Particle Fluxes in Hydrothermal Vent Fields of the Southern Part of the Mohns Ridge

Doklady Earth Sciences - The first results of studies of vertical particle fluxes in a hydrothermal sedimentary system of a subpolar area of the Mid-Atlantic Ridge under the influence of...     

Comparative 3D DEM simulations of sand–structure interfaces with similarly shaped clumps versus spheres with contact moments

Acta Geotechnica - Three-dimensional simulations of a monotonic quasi-static interface behaviour between initially dense cohesionless sand and a rigid wall of different roughness during tests in a...     

Improving Automated Geological Logging of Drill Holes by Incorporating Multiscale Spatial Methods

Mathematical Geosciences - Manually interpreting multivariate drill hole data is very time-consuming, and different geologists will produce different results due to the subjective nature of...     

High-frequency climate oscillations drive ice-off variability for Northern Hemisphere lakes and rivers

Climatic Change - This study examines the climatic drivers of ice-off dates for lakes and rivers across the Northern Hemisphere. Most lakes and rivers have trended toward earlier ice-off dates over...     

Differential sensitivity of flounder (Platichthys flesus) in response to oestrogenic chemical exposure: an issue for design and interpretation of monitoring and research programmes

This study was conducted as an initial investigation of 'differential response' in one of the main sentinel organisms used for monitoring programmes in United Kingdom estuaries, the flounder Platichthys flesus. It has been hypothesised that monitoring using species with a wide geographical spread and limited migration, such as flounder, might result in the comparison of different genetic stocks and certainly of populations with differing early life stage contaminant exposure histories. Furthermore, it is probable that these pre-exposure and genetic differences could manifest themselves in an ability to respond differently to contaminant exposure, so-called 'differential response'. It is important that the extent and nature of this response is understood, if we want to be able to fully interpret the monitoring data from such programmes. During this study, flounder were collected from four separate sources; wild caught fish from the estuaries of the Rivers Alde, Mersey and Tyne, and farmed flounder from Port Erin Farm, Isle of Man. Under controlled laboratory conditions, groups of fish from each source were exposed to water-borne concentrations of the synthetic oestrogen ethynylestradiol (EE2) at a nominal concentration of 50 ng/l. Plasma was taken from each male fish after 6 and 10 days exposure and analysed for the presence of vitellogenin (VTG) using an ELISA technique. Significant levels of VTG induction were evident in fish from all sources after both 6 and 10 days exposure. Flounder from the Mersey were the only fish with significantly elevated initial background levels of VTG (day 0) and this appeared to be reflected in that these specimens showed the highest induction response after day 6. However, after day 10, fish from all other sites had a slightly higher mean VTG than those from the Mersey which showed significantly (p < 0.05) lower mean plasma VTG. It is suggested that other differential responses may have been masked by the use of a high dose of EE2 which produced maximum induction in nearly all fish. The findings of the study are discussed in terms of implications for further research into the differential response issue and how the initial plasma VTG figures contribute to a time-series from the Mersey, Tyne and Alde estuaries.     

Mechanical compression release device in steel bracing system for retrofitting RC frames

1 Introduction Braced steel frames are commonly used to resist seismic loads. Their seismic behavior was extensively studied during the past decades (Bertero et al.., 1989; Roeder, 1989; Jain, 1978). Their design is governed by the buckling behavior of the bracing members (ASCE, 1994,2002; CSA, 1994). To prevent or delay the seismic buckling of compressive members in concentrically braced frames in steel structures, a great number of methods have been proposed. These include the use of sp…     

TERMO-LR Experiment on the Luna-27 Lander: Study of Thermophysical,Physicomechanical, and Electromagnetic Properties of the Lunar Soil

Solar System Research - The device is being developed for the TERMO-LR experiment on the Luna-27 lunar lander; it is intended for contact geophysical measurements of various properties of the lunar...     

On the Attractive Force of an Elliptical Gaussian Ring

Solar System Research - A numerical-analytical method for analyzing the orbital evolution of a planetary satellite under the influence of a perturbing body moving in an elliptical orbit is...