EURD observations of interstellar radiation

The hot interstellar medium (ISM) has far-reaching effect upon thestructure of galaxies. Although ISM heating processes are fairly wellunderstood, after decades of study, the processes that cool the hotinterstellar medium remain obscure. The EURD spectrograph was designed tomeasure the diffuse cosmic background from 350 to 1100 Å in order tostudy the hot ISM and the mechanisms by which it sheds its energy. Wepresent the first analysis of EURD observations of the cosmic background.These EURD observations have proven to be far more sensitive than previouswork; compared to previous results, we have improved the limits to theintensity of 450 to 900 Å line emission from the ISM by one to twoorders of magnitude. Our limit to OVI 1032 Å / 1038 Å doublet of 7900ph s^-1 cm^-2 str^-1 is the lowest yet reported. The EURDlimits to line emission are less intense than predicted by a varietytheoretical models of the local ISM.     

An Analysis of Polar Coronal Hole Evolution: Relations to Other Solar Phenomena and Heliospheric Consequences

We use observations of the green corona low-brightness regions to construct a time series of a polar coronal hole area from 1939 to 1996, covering 5 solar cycles. We then perform a power-spectral analysis of the monthly data time series. Several persistent significant periodicities appear in the spectra, which are related with those found in solar magnetic flux emergence, geomagnetic storm sudden commencements and cosmic-ray flux at Earth. Of particular importance are the peak at around 1.6–1.8 yr recently found in cosmic-ray intensity fluctuations, and the peak at around 1 yr, also identified in coronal hole magnetic flux variations. Additional interesting features are the peaks close to 5 yr, 3 yr and the possible peak at around 30 yr, that were also found in other solar and interplanetary phenomena. Our results stress the physical connection between the solar magnetic flux emergence and the interplanetary medium dynamics, in particular the importance of coronal hole evolution in the structuring of the heliosphere.     

Temporal variability of selected dissolved elements in the lower Orinoco River,Venezuela

Monthly analyses of pH, conductance, alkalinity, total suspended solids, dissolved major cations (Na, K, Ca and Mg), and selected dissolved trace elements (Fe, Al, Mn, Cu, Zn and Cr) were conducted on waters of the lower Orinoco River from February 2004 to May 2006. The data show strong seasonal variability. Major cations had maximum concentrations at low water, and were correlated with pH, conductance and alkalinity because of the tributaries coming from the Andean zones, where the weathering of evaporites and carbonate shales controls water chemistry. K concentrations did not show any relation with evaporite weathering, probably because large amounts of K come from the Guayana Shield rivers as a consequence of feldspar weathering. The concentrations of dissolved Fe, Mn and Cu were highest during the high water stage. Concentrations of the elements K, Cr, Zn and Cu are correlated with each other but not with dissolved Fe and Al, which probably are complexed with humic and fulvic substances. Mn concentrations did not show relationships with other variables. Inter‐annual variability of dissolved elements is explained by temporal changes in precipitation. Copyright © 2008 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Clues to Substellar Formation: Rotation and the Low-Mass End of the Initial Mass Function

We have monitored S Ori 45, a young, low-mass (20 M _j up) brown dwarf of the σ Orionis cluster (～3 Myr, 352 pc), using optical and near-infrared filters. S Ori 45 (spectral type M8.5) is found to be multi-periodic with a dominant modulation at 2.5–3.5 h, and a short modulation at about 46 min. We ascribe the longer of these modulations to a rotation period. After comparing these results with observations of more massive cluster brown dwarfs and field brown dwarfs, we conclude that substellar objects present rotational and angular momentum evolution. We have also obtained intermediate-resolution near-infrared spectroscopy of S Ori 70, which is a T-class, free-floating planetary candidate member in the σ Orionis cluster. Its observed spectrum has been compared to data of field brown dwarfs of similar types and to theoretical spectra computed for different surface temperatures and gravities. We conclude that S Ori 70 has a significantly cool, low-gravity atmosphere. This supports the young age of this object and its membership in the cluster. From state-of-the-art evolutionary models, the mass of S Ori 70 is estimated at 3 times the Jovian mass (⁺⁵ _?2 M _j up), challenging current stellar/substellar formation models. S Ori 70 remains the lowest mass object so far identified in any open cluster.     

Modeling spatial landslide susceptibility in volcanic terrains through continuous neighborhood spatial analysis and multiple logistic regression in La Ciénega watershed,Nevado de Toluca,Mexico

Natural Hazards - Little study has been done on the effect of the pixel neighborhood information when modeling landslide susceptibility using multiple logistic regression (MLR). The present...     

The space-time cube as part of a GeoVisual analytics environment to support the understanding of movement data

This paper reports the results of an empirical usability experiment on the performance of the space-time cube in a GeoVisual analytics environment. It was developed to explore movement data based on the requirements of human geographers. The interactive environment consists of multiple coordinated views incorporating three graphical representations. For the experiment, two groups of the user, domain experts and non-domain experts, had to execute several map-use tasks to answers specific question. The data collected during the experiment were analysis resulting in a set of usability metrics related to the effectiveness, efficiency and user satisfaction of developed application. The comparison of both groups showed that domain experts were able to operate the visual analytical environment more effectively and efficiently due to their interest to explore their data. The user feedback derived from the analysis of both experiments was further processed for the improvement of the application.     

Efficiency of a two-step upscaling method for permeability evaluation at Darcy and pore scales

This work presents a new subdivision method to upscale absolute permeability fields. This process, called two-step method, consists in (i) solving micro-scale equations on subdomains obtained from the full domain regular decomposition and (ii) solve a second upscaling with Darcy’s law on the permeability fields obtained in the first step. The micro-scale equations used depend on the case studied. The two-step upscaling process is validated on randomly generated Darcy-scale permeability fields by measuring the numerical error induced by upscaling. The method is then applied to real domains obtained from sandstone micro-tomographic images. The method specificities due to pore-space structure are discussed. The main advantage of the two-step upscaling method resides in the drastic reduction of computational costs (CPU time and memory usage) while maintaining a numerical error similar to that of other upscaling procedures. This new upscaling method may improve permeability predictions by the use of finer meshes or larger sample volumes.