Pressure
Pressure is the force applied perpendicular to the surface of an object per unit area over which that force is distributed. Gauge pressure is the pressure relative to the ambient pressure. Various units are used to express pressure; some of these derive from a unit of force divided by a unit of area. Pressure may be expressed in terms of standard atmospheric pressure. Manometric units such as the centimetre of water, millimetre of mercury, inch of mercury are used to express pressures in terms of the height of column of a particular fluid in a manometer. Pressure is the amount of force applied at right angles to the surface of an object per unit area; the symbol for it is p or P. The IUPAC recommendation for pressure is a lower-case p. However, upper-case P is used; the usage of P vs p depends upon the field in which one is working, on the nearby presence of other symbols for quantities such as power and momentum, on writing style. Mathematically: p = F A, where: p is the pressure, F is the magnitude of the normal force, A is the area of the surface on contact.
Pressure is a scalar quantity. It relates the vector surface element with the normal force acting on it; the pressure is the scalar proportionality constant that relates the two normal vectors: d F n = − p d A = − p n d A. The minus sign comes from the fact that the force is considered towards the surface element, while the normal vector points outward; the equation has meaning in that, for any surface S in contact with the fluid, the total force exerted by the fluid on that surface is the surface integral over S of the right-hand side of the above equation. It is incorrect to say "the pressure is directed in such or such direction"; the pressure, as a scalar, has no direction. The force given by the previous relationship to the quantity has a direction, but the pressure does not. If we change the orientation of the surface element, the direction of the normal force changes accordingly, but the pressure remains the same. Pressure is distributed to solid boundaries or across arbitrary sections of fluid normal to these boundaries or sections at every point.
It is a fundamental parameter in thermodynamics, it is conjugate to volume. The SI unit for pressure is the pascal, equal to one newton per square metre; this name for the unit was added in 1971. Other units of pressure, such as pounds per square inch and bar, are in common use; the CGS unit of pressure is 0.1 Pa.. Pressure is sometimes expressed in grams-force or kilograms-force per square centimetre and the like without properly identifying the force units, but using the names kilogram, kilogram-force, or gram-force as units of force is expressly forbidden in SI. The technical atmosphere is 1 kgf/cm2. Since a system under pressure has the potential to perform work on its surroundings, pressure is a measure of potential energy stored per unit volume, it is therefore related to energy density and may be expressed in units such as joules per cubic metre. Mathematically: p =; some meteorologists prefer the hectopascal for atmospheric air pressure, equivalent to the older unit millibar. Similar pressures are given in kilopascals in most other fields, where the hecto- prefix is used.
The inch of mercury is still used in the United States. Oceanographers measure underwater pressure in decibars because pressure in the ocean increases by one decibar per metre depth; the standard atmosphere is an established constant. It is equal to typical air pressure at Earth mean sea level and is defined as 101325 Pa; because pressure is measured by its ability to displace a column of liquid in a manometer, pressures are expressed as a depth of a particular fluid. The most common choices are water; the pressure exerted by a column of liquid of height h and density ρ is given by the hydrostatic pressure equation p = ρgh, where g is the gravitational acceleration. Fluid density and local gravity can vary from one reading to another depending on local factors, so the height of a fluid column
Ecology
Ecology is the branch of biology which studies the interactions among organisms and their environment. Objects of study include interactions of organisms that include biotic and abiotic components of their environment. Topics of interest include the biodiversity, distribution and populations of organisms, as well as cooperation and competition within and between species. Ecosystems are dynamically interacting systems of organisms, the communities they make up, the non-living components of their environment. Ecosystem processes, such as primary production, nutrient cycling, niche construction, regulate the flux of energy and matter through an environment; these processes are sustained by organisms with specific life history traits. Biodiversity means the varieties of species and ecosystems, enhances certain ecosystem services. Ecology is not synonymous with natural history, or environmental science, it overlaps with the related sciences of evolutionary biology and ethology. An important focus for ecologists is to improve the understanding of how biodiversity affects ecological function.
Ecologists seek to explain: Life processes and adaptations The movement of materials and energy through living communities The successional development of ecosystems The abundance and distribution of organisms and biodiversity in the context of the environment. Ecology has practical applications in conservation biology, wetland management, natural resource management, city planning, community health, economics and applied science, human social interaction. For example, the Circles of Sustainability approach treats ecology as more than the environment'out there', it is not treated as separate from humans. Organisms and resources compose ecosystems which, in turn, maintain biophysical feedback mechanisms that moderate processes acting on living and non-living components of the planet. Ecosystems sustain life-supporting functions and produce natural capital like biomass production, the regulation of climate, global biogeochemical cycles, water filtration, soil formation, erosion control, flood protection, many other natural features of scientific, economic, or intrinsic value.
The word "ecology" was coined in 1866 by the German scientist Ernst Haeckel. Ecological thought is derivative of established currents in philosophy from ethics and politics. Ancient Greek philosophers such as Hippocrates and Aristotle laid the foundations of ecology in their studies on natural history. Modern ecology became a much more rigorous science in the late 19th century. Evolutionary concepts relating to adaptation and natural selection became the cornerstones of modern ecological theory; the scope of ecology contains a wide array of interacting levels of organization spanning micro-level to a planetary scale phenomena. Ecosystems, for example, contain interacting life forms. Ecosystems are dynamic, they do not always follow a linear successional path, but they are always changing and sometimes so that it can take thousands of years for ecological processes to bring about certain successional stages of a forest. An ecosystem's area can vary from tiny to vast. A single tree is of little consequence to the classification of a forest ecosystem, but critically relevant to organisms living in and on it.
Several generations of an aphid population can exist over the lifespan of a single leaf. Each of those aphids, in turn, support diverse bacterial communities; the nature of connections in ecological communities cannot be explained by knowing the details of each species in isolation, because the emergent pattern is neither revealed nor predicted until the ecosystem is studied as an integrated whole. Some ecological principles, however, do exhibit collective properties where the sum of the components explain the properties of the whole, such as birth rates of a population being equal to the sum of individual births over a designated time frame; the main subdisciplines of ecology, population ecology and ecosystem ecology, exhibit a difference not only of scale, but of two contrasting paradigms in the field. The former focus on organisms distribution and abundance, while the focus on materials and energy fluxes; the scale of ecological dynamics can operate like a closed system, such as aphids migrating on a single tree, while at the same time remain open with regard to broader scale influences, such as atmosphere or climate.
Hence, ecologists classify ecosystems hierarchically by analyzing data collected from finer scale units, such as vegetation associations and soil types, integrate this information to identify emergent patterns of uniform organization and processes that operate on local to regional and chronological scales. To structure the study of ecology into a conceptually manageable framework, the biological world is organized into a nested hierarchy, ranging in scale from genes, to cells, to tissues, to organs, to organisms, to species, to populations, to communities, to ecosystems, to biomes, up to the level of the biosphere; this framework exhibits non-linear behaviors.
Sludge
Sludge is a semi-solid slurry that can be produced from a range of industrial processes, from water treatment, wastewater treatment or on-site sanitation systems. For example, it can be produced as a settled suspension obtained from conventional drinking water treatment, as sewage sludge from wastewater treatment processes or as fecal sludge from pit latrines and septic tanks; the term is sometimes used as a generic term for solids separated from suspension in a liquid. Industrial wastewater treatment plants produce solids that are referred to as sludge; this can be generated from physical-chemical processes. In the activated sludge process for wastewater treatment, the terms "waste activated sludge" and "return activated sludge" are used
Nitrogen
Nitrogen is a chemical element with symbol N and atomic number 7. It was first discovered and isolated by Scottish physician Daniel Rutherford in 1772. Although Carl Wilhelm Scheele and Henry Cavendish had independently done so at about the same time, Rutherford is accorded the credit because his work was published first; the name nitrogène was suggested by French chemist Jean-Antoine-Claude Chaptal in 1790, when it was found that nitrogen was present in nitric acid and nitrates. Antoine Lavoisier suggested instead the name azote, from the Greek ἀζωτικός "no life", as it is an asphyxiant gas. Nitrogen is the lightest member of group 15 of the periodic table called the pnictogens; the name comes from the Greek πνίγειν "to choke", directly referencing nitrogen's asphyxiating properties. It is a common element in the universe, estimated at about seventh in total abundance in the Milky Way and the Solar System. At standard temperature and pressure, two atoms of the element bind to form dinitrogen, a colourless and odorless diatomic gas with the formula N2.
Dinitrogen forms about 78 % of Earth's atmosphere. Nitrogen occurs in all organisms in amino acids, in the nucleic acids and in the energy transfer molecule adenosine triphosphate; the human body contains about 3% nitrogen by mass, the fourth most abundant element in the body after oxygen and hydrogen. The nitrogen cycle describes movement of the element from the air, into the biosphere and organic compounds back into the atmosphere. Many industrially important compounds, such as ammonia, nitric acid, organic nitrates, cyanides, contain nitrogen; the strong triple bond in elemental nitrogen, the second strongest bond in any diatomic molecule after carbon monoxide, dominates nitrogen chemistry. This causes difficulty for both organisms and industry in converting N2 into useful compounds, but at the same time means that burning, exploding, or decomposing nitrogen compounds to form nitrogen gas releases large amounts of useful energy. Synthetically produced ammonia and nitrates are key industrial fertilisers, fertiliser nitrates are key pollutants in the eutrophication of water systems.
Apart from its use in fertilisers and energy-stores, nitrogen is a constituent of organic compounds as diverse as Kevlar used in high-strength fabric and cyanoacrylate used in superglue. Nitrogen is a constituent including antibiotics. Many drugs are mimics or prodrugs of natural nitrogen-containing signal molecules: for example, the organic nitrates nitroglycerin and nitroprusside control blood pressure by metabolizing into nitric oxide. Many notable nitrogen-containing drugs, such as the natural caffeine and morphine or the synthetic amphetamines, act on receptors of animal neurotransmitters. Nitrogen compounds have a long history, ammonium chloride having been known to Herodotus, they were well known by the Middle Ages. Alchemists knew nitric acid as aqua fortis, as well as other nitrogen compounds such as ammonium salts and nitrate salts; the mixture of nitric and hydrochloric acids was known as aqua regia, celebrated for its ability to dissolve gold, the king of metals. The discovery of nitrogen is attributed to the Scottish physician Daniel Rutherford in 1772, who called it noxious air.
Though he did not recognise it as an different chemical substance, he distinguished it from Joseph Black's "fixed air", or carbon dioxide. The fact that there was a component of air that does not support combustion was clear to Rutherford, although he was not aware that it was an element. Nitrogen was studied at about the same time by Carl Wilhelm Scheele, Henry Cavendish, Joseph Priestley, who referred to it as burnt air or phlogisticated air. Nitrogen gas was inert enough that Antoine Lavoisier referred to it as "mephitic air" or azote, from the Greek word άζωτικός, "no life". In an atmosphere of pure nitrogen, animals died and flames were extinguished. Though Lavoisier's name was not accepted in English, since it was pointed out that all gases are mephitic, it is used in many languages and still remains in English in the common names of many nitrogen compounds, such as hydrazine and compounds of the azide ion, it led to the name "pnictogens" for the group headed by nitrogen, from the Greek πνίγειν "to choke".
The English word nitrogen entered the language from the French nitrogène, coined in 1790 by French chemist Jean-Antoine Chaptal, from the French nitre and the French suffix -gène, "producing", from the Greek -γενής. Chaptal's meaning was that nitrogen is the essential part of nitric acid, which in turn was produced from nitre. In earlier times, niter had been confused with Egyptian "natron" – called νίτρον in Greek – which, despite the name, contained no nitrate; the earliest military and agricultural applications of nitrogen compounds used saltpeter, most notably in gunpowder, as fertiliser. In 1910, Lord Rayleigh discovered that an electrical discharge in nitrogen gas produced "active nitrogen", a monatomic allotrope of nitrogen; the "whirling cloud of brilliant yellow light
Mudcrack
Mudcracks are sedimentary structures formed as muddy sediment dries and contracts. Crack formation occurs in clay-bearing soils as a result of a reduction in water content. Forming mudcracks start as wet, muddy sediment dries up and contracts. A strain is developed; when this strain becomes large enough, channel cracks form in the dried-up surface to relieve the strain. Individual cracks join up, forming a polygonal, interconnected network; these cracks may be filled with sediment and form casts over the base. Syneresis cracks are broadly similar features that form from underwater shrinkage of muddy sediment caused by differences in salinity or chemical conditions, rather than aerial exposure and desiccation. Syneresis cracks can be distinguished from mudcracks because they tend to be discontinuous and trilete or spindle-shaped. Mudcracks are polygonal when seen from above and v-shaped in cross section; the "v" opens towards the top of the bed and the crack tapers downward. Allen proposed a classification scheme for mudcracks based on their completeness, orientation and type of infill.
Complete mudcracks form an interconnected tessellating network. The connection of cracks occurs when individual cracks join together forming a larger continuous crack. Incomplete mudcracks are not connected to each other but still form in the same region or location as the other cracks. Orthogonal intersections may be random. In oriented orthogonal cracks, the cracks are complete and bond to one another forming irregular polygonal shapes and rows of irregular polygons. In random orthogonal cracks, the cracks are incomplete and unoriented therefore they do not connect or make any general shapes. Although they do not make general shapes they are not geometric. Non-orthogonal mudcracks have a geometric pattern. In uncompleted non-orthogonal cracks they form as a single three point star shape, composed of three cracks, they could form with more than three cracks but three cracks in considered the minimum. In completed non-orthogonal cracks, they form a geometric pattern; the pattern resembles small polygonal shaped tiles in a repetitive pattern.
Mud curls form during one of the final stages in desiccation. Mud curls occur on the exposed top layer of thinly bedded mud rocks; when mud curls form, the water, inside the sediment begins to evaporate causing the stratified layers to separate. The individual top layer is much weaker than multiple layers and is therefore able to contract and form curls as desiccation occurs. If transported by currents, mud curls may be preserved as mud-chip rip-up clasts. Occurring mudcracks form in sediment, once saturated with water. Abandoned river channels, floodplain muds, dried ponds are localities that form mudcracks. Mudcracks can be indicative of a predominately sunny or shady environment of formation. Rapid drying, which occurs in sunny environments, results in spaced, irregular mudcracks, while closer spaced, more regular mudcracks indicate that they were formed in a shady place. Similar features occur in frozen ground, lava flows, igneous dykes and sills. Polygonal crack networks similar to mudcracks can form in man-made materials such as ceramic glazes, paint film, poorly made concrete.
Mudcrack patterning at smaller scales can be observed studied using technological thin films deposited using micro and nanotechnologies. Mudcracks can be preserved as v-shaped cracks on the top of a bed of muddy sediment or as casts on the base of the overlying bed; when they are preserved on the top of a bed, the cracks look. When they are preserved on the bottom of the bedrock, the cracks are filled in with younger, overlying sediment. In most bottom-of-bed examples, the cracks are the part. Bottom-of-bed preservation occurs when mudcracks that have formed and are dried are covered with fresh, wet sediment and are buried. Through burial and pressure, the new wet sediment is further pushed into the cracks, where it dries and hardens; the mudcracked rock is later exposed to erosion. In these cases, the original mud cracks will erode faster than the newer material that fills the spaces; this type of mudcrack is used by geologists to determine the vertical orientation of rock samples that have been altered through folding or faulting.
Syneresis crack, which occur in muds and can look similar, without requiring subaerial exposure Media related to Mudcracks at Wikimedia Commons NEFI: A software that can be used to extract networks from images of mudcracks
Callistemon
Callistemon is a genus of shrubs in the family Myrtaceae, first described as a genus in 1814. The entire genus is endemic to Australia but cultivated in many other regions and naturalised in scattered locations, their status as a separate taxon is in doubt, some authorities accepting that the difference between callistemons and melaleucas is not sufficient for them to be grouped in a separate genus. Callistemon species have been referred to as bottlebrushes because of their cylindrical, brush like flowers resembling a traditional bottle brush, they are found in the more temperate regions of Australia along the east coast and favour moist conditions so when planted in gardens thrive on regular watering. However, two species are found in Tasmania and several others in the south-west of Western Australia. At least some species are drought-resistant and some are used in ornamental landscaping elsewhere in the world; the genus Callistemon was first formally described in 1814 by Robert Brown. In his description he noted that the genus includes “those species of Metrosideros that have inflorescence similar to that of Melaleuca, distinct elongated filaments.”
Carl Linnaeus had described the genus Melaleuca in 1767 and in 1867, George Bentham brought all the Metrosideros species into Melaleuca. Bentham described melaleucas as having stamens united in bundles opposite the petals. In his 1864 description of Callistemon salignus in Fragmenta phytographiae Australiae, Ferdinand von Mueller noted that the difference between the genera was “entirely artificial”. George Bentham noted in Flora Australiensis that Callistemon “passes into Melaleuca, with which F. Mueller proposes to unite it.” In 1876, Henri Ernest Baillon proposed in Histoire des Plantes that Callistemon, as well as Calothamnus and Lamarchea be merged into Melaleuca. Most authors had preserved the distinction between the two genera Callistemon and Melaleuca until 1998. In that year, in recognition of the fact that the callistemons and melaleucas on New Caledonia were related, Lyndley Craven and J. W. Dawson transferred the callistemons on that island to Melaleuca though some do not have stamens fused in 5 groups.
On the basis of DNA evidence, in 2006 and 2009 Craven moved all but four callistemons to melaleuca. Those four were Callistemon forresterae, Callistemon genofluvialis, Callistemon kenmorrisonii and Callistemon nyallingensis which were regarded as being hybrids; the new description of Melaleuca has been accepted by some herbaria but not all. For example, the Queensland Herbarium accepts Melaleuca flammea but the New South Wales Herbarium accepts Callistemon acuminatus. In 2012, Frank Udovicic and Roger Spencer transferred the newly described species of melaleuca with separate stamens to Callistemon, their argument is. They further argue that if all the genera Beaufortia, Calothamnus, Eremaea, Phymatocarpus were combined there would be no characteristics that would define the group. Many commercial nurseries continue to use the name ‘’Callistemon’’; these species can be propagated either from the seeds. Flowering is in spring and early summer, but conditions may cause flowering at other times of the year.
The obvious parts of the flower masses are stamens, with the pollen at the tip of the filament. Flower heads vary in colour with species; each flower head produces a profusion of triple-celled seed capsules around a stem which remain on the plant with the seeds enclosed until stimulated to open when the plant dies or fire causes the release of the seeds. A few species release the seeds annually. Bottlebrush plants can be grown in pots, they have been grown in Europe since a specimen of Callistemon citrinus was introduced to Kew Gardens in London by Joseph Banks in 1789. There are about 50 species of callistemon, they include: List of Callistemon cultivars Data related to Callistemon at Wikispecies Media related to Callistemon at Wikimedia Commons The Callistemon Page Australian National Botanic Gardens: Callistemon
Dinosaur
Dinosaurs are a diverse group of reptiles of the clade Dinosauria. They first appeared during the Triassic period, between 243 and 233.23 million years ago, although the exact origin and timing of the evolution of dinosaurs is the subject of active research. They became the dominant terrestrial vertebrates after the Triassic–Jurassic extinction event 201 million years ago. Reverse genetic engineering and the fossil record both demonstrate that birds are modern feathered dinosaurs, having evolved from earlier theropods during the late Jurassic Period; as such, birds were the only dinosaur lineage to survive the Cretaceous–Paleogene extinction event 66 million years ago. Dinosaurs can therefore be divided into birds; this article deals with non-avian dinosaurs. Dinosaurs are a varied group of animals from taxonomic and ecological standpoints. Birds, at over 10,000 living species, are the most diverse group of vertebrates besides perciform fish. Using fossil evidence, paleontologists have identified over 500 distinct genera and more than 1,000 different species of non-avian dinosaurs.
Dinosaurs are represented on every continent by fossil remains. Through the first half of the 20th century, before birds were recognized to be dinosaurs, most of the scientific community believed dinosaurs to have been sluggish and cold-blooded. Most research conducted since the 1970s, has indicated that all dinosaurs were active animals with elevated metabolisms and numerous adaptations for social interaction; some were herbivorous, others carnivorous. Evidence suggests that egg-laying and nest-building are additional traits shared by all dinosaurs and non-avian alike. While dinosaurs were ancestrally bipedal, many extinct groups included quadrupedal species, some were able to shift between these stances. Elaborate display structures such as horns or crests are common to all dinosaur groups, some extinct groups developed skeletal modifications such as bony armor and spines. While the dinosaurs' modern-day surviving avian lineage are small due to the constraints of flight, many prehistoric dinosaurs were large-bodied—the largest sauropod dinosaurs are estimated to have reached lengths of 39.7 meters and heights of 18 meters and were the largest land animals of all time.
Still, the idea that non-avian dinosaurs were uniformly gigantic is a misconception based in part on preservation bias, as large, sturdy bones are more to last until they are fossilized. Many dinosaurs were quite small: Xixianykus, for example, was only about 50 cm long. Since the first dinosaur fossils were recognized in the early 19th century, mounted fossil dinosaur skeletons have been major attractions at museums around the world, dinosaurs have become an enduring part of world culture; the large sizes of some dinosaur groups, as well as their monstrous and fantastic nature, have ensured dinosaurs' regular appearance in best-selling books and films, such as Jurassic Park. Persistent public enthusiasm for the animals has resulted in significant funding for dinosaur science, new discoveries are covered by the media; the taxon'Dinosauria' was formally named in 1841 by paleontologist Sir Richard Owen, who used it to refer to the "distinct tribe or sub-order of Saurian Reptiles" that were being recognized in England and around the world.
The term is derived from Ancient Greek δεινός, meaning'terrible, potent or fearfully great', σαῦρος, meaning'lizard or reptile'. Though the taxonomic name has been interpreted as a reference to dinosaurs' teeth and other fearsome characteristics, Owen intended it to evoke their size and majesty. Other prehistoric animals, including pterosaurs, ichthyosaurs and Dimetrodon, while popularly conceived of as dinosaurs, are not taxonomically classified as dinosaurs. Pterosaurs are distantly related to dinosaurs; the other groups mentioned are, like dinosaurs and pterosaurs, members of Sauropsida, except Dimetrodon. Under phylogenetic nomenclature, dinosaurs are defined as the group consisting of the most recent common ancestor of Triceratops and Neornithes, all its descendants, it has been suggested that Dinosauria be defined with respect to the MRCA of Megalosaurus and Iguanodon, because these were two of the three genera cited by Richard Owen when he recognized the Dinosauria. Both definitions result in the same set of animals being defined as dinosaurs: "Dinosauria = Ornithischia + Saurischia", encompassing ankylosaurians, ceratopsians, ornithopods and sauropodomorphs.
Birds are now recognized as being the sole surviving lineage of theropod dinosaurs. In traditional taxonomy, birds were considered a separate class that had evolved from dinosaurs, a distinct superorder. However, a majority of contemporary paleontologists concerned with dinosaurs reject the traditional style of classification in favor of phylogenetic taxonomy. Birds are thus considered to be dinosaurs and dinosaurs are, not extinct. Birds are classified as belonging to the subgroup M
