Hucbald’s Fifths and Vaughan Williams’s Mass

In a Musical Times review of a 1923 performance of Vaughan Williams’s Mass in G minor in Birmingham, H. C. Colles made the comment that “there hasn’t been so many parallel fifths since Hucbald.” This is just one blatant medievalist moment in a review that firmly places the Mass within a tangled web of historical images and associations. Colles’s description of the Mass evokes historicism by utilizing imagery related to the medieval cathedral and drawing on the well-rehearsed sixteenth-century/Tudor tropes prevalent during these years. More interestingly, Colles also identifies an inherent anti–nineteenth century, antiromantic sentiment underpinning the Mass, underlining his view that this work was something both very new and very old and not a throwback to a Victorian neo-Gothicism. Using Vaughan Williams’s Mass and its reception as a case study, this chapter explores the new musical medievalism current during the first decades of the twentieth century to outline changing attitudes toward the music of the past. This chapter argues that the cosmopolitan nature of Victorian medievalism was transformed into an aesthetic that worked both with nationalist agendas and with modernist ideologies in a manner that ultimately created a connection between “old” and “new” music and disenfranchised romantic, nineteenth-century forbears.

The role of dew as a nighttime reservoir and morning source for atmospheric ammonia

Several field studies have proposed that the volatilization of NH3 from evaporating dew is responsible for an early morning pulse of ammonia frequently observed in the atmospheric boundary layer. Laboratory studies conducted on synthetic dew showed that the fraction of ammonium (NH4+) released as gas-phase ammonia (NH3) during evaporation is dependent on the relative abundances of anions and cations in the dew. Hence, the fraction of NH3 released during dew evaporation (Frac(NH3)) can be predicted given dew composition and pH. Twelve separate ambient dew samples were collected at a remote high elevation grassland site in Colorado from 28 May to 11 August, 2015. Average [NH4+] and pH were 26 μM and 5.2, respectively, and were on the lower end of dew [NH4+] and pH observations reported in the literature. Ambient dew mass (in g m−2) was monitored with a dewmeter, which continuously measured the mass of a tray containing artificial turf representative of the grass canopy to track the accumulation and evaporation of dew. Simultaneous measurements of ambient NH3 indicated that a morning increase in NH3 was coincident in time with dew evaporation, and that either a plateau or decrease in NH3 occurred once the dew had completely evaporated. This morning increase in NH3 was never observed on mornings without surface wetness (neither dew nor rain, representing one-quarter of mornings during the study period). Dew composition was used to determine an average Frac(NH3) of 0.94, suggesting that nearly all NH4+ is released back to the boundary layer as NH3 during evaporation at this site. An average NH3 emission of 6.2 ng m−2 s−1 during dew evaporation was calculated using total dew volume (Vdew) and evaporation time (tevap), and represents a significant morning flux in a non-fertilized grassland. Assuming a boundary layer height of 150 m, the average mole ratio of NH4+ in dew to NH3 in the boundary layer at sunrise is roughly 1.6 ± 0.7. Furthermore, the observed loss of NH3 during nights with dew is approximately equal to the observed amount of NH4+ sequestered in dew at the onset of evaporation. Hence, there is strong evidence that dew is both a significant night-time reservoir and strong morning source of NH3. The possibility of rain evaporation as a source of NH3, as well as dew evaporation influencing species of similar water solubility (acetic acid, formic acid, and HONO) is also discussed. If release of NH3 from dew and rain evaporation is pervasive in many environments, then estimates of NH3 dry deposition and NHx (≡NH3 + NH4+) wet deposition may be overestimated by models that assume that all NHx deposited in rain and dew remains at the surface.

Proton conductance and fatty acyl composition of liver mitochondria correlates with body mass in birds

The proton conductance of isolated liver mitochondria correlates significantly with body mass in mammals, but not in ectotherms. To establish whether the correlation in mammals is general for endotherms or mammal-specific, we measured proton conductance in mitochondria from birds, the other main group of endotherms, using birds varying in mass over a wide range (nearly 3000-fold), from 13 g zebra finches to 35 kg emus. Respiratory control ratios were higher in mitochondria from larger birds. Mitochondrial proton conductance in liver mitochondria from birds correlated strongly with body mass [respiration rate per mg of protein driving proton leak at 170 mV being 44.7 times (body mass in g)−0.19], thus suggesting a general relationship between body mass and proton conductance in endotherms. Mitochondria from larger birds had the same or perhaps greater surface area per mg of protein than mitochondria from smaller birds. Hence, the lower proton conductance was caused not by surface area changes but by some change in the properties of the inner membrane. Liver mitochondria from larger birds had phospholipid fatty acyl chains that were less polyunsaturated and more monounsaturated when compared with those from smaller birds. Phospholipid fatty acyl polyunsaturation correlated positively and monounsaturation correlated negatively with proton conductance. These correlations echo those seen in mammalian liver mitochondria, suggesting that they too are general for endotherms.

Locomotion in the abalone Haliotis kamtschatkana: pedal morphology and cost of transport

Morphological analyses of pedal sole area and pedal waves were conducted for a range of speeds and body sizes in the abalone Haliotis kamtschatkana. The pedal sole of resting abalone increased in size disproportionately with animal volume (slope of log10-transformed data, b=0.83; expected slope for isometry, b0=0.67) and length (b=2.51; b0=2.0). Pedal wave frequency increased linearly with speed, confirming that abalone increase speed by increasing the velocity of pedal waves. Total area of the pedal sole decreased by 2.1 % for each shell length per minute increase in speed. Likewise, the area of the foot incorporated into pedal waves increased by 1.8 % for each shell length per minute increase in speed. Together, these changes translated into a 50 % decrease in the pedal sole area in contact with the substratum at a maximum escape speed of 15 shell lengths min-1, relative to the pedal sole at rest. The amount of mucus secreted by resting animals during adhesion to the substratum increased isometrically with foot area (slope of log10-transformed data, b=1.08). The amount of mucus secreted during locomotion did not vary with speed, but was less than the amount needed for adhesion. We suggest that these morphological and physiological changes reduce the energy expenditure during locomotion. Cost of transport was investigated for a range of speeds and abalone sizes. The rate of oxygen consumption O2 (in µl O2 g-1 h-1) increased linearly with increasing absolute speed v (in cm min-1): O2=40.1+0.58v-0.15m (r2=0.35, P=0.04), where m is body mass (in g). Minimum cost of transport, calculated from the slope of absolute speed on O2, was 20.3 J kg-1 m-1. Total cost of transport (COTT) and net cost of transport (COTN) were high at low speeds and decreased as speed increased, to minima of 86.0 J kg-1 m-1 and 29.7 J kg-1 m-1, respectively, at speeds measured in the respirometer. Log10-transformation of both cost of transport and speed data yielded linear relationships with the following regression equations: log10COTT=3.35-0.90log10v-0.21log10m (r2=0.89; P<0.006) and log10COTN=2.29-0.69log10v-0.09log10m (r2=0.48; P<0.006), respectively.