Diurnal variation of the dayside, ionospheric, mid-latitude trough in the southern hemisphere at 800 km: Model and measurement comparison

Our high latitude ionospheric model predicts the existence of a pronounced “dayside” trough in plasma concentration equatorward of the auroral oval in both the Northern and Southern Hemispheres for solar maximum, winter, and low geomagnetic activity conditions. The trough in the Southern Hemisphere is much deeper than that in the Northern Hemisphere, with the minimum trough density at 800 km being 2 × 10³ cm⁻³ in the Southern Hemisphere and 10⁴ cm⁻³ in the Northern Hemisphere. The dayside trough has a strong longitudinal (diurnal) dependence and appears between 11:00 and 19:00 U.T. in the Southern Hemisphere and between 02:00 and 08:00 U.T. in the Northern Hemisphere. This dayside trough is a result of the auroral oval moving to larger solar zenith angles at those universal times when the magnetic pole is on the antisunward side of the geographic pole. As the auroral ionization source moves to higher geographic latitudes, it leaves a region of declining photoionization on the dayside. For low convection speeds, the ionosphere decays and a dayside trough forms. The trough is deeper in the Southern Hemisphere than in the Northern Hemisphere because of the greater offset between the geomagnetic and geographic poles. Satellite data taken in both the Northern and Southern Hemispheres confirm the gross features of the dayside trough, including its strong longitudinal dependence, its depth, and the asymmetry between the Northern and Southern Hemisphere troughs.     

Soil erosion,climatic vagary and agricultural change on the Downs around Lewes and Brighton,autumn 1982

Farmland on the Downs between Lewes and Brighton suffered severe erosion during the autumn of 1982. The erosion was widespread and affected a variety of topographic situations, but it was confined to areas of arable land and recently-sown grass leys. Erosion on the scale recorded during the autumn of 1982 has never previously been recorded from this area. Three major sites of erosion are described and explanations for the erosion are sought through an analysis of rainfall conditions experienced during autumn 1982 and in recent changes in agricultural land use on the Downs. It is concluded that, whilst total rainfall and the intensity of rainstorms were both unusually high, similar events are likely to recur several times a century. Evidence is presented which suggests that the ploughing up of permanent pasture, the removal of field boundaries and the increased adoption of autumn-sown cereals have all contributed to the onset of severe erosion. It appears that a major re-activation of erosion on the Downs may be commencing which threatens the long-term viability of farming in the area.     

The onset of shock wave in an electrically conducting and radiating gas

The present work applies the method of characteristics to study the behaviour of planar and cylindrical wave-heads propagating through a perfectly electrically conducting and thermally radiating inviscid gas under the optically thin limit in the presence of a transverse magnetic field. The true nonlinear progress of the flow variable gradients at the wavefront is predicted and the critical distance at which the characteristics pile up at the wavefront to form a shock wave is obtained. It is investigated as to how the effects of radiative flux, the magnetic field strength and the specific heat ratio influence the process of steepening or flattening of the characteristic wavefront.     

Polarization observations of giant radio pulses from the millisecond pulsar B1937+21 at a frequency of 600 MHz

We performed polarization observations of giant radio pulses from the millisecond pulsar B1937+21. The observations were carried out in July 2002 with the 64-m Kalyazin radio telescope at a frequency of 600 MHz in two polarization channels with left-and right-hand circular polarizations (RCP and LCP). We used the S2 data acquisition system with a time resolution of 125 ns. The duration of an observing session was 20 min. We detected twelve giant radio pulses with peak flux densities higher than 1000 Jy; five and seven of these pulses appeared in the RCP and LCP channels, respectively. We found no event that exceeded the established detection threshold simultaneously in the two polarization channels. Thus, we may conclude that the detected giant pulses have a high degree of circular polarization, with the frequency of occurrence of RCP and LCP pulses being the same.     

The Kaidun meteorite: Mineralogy of an unusual CM1 lithology

Abstract Kaidun is a breccia of disparate enstatite and carbonaceous chondrite clasts that continues to provide real surprises. Many Kaidun clasts have been intensely altered by aqueous fluids, as evidenced by the widespread occurrence of ferromagnesian phyllosilicates and by the presence of carbonate- and phyllo-silicate-filled veins. In this report, we describe an unusual CM lithology containing many mineralogical features not previously reported from any meteorite, including pyrrhotite, with exclusive needlelike morphologies and thick mantles of phyllosilicate, and complex aggregates of phyllosilicate, melanite garnet, crosscut by pentlandite veins. The latter features appear to be due in large part to extensive hydrothermal alteration at temperatures on the order of 450 °C, which is significantly higher than that attained during secondary processing from other known CM material.     

Massless scalar field in Robertson-Walker space-time

Recently, exact spatially-homogeneous solutions have been found for a conformally invariant massless scalar fieldS(t) coupled to a Robertson-Walker geometry. We investigate extending these solutions to inhomogeneous scalar fieldsS(t, x ^l ). For an isotropic scalar fieldS(t, r) we find a solution satisfying three of the five field equations. If we use REDUCE, we show that the remaining equations forceS=S(t).