The Roche Limit

The role of tides in deforming and possibly disrupting a secondary body orbiting about a primary body has been known for a considerable time. This was first inspired by the observations of ocean tides on Earth and then seen as playing an important role in the formation and evolution of the Earth–Moon system. Finally, in the beginning of the 20th century it was generally thought to have a significant role in the formation of the solar system through the tidal disruption of the Sun. Here, an overview of the historical developments of the ideas concerned with tidal disruption of a secondary body that can lead to mass loss is given. Some discussion of possible extensions to consider more realistic situations where the secondary body may not be moving on a circular orbit and may not rotate so as to maintain the phase-on configuration to the primary body is also given.     

Identification of physical processes inherent in artificial neural network rainfall runoff models

The emergence of artificial neural network (ANN) technology has provided many promising results in the field of hydrology and water resources simulation. However, one of the major criticisms of ANN hydrologic models is that they do not consider/explain the underlying physical processes in a watershed, resulting in them being labelled as black‐box models. This paper discusses a research study conducted in order to examine whether or not the physical processes in a watershed are inherent in a trained ANN rainfall‐runoff model. The investigation is based on analysing definite statistical measures of strength of relationship between the disintegrated hidden neuron responses of an ANN model and its input variables, as well as various deterministic components of a conceptual rainfall‐runoff model. The approach is illustrated by presenting a case study for the Kentucky River watershed. The results suggest that the distributed structure of the ANN is able to capture certain physical behaviour of the rainfall‐runoff process. The results demonstrate that the hidden neurons in the ANN rainfall‐runoff model approximate various components of the hydrologic system, such as infiltration, base flow, and delayed and quick surface flow, etc., and represent the rising limb and different portions of the falling limb of a flow hydrograph. Copyright © 2004 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Evolution of the luminosity function and colours of galaxies in a Λ cold dark matter universe

The luminosity function of galaxies is derived from a cosmological hydrodynamic simulation of a Λ cold dark matter universe with the aid of a stellar population synthesis model. At     , the resulting B -band luminosity function has a flat faint-end slope of     with the characteristic luminosity and the normalization in fair agreement with observations, while the dark matter halo mass function is steep with a slope of     . The colour distribution of galaxies also agrees well with local observations. We also discuss the evolution of the luminosity function, and the colour distribution of galaxies from     to 5. A large evolution of the characteristic mass in the stellar mass function as a result of number evolution is compensated by luminosity evolution; the characteristic luminosity increases only by 0.8 mag from     to 2, and then declines towards higher redshift, while the B -band luminosity density continues to increase from     to 5 (but only slowly at     .     

褶皱岩层初始挠曲的分叉特性

基于拖带坐标法建立了岩层大变形的一维非线性微分方程，然后用解析与数值方法研究了变刚度、可伸缩岩层在侧向压力及自重作用下的分叉特性，初步揭示了褶皱岩层初始挠曲的形成机理。     

Wolf-Rayet stars

Summary Recent literature on Population I Wolf-Rayet star research extending from the Milky Way to blue compact dwarf galaxies is reviewed, broken down into inventory, basic parameters and galactic distribution, atmospheres, binaries, intrinsic variability, mass loss, enrichment and evolution. Also the incidence of Wolf-Rayet stars with variable non-thermal radio emission, excess X-ray fluxes, and episodic/periodic IR excesses is reviewed. These phenomena appear to be associated with wind-wind interaction in wide long-period WR+OB binaries and with wind-compact object interaction in WR+c binaries, with orbit sizes of the order of magnitude of the WR radio photosphere sizes or larger.     

Yields of Nucleosynthesis from massive and intermediate mass stars and constraints on their final evolution

Nucleosynthetic yields and production rates of helium and heavy elements are derived using new initial mass functions which take into account the recent revisions in O star counts and the stellar models of Maeder (1981a, b) which incorporate the effects of massloss on evolution. The current production rates are significantly higher than the earlier results due to Chiosi & Caimmi (1979) and Chiosi (1979), and a near-uniform birthrate operating over the history of the galactic disc explains the currently observed abundances. However, the yields are incompatibly high, and to obtain agreement it is necessary to assume that stars above a certain mass do not explode but proceed to total collapse. Further confirmation of this idea comes from the consideration of the specific yields and production rates of oxygen, carbon and iron and the constraints imposed by the observational enrichment history in the disc as discussed by Twarog & Wheeler (1982). Substantial amounts of⁴He and¹⁴C, amongst the primary synthesis species, are contributed by the intermediate mass stars in their wind phases. If substantial numbers of them exploded as Type I SN, their contribution to the yields of¹²C and⁵⁶Fe would be far in excess of the requirements of galactic nucleosynthesis. Either efficient massloss precludes such catastrophic ends for these stars, or the current stellar models are sufficiently in error to leave room for substantial revisions in the specific yields. The proposed upward revision of the¹²C (α,γ)¹⁶O rate may produce the necessary changes in stellar yields to provide a solution to this problem. Stars that produce most of the metals in the Galaxy are the same ones that contribute most to the observed supernova rate.     

Silicon limitation on primary production and its destiny in Jiaozhou Bay, China——Ⅳ：Study on cross-bay transect from estuary to ocean

The authors analyzed the data collected in the Ecological Station Jiaozhou Bay from May 1991 to November 1994, including 12 seasonal investigations, to determine the characteristics, dynamic cycles and variation trends of the silicate in the bay. The results indicated that the rivers around Jiaozhou Bay provided abundant supply of silicate to the bay. The silicate concentration there depended on river flow variation. The horizontal variation of silicate concentration on the transect showed that the silicate concentration decreased with distance from shorelines. The vertical variation of it showed that silicate sank and deposited on the sea bottom by phytoplankton uptake and death, and zooplankton excretion. In this way, silicon would endlessly be transferred from terrestrial sources to the sea bottom. The silicon took up by phytoplankton and by other biogeochemical processes led to insufficient silicon supply for phytoplankton growth. In this paper, a 2D dynamic model of river flow versus silicate concentration was established by which silicate concentrations of 0.028–0.062 μmol/L in seawater was yielded by inputting certain seasonal unit river flows (m³/s), or in other words, the silicate supply rate; and when the unit river flow was set to zero, meaning no river input, the silicate concentrations were between 0.05–0.69 μmol/L in the bay. In terms of the silicate supply rate, Jiaozhou Bay was divided into three parts. The division shows a given river flow could generate several different silicon levels in corresponding regions, so as to the silicon-limitation levels to the phytoplankton in these regions. Another dynamic model of river flow versus primary production was set up by which the phytoplankton primary production of 5.21–15.55 (mgC/m²·d)/(m³/s) were obtained in our case at unit river flow values via silicate concentration or primary production conversion rate. Similarly, the values of primary production of 121.98–195.33 (mgC/m²·d) were achieved at zero unit river flow condition. A primary production conversion rate reflects the sensitivity to silicon depletion so as to different phytoplankton primary production and silicon requirements by different phytoplankton assemblages in different marine areas. In addition, the authors differentiated two equations (Eqs. 1 and 2) in the models to obtain the river flow variation that determines the silicate concentration variation, and in turn, the variation of primary production. These results proved further that nutrient silicon is a limiting factor for phytoplankton growth. This study was funded by NSFC (No. 40036010), and the Director's Fund of the Beihai Sea Monitoring Center, the State Oceanic Administration.     

Observations of hydrogen deficient binary Upsilon sagittarii

The absolute magnitudeM _v of the hydrogen deficient binary υ Sgr has been estimated as -4.8 ± 1.0 from the distribution of the interstellar reddening, polarization and interstellar lines of the surrounding stars. From the ANS observations obtained at the time of the secondary eclipse, it appears that the hotter secondary is surrounded by a disc with colours of a B8-B9 star. The λ 1550 CIv absorption line arising in the stellar wind does not show any change in strength during the secondary minimum. The upper limit to the mass-loss rate from the high temperature wind is estimated as ≤ 5 × 10^-7 M⊙ yr^-1 from the 2 cm and 6 cm radio observations. Based on observations obtained with the Astronomical Netherlands Satellite and VLA. The National Radio Astronomy Observatory’s Very Large Array at Socorro, New Mexico is operated by Associated Universities Inc. under contract with the National Science Foundation.