University of California, Santa Barbara

About: University of California, Santa Barbara is a education organization based out in Santa Barbara, California, United States. It is known for research contribution in the topics: Population & Laser. The organization has 30281 authors who have published 80852 publications receiving 4626827 citations. The organization is also known as: UC Santa Barbara & UCSB.

Biological Effects Within No-Take Marine Reserves: A global Synthesis

Abstract: The study and implementation of no-take marine reserves have increased rapidly over the past decade, providing ample data on the biological effects of reserve protection for a wide range of geographic locations and organisms. The plethora of new studies affords the opportunity to re- evaluate previous findings and address formerly unanswered questions with extensive data synthe- ses. Our results show, on average, positive effects of reserve protection on the biomass, numerical density, species richness, and size of organisms within their boundaries which are remarkably simi- lar to those of past syntheses despite a near doubling of data. New analyses indicate that (1) these results do not appear to be an artifact of reserves being sited in better locations; (2) results do not appear to be driven by displaced fishing effort outside of reserves; (3) contrary to often-made asser- tions, reserves have similar if not greater positive effects in temperate settings, at least for reef ecosystems; (4) even small reserves can produce significant biological responses irrespective of lati- tude, although more data are needed to test whether reserve effects scale with reserve size; and (5) effects of reserves vary for different taxonomic groups and for taxa with various characteristics, and not all species increase in response to reserve protection. There is considerable variation in the responses documented across all the reserves in our data set — variability which cannot be entirely explained by which species were studied. We suggest that reserve characteristics and context, par- ticularly the intensity of fishing outside the reserve and inside the reserve before implementation, play key roles in determining the direction and magnitude of the reserve response. However, despite considerable variability, positive responses are far more common than no differences or negative responses, validating the potential for well designed and enforced reserves to serve as globally important conservation and management tools.

Abrupt deep-sea warming, palaeoceanographic changes and benthic extinctions at the end of the Palaeocene

Abstract: A remarkable oxygen and carbon isotope excursion occurred in Antarctic waters near the end of the Palaeocene (~57.33 Myr ago), indicating rapid global warming and oceanographic changes that caused one of the largest deep-sea benthic extinctions of the past 90 million years. In contrast, the oceanic plankton were largely unaffected, implying a decoupling of the deep and shallow ecosystems. The data suggest that for a few thousand years, ocean circulation underwent fundamental changes producing a transient state that, although brief, had long-term effects on environmental and biotic evolution.

On the spatial correlations of Abell clusters

Abstract: If rich clusters formed where the primordial density enhancement, when averaged over an appropriate volume, was unusually large, then they give a biased measure of the large-scale density correlation function determiend by the probability distribution of the density fluctuations on a rich cluster mass scale. If this distribution was Gaussian, the correlation function is amplified. The amplification for rich clusters is estimated to be eaual about ten and predicted trend of amplification with richness agrees qualitatively with that observed. Some implications of these results for the large-scale density correlations are discussed.

THE SINS SURVEY: SINFONI INTEGRAL FIELD SPECTROSCOPY OF z ∼ 2 STAR-FORMING GALAXIES*

Abstract: We present the Spectroscopic Imaging survey in the near-infrared (near-IR) with SINFONI (SINS) of high-redshift galaxies. With 80 objects observed and 63 detected in at least one rest-frame optical nebular emission line, mainly Hα, SINS represents the largest survey of spatially resolved gas kinematics, morphologies, and physical properties of star-forming galaxies at z ~ 1-3. We describe the selection of the targets, the observations, and the data reduction. We then focus on the "SINS Hα sample," consisting of 62 rest-UV/optically selected sources at 1.3 < z < 2.6 for which we targeted primarily the Hα and [N II] emission lines. Only ≈30% of this sample had previous near-IR spectroscopic observations. The galaxies were drawn from various imaging surveys with different photometric criteria; as a whole, the SINS Hα sample covers a reasonable representation of massive M_* ≳ 10^(10) M_☉ star-forming galaxies at z ≈ 1.5-2.5, with some bias toward bluer systems compared to pure K-selected samples due to the requirement of secure optical redshift. The sample spans 2 orders of magnitude in stellar mass and in absolute and specific star formation rates, with median values ≈3 × 10^(10) M_☉, ≈70 M_☉ yr^(–1), and ≈3 Gyr^(–1). The ionized gas distribution and kinematics are spatially resolved on scales ranging from ≈1.5 kpc for adaptive optics assisted observations to typically ≈4-5 kpc for seeing-limited data. The Hα morphologies tend to be irregular and/or clumpy. About one-third of the SINS Hα sample galaxies are rotation-dominated yet turbulent disks, another one-third comprises compact and velocity dispersion-dominated objects, and the remaining galaxies are clear interacting/merging systems; the fraction of rotation-dominated systems increases among the more massive part of the sample. The Hα luminosities and equivalent widths suggest on average roughly twice higher dust attenuation toward the H II regions relative to the bulk of the stars, and comparable current and past-averaged star formation rates.

Absolute electronegativity and hardness correlated with molecular orbital theory

Abstract: The concepts of absolute electronegativity, χ, and absolute hardness, η, are incorporated into molecular orbital theory. A graphic and concise definition of hardness is given as twice the energy gap between the highest occupied molecular orbital and the lowest unoccupied molecular orbital. Useful correlations can now be made between chemical behavior, visible-UV absorption spectra, optical polarizability, ionization potentials, and electron affinities.