Batse spectroscopy detector calibration

We describe the channel-to-energy calibration of the Spectroscopy Detectors of the Burst and Transient Source Experiment (BATSE) on the Compton Gamma Ray Observatory (GRO). These detectors consist of NaI(Tl) crystals viewed by photomultiplier tubes whose output in turn is measured by a pulse height analyzer. The calibration of these detectors has been complicated by frequent gain changes and by nonlinearities specific to the BATSE detectors. Nonlinearities in the light output from the NaI crystal and in the pulse height analyzer are shifted relative to each other by changes in the gain of the photomultiplier tube. We present the analytical model which is the basis of our calibration methodology, and outline how the empirical coefficients in this approach were determined. We also describe the complications peculiar to the Spectroscopy Detectors, and how our understanding of the detectors' operation led us to a solution to these problems.     

Color display of well logs

Information displayed in image form is conventionally at least two-dimensional. One-dimensional data can also be displayed as imagery by amplitude slicing a function and representing these amplitude slices as grey levels or as intensities of a particular color. An image having length and width can be formed from one-dimensional data by arranging a sequence of such color levels along the length of the image, corresponding to the independent space or time variable, and by extending these color levels arbitrarily along the width of the image. Such an image is of arbitrary width and exhibits changes, or information, only along its length. If three such images are made, one in each of the three primary colors, each image representing a different one-dimensional function over the same range of a common independent space or time variable, standard primary color composition can be used to unite these three images into a single full-color image in either computer graphic or photographic media. When three different well logs from a single borehole are combined in this manner, the resulting full-color image is equivalent to a three-axis cross-plot of the logs involved. Because primary colors appear to the human eye to be orthogonal and miscible, the color image preserves all information present in the three original data sets.Further, because this color representation of data can be arranged conveniently in depth sequence, the color composite image presents both information best visualized in cross-plot presentation (e.g., lithologic clustering and differentiation) and information lacking in cross-plots that is best seen in conventional wiggle-trace displays of well logs (e.g., stratigraphic or depth sequence). Such color presentations of well log data reduce the number of displays competing for an interpreter's attention by uniting three wiggle traces into one display and relieve the burden of mentally combining data from several separate displays. Combined interpretation is particularly essential in well log interpretation where one must analyze individually ambiguous data sets; color log presentation automatically provides combination while leaving interpretation to the scientist. Color log images also present log data to the user in a form that differs from conventional wiggle trace and so appeals to a different and richer set of human perceptions and pattern recognition skills.     

Dietary greenhouse gas emissions of meat-eaters,fish-eaters,vegetarians and vegans in the UK

The production of animal-based foods is associated with higher greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions than plant-based foods. The objective of this study was to estimate the difference in dietary GHG emissions between self-selected meat-eaters, fish-eaters, vegetarians and vegans in the UK. Subjects were participants in the EPIC-Oxford cohort study. The diets of 2,041 vegans, 15,751 vegetarians, 8,123 fish-eaters and 29,589 meat-eaters aged 20–79 were assessed using a validated food frequency questionnaire. Comparable GHG emissions parameters were developed for the underlying food codes using a dataset of GHG emissions for 94 food commodities in the UK, with a weighting for the global warming potential of each component gas. The average GHG emissions associated with a standard 2,000 kcal diet were estimated for all subjects. ANOVA was used to estimate average dietary GHG emissions by diet group adjusted for sex and age. The age-and-sex-adjusted mean (95 % confidence interval) GHG emissions in kilograms of carbon dioxide equivalents per day (kgCO₂e/day) were 7.19 (7.16, 7.22) for high meat-eaters (?>?=?100 g/d), 5.63 (5.61, 5.65) for medium meat-eaters (50-99 g/d), 4.67 (4.65, 4.70) for low meat-eaters (?<?50 g/d), 3.91 (3.88, 3.94) for fish-eaters, 3.81 (3.79, 3.83) for vegetarians and 2.89 (2.83, 2.94) for vegans. In conclusion, dietary GHG emissions in self-selected meat-eaters are approximately twice as high as those in vegans. It is likely that reductions in meat consumption would lead to reductions in dietary GHG emissions.     

Late Pleistocene terrace deposits at Beckford,Worcestershire, England

The Pleistocene deposits in the area of the village of Beckford, in the Carrant Valley, Worcestershire are described. A radio-carbon date of 27,650±250 years B.P. has been obtained from plant material in the terrace deposits in the valley. Detailed studies have been made of the terrace sediments and of the remains of Mollusca and Coleoptera in fossiliferous layers. Frost structures are described and their stratigraphy considered. The nature of the local environment and regional climate in the final stages of the Upton Warren Interstadial period is reconstructed in detail. The terrace appears to have aggraded in a periglacial environment, dominated initially by solifluction processes. Extensive solifluction may have led to local diversions of drainage. In time, the climate deteriorated, becoming cooler and somewhat less continental with the onset of the main Devensian glaciation. This latter stage was characterised by extensive ice-wedge growth, aeolian activity and, subsequently, by river incision.