It has been reported that the sea surface temperature (SST) trend of the East China Sea during the twentieth century was a couple of times larger than the globalmean SST trend. However, the detailed ...spatial structure of the SST trend in the East China Sea and its mechanism have not been understood. The present study examines the SST trend in the East China Sea from 1901 to 2010 using observational data and a Regional Ocean Modeling System (ROMS) with an eddy-resolving horizontal resolution. A comparison among two observational datasets and the model output reveals that enhanced SST warming occurred along the Kuroshio and along the coast of China over the continental shelf. In both regions, the SST trends were the largest in winter. The heat budget analysis using the model output indicates that the upper-layer temperature rises in both regions were induced by the trend of ocean advection, which was balanced in relation to the increase of surface net heat release. In addition, the rapid SST warming along the Kuroshio was induced by the acceleration of the Kuroshio. Sensitivity experiments revealed that this acceleration was likely caused by the negative wind stress curl anomalies over the North Pacific. In contrast, the enhanced SST warming along the China coast resulted from the ocean circulation change over the continental shelf by local atmospheric forcing.
Instead of a conventional 'one-drug-one-target approach', this article presents a novel multi-target approach with a concept of trapping simultaneously as many detrimental factors as possible ...involved in the progression of Parkinson's disease. These factors include reactive carbonyl species, reactive oxygen species, Fe
Cu
and ortho-quinones (
-quinone), in particular. Different from the known multi-target strategies for Parkinson's disease, it is a sort of 'vacuum cleaning' strategy. The new agent consists of reactive carbonyl species scavenging moiety and reactive oxygen species scavenging and metal chelating moiety linked by a spacer. Provided that the capacity of scavenging
-quinones is demonstrated, this type of agent can further broaden its potential therapeutic profile. In order to support this new hypothetical approach, a number of simple
experiments are proposed.
We review the characteristics of sea level variability at the coast focussing on how it differs from the variability in the nearby deep ocean. Sea level variability occurs on all timescales, with ...processes at higher frequencies tending to have a larger magnitude at the coast due to resonance and other dynamics. In the case of some processes, such as the tides, the presence of the coast and the shallow waters of the shelves results in the processes being considerably more complex than offshore. However, ‘coastal variability’ should not always be considered as ‘short spatial scale variability’ but can be the result of signals transmitted along the coast from 1000s km away. Fortunately, thanks to tide gauges being necessarily located at the coast, many aspects of coastal sea level variability can be claimed to be better understood than those in the deep ocean. Nevertheless, certain aspects of coastal variability remain under-researched, including how changes in some processes (e.g., wave setup, river runoff) may have contributed to the historical mean sea level records obtained from tide gauges which are now used routinely in large-scale climate research.
The atmospheric response, especially the response of the meiyu-baiu rainband, to interannual variability of the sea surface temperature (SST) front associated with the Kuroshio in the East China Sea ...in early summer is examined by using reanalysis, satellite, and rain-gauge datasets from 1982 to 2010. It is revealed that the strong (weak) SST front in the East China Sea is accompanied by the heavy (weak) precipitation over the central East China Sea and the southern Japan. Because the strong SST front largely results from the negative SST anomaly over the continental shelf, the local evaporation change in the East China Sea is not balanced by this enhanced precipitation. The moisture for this enhanced precipitation is supplied by interannual variability of horizontal wind convergence over the central East China Sea. In addition to the precipitation change, the strong SST front is also accompanied by the intensification of weather disturbances in the lower troposphere over the East China Sea. This is probably because the negative SST anomaly over the continental shelf enhances the baroclinicity in the lower troposphere. This intensification of the weather disturbances over the East China Sea can explain the enhanced precipitation over the central East China Sea in response to the interannual variability of the SST front. Because the SST anomaly over the continental shelf, which primarily determines the interannual variability of the SST front, persists for a couple of months, these results imply the predictability of the precipitation associated with the meiyu-baiu rainband.
This study investigates and describes the time course of fears and worries about COVID-19 among current employees during this outbreak.
This was a longitudinal study.
This study was a part of the ...Employee Cohort Study in Japan. The study comprised 4120 individuals from February 2019. A baseline survey in March 2020, a 2-month follow-up survey in May 2020, and a 5-month follow-up survey in August 2020 were conducted. Questions surveyed respondents’ global fear and worry and six items related to COVID-19. A mixed model for repeated measures of an analysis of variance was used.
A total of 1421 respondents completed the baseline survey. At 2- and 5-month follow-ups, 1032 and 1181 respondents completed surveys, respectively. Of those, 64 and 33 individuals who were temporarily laid off or on leave were recorded as missing values. Global fear and worry about COVID-19 significantly increased from March to August 2020. Fears of personal or family infection, limiting one's activities and national and local government policies also significantly increased with time. In contrast, fears of lack of knowledge and difficulty of obtaining hygiene products significantly decreased.
To conduct efficient risk communication during a pandemic, knowing the concerns of the populace, providing correct information and a sufficient supply of products, and setting clear guidelines are essential.
Influence of the Kuroshio in the East China Sea on the baiu rainband is examined using satellite observations, a reanalysis dataset, and a regional atmospheric model from 2003 to 2008. Satellite ...observations and reanalysis data reveal that precipitation over the Kuroshio is the highest in early summer (June), when the baiu rainband covers the East China Sea. The high rainfall is collocated with the warm sea surface temperature (SST) tongue of the Kuroshio. This locally enhanced precipitation is embedded in the large-scale baiu rainband, so that the amplitude of precipitation over the Kuroshio is twice as large as that in its surrounding area. The Kuroshio is also accompanied by high surface wind speed, energetic evaporation, and wind convergence. This wind convergence likely results from the SST influence on atmospheric pressure through not only temperature changes, but also humidity changes. Furthermore, the Kuroshio anchors the ascent motion and large diabatic heating with a peak in the midtroposphere, suggesting that the influence of the Kuroshio extends to the upper troposphere. It is also found that the East China Sea in June is the region of the strongest deep atmospheric response to western boundary currents along with the Gulf Stream region in summer.
The observational results are well reproduced by the regional atmospheric model. The model indicates that when the SST tongue of the Kuroshio is smoothed, the enhanced precipitation, the energetic evaporation, and the wind convergence over the Kuroshio disappear, although the large-scale structure of the baiu rainband is not essentially changed.
The High Resolution Fly's Eye (HiRes) experiment has observed the Greisen-Zatsepin-Kuzmin suppression (called the GZK cutoff) with a statistical significance of five standard deviations. HiRes' ...measurement of the flux of ultrahigh energy cosmic rays shows a sharp suppression at an energy of 6 x 10(19) eV, consistent with the expected cutoff energy. We observe the ankle of the cosmic-ray energy spectrum as well, at an energy of 4 x 10(18) eV. We describe the experiment, data collection, and analysis and estimate the systematic uncertainties. The results are presented and the calculation of the statistical significance of our observation is described.
The Kuroshio, which flows to the south of Japan, typically takes two paths on decadal timescales; the straight path and the large meander path, or the so-called Kuroshio large meander. This ...phenomenon is characterized by the presence of the cyclonic cold-core eddy located south of Japan, which leads to both negative and positive sea surface temperature (SST) anomalies along the southeastern coast of Japan. To clarify the atmospheric response to these SST anomalies in winter, we conducted a control experiment employing a regional atmospheric model with observed SSTs and two sensitivity experiments in which the SST boundary conditions were substituted with those corresponding to the periods of for the Kuroshio large meander and the straight path. The differences in these two sensitivity experiments showed that the surface wind response to the SST anomalies associated with the Kuroshio large meander was not only characterized by wind divergence over the cyclonic cold-core eddy, as reported previously but also wind convergence along the southeastern coast of Japan. Interestingly, this wind anomaly blew into the positive SST anomaly along the east coast of Japan at around 36°N. Similar wind anomalies along the east coast of Japan were observed in a reanalysis product. The results of the model simulation and the reanalysis product showed that during the Kuroshio large meander period, the number of rainy days increased significantly over the warm SST anomaly, while the precipitation and the number of rainy days decreased over the cyclonic cold-core eddy. Moisture budget analysis revealed that the observed decrease in precipitation was attributed to the disparity between the reduced evaporation and the anomalous horizontal moisture convergence in a region where the surface winds were divergent. This moisture convergence was mainly induced by a decrease in specific humidity, implying this change in specific humidity effectively mitigated the variation in precipitation.
Abstract
This study examines interannual to decadal variability of the Kuroshio Extension (KE) jet using satellite altimeter observations from 1993 to 2010. The leading empirical orthogonal function ...(EOF) mode of sea level variability in the KE region represents the meridional shift of the KE jet, followed by its strength changes with a few month lag. This shift of the KE jet lags atmospheric fluctuations over the eastern North Pacific by about three years. Broad sea level anomalies (SLAs) emerge in the eastern North Pacific 3–4 years before the upstream KE jet shift, and propagate westward along the KE jet axis. In the course of the propagation, the meridional scale of the SLAs gradually narrows, and their amplitude increases. This westward propagation of SLAs with a speed of about 5 cm s−1 is attributed to the westward propagation of the meridional shift of the jet, consistent with the thin-jet theory, whose importance has been suggested by previous numerical studies. In addition, the westward-propagating signals tend to conserve their quasigeostrophic potential vorticity anomaly, which may explain the characteristic changes of SLAs during the propagation. After the westward-propagating signals of positive (negative) SLAs reach at the east coast of Japan, the upstream KE jet strengthens (weakens) associated with the strength changes of the northern and southern recirculation gyres. Interestingly, this strength change of the KE jet propagates eastward with a speed of about 6 cm s−1, suggesting an importance of advection by the current.
We report studies of ultrahigh-energy cosmic-ray composition via analysis of depth of air shower maximum (X(max)), for air shower events collected by the High-Resolution Fly's Eye (HiRes) ...observatory. The HiRes data are consistent with a constant elongation rate d<X(max)>/dlog(E) of 47.9+/-6.0(stat)+/-3.2(syst) g/cm2/decade for energies between 1.6 and 63 EeV, and are consistent with a predominantly protonic composition of cosmic rays when interpreted via the QGSJET01 and QGSJET-II high-energy hadronic interaction models. These measurements constrain models in which the galactic-to-extragalactic transition is the cause of the energy spectrum ankle at 4x10(18) eV.
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