bay sediment denitrification and oxygen consumption rates and nutrient fluxes were lower but comparable to those of other Gulf of Mexico estuaries. Differences among the estuaries examined are attributed mainly to sediment organic matter content

Solving symmetric quadratic eigenvalue problems with SLEPc

Román Moltó, JE.; Campos González, MC. (2013). Solving symmetric quadratic eigenvalue problems with SLEPc. European Mathematical Society. doi:10.4171/OWR/2013/56

HAMEV and SQRED: Fortran 77 Subroutines for Computing the Eigenvalues of Hamiltonian Matrices Using Van Loanss Square Reduced Method

This paper describes LAPACK-based Fortran 77 subroutines for the reduction of a Hamiltonian matrix to square-reduced form and the approximation of all its eigenvalues using the implicit version of Van Loan's method. The transformation of the Hamilto- nian matrix to a square-reduced Hamiltonian uses only orthogonal symplectic similarity transformations. The eigenvalues can then be determined by applying the Hessenberg QR iteration to a matrix of half the order of the Hamiltonian matrix and taking the square roots of the computed values. Using scaling strategies similar to those suggested for algebraic Riccati equations can in some cases improve the accuracy of the computed eigenvalues. We demonstrate the performance of the subroutines for several examples and show how they can be used to solve some control-theoretic problems