Galaxy evolution, cosmology and dark energy with the Square Kilometer Array

The present-day Universe is seemingly dominated by dark energy and dark matter, but mapping the normal (baryonic) content remains vital for both astrophysics – understanding how galaxies form – and astro-particle physics – inferring properties of the dark components.The Square Kilometer Array (SKA) will provide the only means of studying the cosmic evolution of neutral hydrogen (HI) which, alongside information on star formation from the radio continuum, is needed to understand how stars formed from gas within dark-matter over-densities and the rôles of gas accretion and galaxy merging.‘All hemisphere’ HI redshift surveys to z 1.5 are feasible with wide-field-of-view realizations of the SKA and, by measuring the galaxy power spectrum in exquisite detail, will allow the first precise studies of the equation-of-state of dark energy. The SKA will be capable of other uniquely powerful cosmological studies including the measurement of the dark-matter power spectrum using weak gravitational lensing, and the precise measurement of H₀ using extragalactic water masers.The SKA is likely to become the premier dark-energy-measuring machine, bringing breakthroughs in cosmology beyond those likely to be made possible by combining CMB (e.g. Planck), optical (e.g. LSST, SNAP) and other early-21st-century datasets.     

A new algorithm for the detection of intercluster galaxy filaments using galaxy orientation alignments

We present a new algorithm for detecting intercluster galaxy filaments based upon the assumption that the orientations of constituent galaxies along such filaments are non-isotropic. We apply the algorithm to the 2dF Galaxy Redshift Survey catalogue and find that it readily detects many straight filaments between close cluster pairs. At large intercluster separations  (≫15  h ⁻¹ Mpc)  , we find that the detection efficiency falls quickly, as it also does with more complex filament morphologies. We explore the underlying assumptions and suggest that it is only in the case of close cluster pairs that we can expect galaxy orientations to be significantly correlated with filament direction.     

Factors affecting the elimination of PCBs in the marine copepod Acartia tonsa

The effects of feeding, egg laying, and fecal pellet production on the elimination of polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs) from the marine copepod Acartia tonsa were studied in a series of experiments. Copepods were exposed to ¹⁴C-labelled Aroclor 1254 and allowed to depurate in clean seawater. Copepods fed during depuration eliminated PCBs more rapidly than unfed copepods whether or not the original PCB exposure medium had contained food. Both eggs and fecal pellets contained PCBs during depuration, with the weight specific concentration of PCB in the eggs (up to 407 ppm, dry weight) exceeding four times that in the females that produced them. Female copepods eliminated PCBs twice as rapidly as males, indicating that egg production is an important route for PCB elimination.     

The clearing of the Illawarra rainforests: problems in reconstructing Pre‐European vegetation patterns

Historical information is used in conjunction with a detailed knowledge of the environment and vegetation types of the Illawarra district to reconstruct the original extent of rainforest in the district. While most of the literature and popular opinion suggest that much of the Illawarra was covered in rainforest vegetation, historical accounts and the patterns of existing vegetation clearly indicate that the rainforests were much less extensive than this. Based on historical evidence, the present occurrence of rainforest and other vegetation and a detailed knowledge of the environmental requirements for local rainforest development, three major concentrations of rainforest have been delineated. Termed the ‘Illawarra’, ‘Yarrawa’ and ‘Berkeley’ brushes, these areas covered 12,000, 2,450 and 1,600 hectares, respectively. These brushes represented 70 per cent of the 23,000 ha of rainforest estimated to have occurred in the district before European settlement. Historical information is a valuable tool in ecological research, but a detailed knowledge of the interactions of the vegetation and environment are also required to reconstruct original vegetation patterns.     

The stable aryl hydrocarbon receptor agonist potency of United Kingdom Continental Shelf (UKCS) offshore produced water effluents

The in vitro aryl hydrocarbon receptor (AhR) agonist potency of offshore produced water effluents, collected from the United Kingdom Continental Shelf, was determined using the dioxin responsive (DR)-chemically activated luciferase expression (CALUX) assay. Octadecylsilane (C18) solid phase extraction (SPE) extracts of produced water were exposed to DR-CALUX cells for 24 h in order to investigate the contribution in potency from compounds that are stable to metabolism by the CALUX cells during exposure. The stable AhR agonist potency determined over 24 h was highly variable and ranged from 1 to 430 ng TCDD TEQ_CALUX l⁻¹. These data reflect the highly variable composition of produced water discharges from different production fields. It is recommended that further work be performed to characterise the full range of stable dioxin like AhR agonists present in offshore produced water discharges using techniques such as bioassay-directed analysis.     

Middle and Late Devonian microbial carbonates,reefs and mounds in Guilin,South China and their sequence stratigraphic,paleoenvironmental and paleoclimatic significance

The importance of calcimicrobes and microbialite in carbonate platform and reefal environments has been stressed in recent literature. Burne and Moore[1] introduced the term microbialite to describe the clotted, laminated and undifferentiated fabrics formed by mi-crobial communities. Microbialites are organosedi-mentary deposits that have accreted as a result of ben-thic (prokaryotic or eukaryotic) communities, trapping and binding detrital sediment[1]. Microbial organisms and microbialite are…     

Radiation properties of pulsar magnetospheres: observation,theory, and experiment

In the three decades since their discovery, the accumulated body of observational data from pulsar sources puts constraints on models that seek to explain their periodic radiation. This paper reviews this data, reports on a VLA search for haloes predicted by an early model, and reinvestigates a magnetospheric disk-field-aligned-current transmission line system as the origin of the observed radiation, with external wave excitation by as yet an unexplained source. Three dimensional, fully electromagnetic particle-in-cell simulations of the pulsar surface and magnetosphere are used to explore the waveshape and polarization properties of the observed radiation.