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Although it is widely accepted that the First Old Church Slavonic Life of Wenceslas (FSL) is a tenth-century Bohemian composition written in Old Church Slavonic (OCS), some scholars have hypothesized a Latin original and subsequent translation. This article evaluates that hypothesis by testing the FSL against features typically associated with Latin-to-OCS translation, including loanwords, hendiadys, and morphological patterns. It argues that the FSL lacks consistent evidence of translation from a Latin source. While most Latinisms attested in the text are more plausibly explained as the result of cultural and religious contact with communities under Roman jurisdiction, even those expressions that appear more suggestive fail to meet the criteria of reliable translation markers and are better interpreted as scribal interpolations introduced during the text’s exceptionally complex transmission. Similarly, the purported instances of hendiadys and Bohemian morphological features are too sporadic and contextually ambiguous to support the hypothesis of a Latin prototext. Cases of quasi-hendiadic synonymic reinforcement are more likely to reflect broader literary conventions, and what has been interpreted as Bohemization may instead result from local linguistic norms affecting the text at later stages of its transmission. The article therefore concludes that the FSL should be regarded as an original OCS composition with an unusually complex transmission history.

The Multi-angle Imaging SpectroRadiometer (MISR) instrument has been operational on the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) Earth Observing System (EOS) Terra satellite since early 2000, creating an extensive data set of global Earth observations. Here we introduce the latest version of the MISR aerosol products. The level 2 (swath) product, which is reported on a 4.4 km spatial grid, is designated as version 23 (V23) and contains retrieved aerosol optical depth (AOD) and aerosol particle property information derived from MISR's multi-angle observations over both land and water. The changes from the previous version of the algorithm (V22) have significant impacts on the data product and its interpretation. The V23 data set is created from two separate retrieval algorithms that are applied over dark water and land surfaces, respectively. Besides increasing the horizontal resolution to 4.4 km compared with the coarser 17.6 m resolution in V22 and streamlining the format and content, the V23 product has added geolocation information, pixel-level uncertainty estimates, and improved cloud screening. MISR data can be obtained from the NASA Langley Research Center Atmospheric Science Data Center at https://eosweb.larc.nasa.gov/project/misr/misr_table (last access: 11 October 2019). The version number for the V23 level 2 aerosol product is F13_0023. The level 3 (gridded) aerosol product is still reported at 0.5∘×0.5∘ spatial resolution with results aggregated from the higher-resolution level 2 data. The format and content at level 3 have also been updated to reflect the changes made at level 2. The level 3 product associated with the V23 level 2 product version is designated as F15_0032. Both the level 2 and level 3 products are now provided in NetCDF format.

Since early 2000, the Multi-angle Imaging SpectroRadiometer (MISR) instrument on NASA's Terra satellite has been acquiring data that have been used to produce aerosol optical depth (AOD) and particle property retrievals at 17.6 km spatial resolution. Capitalizing on the capabilities provided by multi-angle viewing, the current operational (Version 22) MISR algorithm performs well, with about 75 % of MISR AOD retrievals globally falling within 0.05 or 20 %  ×  AOD of paired validation data from the ground-based Aerosol Robotic Network (AERONET). This paper describes the development and assessment of a prototype version of a higher-spatial-resolution 4.4 km MISR aerosol optical depth product compared against multiple AERONET Distributed Regional Aerosol Gridded Observations Network (DRAGON) deployments around the globe. In comparisons with AERONET-DRAGON AODs, the 4.4 km resolution retrievals show improved correlation (r = 0. 9595), smaller RMSE (0.0768), reduced bias (−0.0208), and a larger fraction within the expected error envelope (80.92 %) relative to the Version 22 MISR retrievals.

Asian dust, primarily emitted from the Taklamakan and Gobi deserts, has been reported to reach remote destinations, such as North America. However, the relative contribution of the Taklamakan and Gobi deserts to dust loadings through long-range transport remains unaddressed in any observational study. Here, the climatology of Asian dust activation and potential for transport is investigated using stereo observations of dust sources from the Multi-angle Imaging SpectroRadiometer (MISR) instrument combined with observation-initiated trajectory modeling. MISR-derived dust plume top height and dust plume motion vectors confirm the peak of dust activation and transport potential in spring over the Gobi Desert and in both spring and summer over the Taklamakan Desert. The long-range trajectory patterns of Asian dust, including the influence on North America through trans-Pacific transport, are assessed using extensive forward trajectories initiated by MISR dust plume observations. The trajectory analysis reveals latitude-dependent spread of dust trajectories from the Taklamakan and Gobi deserts, with Taklamakan dust dominantly affecting to the south of 50∘ N and Gobi dust primarily affecting to the north of 50∘ N in North America. The Asian dust activation and transport potential exhibit substantial seasonal and interannual variability, motivating future studies on the potential drivers.

The current study investigates the diurnal cycle of dust and dust mixture loading across the global tropics, subtropics, and mid-latitudes by analyzing aerosol extinction and typing profiles observed by the Cloud-Aerosol Transport System (CATS) lidar aboard the International Space Station. According to the comparison with ground-based and other satellite observations, CATS aerosol and dust and dust mixture loading observations exhibit reasonable quality but significant day–night inconsistency. To account for this day–night inconsistency in CATS data quality, the diurnal variability in dust and dust mixture characteristics is currently examined separately for daytime and nighttime periods. Based on an analysis of variance (ANOVA) analytical framework, pronounced diurnal variations in dust and dust mixture loading are generally uncovered during daytime periods and over terrestrial areas. The current study identifies statistically significant diurnal variability in dust and dust mixture loading over key dust sources, including the Bodélé Depression, the West African El Djouf, Rub' al-Khali desert, and western and southern North America, confirming the previous observation-based findings regarding the diurnal cycle of dust emission and underlying meteorological processes in these regions. Significant seasonal and diurnal variability in dust and dust mixture is identified over the Iraqi and Thar deserts. The identified significant diurnal cycles in dust mixture loading over the vegetated regions in the Amazon and tropical southern Africa are hypothesized to be driven by enhanced dust emission due to wildfires.

The large uncertainty in the mineral dust direct radiative effect (DRE) hinders projections of future climate change due to anthropogenic activity. Resolving modeled dust mineral speciation allows for spatially and temporally varying refractive indices consistent with dust aerosol composition. Here, for the first time, we quantify the range in dust DRE at the top of the atmosphere (TOA) due to current uncertainties in the surface soil mineralogical content using a dust mineral-resolving climate model. We propagate observed uncertainties in soil mineral abundances from two soil mineralogy atlases along with the optical properties of each mineral into the DRE and compare the resultant range with other sources of uncertainty across six climate models. The shortwave DRE responds region-specifically to the dust burden depending on the mineral speciation and underlying shortwave surface albedo: positively when the regionally averaged annual surface albedo is larger than 0.28 and negatively otherwise. Among all minerals examined, the shortwave TOA DRE and single scattering albedo at the 0.44–0.63 µm band are most sensitive to the fractional contribution of iron oxides to the total dust composition. The global net (shortwave plus longwave) TOA DRE is estimated to be within −0.23 to +0.35 W/sq. m. Approximately 97 % of this range relates to uncertainty in the soil abundance of iron oxides. Representing iron oxide with solely hematite optical properties leads to an overestimation of shortwave DRE by +0.10 W/sq. m at the TOA, as goethite is not as absorbing as hematite in the shortwave spectrum range. Our study highlights the importance of iron oxides to the shortwave DRE: they have a disproportionally large impact on climate considering their small atmospheric mineral mass fractional burden (∼2 %). An improved description of iron oxides, such as those planned in the Earth Surface Mineral Dust Source Investigation (EMIT), is thus essential for more accurate estimates of the dust DRE.

Fire Influence on Regional to Global Environments and Air Quality (FIREX-AQ) was a field campaign aimed at better understanding the impact of wildfires and agricultural fires on air quality and climate. The FIREX-AQ campaign took place in August 2019 and involved two aircraft and multiple coordinated satellite observations. This study applied and evaluated a self-supervised machine learning (ML) method for the active fire and smoke plume identification and tracking in the satellite and sub-orbital remote sensing datasets collected during the campaign. Our unique methodology combines remote sensing observations with different spatial and spectral resolutions. With as much as a 10% increase in agreement between our produced masks and high-certainty hand-labeled pixels, relative to evaluated operational products, the demonstrated approach successfully differentiates active fire pixels and smoke plumes from background imagery. This enables the generation of a per-instrument smoke and active fire mask product, as well as smoke and fire masks created from the fusion of selected data from independent instruments. This ML approach has the potential to enhance operational active wildfire monitoring systems and improve decision-making in air quality management through fast smoke plume identification and tracking and could improve climate impact studies through fusion data from independent instruments.

The beneficial properties of algae make them perfect functional ingredients for food products. Algae have a high energy value and are a source of biologically active substances, proteins, fats, carbohydrates, vitamins, and macro- and microelements. They are also rich in polyunsaturated fatty acids, proteins, mycosporine-like amino acids, polysaccharides, polyphenols, carotenoids, sterols, steroids, lectins, halogenated compounds, polyketides, alkaloids, and carrageenans. Different extraction parameters are used depending on the purpose and the substances to be isolated. In this study, the following parameters were used: hydromodule 1:10 and an extraction duration of 1–2 h at the extraction temperature of 25–40 °C. A 30–50% solution of ethanol in water was used as an extractant. Algae extracts can be considered as potential natural sources of biologically active compounds with antimicrobial activity and antiviral properties. The content of crude protein, crude fat, and carbohydrates in U. Prolifera, C. racemosa var. peltata (Chlorophyta), S. oligocystum and S. fusiforme (SF-1) was studied. It was found that C. muelleri (Bacillariophyta), I. galbana (Haptophyta), and T. weissflogii (Bacillariophyta) contain about 1.9 times more omega-3 than omega-6 fatty acids. N. gaditana (Ochrophyta), D. salina (Chlorophyta), P. tricornutum (Bacillaryophyta) and I. galbana (Haptophyta) extracts showed inhibitory activity of varying intensities against E. coli or P. aeruginosa. In addition, algae and algae-derived compounds have been proposed to offer attractive possibilities in the food industry, especially in the meat sector, to evolve functional foods with myriad functionalities. Algae can increase the biological activity of food products, while the further study of the structure of compounds found in algae can broaden their future application possibilities.

The lignocellulosic perennial crop miscanthus, especially Miscanthus × giganteus, is particularly interesting for bioenergy production as it combines high biomass production with low environmental impact. However, there are several varieties that pose a hazard due to susceptibility to disease. This review contains links showing genotype and ecological variability of important characteristics related to yield and biomass composition of miscanthus that may be useful in plant breeding programs to increase bioenergy production. Some clones of Miscanthus × giganteus and Miscanthus sinensis are particularly interesting due to their high biomass production per hectare. Although the compositional requirements for industrial biomass have not been fully defined for the various bioenergy conversion processes, the lignin-rich species Miscanthus × giganteus and Miscanthus sacchariflorus seem to be more suitable for thermochemical conversion processes. At the same time, the species Miscanthus sinensis and some clones of Miscanthus × giganteus with low lignin content are of interest for the biochemical transformation process. The species Miscanthus sacchariflorus is suitable for various bioenergy conversion processes due to its low ash content, so this species is also interesting as a pioneer in breeding programs. Mature miscanthus crops harvested in winter are favored by industrial enterprises to improve efficiency and reduce processing costs. This study can be attributed to other monocotyledonous plants and perennial crops that can be used as feedstock for biofuels.

The iron-oxide content of dust in the atmosphere and most notably its apportionment between hematite (α-Fe2O3) and goethite (α-FeOOH) are key determinants in quantifying dust’s light absorption, its top of atmosphere UV radiances used for dust monitoring, and ultimately shortwave dust direct radiative effects (DRE). Hematite and goethite column mass concentrations and iron-oxide mass fractions of total dust mass concentration were retrieved from the DeepSpace Climate Observatory (DSCOVR) Earth Polychromatic Imaging Camera (EPIC) measurements in the ultraviolet–visible (UV–Vis) channels. The retrievals were performed for dust-identified aerosol plumes over land using aerosol optical depth (AOD) and spectral imaginary refractive index provided by the Multi-Angle Implementation of Atmospheric Correction (MAIAC) algorithm over six continental regions (North America, North Africa, West Asia, Central Asia, EastAsia, and Australia). The dust particles are represented as an internal mixture of non-absorbing host and absorbing hematite and goethite. We use the Maxwell–Garnett effective medium approximation with carefully selected complex refractive indices of hematite and goethite that produce mass fractions of iron oxides species consistent with in situ values found in the literature to derive the hematite and goethite volumetric/mass concentrations from MAIAC EPIC products. We compared the retrieved hematite and goethite concentrations with in situ dust aerosol mineralogical content measurements, as well as with published data. Our data display variations within the published range of hematite, goethite, and iron-oxide mass fractions for pure mineral dust cases. A specific analysis is presented for 15 sites over the main dust source regions. Sites in the central Sahara, Sahel, and Middle East exhibit a greater temporal variability of iron oxides relative to other sites. Niger site(13.52°N, 2.63°E) is dominated by goethite over Harmattan season with median of ~2 weight percentage (wt.%) of iron-oxide. Saudi Arabia site (27.49°N, 41.98°E) over Middle East also exhibited surge of goethite content with the beginning of Shamal season. The Sahel dust is richer in iron-oxide than Saharan and northern China dust except in Summer. The Bodélé Depression area shows a distinctively lower iron-oxide concentration (~1 wt.%) throughout the year. Finally, we show that EPIC data allow to constrain the hematite refractive index. Specifically, we select 5 out of 13 different number of hematite refractive indices widely variable in published laboratory studies by constraining the iron-oxide mass ratio to the known measured values. Provided climatology of hematite and goethite mass fractions across main dust regions of the Earth will be useful for dust shortwave DRE studies and climate modeling.