Exotic UV astronomy

After considering a number of historical but somewhat “forgotten” UV astronomy experiments, I discuss a number of ways of non-conventional astronomy in the ultraviolet that, on first considerations, could be viable alternatives and valuable complements to classical space observations. These are (a) UV astronomy from the Antarctic or the Arctic regions that take advantage of the “ozone hole”, (b) the use of high-altitude stratospheric balloon-borne telescopes, and (c) the operation of UV telescopes on the Moon. The advantages of these options are discussed and evaluated against the costs of each option and, one by one, are mostly rejected as not fully justifying the specific alternative. The possibility to achieve valuable (but limited) UV science, such as imaging at ～2000 Å, using long-duration stratospheric balloons is described. The option of lunar UV observatories is retained to be implemented for the case of a UV interferometer, where the stability of the lunar regolith is seen as a significant advantage in comparison to free-flying interferometers. A location beyond the main asteroid belt, where the background due zodiacal light may be negligible, is advocated as an ideal location for a UV observatory in the Solar System.     

The bias of integrated assessment models that ignore climate catastrophes

Climate scientists currently predict there is a small but real possibility that climate change will lead to civilization threatening catastrophic events. Martin Weitzman has used this evidence along with his controversial “Dismal Theorem” to argue that integrated assessment models of climate change cannot be used to determine an optimal price for carbon dioxide. In this paper, I provide additional support for Weitzman’s conclusions by running numerical simulations to estimate risk premiums toward climate catastrophes. Compared to the assumptions found in most integrated assessment models, I incorporate into the model a more realistic range of uncertainty for both climate catastrophes and societal risk aversion. The resulting range of risk premiums indicates that the conclusions drawn from integrated assessment models that do not incorporate the potential for climate catastrophes are too imprecise to support any particular policy recommendation. The analysis of this paper is more straightforward and less technical than Weitzman’s, and therefore the conclusions should be accessible to a wider audience.     

Evaluation of high-resolution simulations of daily-scale temperature and precipitation over the United States

Extreme climate events have been increasing over much of the world, and dynamical models predict further increases in response to enhanced greenhouse forcing. We examine the ability of a high-resolution nested climate model, RegCM3, to capture the statistics of daily-scale temperature and precipitation events over the conterminous United States, using observational and reanalysis data for comparison. Our analyses reveal that RegCM3 captures the pattern of mean, interannual variability, and trend in the tails of the daily temperature and precipitation distributions. However, consistent biases do exist, including wet biases in the topographically-complex regions of the western United States and hot biases in the southern and central United States. The biases in heavy precipitation in the western United States are associated with excessively strong surface and low-level winds. The biases in daily-scale temperature and precipitation in the southcentral United States are at least partially driven by biases in circulation and moisture fields. Further, the areas of agreement and disagreement with the observational data are not intuitive from analyzing the simulated mean seasonal temperature and precipitation fields alone. Our evaluation should enable more informed application and improvement of high-resolution climate models for the study of future changes in socially- and economically-relevant temperature and precipitation events.     

High-redshift objects as probes of nearby cosmic voids

We show that present day observational techniques make it possible to detect diffuse gas masses down to ～10¹⁰ M _⊙ in cosmic voids with linear sizes of ～1 Mpc or larger. The observations consist of searches for absorption lines, similar in character to those produced in galactic interstellar clouds, in the spectra of high-redshift objects located beyond previously identified voids adjoining nearby superclusters.     

Estimating the timescale of fluvial response to anthropogenic disturbance using two generations of dams on the South River,Massachusetts, USA

Centuries-long intensive land-use change in the north-eastern United States provides the opportunity to study the timescale of geomorphic response to anthropogenic disturbances. In this region, forest-clearing and agricultural practices following EuroAmerican settlement led to deposition of legacy sediment along valley bottoms, including behind mill dams. The South River in western Massachusetts experienced two generations of damming, beginning with mill dams up to 6-m high in the eighteenth–nineteenth century, and followed by construction of the Conway Electric Dam (CED), a 17-m-tall hydroelectric dam near the watershed outlet in 1906. We use the mercury (Hg) concentration in upstream deposits along the South River to constrain the magnitude, source, and timing of inputs to the CED impoundment. Based on cesium-137 (¹³⁷Cs) chronology and results from a sediment mixing model, remobilized legacy sediment comprised % of the sediment load in the South River prior to 1954; thereafter, from 1954 to 1980s, erosion from glacial deposits likely dominated (63 ± 14%), but with legacy sediments still a substantial source (37 ± 14%). We also use the CED reservoir deposits to estimate sediment yield through time, and find it decreased after 1952. These results are consistent with high rates of mobilization of legacy sediment as historic dams breached in the early twentieth century, and suggest rapid initial response to channel incision, followed by a long decay in the second half of the century, that is likely dependent on large flood events to access legacy sediment stored in banks. Identifying sources of sediment in a watershed and quantifying erosion rates can help to guide river restoration practices. Our findings suggest a short fluvial recovery time from the eighteenth–nineteenth century to perturbation during the first half of the twentieth century, with subsequent return to a dominant long-term signal from erosion of glacial deposits, with anthropogenic sediment persisting as a secondary source. © 2020 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Galaxy candidates in the Zone of Avoidance

Motivated by recent discoveries of nearby galaxies in the Zone of Avoidance (ZOA), we conducted a pilot study of galaxy candidates at low galactic latitude, near galactic longitude l  ∼ 135°, where the Supergalactic plane is crossed by the Galactic plane. We observed with the 1-m Wise Observatory in the l band 17 of the 'promising' candidates identified by visual examination of Palomar red plates by Hau et al. A few candidates were also observed in R or B bands, or had spectroscopic observations performed at the Isaac Newton Telescope and at the Wise Observatory. Our study suggests that there are probably 10 galaxies in this sample. We also identify a probable planetary nebula. The final confirmation of the nature of these sources must await the availability of full spectroscopic information. The success rate of ∼ 50 per cent in identifying galaxies at galactic latitude | b | < 5° indicates that the ZOA is a promising region to discover new galaxies.     

Late-type dwarf galaxies in the Virgo cluster — I. The samples

We selected samples of late-type dwarf galaxies in the Virgo cluster with H  i information. The galaxies were observed at the Wise Observatory using several broad-band and Hα bandpasses. UV measurements were carried out with the IUE Observatory from VILSPA, and with the FAUST shuttle-borne UV telescope.   We describe the observations in detail, paying particular attention to the determination of measurement errors, and present the observational results together with published data and far-infrared information from IRAS . The sample will be analysed in subsequent papers, in order to study star formation mechanisms in galaxies.     

FAUST observations of ultraviolet sources in the direction of Coma

We analyse an ultraviolet observation toward the Coma cluster by means of the FAUST shuttle-borne telescope. We detect 56 candidate sources to a signal-to-noise ratio of 6.5. Most sources have optical counterparts in existing catalogues and are stars. 10 sources with no listed counterparts were observed at the Wise Observatory. We present identifications based on low-resolution spectrophotometry, and discuss the foreground stars and the galaxies, all in the foreground of the Coma cluster. The FAUST image yields a higher fraction of hot evolved stars than either of the North Galactic Pole or the Virgo regions, analysed previously. We identify these tentatively as cooling white dwarfs in the Coma Berenices (Mel 111) open cluster.     

OSO-8 observations of the impulsive phase of solar flares in the transition-zone and corona

Several solar flares have been observed from their onset in C IV 1548.2 and 1–8 Å X-rays using instruments aboard OSO-8. In addition, microwave and H flare patrol data have been obtained for this study. The impulsive brightening in C IV is frequently accompanied by redshifts, interpreted as downflows, of the order of 80 km s^-1. The maximum soft X-ray intensity usually arrives several minutes after the maximum C IV intensity. The most energetic C IV event studied shows a small blueshift just before reaching maximum intensity, and estimates of the mass flux associated with this upflow through the transition-zone are consistent with the increase of mass in the coronal loops as observed in soft X-rays. This event had no observable microwave burst, suggesting that electron beams did not play a major role in the chromospheric and transition-zone excitation. Lastly, our observations suggest that the frequent occurrence of violent dynamical processes at the onset of the flare are associated with the initial energy release mechanism.Currently at High Altitude Observatory, National Center for Atmospheric Research, P.O. Box 3000, Boulder, Colo. 80307, U.S.A.