Local orbital forcing of antarctic climate change during the last interglacial

During the last interglacial, Antarctic climate changed before that of the Northern Hemisphere. Large local changes in precession forcing could have produced this pattern if there were a rectified response in sea ice cover. Results from a coupled sea ice-ocean general circulation model supported this hypothesis when it was tested for three intervals around the last interglacial. Such a mechanism may play an important role in contributing to phase offsets between Northern and Southern Hemisphere climate change for other time intervals.     

Binary Pulsar PSR 1913 + 16: Model for Its Origin

The existing observational data for the binary pulsar PSR 1913 + 16 are sufficient to give a rather well-defined model for the system. On the basis of evolutionary considerations, the pulsar must be a neutron star near the upper mass limit of 1.2 solar masses (M.). The orbital inclination is probably high, i>/= 700, and the mass of the unseen companion probably lies close to the upper limit of the range 0.25 M. to 1.0 M.. The secondary cannot be a main sequence star and is probably a degenerate helium dwarf. At the 5.6-kiloparsec distance indicated by the dispersion measure, the magnetic dipole model gives an age of approximately 4 x 104 years, a rate of change of the pulsar period of P approximately 2 nanoseconds per day, and a surface magnetic field strength approximately (1/3) that of the Crab pulsar. The pulsar is fainter than an apparent magnitude V approximately + 26.5 and is at least approximately 80 times fainter than the Crab pulsar in the x-ray band. The companion star should be fainter than V approximately + 30, and a radio supernova remnant may be detectable near the position of the pulsar at a flux level of 相似文献   

Transient hypoparathyroidism following successful treatment of hypercalcaemia of malignancy in a dog

A 4-year-old, entire female, English Cocker Spaniel was presented for treatment of lymphosarcoma and secondary hypercalcaemia. After induction chemotherapy the dog became severely hypocalcaemic and showed signs of weakness, muscle fasciculation and facial pruritus. Hormone analysis confirmed inadequate production of parathyroid hormone. Although hypocalcaemia has been previously reported as a component of tumour lysis syndrome, it has not been associated with transient parathyroid hormone deficiency.     

Unitary control in quantum ensembles: maximizing signal intensity in coherent spectroscopy

Experiments in coherent magnetic resonance, microwave, and optical spectroscopy control quantum-mechanical ensembles by guiding them from initial states toward target states by unitary transformation. Often, the coherences detected as signals are represented by a non-Hermitian operator. Hence, spectroscopic experiments, such as those used in nuclear magnetic resonance, correspond to unitary transformations between operators that in general are not Hermitian. A gradient-based systematic procedure for optimizing these transformations is described that finds the largest projection of a transformed initial operator onto the target operator and, thus, the maximum spectroscopic signal. This method can also be used in applied mathematics and control theory.     

Characterization of extraintestinal Escherichia coli isolated from a peacock (Pavo cristatus) with colisepticemia

Extraintestinal infections by avian pathogenic strains of Escherichia coli (APEC) are commonly reported in poultry, but there is little information on infections by APEC in other bird species. Here we report on the characterization of extraintestinal E. coli isolated from a domesticated peacock, from the south of Brazil, that died of colisepticemia. Necropsy examination revealed congested liver, hypertrophied kidneys, peritonitis, severe typhlitis suggestive of coligranuloma, pneumonia, and airsacculitis--typical signs of colisepticemia. The isolates from lungs, kidney, heart, intestine, liver, and bone marrow all harbored the same virulence-associated factors (iucD, colV, iss, mat, fimC, ompA, traT crl, csgA vgrG, and hcp), yielded the same band pattern in amplified ribosomal DNA restriction analysis, and were allocated to the Escherichia coli Reference Collection group B1. The isolates were resistant to bacitracin, trimethoprim, and tetracycline, but displayed slight differences in their resistance to other antimicrobials. The isolates also differed in their virulence in 1-day-old chickens, but none displayed high virulence in vivo. We conclude that the peacock died of colisepticemia after it was infected with an extraintestinal E. coli strain of low virulence that nevertheless harbored virulence factors generally associated with APEC. This study represents the first characterization of an APEC isolated from a nonpoultry bird species.     

Age and growth of sea perch (Helicolenus percoides) from two adjacent areas off the east coast of South Island,New Zealand

A validated ageing methodology using otolith thin sections is presented for sea perch (Helicolenus percoides) in two adjacent areas off the east coast of South Island, New Zealand. Oxytetracycline marking of two adult fish held in captivity for 1 year suggested that a single dark growth increment formed during winter, commencing May or June. The annual formation of growth increments was confirmed by the observed progression of year classes in comparable samples from three different years, and the progression of length modes in several consecutive years that matched the estimated growth curves. Otolith interpretation was difficult because of a central dense region and the presence of many fine bands within each growth increment, but the latter could be counted, and it is considered that a validated ageing procedure is presented. Von Bertalanffy growth parameters were calculated for east coast South Island (ECSI) and Chatham Rise males and females. In both areas the growth rate of males is slightly but significantly faster than for females. Growth is relatively slow throughout life. From the maximum observed ages for ECSI and Chatham Rise fish of 35 and 59 years, the respective natural mortality rates are estimated to be 0.12 and 0.07 year^?1, but the most plausible value for the species is likely to be at the lower end of this range. Some stock differentiation between the two areas is indicated, based primarily on differences in length-frequency distributions implying different patterns of year class strengths, but also on apparent differences in growth rates between areas. This supports the present management regime of separate commercial catch quotas.