The sensitivity of oceanic precipitation to sea surface temperature

Our study forms the oceanic counterpart to numerous observational studies over land concerning the sensitivity of extreme precipitation to a change in air temperature. We explore the sensitivity of oceanic precipitation to changing sea surface temperature (SST) by exploiting two novel datasets at high resolution. First, we use the Ocean Rainfall And Ice-phase precipitation measurement Network (OceanRAIN) as an observational along-track shipboard dataset at 1 min resolution. Second, we exploit the most recent European Reanalysis version 5 (ERA5) at hourly resolution on a 31 km grid. Matched with each other, ERA5 vertical velocity allows the constraint of the OceanRAIN precipitation. Despite the inhomogeneous sampling along ship tracks, OceanRAIN agrees with ERA5 on the average latitudinal distribution of precipitation with fairly good seasonal sampling. However, the 99th percentile of OceanRAIN precipitation follows a super Clausius–Clapeyron scaling with a SST that exceeds 8.5 % K−1 while ERA5 precipitation scales with 4.5 % K−1. The sensitivity decreases towards lower precipitation percentiles, while OceanRAIN keeps an almost constant offset to ERA5 due to higher spatial resolution and temporal sampling. Unlike over land, we find no evidence for a decreasing precipitation event duration with increasing SST. ERA5 precipitation reaches a local minimum at about 26 ∘C that vanishes when constraining vertical velocity to strongly rising motion and excluding areas of weak correlation between precipitation and vertical velocity. This indicates that instead of moisture limitations as over land, circulation dynamics rather limit precipitation formation over the ocean. For the strongest rising motion, precipitation scaling converges to a constant value at all precipitation percentiles. Overall, high resolutions in observations and climate models are key to understanding and predicting the sensitivity of oceanic precipitation extremes to a change in SST

Structured matrices, continued fractions, and root localization of polynomials

We give a detailed account of various connections between several classes of objects: Hankel, Hurwitz, Toeplitz, Vandermonde and other structured matrices, Stietjes and Jacobi-type continued fractions, Cauchy indices, moment problems, total positivity, and root localization of univariate polynomials. Along with a survey of many classical facts, we provide a number of new results.Comment: 79 pages; new material added to the Introductio

Activation Energy of Metastable Amorphous Ge2Sb2Te5 from Room Temperature to Melt

Resistivity of metastable amorphous Ge2Sb2Te5 (GST) measured at device level show an exponential decline with temperature matching with the steady-state thin-film resistivity measured at 858 K (melting temperature). This suggests that the free carrier activation mechanisms form a continuum in a large temperature scale (300 K - 858 K) and the metastable amorphous phase can be treated as a super-cooled liquid. The effective activation energy calculated using the resistivity versus temperature data follow a parabolic behavior, with a room temperature value of 333 meV, peaking to ~377 meV at ~465 K and reaching zero at ~930 K, using a reference activation energy of 111 meV (3kBT/2) at melt. Amorphous GST is expected to behave as a p-type semiconductor at Tmelt ~ 858 K and transitions from the semiconducting-liquid phase to the metallic-liquid phase at ~ 930 K at equilibrium. The simultaneous Seebeck (S) and resistivity versus temperature measurements of amorphous-fcc mixed-phase GST thin-films show linear S-T trends that meet S = 0 at 0 K, consistent with degenerate semiconductors, and the dS/dT and room temperature activation energy show a linear correlation. The single-crystal fcc is calculated to have dS/dT = 0.153 {\mu}V/K for an activation energy of zero and a Fermi level 0.16 eV below the valance band edge.Comment: 5 pages, 5 figure

The design and fabrication of supramolecular semiconductor nanowires formed by benzothienobenzothiophene (BTBT)-conjugated peptides

π-Conjugated small molecules based on a [1]benzothieno[3,2-b]benzothiophene (BTBT) unit are of great research interest in the development of solution-processable semiconducting materials owing to their excellent charge-transport characteristics. However, the BTBT π-core has yet to be demonstrated in the form of electro-active one-dimensional (1D) nanowires that are self-assembled in aqueous media for potential use in bioelectronics and tissue engineering. Here we report the design, synthesis, and self-assembly of benzothienobenzothiophene (BTBT)–peptide conjugates, the BTBT–peptide (BTBT-C3–COHN-Ahx-VVAGKK-Am) and the C8-BTBT–peptide (C8-BTBT-C3–COHN-Ahx-VVAGKK-Am), as β-sheet forming amphiphilic molecules, which self-assemble into highly uniform nanofibers in water with diameters of 11–13(±1) nm and micron-size lengths. Spectroscopic characterization studies demonstrate the J-type π–π interactions among the BTBT molecules within the hydrophobic core of the self-assembled nanofibers yielding an electrical conductivity as high as 6.0 × 10−6 S cm−1. The BTBT π-core is demonstrated, for the first time, in the formation of self-assembled peptide 1D nanostructures in aqueous media for potential use in tissue engineering, bioelectronics and (opto)electronics. The conductivity achieved here is one of the highest reported to date in a non-doped state

Improvements of cloud particle sizing with a 2D-Grey probe

The potential of the 2D-Grey optical array probe (OAP) (with 10-μm resolution) to determine cloud microphysical properties is studied. Systematic test measurements with a spinning glass disk with sample spots of various sizes between 50 and 500 μm in diameter were conducted. These measurements show that the particle image diameter increases considerably if the particle crosses the illuminating laser beam at increasing distance from the object plane. Eventually, shadow images of the smaller spots lose even their circular image shape and appear fragmented. A method is proposed to improve the estimation of the nominal particle size of droplets from the recorded image by exploiting the four available shadow (grey) levels. Laboratory tests show that spherical particles from 50 to 500 μm in diameter can be properly sized with an rms uncertainty of less than 6. After discussion of the concept of depth of field in OAPs, a definition for the 2D-Grey probe is presented that is consistent with the standard definition for the 2D-C probe. The authors' measurements show the depth of field of the 2D-Grey probe to be three times larger than the value conventionally assumed for the 2D-C probe for which similar corrections have been recently discussed in the literature. Finally, the impact of these findings on particle size distribution for in situ measurements is discussed

Situationally edited empathy: an effect of socio-economic structure on individual choice

Criminological theory still operates with deficient models of the offender as agent, and of social influences on the agent’s decision-making process. This paper takes one ‘emotion’, empathy, which is theoretically of considerable importance in influencing the choices made by agents; particularly those involving criminal or otherwise harmful action. Using a framework not of rational action, but of ‘rationalised action’, the paper considers some of the effects on individual psychology of social, economic, political and cultural structure. It is suggested that the climate-setting effects of these structures promote normative definitions of social situations which allow unempathic, harmful action to be rationalised through the situational editing of empathy. The ‘crime is normal’ argument can therefore be extended to include the recognition that the uncompassionate state of mind of the criminal actor is a reflection of the self-interested values which govern non-criminal action in wider society

Falsification Of The Atmospheric CO2 Greenhouse Effects Within The Frame Of Physics

The atmospheric greenhouse effect, an idea that many authors trace back to the traditional works of Fourier (1824), Tyndall (1861), and Arrhenius (1896), and which is still supported in global climatology, essentially describes a fictitious mechanism, in which a planetary atmosphere acts as a heat pump driven by an environment that is radiatively interacting with but radiatively equilibrated to the atmospheric system. According to the second law of thermodynamics such a planetary machine can never exist. Nevertheless, in almost all texts of global climatology and in a widespread secondary literature it is taken for granted that such mechanism is real and stands on a firm scientific foundation. In this paper the popular conjecture is analyzed and the underlying physical principles are clarified. By showing that (a) there are no common physical laws between the warming phenomenon in glass houses and the fictitious atmospheric greenhouse effects, (b) there are no calculations to determine an average surface temperature of a planet, (c) the frequently mentioned difference of 33 degrees Celsius is a meaningless number calculated wrongly, (d) the formulas of cavity radiation are used inappropriately, (e) the assumption of a radiative balance is unphysical, (f) thermal conductivity and friction must not be set to zero, the atmospheric greenhouse conjecture is falsified.Comment: 115 pages, 32 figures, 13 tables (some typos corrected

Hyperbolic Fourier series and the Klein-Gordon equation

In an effort to extend classical Fourier theory, Hedenmalm and Montes-Rodr\'{\i}guez (2011) found that the function system $$e_m(x)=e^{i\pi mx},\quad e_n^\dagger(x)=e_n(-1/x)=e^{-i\pi n/x}$$ is weak-star complete in $L^{\infty}(\mathbb{R})$ when $m,n$ range over the integers with $n\ne0$. It turns out that the system can be used to provide unique representation of functions and more generally distributions on the real line $\mathbb{R}$. For instance, we may represent uniquely the unit point mass at a point $x\in\mathbb{R}$: $$\delta_x(t)=A_0(x)+\sum_{n\ne0}\big(A_n(x)\,e^{i\pi nt} +B_n(x)\,e^{-i\pi n/t}\big),$$ with at most polynomial growth of the coefficients, so that the sum converges in the sense of distribution theory. In a natural sense, the system $\{A_n,B_n\}_n$ is biorthogonal to the initial system $\{e_n,e_n^\dagger\}_n$ on the real line. More generally, for a distribution $f$ on the compactified real line, we may decompose it in a \emph{hyperbolic Fourier series} $$f(t)=a_0(f)+\sum_{n\ne0}\big(a_n(f)\,e^{i\pi nt}+b_n(f)\,e^{-i\pi n/t}\big),$$ understood to converge in the sense of distribution theory. Such hyperbolic Fourier series arise from two different considerations. One is the Fourier interpolation problem of recovering a radial function $\phi$ on $\mathbb{R}^d$ from partial information on $\phi$ and its Fourier transform $\hat \phi$, studied by Radchenko and Viazovska (2019). Another consideration is the interpolation theory of the Klein-Gordon equation $\partial_x\partial_y u+u=0$. For instance, the biorthogonal system $\{A_n,B_n\}_n$ leads to a collection of solutions that vanish along the lattice-cross of points $(\pi k,0)$ and $(0,\pi l)$ save for one of these points. These interpolating solutions allow for restoration of a given solution $u$ from its values on the lattice-cross.Comment: 90 page

Interpersonal Arrogance and the Incentive Salience of Power <i>Versus</i> Affiliation Cues

The arrogance dimension of the circumplex contrasts people who seemingly value power over affiliation (high arrogance) versus those who do not (low arrogance). Following this line of thinking, and building on an incentive salience model of approach motivation, three studies (total N = 284) examined the differential processing of power versus affiliation stimuli in categorization, perception and approach–avoidance paradigms. All studies found interactions of the same type. In study 2, for example, people high in arrogance perceived power stimuli to be larger than affiliation stimuli, but this differential pattern was not evident at low arrogance levels. People high, but not low, in arrogance also approached power stimuli faster than affiliation stimuli in a motor movement task (study 3). The results contribute to a process–based understanding of how interpersonal arrogance functions while linking such differences to the manner in which power versus affiliation cues are perceived and reacted to. Copyright © 2014 European Association of Personality Psychology </jats:p