Cosmic rays, solar activity, magnetic coupling, and lightning incidence

A theoretical model is presented and described that unifies the complex influence of several factors on spatial and temporal variation of lightning incidence. These factors include the cosmic radiation, solar activity, and coupling between geomagnetic and interplanetary (solar wind) magnetic fields. Atmospheric electrical conductivity in the 10 km region was shown to be the crucial parameter altered by these factors. The theory reconciles several large scale studies of lightning incidence previously misinterpreted or considered contradictory. The model predicts additional strong effects on variations in lightning incidence, but only small effects on the morphology and rate of thunderstorm development

Solar influence on terrestrial weather and global lightning patterns via cosmic ray modulations

A series of cosmic ray neutron monitor data which were used in three analyses: (1) solar activity influence on ionization of the upper troposphere and tropopause; (2) solar activity influence on Canadian high stratus in winter; and (3) the S3-4 satellite study of IMF/GMF magnetic coupling effects are reported. The magnetic coupling model of solar activity influence on atmospheric processes were investigated. The magnetic coupling model is used to explain a number of seemingly diverse studies lightning incidence is emphasized

Purchase Request Through Epicor System in Manufacturing Company

Purchase transaction is the most often performed transaction to fulfill the needs in a company. Company's needs shall be processed to be bought if purchase requisition for required items/services already be performed. This research aims to know the purchase requisition at sample company in terms of fulfilling the needs of the company which the procedure is carried out online through Epicor10 Environment system. Data collection methods used are interviews, direct observation, and literature reviews. Data obtained includes organizational structure, purchase requisition procedure, other various documents, and functions related to purchase requisition procedure. The result of this research shows that purchase requisition procedure applied by company has done fairly well, but there are some weaknesses in applying procedure. As for some of these weaknesses are no standards to create part number to register items or services to the system and multiple positioning causing inefficiency in purchase requisition procedure. It is recommended for the company to create clear standards, so that items or services needed can be processed easily and purchase requisition procedure is not obstructed by multi positioning

Numerical Mean Element Orbital Analysis with Morbiter

The Morbiter software numerically averages an osculating orbit s equations of motion (EOM) to arrive at the mean orbit s EOMs, which are then numerically propagated to obtain the long-term orbital ephemerides. The long-term evolution characteristics, and stability, of an orbit are best characterized using a mean element propagation of the perturbed, two-body variational equations of motion. The average process eliminates short period terms, leaving only secular and long period effects. Doing this avoids the Fourier series expansions and truncations required by the traditional analytic methods

Observation of Neutrons with a Gadolinium Doped Water Cerenkov Detector

Spontaneous and induced fission in Special Nuclear Material (SNM) such as 235U and 239Pu results in the emission of neutrons and high energy gamma-rays. The multiplicities of and time correlations between these particles are both powerful indicators of the presence of fissile material. Detectors sensitive to these signatures are consequently useful for nuclear material monitoring, search, and characterization. In this article, we demonstrate sensitivity to both high energy gamma-rays and neutrons with a water Cerenkov based detector. Electrons in the detector medium, scattered by gamma-ray interactions, are detected by their Cerenkov light emission. Sensitivity to neutrons is enhanced by the addition of a gadolinium compound to the water in low concentrations. Cerenkov light is similarly produced by an 8 MeV gamma-ray cascade following neutron capture on the gadolinium. The large solid angle coverage and high intrinsic efficiency of this detection approach can provide robust and low cost neutron and gamma-ray detection with a single device.Comment: 7 pages, 4 figures. Submitted to Nuclear Instruments and Methods,

The Highly Selective and Near-Quantitative Conversion of Glucose to 5-Hydroxymethylfurfural Using Ionic Liquids

A number of ionic liquids have been shown to be excellent solvents for lignocellulosic biomass processing, and some of these are particularly effective in the production of the versatile chemical building block 5-hydroxymethylfurfural (HMF). In this study, the production of HMF from the simple sugar glucose in ionic liquid media is discussed. Several aspects of the selective catalytic formation of HMF from glucose have been elucidated using metal halide salts in two distinct ionic liquids, 1-butyl-3-methylimidazolium chloride and 1-butyl-3-methylimidazolium hydrogen sulfate as well as mixtures of these, revealing key features for accelerating the desired reaction and suppressing byproduct formation. The choice of ionic liquid anion is revealed to be of particular importance, with low HMF yields in the case of hydrogen sulfate-based salts, which are reported to be effective for HMF production from fructose. The most successful system investigated in this study led to almost quantitative conversion of glucose to HMF (90% in only 30 minutes using 7 mol% catalyst loading at 120°C) in a system which is selective for the desired product, has low energy intensity and is environmentally benign

The rise of an ionized wind in the Narrow Line Seyfert 1 Galaxy Mrk 335 observed by XMM-Newton and HST

We present the discovery of an outflowing ionized wind in the Seyfert 1 Galaxy Mrk 335. Despite having been extensively observed by most of the largest X-ray observatories in the last decade, this bright source was not known to host warm absorber gas until recent XMM-Newton observations in combination with a long-term Swift monitoring program have shown extreme flux and spectral variability. High resolution spectra obtained by the XMM-Newton RGS detector reveal that the wind consists of three distinct ionization components, all outflowing at a velocity of 5000 km/s. This wind is clearly revealed when the source is observed at an intermediate flux state (2-5e-12 ergs cm^-2 s^-1). The analysis of multi-epoch RGS spectra allowed us to compare the absorber properties at three very different flux states of the source. No correlation between the warm absorber variability and the X-ray flux has been determined. The two higher ionization components of the gas may be consistent with photoionization equilibrium, but we can exclude this for the only ionization component that is consistently present in all flux states (log(xi)~1.8). We have included archival, non-simultaneous UV data from HST (FOS, STIS, COS) with the aim of searching for any signature of absorption in this source that so far was known for being absorption-free in the UV band. In the COS spectra obtained a few months after the X-ray observations we found broad absorption in CIV lines intrinsic to the AGN and blueshifted by a velocity roughly comparable to the X-ray outflow. The global behavior of the gas in both bands can be explained by variation of the covering factor and/or column density, possibly due to transverse motion of absorbing clouds moving out of the line of sight at Broad Line Region scale.Comment: 24 pages, 12 figures, ApJ accepte

Cellulosomal expansin: functionality and incorporation into the complex

Additional file 1: Figure S1. Cellulases GH48 and GH9 work in a synergistic manner. The recombinant putative C. clariflavum exoglucanase GH48 and endoglucanase GH9 were used for degradation of PASC (phosphoric acid-swollen cellulose) alone or combined. Reaction tubes were supplemented with 0.5 µM of each enzyme, or 1 µM in total of the two enzymes combined. The duration of the reaction was 3 h, and the level of cellulose degradation was assessed by measuring the amount of released reducing sugars. The combination of the two enzymes resulted in 1.29-fold enhancement of PASC degradation. Synergy was calculated by summation of the released reducing sugars from the degradation by each enzyme alone, and comparing it to the amount of released reducing sugars by the action of the two enzymes together