Determination of Cloud-top Height through Three-dimensional Cloud Reconstruction using DIWATA-1 Data.

Cloud-top height is a useful parameter with which to elucidate cloud vertical growth, which often indicates severe weather such as torrential rainfall and thunderstorms; it is widely used in meteorological research. However, general cloud-top height estimation methods are hindered by observational and analytical constraints. This study used data from DIWATA-1, the Philippines' first microsatellite, to overcome these limitations and successfully produce sophisticated three-dimensional cloud models via stereo-photogrammetry.

Positive Trend in the Antarctic Sea Ice Cover and Associated Changes in Surface Temperature.

The Antarctic sea ice extent has been slowly increasing contrary to expected trends due to global warming and results from coupled climate models. After a record high extent in 2012 the extent was even higher in 2014 when the magnitude exceeded 20×10 km for the first time during the satellite era. The positive trend is confirmed with a newly reprocessed sea ice data that addressed inconsistency issues in the time series.

Prior individual training and self-organized queuing during group emergency escape of mice from water pool.

We study the impact of prior individual training during group emergency evacuation using mice that escape from an enclosed water pool to a dry platform via any of two possible exits. Experimenting with mice avoids serious ethical and legal issues that arise when dealing with unwitting human participants while minimizing concerns regarding the reliability of results obtained from simulated experiments using 'actors'. First, mice were trained separately and their individual escape times measured over several trials.

Self-organized queuing and scale-free behavior in real escape panic.

Numerical investigations of escape panic of confined pedestrians have revealed interesting dynamical features such as pedestrian arch formation around an exit, disruptive interference, self-organized queuing, and scale-free behavior. However, these predictions have remained unverified because escape panic experiments with real systems are difficult to perform. For mice escaping out of a water pool, we found that for a critical sampling rate the escape behavior exhibits the predicted features even at short observation times.