The mid-Holocene (6000 years ago) is a standard time period for the evaluation of the simulated response of global climate models using palaeoclimate reconstructions. The latest mid-Holocene ...simulations are a palaeoclimate entry card for the Palaeoclimate Model Intercomparison Project (PMIP4) component of the current phase of the Coupled Model Intercomparison Project (CMIP6) – hereafter referred to as PMIP4-CMIP6. Here we provide an initial analysis and evaluation of the results of the experiment for the mid-Holocene. We show that state-of-the-art models produce climate changes that are broadly consistent with theory and observations, including increased summer warming of the Northern Hemisphere and associated shifts in tropical rainfall. Many features of the PMIP4-CMIP6 simulations were present in the previous generation (PMIP3-CMIP5) of simulations. The PMIP4-CMIP6 ensemble for the mid-Holocene has a global mean temperature change of −0.3 K, which is −0.2 K cooler than the PMIP3-CMIP5 simulations predominantly as a result of the prescription of realistic greenhouse gas concentrations in PMIP4-CMIP6. Biases in the magnitude and the sign of regional responses identified in PMIP3-CMIP5, such as the amplification of the northern African monsoon, precipitation changes over Europe, and simulated aridity in mid-Eurasia, are still present in the PMIP4-CMIP6 simulations. Despite these issues, PMIP4-CMIP6 and the mid-Holocene provide an opportunity both for quantitative evaluation and derivation of emergent constraints on the hydrological cycle, feedback strength, and potentially climate sensitivity.
Context.
Parker Solar Probe (PSP) measures the magnetic field and plasma parameters of the solar wind at unprecedentedly close distances to the Sun. These data provide great opportunities to study ...the early-stage evolution of magnetohydrodynamic (MHD) turbulence in the solar wind.
Aims.
In this study, we make use of the PSP data to explore the nature of solar wind turbulence focusing on the Alfvénic character and power spectra of the fluctuations and their dependence on the distance and context (i.e., large-scale solar wind properties), aiming to understand the role that different effects such as source properties, solar wind expansion, and stream interaction might play in determining the turbulent state.
Methods.
We carried out a statistical survey of the data from the first five orbits of PSP with a focus on how the fluctuation properties at the large MHD scales vary with different solar wind streams and the distance from the Sun. A more in-depth analysis from several selected periods is also presented.
Results.
Our results show that as fluctuations are transported outward by the solar wind, the magnetic field spectrum steepens while the shape of the velocity spectrum remains unchanged. The steepening process is controlled by the “age” of the turbulence, which is determined by the wind speed together with the radial distance. Statistically, faster solar wind has higher “Alfvénicity,” with a more dominant outward propagating wave component and more balanced magnetic and kinetic energies. The outward wave dominance gradually weakens with radial distance, while the excess of magnetic energy is found to be stronger as we move closer toward the Sun. We show that the turbulence properties can significantly vary from stream to stream even if these streams are of a similar speed, indicating very different origins of these streams. Especially, the slow wind that originates near the polar coronal holes has much lower Alfvénicity compared with the slow wind that originates from the active regions and pseudostreamers. We show that structures such as heliospheric current sheets and velocity shears can play an important role in modifying the properties of the turbulence.
We present OSIRIS/NAC observations of decimetre-sized, likely ice-containing aggregates ejected from a confined region on the surface of comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko. The images were obtained in ...January 2016 when the comet was at 2 AU from the Sun out-bound from perihelion. We measure the acceleration of individual aggregates through a two-hour image series. Approximately 50% of the aggregates are accelerated away from the nucleus, and 50% towards it, and likewise towards either horizontal direction. The accelerations are up to one order of magnitude stronger than local gravity, and are most simply explained by the combined effect of gas drag accelerating all aggregates upwards, and the recoil force from asymmetric outgassing, either from rotating aggregates with randomly oriented spin axes and sufficient thermal inertia to shift the temperature maximum away from an aggregate's subsolar region, or from aggregates with variable ice content. At least 10% of the aggregates will escape the gravity field of the nucleus and feed the comet's debris trail, while others may fall back to the surface and contribute to the deposits covering parts of the northern hemisphere. The rocket force plays a crucial role in pushing these aggregates back towards the surface. Our observations show the future back fall material in the process of ejection, and provide the first direct measurement of the acceleration of aggregates in the innermost coma (<2km) of a comet, where gas drag is still significant.
The COVID-19 lockdowns led to major reductions in air pollutant emissions. Here, we quantitatively evaluate changes in ambient NO
, O
, and PM
concentrations arising from these emission changes in 11 ...cities globally by applying a deweathering machine learning technique. Sudden decreases in deweathered NO
concentrations and increases in O
were observed in almost all cities. However, the decline in NO
concentrations attributable to the lockdowns was not as large as expected, at reductions of 10 to 50%. Accordingly, O
increased by 2 to 30% (except for London), the total gaseous oxidant (O
= NO
+ O
) showed limited change, and PM
concentrations decreased in most cities studied but increased in London and Paris. Our results demonstrate the need for a sophisticated analysis to quantify air quality impacts of interventions and indicate that true air quality improvements were notably more limited than some earlier reports or observational data suggested.
The radial velocity (RV) is a basic physical quantity that can be determined through the Doppler shift of the spectrum of a star. The precision of the RV measurement depends on the resolution of the ...spectrum we used and the accuracy of wavelength calibration. In this work, radial velocities of the Large Sky Area Multi-Object Fibre Spectroscopic Telescope-II (LAMOST-II) medium-resolution (R ∼ 7500) spectra are measured for 1,594,956 spectra (each spectrum has two wavebands) through matching with templates. A set of RV standard stars are used to recalibrate the zero point of the measurement, and some reference sets with RVs derived from medium-/high-resolution observations are used to evaluate the accuracy of the measurement. By comparing with reference sets, the accuracy of our measurement can get 0.0277 km s−1 with respect to radial velocities of standard stars. The intrinsic precision is estimated with the multiple observations of single stars, which can be achieved to 1.36 km s−1, 1.08 km s−1, and 0.91 km s−1 for the spectra at signal-to-noise levels of 10, 20, and 50, respectively.
We introduce the Large Sky Area Multi-Object Fiber Spectroscopic Telescope (LAMOST) stellar parameter pipeline at Peking University – lsp3, developed and implemented for the determinations of radial ...velocity V
r and stellar atmospheric parameters (effective temperature T
eff, surface gravity log g, metallicity Fe/H) for the LAMOST Spectroscopic Survey of the Galactic Anticentre (LSS-GAC). We describe the algorithms of lsp3 and examine the accuracy of parameters yielded by it. The precision and accuracy of parameters yielded are investigated by comparing results of multi-epoch observations and of candidate members of open and globular clusters, with photometric calibration, as well as with independent determinations available from a number of external data bases, including the PASTEL archive, the APOGEE, SDSS and RAVE surveys, as well as those released in the LAMOST DR1. The uncertainties of lsp3 parameters are characterized and quantified as a function of the spectral signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) and stellar atmospheric parameters. We conclude that the current implementation of lsp3 has achieved an accuracy of 5.0 km s−1, 150 K, 0.25 dex, 0.15 dex for the radial velocity, effective temperature, surface gravity and metallicity, respectively, for LSS-GAC spectra of FGK stars of SNRs per pixel higher than 10. The lsp3 has been applied to over a million LSS-GAC spectra collected hitherto. Stellar parameters yielded by the lsp3 will be released to the general public following the data policy of LAMOST, together with estimates of the interstellar extinction E(B − V) and stellar distances, deduced by combining spectroscopic and multiband photometric measurements using a variety of techniques.
A mysterious feature of Crohn’s disease (CD) is the extra-intestinal manifestation of “creeping fat” (CrF), defined as expansion of mesenteric adipose tissue around the inflamed and fibrotic ...intestine. In the current study, we explore whether microbial translocation in CD serves as a central cue for CrF development. We discovered a subset of mucosal-associated gut bacteria that consistently translocated and remained viable in CrF in CD ileal surgical resections, and identified Clostridium innocuum as a signature of this consortium with strain variation between mucosal and adipose isolates, suggesting preference for lipid-rich environments. Single-cell RNA sequencing characterized CrF as both pro-fibrotic and pro-adipogenic with a rich milieu of activated immune cells responding to microbial stimuli, which we confirm in gnotobiotic mice colonized with C. innocuum. Ex vivo validation of expression patterns suggests C. innocuum stimulates tissue remodeling via M2 macrophages, leading to an adipose tissue barrier that serves to prevent systemic dissemination of bacteria.
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•Gut bacterial translocation to mesenteric adipose tissue (MAT) naturally occurs•MAT from Crohn’s disease (CD) harbors a bacterial consortium defined by C. innocuum•These bacteria in CD promote restructuring of MAT and formation of “creeping fat”•Creeping fat expansion and fibrosis prevent systemic translocation of gut bacteria
Ha et al. provide evidence that, in humans with inflammatory bowel disease, the phenomenon known as “creeping fat” is a protective response where mesenteric adipose tissue migrates (or “creeps”) to sites of gut barrier dysfunction to prevent systemic dissemination of potentially harmful bacterial antigens that have translocated across the barrier from the gut lumen.
The qubit is the fundamental building block of a quantum computer. We fabricate a qubit in a silicon double-quantum dot with an integrated micromagnet in which the qubit basis states are the singlet ...state and the spin-zero triplet state of two electrons. Because of the micromagnet, the magnetic field difference Δ B between the two sides of the double dot is large enough to enable the achievement of coherent rotation of the qubit’s Bloch vector around two different axes of the Bloch sphere. By measuring the decay of the quantum oscillations, the inhomogeneous spin coherence time Formula is determined. By measuring Formula at many different values of the exchange coupling J and at two different values of Δ B , we provide evidence that the micromagnet does not limit decoherence, with the dominant limits on Formula arising from charge noise and from coupling to nuclear spins.
The similarities between gated quantum dots and the transistors in modern microelectronics--in fabrication methods, physical structure and voltage scales for manipulation--have led to great interest ...in the development of quantum bits (qubits) in semiconductor quantum dots. Although quantum dot spin qubits have demonstrated long coherence times, their manipulation is often slower than desired for important future applications, such as factoring. Furthermore, scalability and manufacturability are enhanced when qubits are as simple as possible. Previous work has increased the speed of spin qubit rotations by making use of integrated micromagnets, dynamic pumping of nuclear spins or the addition of a third quantum dot. Here we demonstrate a qubit that is a hybrid of spin and charge. It is simple, requiring neither nuclear-state preparation nor micromagnets. Unlike previous double-dot qubits, the hybrid qubit enables fast rotations about two axes of the Bloch sphere. We demonstrate full control on the Bloch sphere with π-rotation times of less than 100 picoseconds in two orthogonal directions, which is more than an order of magnitude faster than any other double-dot qubit. The speed arises from the qubit's charge-like characteristics, and its spin-like features result in resistance to decoherence over a wide range of gate voltages. We achieve full process tomography in our electrically controlled semiconductor quantum dot qubit, extracting high fidelities of 85 per cent for X rotations (transitions between qubit states) and 94 per cent for Z rotations (phase accumulation between qubit states).
By combing Zn-diffusion and oxide-relief apertures with strong detuning (>20 nm) in our demonstrated short-cavity (λ/2) 850-nm vertical-cavity surface-emitting lasers (VCSELs), wide ...electrical-to-optical bandwidth (29-24 GHz), low-differential resistance (~100 Q), and (quasi) single-mode (SM) with reasonable output power (~1.4 mW) performances can be simultaneously achieved. Error-free ON-OFF keying transmission at 54-Gb/s data rate through 1-km OM4 multi-mode fiber can be achieved by using highly SM device with forward error correction and decision feedback equalization techniques. As compared with the reference device with a larger oxide-relief aperture and a multi-mode performance, the SM device exhibits lower bit-error rate (1 × 10 -5 versus 1 × 10 -2 ) at 54 Gb/s. This result indicates that modal dispersion plays more important role in transmission than that of output power does. We benchmark these results to an industrial 50-Gb/s SM VCSEL. It shows a higher bit-error-rate value ~3.5×10 -3 versus ~1.4×10 -4 under the same received optical power.