Voyager 1 in the foreshock, termination shock, and heliosheath

Voyager 1 (V1) began measuring precursor energetic ions and electrons from the heliospheric termination shock (TS) in July 2002. During the ensuing 2.5 years, average particle intensities rose as V1 penetrated deeper into the energetic particle foreshock of the TS. Throughout 2004, V1 observed even larger, fluctuating intensities of ions from 40 kiloelectron volts (keV) to >/=50 megaelectron volts per nucleon and of electrons from >26 keV to >/=350 keV. On day 350 of 2004 (2004/350), V1 observed an intensity spike of ions and electrons that was followed by a sustained factor of 10 increase at the lowest energies and lesser increases at higher energies, larger than any intensities since V1 was at 15 astronomical units in 1982. The estimated solar wind radial flow speed was positive (outward) at approximately +100 kilometers per second (km s(-1)) from 2004/352 until 2005/018, when the radial flows became predominantly negative (sunward) and fluctuated between approximately -50 and 0 km s(-1) until about 2005/110; they then became more positive, with recent values (2005/179) of approximately +50 km s(-1). The energetic proton spectrum averaged over the postshock period is apparently dominated by strongly heated interstellar pickup ions. We interpret these observations as evidence that V1 was crossed by the TS on 2004/351 (during a tracking gap) at 94.0 astronomical units, evidently as the shock was moving radially inward in response to decreasing solar wind ram pressure, and that V1 has remained in the heliosheath until at least mid-2005.     

Cytokinin activity: localization in transfer RNA preparations

Transfer RNA from yeast, liver, and Escherichia coli has cytokinin activity in the tobacco callus bioassay, whereas ribosomal RNA from yeast is inactive. In contrast to fractions of yeast transfer RNA rich in serine acceptor and cytokinin activity, preparations (70 to 90 percent pure) of arginine transfer RNA(2), glycine transfer RNA, phenylalanine transfer RNA, and valine transfer RNA(1) and of highly purified alanine transfer RNA from yeast were inactive at concentrations of 20 to 2500 micrograms per liter. One molecule of 6-(gamma,gamma-dimethylallylamino) purine per 20 molecules of yeast tRNA would account for the observed cytokinin activity. The number of major molecular species contributing to cytokinin activity of transfer RNA, therefore, must be small.     

Methods to evaluate pesticide damage to the biomass of the soil microflora

Respiratory methods to estimate the amount of C in the soil microbial biomass and the relative contributions of procaryotes and eucaryotes to the biomass were used to evaluate the influence of pesticides on the soil microflora. Experiments were conducted with 5 and 50 μg·g^?1 of three fungicides, captan, thiram and verdasan. At 5 μg·g^?1 they caused significant decreases (40%) in the biomass; the organomercury fungicide verdasan also caused a shift from fungal to bacterial dominance. Within 8 days, biomass in captan- and thiram-amended soils had recovered to that of the controls. Although the fungal to bacterial balance was restored in verdasan-amended soils, biomass recovery was not complete. At 50 μg·g^?1 the fungicides caused long-term decreases in the biomass and altered the relative proportions of the bacterial and fungal populations. Verdasan had the greatest effect on soil microbial biomass and composition.     

Determination of N-nitrosodimethylamine levels in some Canadian 2,4-D amine formulations

Levels of N-nitrosodimethylamine (NDMA) were determined in 112 samples of 2,4-dichlorophenoxyacetic acid, (2,4-D), formulated as the dimethylamine salt, collected over a 2 year period from products on the Canadian market. A sample aliquot is partitioned with dichloromethane, and the co-extracted dimethylamine is removed by cleanup on a silica gel column. The eluates containing NDMA are concentrated, an internal standard of N-nitrosodipropylamine is added, and nitrosamine levels are determined using a gas chromatograph interfaced with a thermal energy analyzer. Recoveries of NDMA and N-nitrosodiethylamine spiked into samples were 103 +/- 16 and 96.3 +/- 9.8%, respectively. Of the 112 samples analyzed, 92 were below 1 part per million (ppm) relative to the amount of 2,4-D in the samples, 16 were between 1 and 5 ppm, and 4 were greater than 5 ppm. The gas chromatographic column used is compared to a conventional packing material for volatile nitrosamine analysis. Formation of NDMA during cleanup and analysis was shown not to occur.