Measurement of charge of heavy ions in emulsion using a CCD camera Kudzia, D.; Cherry, M.L.; Da̧browska, A. ...
Nuclear instruments & methods in physics research. Section A, Accelerators, spectrometers, detectors and associated equipment,
07/1999, Letnik:
431, Številka:
1
Journal Article
Recenzirano
A system has been developed for semi-automated determination of the charges of heavy ions recorded in nuclear emulsions. The profiles of various heavy ion tracks in emulsion, both accelerator beam ...ions and fragments of heavy projectiles, were obtained with a CCD camera mounted on a microscope. The dependence of track profiles on illumination, emulsion grain size and density, background in emulsion, and track geometry was analyzed. Charges of the fragments of heavy projectiles were estimated independently by the delta ray counting method. A calibration of both width and height of track profiles against ion charges was made with ions of known charges ranging from helium to gold nuclei.
High levels of physical activity (PA) may prevent the development of obesity. However, the magnitude and direction of the association between PA of various intensities, sedentary time and weight ...status remain unclear. Thus, we examined whether objectively measured sedentary time and PA independently predict gain in body weight, change in body weight and to examine the possibility of reverse causation.
We examined the prospective associations between sedentary time, PA and body weight (BW). Baseline measurements were conducted in 2008/2009 and follow-up measurements in 2014/2015 in a random sample of the adult Norwegian population (N=1710, 45.1% men). Moderate and vigorous intensity PA (MVPA) and sedentary time were measured by accelerometry and BW and height self-reported. We first modelled the associations between baseline sedentary time and PA with BW at follow-up. We then modelled the reverse associations (BW as the exposure) and sedentary time and PA (as outcomes) in separate models. All models were adjusted for age, sex, baseline value of the outcome, socio-economic status, alcohol consumption, smoking, monitor wear time and follow-up time.
Body mass index (BMI) increased by 0.2 units (P=0.003) between baseline and follow-up, and 46.5% of participants were either overweight (36.4%) or obese (10.1%) at baseline increasing to 49.6% (11.7% obese) at follow-up. Baseline sedentary time, MVPA and vigorous PA were not associated with BW at follow-up after adjustment for covariates. In contrast, baseline BW was inversely associated with MVPA (β=-0.11; 95% confidence interval (CI); -0.21, -0.009) and VPA (β=-0.035; 95% CI; -0.059, -0.011) in adjusted models. These associations were unchanged when BW was substituted by BMI.
Baseline BW seems to determine a decrease in MVPA in healthy adult Norwegian men and women, more so than the reverse.
The Open Science (OS) movement is rapidly gaining traction among policy-makers, research funders, scientific journals and individual scientists. Despite these tendencies, the pace of implementing OS ...throughout the scientific process and across the scientific community remains slow. Thus, a better understanding of the conditions that affect OS engagement, and in particular, of how practitioners learn, use, conduct and share research openly can guide those seeking to implement OS more broadly. We surveyed participants at an OS workshop hosted by the Living Norway Ecological Data Network in 2020 to learn how they perceived OS and its importance in their research, supervision and teaching. Further, we wanted to know what OS practices they had encountered in their education and what they saw as hindering or helping their engagement with OS. The survey contained scaled-response and open-ended questions, allowing for a mixed-methods approach. We obtained survey responses from 60 out of 128 workshop participants (47%). Responses indicated that usage and sharing of open data and code, as well as open access publication, were the most frequent OS practices. Only a minority of respondents reported having encountered OS in their formal education. A majority also viewed OS as less important in their teaching than in their research and supervisory roles. The respondents' suggestions for what would facilitate greater OS engagement in the future included knowledge, guidelines, and resources, but also social and structural support. These are aspects that could be strengthened by promoting explicit implementation of OS practices in higher education and by nurturing a more inclusive and equitable OS culture. We argue that incorporating OS in teaching and learning of science can yield substantial benefits to the research community, student learning, and ultimately, to the wider societal objectives of science and higher education.
Few studies account for prehospital deaths when estimating incidence and mortality rates of moderate and severe traumatic brain injury (msTBI). In a population-based study, covering both urban and ...rural areas, including also prehospital deaths, the aim was to estimate incidence and mortality rates of msTBI. Further, we studied the 30-day and 6-month case-fatality proportion of severe TBI in relation to age.
All patients aged ≥17 years who sustained an msTBI in Central Norway were identified by three sources: (1) the regional trauma center, (2) the general hospitals, and (3) the Norwegian Cause of Death Registry. Incidence and mortality rates were standardized according to the World Health Organization's world standard population. Case-fatality proportions were calculated by the number of deaths from severe TBI at 30 days and 6 months, divided by all patients with severe TBI.
The overall incidence rates of moderate and severe TBI were 4.9 and 6.7 per 100,000 person-years, respectively, increasing from age 70 years. The overall mortality rate was 3.4 per 100,000 person-years, also increasing from age 70 years. Incidence and mortality rates were highest in men. The case-fatality proportion in people with severe TBI was 49% in people aged 60-69 years and 81% in people aged 70-79 years.
The overall incidence and mortality rates for msTBI in Central Norway were low but increased from age 70 years, and among those ≥80 years of age with severe TBI, nearly all died. Overall estimates are strongly influenced by high incidence and mortality rates in the elderly, and studies should therefore report age-specific estimates, for better comparison of incidence and mortality rates.
A number of cost-effective and environmentally friendly flood reduction measures can provide detention of runoff from natural landscapes upstream of urban areas, with multiple added benefits. This ...study presents a methodology for assessing the needs for and feasibility of natural flood detention facilities. The candidate catchments for natural flood detention facilities were identified by GIS analysis and further assessed using data from maps and field inspections. Results for two case catchments show that a suitable topography and nature and biodiversity are key feasibility criteria for natural flood detention facilities. The study concluded that it is possible to streamline the process of selecting the location and type of natural flood detention facilities. Map analyses, field inspections and interdisciplinary collaboration are all important when planning natural flood detention facilities. As a result of the study, the City of Oslo will construct several natural flood detention facilities upstream of the city to gain practical experience with such facilities. While it is not expected that natural flood detention will solve all flooding problems in urban areas, it is expected that natural flood detention can positively contribute to future resilient stormwater management and the implementation of the EU Strategy on Adaptation to Climate Change.
Studies of the global sea-level budget (SLB) and the global ocean-mass
budget (OMB) are essential to assess the reliability of our knowledge of
sea-level change and its contributors. Here we present ...datasets for times
series of the SLB and OMB elements developed in the framework of ESA's
Climate Change Initiative. We use these datasets to assess the SLB and the
OMB simultaneously, utilising a consistent framework of uncertainty
characterisation. The time series, given at monthly sampling and available
at https://doi.org/10.5285/17c2ce31784048de93996275ee976fff (Horwath et
al., 2021), include global mean sea-level (GMSL) anomalies from satellite
altimetry, the global mean steric component from Argo drifter data with
incorporation of sea surface temperature data, the ocean-mass component from
Gravity Recovery and Climate Experiment (GRACE) satellite gravimetry, the
contribution from global glacier mass changes assessed by a global glacier
model, the contribution from Greenland Ice Sheet and Antarctic Ice Sheet
mass changes assessed by satellite radar altimetry and by GRACE, and
the contribution from land water storage anomalies assessed by the global
hydrological model WaterGAP (Water Global Assessment and Prognosis). Over the period January 1993–December 2016 (P1, covered by the satellite altimetry records), the mean rate (linear trend) of GMSL is 3.05 ± 0.24 mm yr−1. The steric component is 1.15 ± 0.12 mm yr−1 (38 % of the GMSL trend), and the mass component is 1.75 ± 0.12 mm yr−1 (57 %). The mass component includes 0.64 ± 0.03 mm yr−1 (21 % of the GMSL trend) from glaciers outside
Greenland and Antarctica, 0.60 ± 0.04 mm yr−1 (20 %) from
Greenland, 0.19 ± 0.04 mm yr−1 (6 %) from Antarctica, and
0.32 ± 0.10 mm yr−1 (10 %) from changes of land water storage. In the period January 2003–August 2016 (P2, covered by GRACE and the Argo drifter system), GMSL rise is higher than in P1 at 3.64 ± 0.26 mm yr−1. This is due to an increase of the mass contributions, now about 2.40 ± 0.13 mm yr−1 (66 % of the GMSL trend), with the
largest increase contributed from Greenland, while the steric contribution
remained similar at 1.19 ± 0.17 mm yr−1 (now 33 %). The SLB of
linear trends is closed for P1 and P2; that is, the GMSL trend agrees with
the sum of the steric and mass components within their combined
uncertainties. The OMB, which can be evaluated only for P2, shows that our
preferred GRACE-based estimate of the ocean-mass trend agrees with the sum of mass contributions within 1.5 times or 0.8 times the combined 1σ
uncertainties, depending on the way of assessing the mass contributions.
Combined uncertainties (1σ) of the elements involved in the budgets are between 0.29 and 0.42 mm yr−1, on the order of 10 % of GMSL rise.
Interannual variations that overlie the long-term trends are coherently
represented by the elements of the SLB and the OMB. Even at the level of
monthly anomalies the budgets are closed within uncertainties, while also
indicating possible origins of remaining misclosures.
Sea level change is an important indicator of climate change. Our study focuses on the sea level budget assessment of the Arctic Ocean using: (1) the newly reprocessed satellite altimeter data with ...major changes in the processing techniques; (2) ocean mass change data derived from GRACE satellite gravimetry; (3) and steric height estimated from gridded hydrographic data for the GRACE/Argo time period (2003–2016). The Beaufort Gyre (BG) and the Nordic Seas (NS) regions exhibit the largest positive trend in sea level during the study period. Halosteric sea level change is found to dominate the area averaged sea level trend of BG, while the trend in NS is found to be influenced by halosteric and ocean mass change effects. Temporal variability of sea level in these two regions reveals a significant shift in the trend pattern centered around 2009–2011. Analysis suggests that this shift can be explained by a change in large-scale atmospheric circulation patterns over the Arctic. The sea level budget assessment of the Arctic found a residual trend of more than 1.0 mm/yr. This nonclosure of the sea level budget is further attributed to the limitations of the three above mentioned datasets in the Arctic region.
We present new magnetic heat capacity and neutron scattering results for two magnetically frustrated molybdate pyrochlores: S=1 oxide Lu_{2}Mo_{2}O_{7} and S=1/2 oxynitride Lu_{2}Mo_{2}O_{5}N_{2}. ...Lu_{2}Mo_{2}O_{7} undergoes a transition to an unconventional spin glass ground state at T_{f}∼16 K. However, the preparation of the corresponding oxynitride tunes the nature of the ground state from spin glass to quantum spin liquid. The comparison of the static and dynamic spin correlations within the oxide and oxynitride phases presented here reveals the crucial role played by quantum fluctuations in the selection of a ground state. Furthermore, we estimate an upper limit for a gap in the spin excitation spectrum of the quantum spin liquid state of the oxynitride of Δ∼0.05 meV or Δ/|θ|∼0.004, in units of its antiferromagnetic Weiss constant θ∼-121 K.
Abstract
The successful mitigation of emerging wildlife diseases may involve controversial host culling. For livestock, ‘preemptive host culling’ is an accepted practice involving the removal of ...herds with known contact to infected populations. When applied to wildlife, this proactive approach comes in conflict with biodiversity conservation goals. Here, we present an alternative approach of ‘proactive hunting surveillance’ with the aim of early disease detection that simultaneously avoids undesirable population decline by targeting demographic groups with (1) a higher likelihood of being infected and (2) a lower reproductive value. We applied this harvesting principle to populations of reindeer to substantiate freedom of chronic wasting disease (CWD) infection. Proactive hunting surveillance reached 99% probability of freedom from infection (<4 reindeer infected) within 3–5 years, in comparison to ~10 years using ordinary harvest surveillance. However, implementation uncertainties linked to social issues appear challenging also with this kind of host culling.
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