Survival of endospores of Bacillus subtilis on spacecraft surfaces under simulated martian environments: implications for the forward contamination of Mars

Experiments were conducted in a Mars simulation chamber (MSC) to characterize the survival of endospores of Bacillus subtilis under high UV irradiation and simulated martian conditions. The MSC was used to create Mars surface environments in which pressure (8.5 mb), temperature (-80, -40, -10, or +23 degrees C), gas composition (Earth-normal N2/O2 mix, pure N2, pure CO2, or a Mars gas mix), and UV-VIS-NIR fluence rates (200-1200 nm) were maintained within tight limits. The Mars gas mix was composed of CO2 (95.3%), N2 (2.7%), Ar (1.7%), O2 (0.2%), and water vapor (0.03%). Experiments were conducted to measure the effects of pressure, gas composition, and temperature alone or in combination with Mars-normal UV-VIS-NIR light environments. Endospores of B. subtilis, were deposited on aluminum coupons as monolayers in which the average density applied to coupons was 2.47 x 10(6) bacteria per sample. Populations of B. subtilis placed on aluminum coupons and subjected to an Earth-normal temperature (23 degrees C), pressure (1013 mb), and gas mix (normal N2/O2 ratio) but illuminated with a Mars-normal UV-VIS-NIR spectrum were reduced by over 99.9% after 30 sec exposure to Mars-normal UV fluence rates. However, it required at least 15 min of Mars-normal UV exposure to reduce bacterial populations on aluminum coupons to non-recoverable levels. These results were duplicated when bacteria were exposed to Mars-normal environments of temperature (-10 degrees C), pressure (8.5 mb), gas composition (pure CO2), and UV fluence rates. In other experiments, results indicated that the gas composition of the atmosphere and the temperature of the bacterial monolayers at the time of Mars UV exposure had no effects on the survival of bacterial endospores. But Mars-normal pressures (8.5 mb) were found to reduce survival by approximately 20-35% compared to Earth-normal pressures (1013 mb). The primary implications of these results are (a) that greater than 99.9% of bacterial populations on sun-exposed surfaces of spacecraft are likely to be inactivated within a few tens of seconds to a few minutes on the surface of Mars, and (b) that within a single Mars day under clear-sky conditions bacterial populations on sun-exposed surfaces of spacecraft will be sterilized. Furthermore, these results suggest that the high UV fluence rates on the martian surface can be an important resource in minimizing the forward contamination of Mars.     

Space-time visualization and analysis in the Cancer Atlas Viewer

This article describes the Cancer Atlas Viewer: free, downloadable software for the exploration of United States cancer mortality data. We demonstrate the software by exploring spatio-temporal patterns in colon cancer mortality rates for African-American and white females and males in the southeastern United States over the period 1970–1995. We compare the results of two cluster statistics: the local Moran and the local G*, through time. Overall, the two statistics reach similar conclusions for most locations. Where they disagree reveals functional differences in the kinds of local spatial variation to which the statistics are sensitive and identifies some interesting patterns in the data. There are only two persistent clusters of colon cancer mortality through time, and these are clusters of low values.This project was funded by grant CA92669 from the National Cancer Institute to BioMedware, Inc. The perspectives stated in this article are those of the authors and do not necessarily represent the official views of the National Cancer Institute. Constructive criticism from Heidi Durbeck of BioMedware, Peter Rogerson of SUNY-Buffalo, and three anonymous reviewers helped us improve the interpretation and presentation of these results.     

U.K.USAGE OF CHEMOMETRICS AND ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE IN QSAR ANALYSIS

A survey of members of the U.K.QSAR Discussion Group has been made to determine the extent ofuse and development of chemometric and artificial intelligence(AI)methods in the analysis ofmultivariate quantitative structure-activity relationship(QSAR)data in the U.K.Chemometric methodswere found to be well established in both industrial and educational establishments and there wassignificant method development occurring.AI methods were not employed to any great extent and thegeneral level of interest in these techniques was low compared to chemometric methods.A requirementfor more education in multivariate statistical methods and regression methods was indicated.A need fora user-friendly,comprehensive,commercially available multivariate statistical package containingmultivariate stability testing and regression diagnostic methods was identified.     

水土界面上的金属反应

土壤重污染会进一步污染水体,对土壤生物和植物生长不利,而且会把这些重金属引入食物链中,天然源和污染源金属的长期生物效力和运移性到决于从固体土壤中解吸到土壤溶液的能力,评述了土壤中金属解吸过程研究的现状,天然的和添加的金属从土壤中的解吸量随土遥ｐＨ值增加而降低,对金属解吸动力学的研究表明,金属解吸速度也随着土壤ｐＨ值的升高和接触时间的增加而降低。     

Approaches to the simulation of unconfined flow and perched groundwater flow in MODFLOW

Various approaches have been proposed to manage the nonlinearities associated with the unconfined flow equation and to simulate perched groundwater conditions using the MODFLOW family of codes. The approaches comprise a variety of numerical techniques to prevent dry cells from becoming inactive and to achieve a stable solution focused on formulations of the unconfined, partially-saturated, groundwater flow equation. Keeping dry cells active avoids a discontinuous head solution which in turn improves the effectiveness of parameter estimation software that relies on continuous derivatives. Most approaches implement an upstream weighting of intercell conductance and Newton-Raphson linearization to obtain robust convergence. In this study, several published approaches were implemented in a stepwise manner into MODFLOW for comparative analysis. First, a comparative analysis of the methods is presented using synthetic examples that create convergence issues or difficulty in handling perched conditions with the more common dry-cell simulation capabilities of MODFLOW. Next, a field-scale three-dimensional simulation is presented to examine the stability and performance of the discussed approaches in larger, practical, simulation settings.     

从有机碳／矿物表面积比值识别阿拉伯海东南部缺氧带的有机质保存

已公开出版了许多验证沉积物中有机物保存和局部海洋学条件之间关系的研究。然而缺少对不同局部参数［底部水氧（ＢＷＯ）、初始生产力、水柱深度、沉积速率等］重要性的研究。本文尝试通过测定受和不受缺氧水团影响的沉积物中有机碳／矿物表面积比值（ＯＣ／ＳＡ）确定缺氧底部水的存在和沉积物底部有机质量增加之间的一般关系。沿海岸边缘 ,沉积物粒度和有机质百分含量之间为负相关。该关系取决于细粒沉积物对扩散交换的阻抗、细粒沉积物和有机质颗粒间的相似水动力搬运特性或具较高表面细粒沉积物对有机质的吸附。此观察结果已用于解释缺…     

加拿大安大略西北部Schryburt湖碳酸岩杂岩体中的钙钛矿,铈铌钙铁…

安大略西北部Ｓｃｈｒｙｂｕｒｔ湖碳酸岩杂岩体的一套不含长英质、富含云母的碱性超镁铁质岩内，铈铌钙钛矿和Ｂａ－Ｆｅ锰钡矿与钙钛矿这发共生。围岩中主要为各种不同含量的Ｍｇ－橄榄石、金云母、磁铁矿、磷灰石和碳酸盐（通常为方解石），其次为少量的镁次透辉石。因此，它们相当于Ｒｏｃｋ（１９９０）所指的超镁铁质煌班岩（即方解霞黄煌岩），或Ｍｉｔｃｈｅｌｌ（１９９３）所指的黄长岩类的煌班岩相。杂岩体中的钙钛矿是主