ALBERT

Description: State-of-the-art climate models have long-standing intrinsic biases that limit their simulation and projection capabilities. Significantly weak ENSO asymmetry and weakly nonlinear air–sea interaction over the tropical Pacific was found in CMIP5 (Coupled Model Intercomparison Project, Phase 5) climate models compared with observation. The results suggest that a weak nonlinear air–sea interaction may play a role in the weak ENSO asymmetry. Moreover, a weak nonlinearity in air–sea interaction in the models may be associated with the biases in the mean climate—the cold biases in the equatorial central Pacific. The excessive cold tongue bias pushes the deep convection far west to the western Pacific warm pool region and suppresses its development in the central equatorial Pacific. The deep convection has difficulties in further moving to the eastern equatorial Pacific, especially during extreme El Ni˜no events, which confines the westerly wind anomaly to the western Pacific. This weakens the eastern Pacific El Ni˜no events, especially the extreme El Ni˜no events, and thus leads to the weakened ENSO asymmetry in climate models. An accurate mean state structure (especially a realistic cold tongue and deep convection) is critical to reproducing ENSO events in climate models. Our evaluation also revealed that ENSO statistics in CMIP5 climate models are slightly improved compared with those of CMIP3. The weak ENSO asymmetry in CMIP5 is closer to the observation. It is more evident in CMIP5 that strong ENSO activities are usually accompanied by strong ENSO asymmetry, and the diversity of ENSO amplitude is reduced.

Description: We hereby present experimental and theoretical insights on the use of biomineralized magnetite nanoparticles, called magnetosomes, as heat nanoinductors in the magnetic hyperthermia technique. The heating efficiency or specific absorption rate of magnetosomes extracted from Magnetospirillum gryphiswaldense bacteria and immersed in water and agarose gel, was directly determined from the hysteresis loops obtained at different frequencies and magnetic field amplitudes. We demonstrate that heat production of magnetosomes can be predicted in the framework of the Stoner−Wohlfarth theory of uniaxial magnetic anisotropy subjected to significant dipolar interactions, which can be described in terms of an interaction anisotropy superimposed to that of each particle. Based on these findings, we propose optimal magnetic field amplitude and frequency values in order to maximize the heat production while keeping the undesired eddy current effects below safe and tolerable limits. The efficiency of magnetosomes as heat generators and their impact on cell viability has been checked in macrophage cells. Our results clearly indicate that the hyperthermia treatment causes both cell death and inhibition of cell proliferation. Specifically, only 36% of the treated macrophages remained alive 2 h after alternating magnetic field exposure, and 24 h later the percentage fell to 22%.

Description: The Southern Ocean ecosystem at the Antarctic Peninsula has steep natural environmental gradients, e.g. in terms of water masses and ice cover, and experiences regional above global average climate change. An ecological macroepibenthic survey was conducted in three ecoregions in the north-western Weddell Sea, on the continental shelf of the Antarctic Peninsula in the Bransfield Strait and on the shelf of the South Shetland Islands in the Drake Passage, defined by their environmental envelop. The aim was to improve the so far poor knowledge of the structure of this component of the Southern Ocean ecosystem and its ecological driving forces. It can also provide a baseline to assess the impact of ongoing climate change to the benthic diversity, functioning and ecosystem services. Different intermediate-scaled topographic features such as canyon systems including the corresponding topographically defined habitats ‘bank’, ‘upper slope’, ‘slope’ and ‘canyon/deep’ were sampled. In addition, the physical and biological environmental factors such as sea-ice cover, chlorophyll-a concentration, small-scale bottom topography and water masses were analysed. Catches by Agassiz trawl showed high among-station variability in biomass of 96 higher systematic groups including ecological key taxa. Large-scale patterns separating the three ecoregions from each other could be correlated with the two environmental factors, sea-ice and depth. Attribution to habitats only poorly explained benthic composition, and small-scale bottom topography did not explain such patterns at all. The large-scale factors, sea-ice and depth, might have caused large-scale differences in pelagic benthic coupling, whilst small-scale variability, also affecting larger scales, seemed to be predominantly driven by unknown physical drivers or biological interactions.