Mycological evidence of coprophagy from the feces of an Alaskan Late Glacial mammoth     

Bas van Geel  R. Dale Guthrie  Jens G. Altmann  Peter Broekens  Ian D. Bull  Fiona L. Gill  Boris Jansen  Aline M. Nieman  Barbara Gravendeel 《Quaternary Science Reviews》2011,30(17-18):2289-2303

Dung from a mammoth was preserved under frozen conditions in Alaska. The mammoth lived during the early part of the Late Glacial interstadial (ca 12,300 BP). Microfossils, macroremains and ancient DNA from the dung were studied and the chemical composition was determined to reconstruct both the paleoenvironment and paleobiology of this mammoth. Pollen spectra are dominated by Poaceae, Artemisia and other light-demanding taxa, indicating an open, treeless landscape (‘mammoth steppe’). Fruits and seeds support this conclusion. The dung consists mainly of cyperaceous stems and leaves, with a minor component of vegetative remains of Poaceae. Analyses of fragments of the plastid rbcL gene and trnL intron and nrITS1 region, amplified from DNA extracted from the dung, supplemented the microscopic identifications. Many fruit bodies with ascospores of the coprophilous fungus Podospora conica were found inside the dung ball, indicating that the mammoth had eaten dung. The absence of bile acids points to mammoth dung. This is the second time that evidence for coprophagy of mammoths has been derived from the presence of fruit bodies of coprophilous fungi in frozen dung. Coprophagy might well have been a common habit of mammoths. Therefore, we strongly recommend that particular attention should be given to fungal remains in future fossil dung studies.  相似文献   

Assessment of coastal flooding hazard along the Emilia Romagna littoral,IT     

Luca Martinelli  Barbara Zanuttigh  Corinne Corbau 《Coastal Engineering》2010,57(11-12):1042-1058

Aim of this paper is to develop simple tools for mapping — at regional and local scale — coastal areas exposed at flooding risk. A two-step simplified procedure for coastal management purposes is presented and is applied to Emilia Romagna (Italy), whose low and sandy coast faces the relatively mild Northern Adriatic Sea. The procedure is composed by a 1D conceptual model to determine flooding probability along wide coastal stretches and by a more detailed 2D Level II reliability method, that provides local quantitative statistical maps of inland flooding propagation. Qualitative maps obtained by literature approaches and quantitative results of flooding probability along the littoral show a good agreement. A coastal flood state indicator is proposed to rapidly assess coastal hazard.  相似文献   

Calibration of the Soho/Lasco C3 White Light Coronagraph     

J. S. Morrill  C. M. Korendyke  G. E. Brueckner  F. Giovane  R. A. Howard  M. Koomen  D. Moses  S. P. Plunkett  A. Vourlidas  E. Esfandiari  N. Rich  D. Wang  A. F. Thernisien  P. Lamy  A. Llebaria  D. Biesecker  D. Michels  Q. Gong  M. Andrews 《Solar physics》2006,233(2):331-372

We present a detailed review of the calibration of the LASCO C3 coronagraph on the SOHO satellite. Most of the calibration has been in place since early in the mission and has been utilized to varying degrees as required by specific analysis efforts. However, using observational data from the nearly decade-long database of LASCO images, we have re-evaluated and improved many aspects of the calibration. This includes the photometric calibration, vignetting function, geometric distortion, stray light, and exposure and observation times. Using this comprehensive set of corrections we have generated and made available a set of calibrated coronal images along with a set of periodic background images to ease the accessibility and use of the LASCO database. Deceased  相似文献   

Late Holocene (ca. 4 ka) marine and terrestrial environmental change in Reykjarfjördur,north Iceland: climate and/or settlement?     

John T. Andrews  Chris Caseldine  Nancy J. Weiner  Jackie Hatton 《第四纪科学杂志》2001,16(2):133-143

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Lasco and eit Observations of the Bastille day 2000 Solar Storm     

Andrews  M.D. 《Solar physics》2001,204(1-2):179-196

The period of 10–14 July 2000 saw a large number of energetic solar events ending with a very energetic flare that was associated with a large solar energetic particle event and a fast halo coronal mass ejection (CME) that produced the largest geomagnetic disturbance since 1989. This paper tries to summarize the complex coronal activity observed during this period, in order to establish a background for a number of papers in this topical issue. The GOES X-ray data are presented. Data animations of observations from EIT and LASCO C2 and C3 are presented on the accompanying CD-ROM. The observations around the time of the three X-class flares are considered. EIT observations of the Bastille Day flare show coronal brightening followed by dimming. LASCO had good data coverage for all three events. For one of the flares, no coronal response was seen. The other two flares are associated with halo CMEs. The timing suggests that the start of the flares and CMEs are simultaneous to approximately 30 min. Analysis of the LASCO and EIT images following the Bastille Day flare show the arrival of energetic particles at SOHO at approximately 10:41 UT on 14 July. Individual features of these CMEs have been tracked and the height–time plots used to estimate the dynamics of the CMEs. The initial speed and deceleration of the halo CMEs estimated from the fitting of height–time plots are compared with the in-situ observations at L1. The three flares are identified as the solar sources of three shocks observed at 1 AU. Finally, it is stressed that global heliospheric effects during periods of exceptional activity should consider a cumulative scenario rather than events in isolation.  相似文献   

Disc scalelengths of non-active and active spiral galaxies     

Barbara Cunow 《Monthly notices of the Royal Astronomical Society》2001,323(1):130-146

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TOWARD A STATUS-OF-WOMEN INDEX     

Alice C. Andrews 《The Professional geographer》1982,34(1):24-31

A useful index of the status of women should be mappable, in order to allow global and regional comparisons. Ideally, such an index should include political, economic, and social components. In actuality, data that measure political and economic equality are available only in Western societies. An index that measures the general well-being of women, however, can be mapped and used crossculturally. An index is proposed that includes indicators from the areas of health, education and fertility.  相似文献   

First-order asymptotics for the eigenfrequencies of the Earth and application to the retrieval of large-scale lateral variations of structure     

Barbara Romanowicz  Geneviève Roult 《Geophysical Journal International》1986,87(1):209-239

Summary . We present a variety of examples, showing systematic fluctuations as a function of angular order of measured eigenfrequencies for given normal modes of the Earth. The data are single station measurements from the GEOSCOPE network. Such fluctuations are attributed to departures from the lowest order asymptotic expression of the geometrical optics approximation. We derive first-order asymptotic expressions for the location parameter for all three components of the Earth's motion, by a method based on the stationary phase approximation and geometric relations on the unit sphere.
We illustrate the sensitivity of the fluctuations to the different parameters involved (source parameters, epicentral distance, laterally heterogeneous earth model) with synthetic examples corresponding to GEOSCOPE observations. Finally, we show the results of first attempts at inversion, which indicate that, when the fluctuations are taken into account, more accurate estimates of the great circle average eigenfrequencies can be obtained, and additional constraints put on the structure in the neighbourhood of the great circle.  相似文献   

Resources in Antarctica: Potential for conflict     

Barbara Mitchell 《Marine Policy》1977,1(2):91-101

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A simple method for calculating growth rates of petroleum hydrocarbon plumes   总被引：3，自引：0，他引：3  

Bekins BA  Cozzarelli IM  Curtis GP 《Ground water》2005,43(6):817-826

Consumption of aquifer Fe(III) during biodegradation of ground water contaminants may result in expansion of a contaminant plume, changing the outlook for monitored natural attenuation. Data from two research sites contaminated with petroleum hydrocarbons show that toluene and xylenes degrade under methanogenic conditions, but the benzene and ethylbenzene plumes grow as aquifer Fe(III) supplies are depleted. By considering a one-dimensional reaction front in a constant unidirectional flow field, it is possible to derive a simple expression for the growth rate of a benzene plume. The method balances the mass flux of benzene with the Fe(III) content of the aquifer, assuming that the biodegradation reaction is instantaneous. The resulting expression shows that the benzene front migration is retarded relative to the ground water velocity by a factor that depends on the concentrations of hydrocarbon and bioavailable Fe(III). The method provides good agreement with benzene plumes at a crude oil study site in Minnesota and a gasoline site in South Carolina. Compared to the South Carolina site, the Minnesota site has 25% higher benzene flux but eight times the Fe(III), leading to about one-sixth the expansion rate. Although it was developed for benzene, toluene, ethylbenzene, and xylenes, the growth-rate estimation method may have applications to contaminant plumes from other persistent contaminant sources.  相似文献