Description: Tellurium nanorods have been successfully fabricated by template and surfactant-free electrochemical technique from an aqueous solution at room temperature. The as-prepared tellurium nanorods were characterized by X-ray diffraction (XRD), scanning electron microscopy (SEM), transmission electron microscopy (TEM), Raman spectrometry, UV-vis spectroscopy and photoluminescence spectroscopy. Films based on tellurium nanorods were constructed to study the photoresponse and I-V curves. These photoresponse measurements demonstrate that tellurium nanorods exhibited enhanced conductivity under illumination compared to in the dark measurement.

Description: Based on an accurate atmospheric radiative transfer scheme, a parametrization of instantaneous global horizontal irradiance (GHI) at the Earth's surface has been developed. The scheme is named SUNFLUX and this article describes the development of the scheme for clear-sky conditions. The work dealing with clouds has been published in a separate article. Unlike traditional methods, this study applies the band model idea used in radiative transfer theory to the development of the surface radiation scheme and, importantly, includes absorption and scattering in the parametrization. Thus the scheme is more accurate compared with those using simple empirical approaches and may be applied to any site without being tuned for local conditions. The parametrization of aerosol transmittance and albedo developed by Kokhanovsky et al. is adopted to account for the effects of aerosols. All variables used in the scheme are available in climate models or from satellite observations. Therefore, the parametrization can be used to determine the GHI at the surface under clear-sky conditions The scheme is evaluated using observations obtained from three US Atmospheric Radiation Measurement (ARM) stations and three stations on the Tibetan Plateau, and the results demonstrate that the scheme is accurate. The relative mean bias difference is less than 4.3% and the relative root-mean-squared difference is less than 0.09%. Copyright © 2013 Royal Meteorological Society

Description: Earthward-propagating dipolarization fronts (DFs) are often found to be associated with magnetic reconnection and bursty bulk flows (BBFs) in the magnetotail. Recent THEMIS (Time History of Events and Macroscale Interactions During Substorms) probe observations have shown a DF propagating over 10 RE from the mid-tail region to the near-Earth tail region, and THEMIS All-Sky Imager data show a north-south auroral form and intensification of westward auroral zone currents. In this study, we examine THEMIS in situ observations of DFs in the magnetotail and simultaneous observations of the proton aurora from ground-based CANOPUS (the Canadian Auroral Network for the OPEN Program Unified Study) Meridian Scanning Photometers (MSPs). We find that earthward-moving DFs are often associated with intensification of proton aurora when the THEMIS probes are conjugate to the meridian of the MSP. The proton auroral intensifications are transient and in some cases detached from the background proton precipitation. Just before the DFs, the ion distribution is anisotropic in the field-aligned direction (mostly earthward) and the ion energy increases. These observations suggest that plasma sheet protons can be reflected and energized by earthward-moving DFs as they propagate through the magnetotail. We postulate that this population of ions is the source of the proton auroral intensification observed on the ground. This conjecture is tested using our global MHD simulation results, where the proton precipitation is calculated with the field-line curvature (FLC) model. The MHD simulation results show that proton precipitation enhancement can be caused by compression of plasma by approaching DFs/BBFs, which is consistent with ion reflection at DFs. Thus, using the conjugate observations from THEMIS spacecraft and MSP in this study, we are able to directly link the magnetotail dynamics, i.e., dipolarization fronts, with ground auroral activities. However, understanding of DF-associated ion energization requires detailed test-particle simulations with an analytical magnetotail model, such as those in our companion paper.

Description: [1]  The impact of changes in the abundance of greenhouse gases (GHGs) on the evolution of tropospheric ozone (O 3 ) between 1960 and 2005 is examined using a version of the Goddard Earth Observing System chemistry-climate model (GEOS CCM) with a combined troposphere-stratosphere chemical mechanism. Simulations are performed to isolate the relative role of increases in methane (CH 4 ) and stratospheric ozone depleting substances (ODSs) on tropospheric O 3 . The 1960 to 2005 increases in GHGs (CO 2 , N 2 O, CH 4 , and ODSs) cause increases of around 1–8% in zonal-mean tropospheric O 3 in the tropics and northern extratropics, but decreases of 2–4% in most of the southern extratropics. These O 3 changes are due primarily to increases in CH 4 and ODSs, which cause changes of comparable magnitude but opposite sign. The CH 4 -related increases in O 3 are similar in each hemisphere (∼6%), but the ODS-related decreases in the southern extratropics are much larger than in northern extratropics (10% compared to 2%). This results in an interhemispheric difference in the sign of past O 3 change. Increases in the other GHGs (CO 2 and N 2 O) and SSTs have only a small impact on the total burden over this period, but do cause zonal variations in the sign of changes in tropical O 3 that are coupled to changes in vertical velocities and water vapor.

Description: The impact of changes in the abundance of greenhouse gases (GHGs) on the evolution of tropospheric ozone (O3) between 1960 and 2005 is examined using a version of the Goddard Earth Observing System chemistry-climate model (GEOS CCM) with a combined troposphere-stratosphere chemical mechanism. Simulations are performed to isolate the relative role of increases in methane (CH4) and stratospheric ozone depleting substances (ODSs) on tropospheric O3. The 1960 to 2005 increases in GHGs (CO2, N2O, CH4, and ODSs) cause increases of around 1–8% in zonal-mean tropospheric O3 in the tropics and northern extratropics, but decreases of 2–4% in most of the southern extratropics. These O3 changes are due primarily to increases in CH4 and ODSs, which cause changes of comparable magnitude but opposite sign. The CH4-related increases in O3 are similar in each hemisphere (∼6%), but the ODS-related decreases in the southern extratropics are much larger than in northern extratropics (10% compared to 2%). This results in an interhemispheric difference in the sign of past O3 change. Increases in the other GHGs (CO2 and N2O) and SSTs have only a small impact on the total burden over this period, but do cause zonal variations in the sign of changes in tropical O3 that are coupled to changes in vertical velocities and water vapor.