A Slightly Modified Expression of the Polar Surface Area Applied to an Olfactory Study

The polar surface area of a molecule is currently defined as the surface sum over all polar atoms, primarily oxygen and nitrogen, also including their attached hydrogens (named PSA1 in the present study). Some authors also include sulfur and phosphor (PSA3). The slight modification suggested here is based on the fact that it is difficult to consider, on a theoretical point of view, hexavalent S and pentavalents N and P as polar atoms. Indeed, in these cases, all their peripheral electrons are involved in bondings. We propose to define PSA2 using the initial definition extended to O, S, N, P, with the exception of hexavalent S and pentavalents N and P. In order to test this hypothesis, the three expressions PSA1, PSA2 and PSA3 have been applied in a QSAR to a physiological phenomenon called comfort olfactory perceived intensity, for the human responses to 186 odorants (QSAR stands for Quantitative Structure Activity Relationship). The PSA2 expression has been selected as the more suitable, associated with two other molecular properties (molar refraction and Van der Waals molecular volume).

Using the physical decomposition method to study the effects of Arctic factors on wintertime temperatures in the Northern Hemisphere and China

The physical decomposition method separates atmospheric variables into four parts, correlating each with solar radiation, land-sea distribution, and inter-annual and seasonal internal forcing, strengthening the anomaly signal and increasing the correlation between variables. This method was applied to the reanalysis data from the National Centers for Environmental Prediction/National Center for Atmospheric Research （NCEP/NCAR）, to study the effects of Arctic factors （Arctic oscillation （AO） and Arctic polar vortex） on wintertime temperatures in the Northern Hemisphere and China. It was fotmd that AO effects on zonal average temperature disturbance could persist for 1 month. In the AO negative phase in wintertime, the temperatures are lower in the mid-high latitudes than in normal years, but higher in low latitudes. When the polar vortex area is bigger, the zonal average temperature is lower at 50N. Influenced mainly by meridional circulation enhancement, cold air flows from high to low latitudes; thus, the temperatures in Continental Europe and the North American continent exhibit an antiphase seesaw relationship. When the AO is in negative phase and the Arctic polar vortex larger, the temperature is lower in Siberia, but higher in Greenland and the Bering Strait. Influenced by westerly troughs and ridges, the polar air disperses mainly along the tracks of atmospheric activity centers. The AO index can be considered a predictor of wintertime temperature in China. When the AO is in negative phase or the Asian polar vortex is intensified, temperatures in Northeast China and Inner Mongolia are lower, because under the influence of the Siberia High and northeast cold vortex, the cold air flows southwards.

On inertial navigation and attitude initialization in polar areas

Inertial navigation and attitude initialization in polar areas become a hot topic in recent years in the navigation community,as the widely-used navigation mechanization of the local level frame encounters the inherent singularity when the latitude approaches 90°.Great endeavors have been devoted to devising novel navigation mechanizations such as the grid or transversal frames.This paper highlights the fact that the common Earth-frame mechanization is sufficiently good to handle the singularity problem in polar areas.Simulation results are reported to demonstrate the singularity problem and the effectiveness of the Earth-frame mechanization.

树轮记录的华北地区过去三个世纪的干旱变化

Droughts are the most frequent natural disaster in regions at the margins of the East Asian summer monsoon(EASM),which pose threats to agriculture,the economy,and human lives.However,the limitations of only approximately 60 years of meteorological observations hamper our understanding of the characteristics and mechanisms of local hydroclimate.Trees growing in the marginal region of the EASM are usually sensitive to moisture variations and have played important roles in past hydroclimatic reconstructions.Here,a 303-year tree-ring-width chronology of Pinus tabulaeformis from Mt.Lama,which is located in the junction of the Liaoning Province and Inner Mongolia,China,was used to reconstruct the May-August Palmer drought severity index(PDSI)in the marginal region of the EASM.The transfer function explains 48.0%(or 47.2%after adjusting for the loss of the degrees of freedom)of the variance over the calibration period from 1946 to 2012.A spatial correlation analysis demonstrates that our PDSI reconstruction can represent the drought variability on the northernmost margin of the EASM.The winter Asian polar vortex area index showed a delayed impact on the summer EASM precipitation in the following year.