Coulometric TCO2 analyses for marine studies; an introduction

Progress in the introduction of coulometry for the analysis of total carbon dioxide (TCO₂) in marine waters is described. An extractor—stripper removes CO₂ that is measured coulometrically by the quantity of electricity (coulombs) used to electrogenerate OH^? ions for the titration of the acid formed by the reaction of CO₂ and ethanolamine. The equivalence point is detected photometrically with thymolphthalein as the indicator, and Faraday's Law relates coulombs to equivalents of titrant generated and CO₂ determined so that there are no standard curves needed or titrants to standardize or store. Accuracy was determined by adding gelatin capsules containing 100–1500 μg C of pure CaCO₃ into the stripper, and accuracies of better than ± 1 μg C were achieved. The best precision for natural seawater (± 1 standard error) of ± 0.5 μmol l^?1 was found for 17 samples of Bermuda coastal waters having a mean TCO₂ of 2007.2 μmol l^?1 (0.05% CV). Sources of error and precautions are discussed. This method, which has been used successfully at sea, can be used to study a variety of marine phenomena involving TCO₂.     

A comparison of artificial solar granules with real solar granules

The lifetimes, characteristics of the shapes as well as lengths and perimeters of artificial solar granules (Nordlund, 1982, 1984a) are compared with data from the literature and parameters determined from two different sets of observed granules. No significant differences of the parameters for these sets of granules are detectable.Mitteilungen aus dem Kiepenheuer-Institut Nr. 251.     

Arsenic incorporation in a salt marsh ecosystem

Replicate portions of a Delaware salt marsh were enclosed in cylindrical microcosms and exposed to elevated levels of inorganic arsenic (arsenate). All biotic and abiotic components in dosed cylinders rapidly incorporated arsenic. Spartina blades showed the greatest arsenic enrichment, with dosed plants incorporating arsenic concentrations an order of magnitude higher than controls. Spartina detritus and sediments also exhibited greatly elevated arsenic concentrations. Virtually all of the arsenic was incorporated into plant tissue or strongly sorbed to cell surfaces. Thus, elevated arsenic concentrations in estuarine waters will be reflected in living and non-living components of a salt marsh ecosystem, implying that increased arsenic will be available to organisms within the marsh ecosystem.     

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.     

Spectrophotometric Variability of Mira

Data from the Pulkovo spectrophotometric data base on the absolute quasimonochromatic fluxes from oCet in the 320–1080 nm range are used to determine the physical parameters of this star in different phases of its light curve. The continuum emission layer is found to expand between the phases of the cycle corresponding to the rising and falling branches of the light curve. The average expansion velocity is 32 km/s. By the time the star’s brightness has fallen by roughly three magnitudes, its radius has increased by almost a factor of three. Over this same time the temperature of the layer has fallen from 3000 K to 2200 K. For this expansion velocity, the calculated mass rate loss is ⊙ M /year.__________Translated from Astrofizika, Vol. 48, No. 2, pp. 175–189 (May 2005).     

The determination and analysis of the orbit of NIMBUS 1 ROCKET, 1964-52B: Part 2: Variations in orbital eccentricity

The influence of aerodynamic drag and the geopotential on the motion of the satellite 1964-52B is considered. A model of the atmosphere is adopted that allows for oblateness, and in which the density behaviour approximates to the observed diurnal variation. A differential equation governing the variation of the eccentricity, e, combining the effects of air drag with those of the Earth's gravitational field is given. This is solved numerically using as initial conditions 310 computed orbits of 1964-52B.The observed values of eccentricity are modified by the removal of perturbations due to luni-solar attraction, solid Earth and ocean tides, solar radiation pressure and low-order long-periodic tesseral harmonic perturbations. The method of removal of these effects is given in some detail. The behaviour of the orbital eccentricity predicted by the numerical solution is compared with the modified observed eccentricity to obtain values of atmospheric parameters at heights between 310 and 430 km. The daytime maximum of air density is found to be at 14.5 hours local time. Analysis of the eccentricity near 15th order resonance with the geopotential yielded values of four lumped geopotential harmonics of order 15, namely: $\text{10}{}^9\text{C}{}^{\mathrm{1,0}}{}_{15}\text{= ?78.8 ± 7.0}$, $\text{10}{}^9\text{S}{}^{\mathrm{1,0}}{}_{15}\text{= ?69.4 ± 5.3}$, $\text{10}{}^9\text{C}{}^{\mathrm{?1,2}}{}_{15}\text{= ?41.6 ± 3.5}$$\text{10}{}^9\text{S}{}^{\mathrm{?1,2}}{}_{15}\text{= ?26.1 ± 8.9}$, at inclination 98.68°.     

Common Proper Motion Search for Faint Companions Around Early-Type Field Stars – Progress Report

The multiplicity of early-type stars is still not well established. The derived binary fraction is different for individual star forming regions, suggesting a connection with the age and the environment conditions. The few studies that have investigated this connection do not provide conclusive results. To fill in this gap, we started the first detailed adaptive-optic-assisted imaging survey of early-type field stars to derive their multiplicity in a homogeneous way. The sample has been extracted from the Hipparcos Catalog and consists of 341 BA-type stars within ∼300 pc from the Sun. We report the current status of the survey and describe a Monte-Carlo simulation that estimates the completeness of our companion detection.