[1] Definitions of the extratropical tropopause are examined from the perspective of chemical composition. Fine-scale measurements of temperature, ozone, carbon monoxide, and water vapor from approximately 70 aircraft flights, with ascending and descending tropopause crossings near 40°N and 65°N, are used in this analysis. Using the relationship of the stratospheric tracer O 3 and the tropospheric tracer CO, we address the issues of tropopause sharpness and where the transitions from troposphere to stratosphere occur in terms of the chemical composition. Tracer relationships indicate that mixing of stratospheric and tropospheric air masses occurs in the vicinity of the tropopause to form a transition layer. Statistically, this transition layer is centered on the thermal tropopause. Furthermore, we show that the transition is much sharper near 65°N (a region away from the subtropical jet) but spans a larger altitude range near 40°N (in the vicinity of the subtropical jet). This latter feature is consistent with enhanced stratosphere-troposphere exchange and mixing activity near the tropopause break.
We report on a V ¼ 11:2 early K dwarf, , that hosts a R p ¼ 0:98AE 0:03 0:01 R J , M p ¼ 0:57 AE 0:06 M J transiting extrasolar planet, XO-2b, with an orbital period of 2:615857 AE 0:000005 days. XO-2 has high metallicity, ½Fe/H ¼ 0:45 AE 0:02, high proper motion, tot ¼ 157 mas yr À1 , and a common proper motion stellar companion with 31 00 separation. The two stars are nearly identical twins, with very similar spectra and apparent magnitudes. Due to the high metallicity, these early K dwarf stars have a mass and radius close to solar, M ? ¼ 0:98 AE 0:02 M and R ? ¼ 0:97AE 0:02 0:01 R . The high proper motion of XO-2 results from an eccentric orbit (Galactic pericenter, R per < 4 kpc) well confined to the Galactic disk (Z max $ 100 pc). In addition, the phase-space position of XO-2 is near the Hercules dynamical stream, which points to an origin of XO-2 in the metal-rich, inner thin disk and subsequent dynamical scattering into the solar neighborhood. We describe an efficient Markov chain Monte Carlo algorithm for calculating the Bayesian posterior probability of the system parameters from a transit light curve.
Particle size and volume measurements obtained with the forward scattering spectrometer probe (FSSP), model 300 during January and February 1989 in the Airborne Arctic Stratospheric Experiment are presented and used to study processes important in the formation and growth of polar stratospheric cloud (PSC) particles. Comparisons of the observations with expected sulfuric acid droplet deliquescence suggest that in the Arctic a major fraction of the sulfuric acid droplets remain liquid until temperatures at least as low as 193 K. Arguments are presented to suggest that homogeneous freezing of the sulfuric acid droplets might occur near 190 K and might play a role in the formation of PSCs. The first suggestion of nitric acid trihydrate (NAT) particles appears near saturation ratios of HNO3 with respect to NAT of 1 (about 195 K) as an enhancement, of the large particles on the tail of the sulfuric acid droplet size distribution. The major increases in number and volume indicative of the main body of the NAT cloud are not seen in these Arctic investigations until 191 to 192 K, which corresponds to an apparent saturation ratio of HNO3 with respect to NAT of about 10, unlike the Antarctic where clouds were encountered at saturation ratios near 1. A decrease in the number of particles was observed in regions in which the airmass was denitrified, i.e. NOy, the sum of all reactive nitrogen species, was reduced. This was especially true for the larger particles on the upper tail of the sulfate size distribution. The loss of these largest particles supports the idea that denitrification may be the result of the preferential nucleation and growth of NAT on only the largest sulfate particles, which then sediment out of the airmass.
We have obtained extensive photometric observations of the polluted white dwarf WD 1145+017 which has been reported to be transited by at least one, and perhaps several, large asteroids with dust emission. Observation sessions on 37 nights spanning 2015 November to 2016 January with small to modest size telescopes have detected 237 significant dips in flux. Periodograms reveal a significant periodicity of 4.5004 hours consistent with the dominant ("A") period detected with K2. The folded light curve shows an hour-long depression in flux with a mean depth of nearly 10%. This depression is, in turn, comprised of a series of shorter and sometimes deeper dips which would be unresolvable with K2. We also find numerous dips in flux at other orbital phases. Nearly all of the dips associated with this activity appear to drift systematically in phase with respect to the "A" period by about 2.5 minutes per day with a dispersion of ∼0.5 min/d, corresponding to a mean drift period of 4.4928 hours. We are able to track ∼15 discrete drifting features. The "B"-"F" periods found with K2 are not detected, but we would not necessarily have expected to see them. We explain the drifting motion as due to smaller fragmented bodies that break off from the asteroid and go into a slightly smaller orbit. In this interpretation, we can use the drift rate to determine the mass of the asteroid, which we find to be ≈ 10 23 grams, or about 1/10th the mass of Ceres.
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