We consider the time evolution in two spatial dimensions of a double vorticity layer consisting of two contiguous, infinite material fluid strips, each with uniform but generally differing vorticity, embedded in an otherwise infinite, irrotational, inviscid incompressible fluid. The potential application is to the wake dynamics formed by two boundary layers separating from a splitter plate. A thin-layer approximation is constructed where each layer thickness, measured normal to the common centre curve, is small in comparison with the local radius of curvature of the centre curve. The three-curve equations of contour dynamics that fully describe the double-layer dynamics are expanded in the small thickness parameter. At leading order, closed nonlinear initial-value evolution equations are obtained that describe the motion of the centre curve together with the time and spatial variation of each layer thickness. In the special case where the layer vorticities are equal, these equations reduce to the single-layer equation of Moore (Stud. Appl. Math., vol. 58, 1978, pp. 119–140). Analysis of the linear stability of the first-order equations to small-amplitude perturbations shows Kelvin–Helmholtz instability when the far-field fluid velocities on either side of the double layer are unequal. Equal velocities define a circulation-free double vorticity layer, for which solution of the initial-value problem using the Laplace transform reveals a double pole in transform space leading to linear algebraic growth in general, but there is a class of interesting initial conditions with no linear growth. This is shown to agree with the long-wavelength limit of the full linearized, three-curve stability equations.

The gomphotheres were a diverse and widespread group of proboscideans occupying Eurasia, North America, and South America throughout the Neogene. Their decline was temporally and spatially heterogeneous, and the gomphotheres ultimately became extinct during the late Pleistocene; however, the genus Cuvieronius is rarely represented in late Pleistocene assemblages in North America. Two alternative hypotheses have been invoked to explain this phenomenon: (1) competitive exclusion by sympatric mammoths and mastodons or (2) ecologic displacement due to an environmental transition from closed forests to open grasslands. To test whether competition for resources contributed to the demise of North American Cuvieronius, we present herein a large collection of stable isotope and dental microwear data from populations occupying their Pleistocene refugium in the Atlantic Coastal Plain. Results suggest that Cuvieronius consumed a wide range of resources with variable textural and photosynthetic properties and was not specialized on either grasses or browse. Further, we document evidence for the consumption of similar foods between contemporaneous gomphotheres, mammoths, and mastodons. The generalist feeding strategy of the gomphotheres likely facilitated their high Miocene abundance and diversity. However, this “jack of all trades and master of none” feeding strategy may have proved challenging following the arrival of mammoths and likely contributed to the extirpation of Cuvieronius in North America.

Measurements made by an underwater glider deployed near the Ross Ice Shelf were used to identify the presence of Ice Shelf Water (ISW), which is defined as seawater with its potential temperature lower than its surface freezing point temperature. Properties logged by the glider included in situ temperature, electrical conductivity, pressure, GPS location at surfacings and time. For most of the first 30 recorded dives of its deployment, evidence suggests the glider was prevented from surfacing due to being under the ice shelf. For dives under the ice shelf, farthest from the ice shelf front, ISW layers of varying thicknesses and depth locations were observed; between 2 m thick (centred at 231 m depth) to >93 m thick (centred at >360 m). For dives under the ice shelf, close to the ice shelf front, either no ISW was observed or ISW layers were centred at shallower depths (116–127 m). Thicker ISW layers (e.g. up to 250 m thickness centred at 421 m) were observed for some glider dives in open water in front of the Ross Ice Shelf. No in situ supercooling (water colder than the pressure-dependent freezing point temperature) was observed.

In university research on the flow through turbo-machines it is often necessary to produce blades which can be manufactured in a small workshop at relatively low cost. As part of a project to investigate the development of the annulus wall boundary layers in a compressor, a set of rotor blades were designed and manufactured for the large rotating cascade wind tunnel at Cambridge University. The apparatus is shown in outline in Fig. 1 and a detailed description of this wind tunnel has been given by Oxford. The air passes through the research rotor and then through the auxiliary fan and throttle. The combination of a variable speed research rotor with variable speed and pitch on the auxiliary fan and variable throttle leads to a highly versatile apparatus with a wide range of operation. An important feature of this apparatus is the sixteen channel pressure transfer device which allows pressures measured on the rotating blade to be transmitted out to a stationary multi-tub manometer.

The design and construction of the 30 m2 Bicentennial Gamma Ray Telescope at Woomera South Australia is described. This novel instrument is now completed and commissioning is underway. It is designed to observe astronomical sources at energies greater than ∼ 500 GeV by means of atmospheric Cerenkov light. It contains 55 spherical, glass mirrors of focal length 2.66 m arranged in three groups of 10 m2, to focus the light onto three sets of detectors operated in fast co-incidence. The recording electronics includes a rubidium clock to enable pulsars to be studied.

A distinctive feature of polar regions is the formation of ice clusters attached to the seabed, known as ‘anchor ice’. Anchor ice plays an important role in mobilizing bed sediments, and serves ecological roles providing habitats, or as an agent of disturbance creating potentially fatal environments to benthic fauna. The sublittoral zone associated with the landward margin represents the most likely environment for anchor ice formation, where conditions conducive to the advection of supercooled water from sub-ice-shelf cavities are favourable. We develop a framework to estimate the areal extent of anchor ice formation assuming a northerly flow of 75m deep supercooled water plumes from the Ross and McMurdo Ice Shelf cavities, Antarctica. In McMurdo Sound our results indicate that regions beneath the McMurdo Ice Shelf, extending along Brown Peninsula and White and Black Islands, are likely conducive to anchor ice formation. Anchor ice may also form along the Hut Point Peninsula and around Ross Island, and in pockets along the southern Victoria Land coast. The limitations of our approach include an imposed northerly flow of Ice Shelf Water, poorly constrained sub-ice-shelf bathymetry, and temporal variability in supercooled water depth production, particularly in the eastern Sound.

A new quantitative X-ray powder diffraction (QXRPD) method has been developed to analyze polyphase crystalline mixtures. The unique approach employed in this method is the utilization of the full diffraction pattern of a mixture and its reconstruction as a weighted sum of diffraction patterns of the component phases. To facilitate the use of the new method, menu-driven interactive computer programs with graphics have been developed for the VAX series of computers. The analyst builds a reference database of component diffraction patterns, corrects the patterns for background effects, and determines the appropriate reference intensity ratios. This database is used to calculate the weight fraction of each phase in a mixture by fitting its diffraction pattern with a least-squares best-fit weighted sum of selected database reference patterns.

The new QXRPD method was evaluated using oxides found in ceramics, corrosion products, and other materials encountered in the laboratory. Experimental procedures have been developed for sample preparation and data collection for reference samples and unknowns. Prepared mixtures have been used to demonstrate the very good results that can be obtained with this method.

The dependence of oxygen isotope fractionation on ice growth rate during the freezing of sea water is investigated based on laboratory experiments and field observations in McMurdo Sound, Antarctica. The laboratory experiments were performed in a tank filled with sea water, with sea ice grown under calm conditions at various room temperatures ranging from −5°C to −20°C. In McMurdo Sound, the ice growth rate was monitored using thermistor probes for first-year landfast ice that grew to ∼2 m in thickness. Combining these datasets allows, for the first time, examination of fractionation at a wide range of growth rates from 0.8 × 10−7 to 9.3 × 10−7 m s−1. In the analysis a stagnant boundary-layer model is parameterized using these two independent datasets. As a result, the optimum values of equilibrium pure-ice fractionation factor and boundary-layer thickness are estimated. It is suggested that a regime shift may occur at a growth rate of ∼2.0 × 10−7 m s−1. A case study on sea ice in the Sea of Okhotsk, where the growth rate is modeled by coupling the thermodynamic properties of the sea ice with meteorological data, demonstrates the utility of the fitted models.

Some meat retailers have introduced a trade embargo on fat lambs sold through livestock markets on the grounds that welfare standards associated with live auction markets are said to be worse than standards associated with direct sale to abattoirs. The current study examined the handling difficulties and welfare standards at 24 UK livestock markets. Comparisons were made according to class of animal (store, fat, breeding animals, etc.) and throughput of the market: <100 livestock units (LU) per week, 100–300 LU per week and >300 LU per week. Handling problems examined included refusal to move, balking, slips, falls, impacts, isolation leading to apparent distress, confusion while loading onto vehicles and inappropriate handling such as wool pulling. The overall prevalence of each handling problem was low (usually <0·05 of the sheep). The most common difficulties were impacts, slips and falls when grading fat lambs, and confusion or refusal to load onto the vehicles after the sale in ewes. Store lambs were generally easier to handle than fat lambs. They were less prone to refusing to move, balking, impacts, slips and falls. In fat lambs, slips and falls during grading were more common at small markets, while at larger markets there were more impacts, slips and falls during selling. Confusion during loading onto vehicles after the sale was more common in breeding ewes and rams, and at small markets. Projections in the corridors that were considered to be potential bruising or impact points were found in 0·33 of the markets and 0·71 did not have a way of ensuring that legs could not get trapped between gates and gateposts if sheep attempted to jump out of a holding pen. In most other respects the prevalence of problems with the facilities and during handling was low and it was concluded that a trade embargo on selling fat lambs in markets might not be justified.

Radiation damage and the effect on physical and chemical properties is an important component in the prediction of the long-term stability of waste form materials. As part of the ongoing goal of increasing the accuracy of long-term predictions of radiation damage, two types of material, based on proposed materials with a waste form application have been irradiated. Results have shown that Y2TiO5 (Y2.67Ti1.33O6.67), and Yb2TiO5 (Yb2.67Ti1.33O6.67), both of which are non-stoichiometric, disordered pyrochlore-based compounds, behave significantly different to the stoichiometric, ordered pyrochlore equivalent. For example the critical temperature, the temperature above which materials remain crystalline during irradiation, is found to decrease from the ordered equivalents, e.g. Y2Ti2O7. A second material based on La2TiO5 has been found to behave differently to both La2/3TiO3 and La2Ti2O7, with a change in Tc of ∼ 200 K.