The Venusian induced magnetosphere: A case study of plasma and magnetic field measurements on the Venus Express mission

Plasma and magnetic field measurements made onboard the Venus Express on June 1, 2006, are analyzed and compared with predictions of a global model. It is shown that in the orbit studied, the plasma and magnetic field observations obtained near the North Pole under solar minimum conditions were qualitatively and, in many cases also, quantitatively in agreement with the general picture obtained using a global numerical quasi-neutral hybrid model of the solar wind interaction (HYB-Venus). In instances where the orbit of Venus Express crossed a boundary referred to as the magnetic pileup boundary (MPB), field line tracing supports the suggestion that the MPB separates the region that is magnetically connected to the fluctuating magnetosheath field from a region that is magnetically connected to the induced magnetotail lobes.     

Disaster risk assessment of ports based on the perspective of vulnerability

Global environmental changes have led to frequent occurrences of climatic extremes. The increasingly frequent and high-magnitude natural disasters in Taiwan have caused significant mortality, injury, and property damage. In response, there have been requests to improve the capacity to cope with extreme climatic conditions through increased awareness and identification of vulnerability. Disruptions to transportation systems affect the resilience for sustaining daily operations. Among the various types of transportation systems, ports provide substantial employment and industrial activity, contributing to national and regional development. In addition, ports integrate the functions of supply chains such as services in logistics, information, and business, becoming the location of industrial clusters. Therefore, this study examines the risk of port failures from the perspective of vulnerability. Specifically, seven vulnerable factors derived from the extant literature and lessons learned from the previous disaster cases are evaluated using geographic information systems. The results reveal that port capacity and efficiency have a significant effect on port vulnerability in which the efficiency of gantry cranes, labor productivity, free trade zone business volume, and ground access networks play crucial roles in port failure. Moreover, the risks associated with port operation are evaluated by overlapping a hazard map of areas prone to debris flows and tsunami inundation. The risk maps can assist decision makers in understanding the vulnerability and adopting appropriate strategies to minimize disaster risks.     

A Note on the Flux-Variance Similarity Relationships for Heat and Water Vapour in the Unstable Atmospheric Surface Layer

Atmospheric surface layer (ASL) experiments over the past 10 years demonstrate that the flux-variance similarity functions for water vapour are consistently larger in magnitude than their temperature counterpart. In addition, latent heat flux calculations using the flux-variance method do not compare as favorably to eddy- correlation measurements when compared to their sensible heat counterpart. These two findings, in concert with measured heat to water vapour transport efficiencies in excess of unity, are commonly used as evidence of dissimilarity between heat and water vapour transport in the unstable atmospheric surface layer. In this note, it is demonstrated that even if near equality in flux-profile similarity functions for heat and water vapour is satisfied, the flux-variance similarity functions for water vapour are larger in magnitude than temperature for a planar, homogeneous, unstably-stratified turbulent boundary-layer flow.     

A semi‐distributed parallel‐type linear reservoir rainfall‐runoff model and its application in Taiwan

The main purpose of this paper is to introduce a semi‐distributed parallel surface rainfall‐runoff conceptual model. In this paper, a general solution of the instantaneous unit hydrograph (IUH) has been derived successfully for N linearly connected reservoirs, each having a different storage constant. The solution is a function of geomorphologic parameters, meteorologic factors and roughness coefficients. The model also takes into account the hydrologic response which is influenced by outflow downstream of a reservoir. For calibration, the shuffled complex evolution (SCE) algorithm is used to search for the global optimal parameters of the model. Because of the parallel structure, the mean roughness parameter of the channel becomes a “conceptual” parameter without a real physical meaning. To evaluate the adaptability of the model adopted, three watersheds around the city of Taipei in Taiwan were chosen to test the effectiveness of the model. The study provides an appropriate rainfall‐runoff model for planning flood mitigation in Taiwan. Copyright © 1999 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Influence of strong monsoon winds on the water quality around a marine cage-culture zone in a shallow and semi-enclosed bay in Taiwan

Influences of marine cage culture and monsoonal disturbances, northeasterly (NE) and southwesterly (SW) monsoons on the proximal marine environment were investigated across a gradient of sites in a semi-enclosed bay, Magong Bay (Penghu Islands, Taiwan). Elevated levels of ammonia produced by the cages were the main pollutant and distinguished the cage-culture and intermediary zones (1000 m away from the cages) from the reference zone in the NE monsoon, indicating currents produced by the strong monsoon may have extended the spread of nutrient-enriched waters without necessarily flushing such effluents outside Magong Bay. Moreover, the levels of chlorophyll-a, dissolved oxygen, and turbidity were distinguishable between two seasons, suggesting that resuspension caused by the NE monsoon winds may also influence the water quality across this bay. It indicated that the impacts of marine cage culture vary as a function of distance, and also in response to seasonal movements of water driven by local climatic occurrences.     

Does geographic location impact the survival differential between screen- and interval-detected breast cancers?

Although mammography screening programs aim to diagnose breast cancer at an early stage, not all tumours are detected during the regular screening examination. This study examines the influence of various characteristics, including geographical residence, on the survival between screen- and interval-detected breast cancers among participants of a public population-based breast screening program in Queensland, Australia. The investigation was performed using the linked population-based datasets from BreastScreen Queensland and the Queensland Cancer Registry for the period of 1997–2008 for women aged 40–89 years at diagnosis. A Bayesian spatial relative survival modelling approach that accommodates rare outcomes in small geographic regions was adopted, with the use of Markov chain Monte Carlo computation, to evaluate the relative excess risk of breast cancer. In the multivariate Bayesian spatial model, higher relative excess risk of mortality was observed in interval-detected cancer (RER = 1.59, 95 % credible interval = [1.33, 1.89]) compared to screen-detected cancer. Higher cancer survival among the study cohort was also observed among younger women (40–59 years), those of non-Indigenous ethnicity, with localised (stage I) tumour stage as well as those not in the work force. There was no independent association with marital status. Moreover, there was no substantive evidence of either measured geographical or latent random spatial inequalities in survival among screening participants across Queensland, meaning the higher survival for screen-detected breast cancer patients compared to interval-detected women was consistent across the state. These results provide suggestive evidence supporting the effectiveness of the BreastScreen Queensland screening program in reaching socio-economically disadvantaged women as well as those living in rural and remote areas of the state, but also highlights the need for any interval cancer awareness programs to be geographically widespread.     

Application of a multi‐temporal,LiDAR‐derived,digital terrain model in a landslide‐volume estimation

Sediments produced by landslides are crucial in the sediment yield of a catchment, debris flow forecasting, and related hazard assessment. On a regional scale, however, it is difficult and time consuming to measure the volumes of such sediment. This paper uses a LiDAR‐derived digital terrain model (DTM) taken in 2005 and 2010 (at 2 m resolution) to accurately obtain landslide‐induced sediment volumes that resulted from a single catastrophic typhoon event in a heavily forested mountainous area of Taiwan. The landslides induced by Typhoon Morakot are mapped by comparison of 25 cm resolution aerial photographs taken before and after the typhoon in an 83.6 km² study area. Each landslide volume is calculated by subtraction of the 2005 DTM from the 2010 DTM, and the scaling relationship between landslide area and its volume are further regressed. The relationship between volume and area are also determined for all the disturbed areas (V_L = 0.452A_L^1.242) and for the crown areas of the landslides (V_L = 2.510A_L^1.206). The uncertainty in estimated volume caused by use of the LiDAR DTMs is discussed, and the error in absolute volume estimation for landslides with an area >10⁵ m² is within 20%. The volume–area relationship obtained in this study is also validated in 11 small to medium‐sized catchments located outside the study area, and there is good agreement between the calculation from DTMs and the regression formula. By comparison of debris volumes estimated in this study with previous work, it is found that a wider volume variation exists that is directly proportional to the landslide area, especially under a higher scaling exponent. Copyright © 2013 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Adsorption of Complex Pollutants from Aqueous Solutions by Nanocomposite Materials

In view of water pollutants becoming more complex, both anionic and cationic pollutants need to be removed. The multi‐pollutants simultaneous removal is paid more and more attention. Hence, development composite materials for treatment complex wastewater are the aim of this study. In this research, iron–nickel nanoparticles deposited onto aluminum oxide (α‐Al₂O₃) and carbon nanotubes (CNTs) to form nanocomposite materials Fe–Ni/Al₂O₃ and Fe–Ni/CNTs, respectively, were used as adsorbents. The adsorption capacities of Fe–Ni/Al₂O₃ and Fe–Ni/CNTs for AO7, HSeO, and Pb²⁺ were observed to be 5.46, 8.28, 27.02, and 25.6 mg/g, 15.29 and 17.12 mg/g, separately. The composite materials with negative charges were superior in adsorption of anionic pollutants. Using orthogonal experimental design and analysis of variance to co‐treat dye AO7, HSeO and Pb²⁺ in aqueous solutions, seven testing factors were included: (1) adsorbent types, (2) amount of iron, (3) solution pHs, (4) AO7 concentrations, (5) Pb²⁺ concentrations, (6) HSeO concentrations and (7) reaction time. The experimental results showed that the removal of complex pollutants AO7, HSeO, and Pb²⁺ on Fe–Ni/CNTs could reach up to 90% in the optimal treatment conditions. When using Fe–Ni/CNTs as the adsorbent, the sorption isothermals were well fitted in the Freundlich isotherm, and R² could reach up to 0.98.     

Two episodes of the Indosinian thermal event on the South China Block: Constraints from LA-ICPMS U–Pb zircon and electron microprobe monazite ages of the Darongshan S-type granitic suite

The Darongshan granitic suite (~ 10,000 km²) consists of five major units (Taima, Nadong and Jiuzhou plutons, and Pubei and Darongshan batholiths) typical of peraluminous S-type granitoids containing abundant granulite inclusions in the Cathaysia block, South China. Six samples from these plutons and batholiths have been investigated using both LA-ICPMS U–Pb age dating on zircon cores and EMP U–Th–Pb chemical age dating on monazite cores and rims. LA-ICPMS zircon results give similar major age populations ranging between 260 ± 3 and 250 ± 3 Ma for all units, with apparent older age peaks concentrated at 1020, 800, 430 and 330 Ma. On the other hand, EMP monazite results yield younger ages of 231–229 Ma for Nadong, Taima, Pubei and Darongshan and 224 Ma for Jiuzhou samples, with older age groups of 264 Ma for Taima and 256–250 Ma for Pubei units. Since the older monazite ages are similar to the majority of zircon ages, the latter are considered as inherited ages. Further because such zircon ages are similar with the emplacement time of the Emeishan large igneous province in western South China, they likely reflect the timing of metamorphism for the included fragments of granulitic crusts that had been formed by invasion of the Emeishan plume. The younger monazite ages, as present for all plutons and batholiths in the entire Darongshan area, are taken as the formation age of the host granites. Combining U–Pb zircon and EMP monazite ages known for Permo-Triassic high temperature and high pressure metamorphic rocks and granites in the Indochina block (e.g., the Kannack Complex of the Kontum massif), it is suggested that the Indosinian thermal activity had set records over both the Indochina (plus Simao) and South China blocks in two main episodes, one is 260–250 Ma and the other is 231–229 Ma. One plausible explanation is that these two blocks were one united continent before the Emeishan plume activity and an opening was triggered by this plume at ~ 260 Ma. Due to forces of the approaching Sibumasu block, both the South China and Indochina blocks were amalgamated again at ~ 230 Ma. We, therefore, advocate that double subduction of the plume-triggered oceanic crusts in opposite directions is responsible for the generation of the Darongshan granitic suite in the South China block and its counterpart in the Indochina block.