Diet shift of upland buzzards (Buteo hemilasius): evidence from stable carbon isotope ratios

We measured the stable carbon isotope ratios for muscle of the upland buzzards (Buteo hemilasius), plateau pika (Ochotoma curzoniae), root vole (Microtus oeconomus), plateau zokor (Myospalax fontanierii) and passerine bird species at the Haibei Alpine Meadow Ecosystem Research Station (HAMERS), and provided diet information of upland buzzards with the measurement of stable carbon isotopes in tissues of these consumers. The results showed that δ~(13)C values of small mammals and passerine bird species ranged from -25.57‰ to -25.78‰ (n = 12), and from -24.81‰ to -22.51% (n = 43), respectively, δ~(13)C values of the upland buzzards ranged from -22.60‰ to -23.10‰ when food was not available. The difference in δ~(13)C values (2.88‰±0.31‰) between upland buzzards and small mammals was much larger than the differences reported previously, 1‰-2‰, and showed significant difference, while 1.31‰±0.34‰ between upland buzzard and passerine bird species did not differ from the previously reported trophic fractionation difference of 1‰-2‰. Estimation of trophic position indicated that upland buzzards stand at trophic position 4.23, far from that of small mammals, i.e., upland buzzards scarcely captured small mammals as food at the duration of food shortage. According to isotope mass balance model, small mammals contributed 7.89% to 35.04% of carbon to the food source of the upland buzzards, while passerine bird species contributed 64.96% to 92.11%. Upland buzzards turned to passerine bird species as food during times of shortage of small mammals. δ~(13)C value, a useful indicator of diet, indicates that the upland buzzards feed mainly on passerine bird species rather than small mammals due to "you are what you eat" when small mammal preys are becoming scarce.

芙蓉锡矿田骑田岭花岗岩黑云母矿物化学组成及其对锡成矿的指示意义

芙蓉锡矿田骑田岭复式岩体主要由早阶段角闪石黑云母花岗岩和晚阶段黑云母花岗岩组成.电子探针分析结果表明角闪石黑云母花岗岩中的黑云母属于铁黑云母,黑云母花岗岩中的黑云母属于铁叶云母.相对于黑云母花岗岩,角闪石黑云母花岗岩中黑云母的MgO、TiO2含量偏高,Al2O3含量偏低.矿物化学研究结果显示,角闪石黑云母花岗岩中黑云母的结晶温度、氧逸度(logfO2)分别为680℃～740℃、-16.00～-15.31,黑云母花岗岩中黑云母的结晶温度、氧逸度分别为530℃～650℃、-19.20～-17.50.从角闪石黑云母花岗岩到黑云母花岗岩,岩浆结晶温度和氧逸度逐渐降低.与花岗岩有关的共存流体性质的研究发现,与角闪石黑云母花岗岩共存的热液流体log(fH2O/fHF)fluid,log(fH2O/fHCl)fluid,log(fHF/fHCl)fiuid值分别为4.22～4.39,2.78～3.24,-1.82～-1.73,而与黑云母花岗岩共存的热液流体log(fH2O/fHF)fluid,log(fH2OfHCl)fluid,log(fHF/fHCl)fluid值分别为3.27～3.53,2.85～3.22,-0.75～-0.22,可见与两种岩石类型共存热液流体的性质存在明显差异,且热液中Cl、Sn含量变化与岩浆结晶分异指数呈正相关关系.骑田岭岩体从角闪石黑云母花岗岩到黑云母花岗岩,随着岩浆的演化.岩浆结晶期后分异出的热液流体向富Cl和Sn方向演化.芙蓉锡矿田的成矿流体应主要来源于黑云母花岗岩岩浆结晶期后分异出的岩浆热液.

甘肃金川Ⅱ号岩体岩相学特征及分离结晶过程探讨

金川Ⅱ号岩体主要由二辉橄榄岩和硫化物橄榄岩构成,中细粒含辉橄榄岩呈"上悬体"产于岩体顶部,与中粒二辉橄榄岩呈短程渐变关系,反映出岩浆或"晶粥"多期贯入的特点.在各岩相矿物之间的岩相学关系的研究基础上,结合热力学相图分析,本文认为金川Ⅱ号岩体造岩矿物的结晶顺序为:尖晶石、橄榄石、斜方辉石、单斜辉石和斜长石.同时,橄榄石结晶后与母岩浆发生反应,使橄榄石颗粒变为浑圆状.此外,矿体硫化物橄榄岩、硫化物含辉橄榄岩中堆积矿物橄榄石粒度明显小于硫化物二辉橄榄岩中橄榄石粒度,暗示在"晶粥"侵入浅部岩浆房之前,深部岩浆房底部已聚集了大量的硫化物矿浆.

乌江流域不同演化阶段水库汞的输入输出通量研究

北欧和北美的研究发现水库是典型的汞敏感生态系统，新建水库而引起的鱼体甲基汞污染问题已受到科学家的高度重视，而我国在这方面的研究比较薄弱。本论文选择乌江流域的6个水库作为研究对象，并根据年龄把这些水库划分为3个演化阶段，洪家渡、引子渡、索风营水库为初级演化阶段，普定、东风水库为中级演化阶段，乌江渡水库为高级演化阶段。对这6个水库总汞和甲基汞的输入和输出通量进行了研究，探讨了不同演化阶段的水库对总汞和甲基汞的“源/汇”作用，主要研究内容有以下三个方面：(1)各水库入出库河流中汞的分布特征；(2)大气降水中汞浓度及沉降通量的分布；(3)乌江流域不同水库汞的输入输出通量。通过本论文的研究，得出以下主要结论： 1. 乌江流域河流中总汞、颗粒态汞、溶解态汞、活性汞、总甲基汞、溶解态甲基汞的年均浓度分别为3.41±1.98、2.05±1.73、1.36±0.44、0.24±0.11、0.15±0.06、0.08±0.03 ng•L-1。与国内外其它河流的比较发现，总汞的浓度明显低于国外受污染的河流，略高于国外未受污染的河流。溶解态汞、活性汞、甲基汞的浓度略低于受污染的河流，与未受污染的河流基本相当。与同处在贵州喀斯特地区的阿哈湖、红枫湖、百花湖的入出库河流相比，总汞、溶解态汞、活性汞、甲基汞、溶解态甲基汞的浓度均明显偏低。 2. 水库的修建显著降低了出库河流中总汞、颗粒态汞的浓度，使总甲基汞和溶解态甲基汞的浓度升高，而且增加了出库河流中溶解态汞、活性汞、总甲基汞占总汞的比例。不同形态汞的沿程分布显示，梯级水库的修建改变了河流原有的汞的生物地球化学过程，使乌江多个河段的甲基汞升高，并且随着水库生态系统的不断演化，水库输出的甲基汞将增加，下游河流水体中甲基汞有继续升高的趋势。 3. 大气降雨中总汞、溶解态汞、颗粒态汞、活性汞、总甲基汞的浓度分别为7.49~149 ng•L-1、1.23~10.0 ng•L-1、5.76~142 ng•L-1、0.56~2.94 ng•L-1、0.08~0.82 ng•L-1，且以颗粒态汞为主，约占总汞比例的87%。总汞、溶解态汞、颗粒态汞、甲基汞的浓度有明显的季节变化趋势，冬春季高于夏秋季，而空间分布特征不明显。2006年总汞、甲基汞的年湿沉降通量为34.7±5.80 µg•m-2•yr-1、0.18±0.03 µg•m-2•yr-1，且主要受降雨量的影响。乌江流域降雨中总汞的浓度及其湿沉降通量远高于北美和日本，低于中国的一些城市地区（如长春和北京），而甲基汞的浓度和通量与其它地区相当。 4. 在乌江流域的不同水库中，降雨输入总汞和甲基汞的通量主要受降雨量和水库面积的影响，而与降雨的汞浓度间没有相关性。河流向水库输入总汞的量主要受河流流量的控制，而输入甲基汞和颗粒物的量受河流流量和浓度的影响。下泄水输出总汞、甲基汞、颗粒物的通量受浓度和流量的影响。由于流域面积/水面面积的比值较大，水库水量、总汞、甲基汞、颗粒物的输入以河流为主，分别占总输入的87%、80%、85%、86%。输出以下泄输出为主，下泄水输出的水量、总汞、甲基汞、颗粒物分别占总输出的80%、77%、86%、79%。 5. 从输入-输出通量的结果发现，各水库均表现为河流颗粒物输送的“汇”；除乌江渡水库外，其它水库均表现为总汞的“汇”；对甲基汞而言，引子渡、洪家渡、索风营水库表现为“汇”，而普定、东风、乌江渡水库则表现为“源”。 6. 普定和洪家渡水库中总汞的贮存率为56%和57%，明显高于其它水库，说明在上游有水库存在的情况下，水库对总汞“汇”的作用将降低。普定、东风、乌江渡水库中甲基汞的净通量分别为+69.4 g•yr-1、+368 g•yr-1、+857 g•yr-1，转化率为13%、73%、84%，说明甲基汞的净通量和转化率与水库的演化阶段有关，随着水库演化阶段的升高而增加，并且随着水库的不断演化，甲基汞将从“汇”变成“源”。

Measurements of the heat capacity of an azeotropic mixture of water and n-butanol from 78 to 320 K

Molar heat capacities of n-butanol and the azeotropic mixture in the binary system [water (x=0.716) plus n-butanol (x=0.284)] were measured with an adiabatic calorimeter in a temperature range from 78 to 320 K. The functions of the heat capacity with respect to thermodynamic temperature were established for the azeotropic mixture. A glass transition was observed at (111.9 +/- 1.1) K. The phase transitions took place at (179.26 +/- 0.77) and (269.69 +/- 0.14) K corresponding to the solid-liquid phase transitions of. n-butanol and water, respectively. The phase-transition enthalpy and entropy of water were calculated. A thermodynamic function of excess molar heat capacity with respect to temperature was established, which took account of physical mixing, destructions of self-association and cross-association for n-butanol and water, respectively. The thermodynamic functions and the excess thermodynamic ones of the binary systems relative to 298.15 K were derived based on the relationships of the thermodynamic functions and the function of the measured heat capacity and the calculated excess heat capacity with respect to temperature.

Automatic code generation of overlapped communications in a parallelisation tool

This paper addresses the exploitation of overlapping communication with calculation within parallel FORTRAN 77 codes for computational fluid dynamics (CFD) and computational structured dynamics (CSD). The obvious objective is to overlap interprocessor communication with calculation on each processor in a distributed memory parallel system and so improve the efficiency of the parallel implementation. A general strategy for converting synchronous to overlapped communication is presented together with tools to enable its automatic implementation in FORTRAN 77 codes. This strategy is then implemented within the parallelisation toolkit, CAPTools, to facilitate the automatic generation of parallel code with overlapped communications. The success of these tools are demonstrated on two codes from the NAS-PAR and PERFECT benchmark suites. In each case, the tools produce parallel code with overlapped communications which is as good as that which could be generated manually. The parallel performance of the codes also improve in line with expectation.

A run-time configurable software architecture for self-managing systems

This paper describes a highly flexible component architecture, primarily designed for automotive control systems, that supports distributed dynamically- configurable context-aware behaviour. The architecture enforces a separation of design-time and run-time concerns, enabling almost all decisions concerning runtime composition and adaptation to be deferred beyond deployment. Dynamic context management contributes to flexibility. The architecture is extensible, and can embed potentially many different self-management decision technologies simultaneously. The mechanism that implements the run-time configuration has been designed to be very robust, automatically and silently handling problems arising from the evaluation of self- management logic and ensuring that in the worst case the dynamic aspects of the system collapse down to static behavior in totally predictable ways.

A Quantitative and Mechanistic Assessment of Activated Thrombin-Activatable Fibrinolysis Inhibitor and its Role in Pathological Bleeding and Thrombosis

The coagulation and fibrinolytic systems are linked by the thrombin-thrombomodulin complex which regulates each system through activation of protein C and TAFI, respectively. We have used novel assays and techniques to study the enzymology and biochemistry of TAFI and TAFIa, to measure TAFI activation in hemophilia A and protein C deficiency and to determine if enhancing TAFI activation can improve hemostasis in hemophilic plasma and whole blood. We show that TAFIa not TAFI attenuates fibrinolysis in vitro and this is supported by a relatively high catalytic efficiency (16.41μM-1s-1) of plasminogen binding site removal from fibrin degradation products (FDPs) by TAFIa. Since the catalytic efficiency of TAFIa in removing these sites is ~60-fold higher than that for inflammatory mediators such as bradykinin it is likely that FDPs are a physiological substrate of TAFIa. The high catalytic efficiency is primarily a result of a low Km which can be explained by a novel mechanism where TAFIa forms a binary complex with plasminogen and is recruited to the surface of FDPs. The low Km also suggests that TAFIa would effectively cleave lysines from FDPs during the early stages of fibrinolysis (i.e. at low concentrations of FDPs). Since individuals with hemophilia suffer from premature fibrinolysis as a result of insufficient TAFI activation we quantified TAFI activation in whole blood from hemophilic subjects. Both the rate of activation and the area under the TAFI activation time course (termed TAFIa potential) was determined to be reduced in hemophilia A and the TAFIa potential was significantly and inversely correlated with the clinical bleeding iii phenotype. Using a novel therapeutic strategy, we used soluble thrombomodulin to increase TAFI activation which improved the clot lysis time in factor VIII deficient human plasma and hemophilic dog plasma as well as hemophilic dog blood. Finally, we briefly show in a biochemical case study that TAFI activation is enhanced in protein C deficiency and when afflicted individuals are placed on Warfarin anticoagulant therapy, TAFI activation is reduced. Since TAFIa stabilizes blood clots, this suggests that reducing TAFI activation or inhibiting TAFIa may help restore blood flow in vessels with pathological thrombosis.

Pre-Operative Visits to Reduce Patient Anxiety: A Study

The aim of this study was to evaluate the effect of pre-operative visits by theatre nurses on pre- and post-operative levels of anxiety in two groups of general surgical patients, and to see if the outcome was reflected in the level of post-operative pain, nausea, mobility or length of hospitalisation. One group received pre-operative visits while the other group did not. Results of the study showed a significant decrease in anxiety 24 to 72 hours post-operatively for the visited group. A positive relationship between pre-operative anxiety levels and the level of pain, nausea and lack of independence experienced by both groups was also found. Length of hospitalisation was unaffected by the level of anxiety experienced in both groups. The author recommends that all surgical patients should receive a visit from theatre nurses before their operation.