5,090 Matching Annotations
  1. Nov 2022
    1. LMP,

      Lysosomal Membrane Permeabilization - Making the lysosome membrane able to take up substance easily.

    2. cytotoxic agents

      Chemicals that may be toxic to cells at certain doses

    3. gain- and loss-of-function approaches

      Enhance (gain) or reduce/block (loss) the expression of a gene to study its biological function

    4. intracellular

      Inside the cell

    5. Golgi apparatus

      One of the cell organelles

    6. ortholog

      A similar gene in different species of organisms

    7. putative

      Thought to be

    8. rheostat

      Regulation by control of the levels of contrasting signals

    9. ion channe

      A passage in the cell membranes through which charged chemical elements (ions) enter or exit the cell or cell compartment

    10. calcium homeostasis

      Regulation of Calcium use in cells.

    11. cytotoxic stimuli

      Cyto (from cell) - toxic: Poisonous situation/condition/change in a cell

    12. homologs

      Related proteins across different organisms

    13. transmembrane BAX inhibitor motif containing (TMBIM) superfamily

      A group of proteins that span membranes and oppose the function of BAX (a positive regulator of apoptosis).

    14. pathophysiological

      Disease-related

    15. lysosomal membrane permeabilization (LMP)

      Making a membrane easily take up external substances, where it would normally not

    16. caspase cascade

      A group of proteins that function together in programmed cell death

    17. cytochrome c

      Protein associated with the inner membrane of mitochondria and is involved in apoptosis

    18. homo-oligomerization

      Protein complex consisting of identical protein subunits.

    19. conformational activation

      Activation preceded by a change in protein structure

    20. proapoptotic proteins

      Positively regulate programmed cell death. Proteins such as BAK and BAX

    21. Dysmorphic embryos

      Zebrafish embryos with abnormal morphology/structure/shape.

    22. cridine orange (

      An organic dye for cell imaging. Dead cells are stained more by AO.

    23. The di-aspartyl sensor is conserved in all six TMBIM proteins, while the arginine latch is only present in the LFG subfamily (LFG1 to LFG4) but not in BI-1, where it has been replaced by His78 (Fig. 7A) (11).

      Two conserved Aspartic acid residues in all proteins in this group. These two residues are involved in sensing lysosomal pH changes.

    24. intraluminal cathepsins

      Proteins inside the lysosomes that degrade other proteins

    25. cytotoxic

      Toxic to cells at certain doses

    26. abrogate

      Reverse

    27. Ablation

      To remove

    28. BAX and BAK

      Two of the proteins that are well known to be activators of cell death (proapoptotic proteins)

    29. SYTO16 staining

      A green fluorescent dye that stains live cells

    30. lysosomotropic agents

      Chemicals that cause stress to lysosomes

  2. Oct 2022
    1. BH3 protein

      Proteins that possess a characteristic short protein (or peptide) sequence termed the "BH3 domain" (also called the death domain).

      Members of this family of proteins are known to trigger key mitochondrial events that kill the cell and hence are associated with apoptosis.

    2. curve fitting

      The process of constructing a curve that has the best fit to a series of data points.

    3. chromogenic caspase assay

      An experiment which uses colored of fluorescent substrates (e.g., Z-DEVD-R110) to quantify the activity of an enzyme (e.g., caspase).

      As a result, the higher the fluorescence detected, the higher the enzyme activity.

    4. mitochondrial outer membrane permeabilization (MOMP)

      Process where pores are created in the outer membrane of the mitochondria to facilitate the release of cytochrome c which in turn activates caspases necessary for apoptosis to occur.

    5. XIAP

      A protein that blocks apoptosis by keeping caspase-3 and caspase-7 in an inactive state where they are not able to perform their roles in apoptosis.

    6. hydrolyzed

      To break down (a compound) by chemical reaction with water.

    7. substrate

      A molecule upon which an enzyme (e.g., caspase) acts. Enzymes catalyze chemical reactions involving the substrate(s).

    8. interphase extract

      Refers to "interphase cytoplasmic extract" with no cycloheximide treatment and no cytochrome c.

    9. chromatin

      A nucleic acid–protein complex that makes up eukaryotic chromosomes

    10. apoptotic extract

      Refers to the cycloheximide-treated interphase with cytochrome c

    11. cytochrome c

      Small protein which is loosely associated with the inner membrane of the mitochondria [powerhouse of the cell]. Perturbations to the inner mitochondrial membrane causes the release of cytochrome c which then activates apoptosis.

    12. Texas Red–conjugated dextran

      Dye used to monitor cell division and track the movement of live cells.

    13. cycloheximide

      A chemical that blocks protein synthesis in eukaryotic organisms. Upon exposure, many cell types rapidly undergo apoptosis.

    14. video microscopy

      Provides live feed (real-time) video image directly to a computer for visualization and monitoring.

    15. inflammatory response

      Defense mechanism used by an organism to remove harmful agents (such as damaged cells and pathogens).

    16. regulatory network

      Used here to describe a system of biological molecules that interact to obtain desired outcome such as apoptosis.

    17. meiosis II

      A stage in cell division where chromatids [one half of a duplicated chromosome] separate.

    18. metaphase

      The second stage of cell division where the chromosomes prepare to be separated into daughter cells by aligning in the equator of the parent cell.

    19. cell signaling

      A form of cellular communication involving the reception, processing and transmission of biological and chemical signals.

    20. caspase

      Proteases (enzymes that break down proteins) that function as the main effectors of apoptosis

    21. oocytes

      An immature egg

    22. inhibitor studies

      Used here to describe assays or experiments involving the blocking of activity of an enzyme or biological process.

    23. homeostasis

      Steady state conditions (no disturbances)

    24. evolutionarily conserved

      Describes a process or feature that is maintained and takes place across different species (organisms that share common characteristics)

    25. programmed cell death

      Describes a process where cells destroy themselves when they are no longer needed.

  3. Sep 2022
    1. Consumers expect ever easier and faster services. The SEPA Instant Credit Transfer scheme delivers these by enabling pan-European credit transfers with the funds made available on the account in less than ten seconds.
  4. May 2022
    1. What is difference between mission and vision?The mission sets the direction for the company's goals and the vision should light a path for how the organization can get there. These statements establish part of the framework for expected behavior and give employees and volunteers a sense of cohesiveness.Jul 21, 2021
    1. convection

      The movement caused within a fluid by the forces acting on the fluid, primarily due to pressure.

    2. diffusive

      Relates to the intermingling of substances by the natural movements of their molecules or particles.

    1. elastic oscillations

      The regular changes in the prototype's structure, where the original size and shape is retained after contact forces have been removed.

  5. Apr 2022
    1. aqueous buffer

      Aqueous buffer is a solution of weak acid and its conjugate base which provides a degree of stability to prevent the rapid fluctuation in pH when a small amount of strong acid or base is added.

    2. uniaxial flows,

      Flows constrained along a single dimension such as those found in the microchannels of microfluidic devices.

    3. DOI 10.1126/science.1066238

      Digital Object Identifier (DOI) is a standardized method for uniquely referencing digital documents with the aim of easily leading to the documents location. Almost all published academic journal articles as well as research reports and data sets have an assigned DOI.

    4. homogenize

      To make uniform or similar.

  6. Mar 2022
    1. a differing payment basically means an agreement between the lender and borrower where the borrower requests the lender to give them loan and that loan will be repaid at a later date when situation would be comparatively better

      What is deferring payment ?

    2. sri lankan government has approached the international monetary fund for a bailout bailout basically means asking 00:00:37 financial assistance in order to save any business or in this case you can say save the country's economy from collapsing and you also need to ponder upon the fact that the sri lankan government is asking this kind of financial assistance on deferring loan

      IMF bailout for SriLanka

    1. unimorph piezoelectric structure

      Piezoelectric materials undergo a shape change when voltage is applied across them. A piezoelectric unimorph is a thin and long microstructure that flexes when voltage is applied to it. In this paper, the properties of the piezoelectric material are used to create forward movement of the robot.

    2. duty cycles

      Fraction of time spent in each phase of one cycle of the motion.

    3. information reconnaissance

      Military term for gathering information about an enemy for combat intelligence.

    4. fault-tolerant behavior

      The ability to continue operating despite the failure of one or more components

    5. fail-safe

      Revert to a safe state in the event of failure

    6. Paratarsotomus macropalpis

      Mite species native to Southern California. Discovered to be worlds fastest terrestrial animal and passed the Australian Tiger Beetle as the previous record holder.

    7. gait

      A pattern of limb movement, where the gallop, commonly seen in horses, is the one of the fastest gait that can be performed.

    8. anisotropic lateral forces

      The force that acts in the direction parallel to ground, with varying magnitudes in different directions.

    9. first vibrational mode

      The lowest frequency at which a system oscillates (displays distinct periodic patterns of motion).

    10. oscillatory center of mass (COM) trajectory

      The point within an object at which the whole mass may be considered as concentrated. Here, the authors tracked the center of mass (COM) motion to represent the motion of the entire robot.

    1. transverse

      Perpendicular to the direction of the flow along the channel

    2. kinematic viscosity

      The measurement of a fluid's internal resistance to flow

    3. lithography

      The process of printing a design onto a flat surface using chemical reactions.

    4. Stokes flow

      A form of fluid motion dominated by viscous forces. This occurs at low fluid velocities, high fluid viscosities, or very small length-scales of flow.

    5. layer-by-layer geometries

      Lithography techniques rely on fabricating one layer at a time to construct device features at the microscale.

    6. Pe ́cletnumber

      A dimensionless number that represents the ratio of the rate of transport by bulk motion of a fluid to the rate of transport by diffusion.

    1. umbra

      Sunspots are darker, cooler areas of the sun's surface. The umbra is the darkest part of a sunspot, at its center. It is surrounded by the lighter penumbra.

    1. To get a sorted list of all glossary items you could use YAML in the front matter of each glossary term then use the dataview plugin and sort ascending.
      • idea for glossary
  7. Feb 2022
    1. vertical spring-damper

      a spring that absorbs up and down movement

    2. torsional spring-damper

      a spring that absorbs rotational movement

    3. resonant frequencies

      At resonant frequency, the circuit exhibits a maximum oscillatory, or regularly varying, response at a specific frequency (the number of times the AC switches between positive and negative in 1 second).

    4. two-segment mass-spring model

      This idealized model allows for the characterization of motion animals use, like bouncing. Specifically, it is assumed that the movement behaves like a mass bouncing on a spring.

    5. piezoelectric effect

      The ability of the PVDF to generate an electric charge in response to the applied voltage, resulting in expansion (or stretching) and contraction (or shrinking).

    6. pin joint

      A connection between two rigid bodies that allows only relative rotation about a single direction.

    7. cross-sectional view scanning electron microscopy (SEM) image

      SEM is an instrument that produces a largely magnified image by using electrons instead of light to form an image.

    8. MATLAB

      A programming language that is primarily used for numerical computation as well as computational modeling, simulation, and prototyping.

    9. ground reaction force

      The force that opposes gravity because it is exerted by the ground onto a body that is in contact with the ground.

    10. both-touching

      Both the front- and back-legs making contact with the ground

    11. polyethylene terephthalate (PET)

      A soft, highly stretchable plastic, which most plastic bottles are made of.

    12. adhesive silicone

      A pressure sensitive substance that can change shape in order to seal gaps in materials.

    13. PVDF

      A polymeric material that has high piezoelectric coefficient, good stability and flexibility. This material is commonly used in soft actuators.

    14. polymeric materials

      Polymers are materials made of long, repeating chains of subunits called monomers. Examples include plastics, proteins and DNA.

    15. robustness

      The ability to withstand rigorous testing and maintain its original condition.

    16. Soft robots

      A subset of the robotics field that primarily aims to mimic body motion of living organisms using soft materials.

    17. actuators

      A machine that causes motion or power (i.e. pushes, pulls, or rotates).

    18. arthropods

      A classification of the animal kingdom that encompasses organisms that have an exoskeleton, a segmented body, and jointed appendages (i.e. insects, crustaceans, arachnids, centipedes).

    19. Mobility

      The ability to move freely and easily

    20. animal locomotion

      A variety of methods that animals use to move from one place to another.

    1. microstructure

      Structures of an object, organism, or material with a typical feature length scale of 1-100 micrometers

    2. dermis

      Inner layer of the skin tissue containing blood capillaries, nerve endings, sweat glands, and hair follicles.

    3. mechanoreceptors

      Receptors typically located on cell membrane that relay external mechanical stimuli such as pressure, touch, or motion.

    4. biomimetic

      Synthetic materials/methods that mimic biological materials/mechanisms.

    5. magnetic flux

      the measurement of the total magnetic field which passes through a specified area

    6. transcutaneous electrical nerve stimulation

      A therapy that uses low-voltage electrical current for pain relief, also known as TENS.

    7. action potentials

      Nerve signals that occur when a neuron sends information away from the cell body. The action potential itself is a burst of electrical energy.

    8. inductance-capacitance (LC) oscillation circuit

      A circuit containing both an inductor (L) and capacitor (C) that oscillates by shifting the energy between the electric and magnetic fields.

    9. giant magneto-impedance

      An external magnetic field causing a large variation in the electrical impedance of the material.

    10. stimuli

      signal or input that evokes a specific functional reaction in an organ or tissue.

    11. neuromorphic

      Describes any large system of integrated circuits that mimic the nervous system.

    12. nociceptors

      A pain receptor that responds to damaging stimuli by sending the "threat" signals to the spinal cord and brain.

    13. nanomeshes

      Inorganic nano-structured two-dimensional material.

    14. organic field-effect transistors

      A three-terminal active organic semiconductor device where the output current is controlled by an electric field generated by the input voltage. These are compact and have lower power consumption.

    15. piezoresistors

      A device that exhibits a change in resistance when it is strained.

    16. pascals

      the standard unit of pressure or stress in the International System of Units (SI), equal to one newton per square meter.

    17. tactile

      connected with the sense of touch

    18. bionic

      having artificial body parts, especially electromechanical ones.

    19. prosthetic

      an artificial body part

    1. confocal micrographs

      Images obtained by confocal microscopy, a fluorescence imaging technique that uses lasers to create a three-dimensional image of a sample

    2. herringbones

      An arrangement or design consisting of columns of short parallel lines, with all lines from one column slopping in an opposite direction from the next column.

    3. orthogonal

      At a right angle, perpendicular

    4. Re

      Re is an abbreviation for Reynolds number.

    5. bas-relief structures

      Ridge like structures used to disrupt laminar flow patterns

    6. turbulent

      Fluid flow that is subject to chaotic changes in velocity and pressure. The opposite of laminar flow.

    7. topography

      Natural and artificial arrangements of physical features of an area.

    8. hydrodynamic dispersion

      The spreading out of a solute in a stream of fluid.

    9. microfabrication

      The process of fabricating a structure on a micrometer or smaller scale.

    10. Microfluidic

      A device that uses small amounts of liquid on a microscopic scale

    11. Poiseuille flows

      Steady viscous (thick) fluid flow driven by an effective pressure gradient established between the two ends of a long straight pipe of uniform circular cross-section

    12. photolithography

      A microfabrication technique that uses photosensitive resin and ultraviolet light to create microscale features and devices.

    13. chromatography

      Chemical analysis technique involving the separation of components in a mixture by passing it through a material in which the components move at different rates.

      [Chromatography basics video] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XfSopnqrHOs)

    14. Electroosmotic

      Pertaining to the flow of fluid caused by an applied voltage across a membrane, microchannel, or porous material.

    15. anisotropic

      Possessing a different property depending on the direction of the material.

    16. uniaxial

      Pertaining to a single direction.

    17. laminar

      Characterized by flow in which fluid moves smoothly along a path.

    18. Reynolds number

      A ratio of the internal forces to the viscous forces in a fluid. A low Reynolds number indicates stronger viscous force and smoother (laminar) flow, whereas a high Reynolds number indicates greater internal forces and irregular (turbulent) flow.

  8. Jan 2022
    1. reverse transcription quantitative real-time fluorescence polymerase chain reaction (qRT-PCR)

      Reverse transcription quantitative real-time fluorescence polymerase chain reaction, or qRT-PCR, is a widely used molecular technique to measure RNA levels.

      RNA is first reverse transcribed into complimentary DNA. This complimentary DNA is then used as a template for a fluorescence-tagged amplification reaction to calculate the relative amount of a specific starting transcript.

      The transcript levels are compared between genes of interest, which are all compared to a "housekeeping gene" or a transcript that has the same levels of expression across conditions. This comparison standardizes the levels of overall transcription across samples.

      Thermo Fisher provides an extensive introduction to gene expression measuring technologies here: https://www.thermofisher.com/us/en/home/life-science/pcr/real-time-pcr/real-time-pcr-learning-center/gene-expression-analysis-real-time-pcr-information/introduction-gene-expression.html

  9. Dec 2021
    1. PeVN

      The periventricular nucleus is a thin sheet of neurons located in the hypothalamus. For the purpose of this paper, PeVN can be defined as the part of the hypothalamus that is a major source of dopamine and somatostatin expression.

    2. PaVN

      The paraventricular nucleus is a region of the hypothalamus, considered to be the body's most important autonomic control center. The neurons of the PaVN are involved in controlling stress, metabolism, growth, reproduction, immune, gastrointestinal, renal, and cardiovascular functions. For the purpose of this paper, PaVN can be defined as the part of the hypothalamus that is a major source of dopamine and somatostatin expression.

    1. polar cap

      The polar cap is the region of each pole that is covered in ice.

    2. interannual variability

      Interannual events take place in different years.

      Here, it refers to variations that occur from year to year.

    3. forcings

      Forcings refer to factors that drive changes in the climate.

    4. absorption of sunlight

      Light absorption occurs when light transfers energy to an object.

      Here, sunlight's energy is transferred to ozone in the form of heat.

    5. high-latitude

      High latitudes are approximately 60 degrees from the equator and higher. This includes the polar regions.

    6. dynamical variability

      Dynamical variability refers to naturally occurring changes in the climate from year to year.

      Halogen-induced changes become more apparent when naturally occurring changes are removed from the analysis.

    7. low latitudes

      The low latitudes are approximately between 0 degrees (equator) and 30 degrees.

    8. halocarbons

      Halocarbons are chemicals that contain bonds between carbon and halogen atoms.

      Halogens are a group of elements that includes fluorine, chlorine, bromine, iodine, astatine, and tennessine.

      Halocarbons are highly reactive in the Earth's atmosphere and lead to ozone depletion.

    9. anthropogenic

      Anthropogenic means caused by human activity.

      In this context, humans released chemicals into the atmosphere, and these chemicals produced the hole in the ozone layer.

    10. mid-latitudes

      Latitude is the coordinate that specifies the north-south location on the surface of the Earth and ranges from 0 degrees at the equator to 90 degrees at the North and South Poles.

      Mid(or middle)-latitudes are approximately between 30 degrees and 60 degrees.

    11. total integrated column amount

      The integrated column is a way to quantify how much of a particular gas is found in the Earth's atmosphere.

      For a vertical path, or column, that extends through the atmosphere, the number of gas molecules is measured at each point along the path. Then, the sum total is calculated for the entire path.

      In this case, it is used to measure the amount of ozone in the atmosphere.

    12. ozone

      Ozone is a gaseous molecule composed of 3 oxygen atoms with the chemical formula O\(_{3}\).

      Here, the authors are referring to the layer of ozone in the Earth's atmosphere that filters harmful ultraviolet radiation from the sun.

    1. altithermal

      The altithermal, also known as the Holocene climatic optimum, was a warm period which occurred from around 9,000 to 5,000 years ago.

    2. mean radiating level

      The mean radiating level is the average altitude at which radiation is emitted from Earth out to space.

    3. hot, dry summer of 1980

      In 1980, the United States experienced an intense heat wave that remains among the most destructive natural disasters in American history.

    4. Paleoclimatic

      Paleoclimatology is the study of climate before direct measurements were taken. Analysis of samples from rock, ice, and trees can allow scientists to reconstruct climate patterns from hundreds to thousands of years ago.

    5. σ

      Here, σ refers to standard deviation, a measure of the amount of variation in a dataset.

    6. 5-year smoothed

      Smoothed datasets use approximations that combine points with their surrounding values in order to capture the largest patterns without small variations.

    7. a posteriori

      A posteriori means based on empirical evidence, rather than by theoretical deduction.

    8. correlation coefficient

      The correlation coefficient is a measure of how closely the variation in one quantity is related to the variation in another quantity. This value ranges from 0 to 1, with 0 indicating no correlation and 1 indicating perfect correlation.

    9. forcings

      A radiative forcing is a change in the energy flows in the atmosphere.

    10. solar insolation

      Solar insolation refers to the power per unit area received from the sun.

    11. Mount Agung

      Mount Agung is an active volcano in Bali, Indonesia. Its eruption in 1963 sent debris 10 km into the air and killed over 1,000 people. The volcano experienced several smaller eruptions between 2017 and 2019.

    12. heterogeneous

      Heterogeneous distributions are unevely spread out.

    13. stratospheric

      The stratosphere is the layer of the atmosphere above the troposphere. The stratosphere extends to around 50 km above sea level.

    14. optical thickness

      Optical thickness, or optical depth, is a measure of how much light can be transmitted through a material. The higher the optical thickness, the less light will make it through the substance.

    15. thermocline

      The thermocline is the horizontal layer in a body of water where the change in temperature with depth is greater than the layers above or below. Most sunlight is absorbed by the ocean above the thermocline, and this is also where most of the turbulent mixing by waves occurs.

    16. e-folding time

      e-Folding time is the time interval in which a quantity increases by a factor of e, or about 2.72.

    17. Wisconsin ice age

      The Wisconsin ice age, also known as the Wisconsin glaciation, was a period of colder temperatures and glacier advance in North America. This glaciation occurred between 75,000 and 11,000 years ago.

    18. moist adiabatic limiting lapse rate

      The moist adiabatic lapse rate is the rate at which the temperature of a moist air parcel changes as it rises adiabatically (zero heat transfer).

      Unlike the dry adiabatic lapse rate, the moist rate depends strongly on temperature. This is because cold air can hold less water than warm air, so as the parcel rises, water begins to condense and release heat to the air around it. This means that the moist rate is generally lower than the dry rate.

    19. absolute humidity

      Absolute humidity is the ratio of the mass of water in a parcel of air to the volume of that parcel.

    20. relative humidity

      Relative humidity is the ratio of how much water is in the air to how much water the air can hold at the temperature of measurement.

    21. model sensitivity

      The model sensitivity refers to how much the output changes for a given change in input. Here, we are interested in the amount of warming predicted for a doubling in carbon dioxide concentration.

    22. Mie scattering theory

      Mie scattering theory is a model of light scattering that assumes that the particles scattering the light are spherical. This theory applies best when the particles have similar diameter to the wavelength of the incident light. Scattering in the lower 4,500 m of the atmosphere is well described by these equations.

    23. absorption coefficients

      The absorption coefficient of a substance is how efficiently it absorbs radiation at a given frequency.

    24. radiative transfer equation

      The radiative transfer equation mathematically describes how a beam of radiation responds to absorption, emission, and scattering processes.

    25. flux divergences

      The divergence of a flux is a measure of how much some process flows in or out through a surface. If something is a source of the flow, its divergence will be positive, and if it is a sink, its divergence will be negative.

    26. heat capacity

      Heat capacity is the energy it takes to raise the temperature of a substance by a given amount (e.g., 1 degree). It usually has units of joules per mole per kelvin.

    27. convectively unstable

      Convective stability is the ability of a mass of air to resist vertical motion (convection). When an atmosphere is unstable, air masses have larger vertical movements. In the extreme, this can create turbulence and sometimes severe weather.

    28. latent heat

      Latent heat is heat transfer that is not accompanied by a change in temperature. This occurs when water condenses (releasing heat) or evaporates (absorbing heat).

      This is the mechanism by which sweat cools our bodies, even though the temperature of the water remains the same before and immediately after evaporation.

    29. dry adiabatic value

      An adiabatic process is one that occurs with no heat transfer between a system and its surroundings.

      As an air mass rises or falls adiabatically, its temperature changes with altitude due to the change in pressure. The rate of this change for a dry air mass is the dry adiabatic lapse rate.

    30. troposphere

      The troposphere is the lowest layer of Earth's atmosphere, extending from the surface to 13 km above ground on average. This layer contains most of the mass of the atmosphere and is where most weather phenomena take place.

    31. temperature gradient (lapse rate)

      The lapse rate is the rate at which temperature changes with altitude in the atmosphere.

    32. flux-weighted

      Radiant flux refers to light emitted through a surface and has units of watts per square meter. A spherical object emitting radiation will have a radiant flux that gets smaller as one gets further from the source's center.

    33. Stefan-Boltzmann constant

      The Stefan-Boltzmann constant is a number used in the Stefan-Boltzmann law. This equation relates an object's temperature to the wavelengths of light it emits.

      The constant's value is about 5.67 W / (m^2 K^4).

    34. albedo

      Albedo is the proportion of incoming light that is reflected back into space. This reflected light is in the visible and ultraviolet range, rather than the light emitted by Earth itself which is in the infrared.

      Clouds and snow are responsible for much of the planet's albedo.

    35. greenhouse effect

      The greenhouse effect is the warming of Earth's surface due to the behavior of certain atmospheric gases, called greenhouse gases.

      Greenhouse gases absorb and emit the same wavelengths of light (infrared) that are emitted by the planet's surface. This slows down the loss of heat energy to space.

    36. order of magnitude

      An order of magnitude generally refers to a factor of ten. If two results disagree by an order magnitude or more, they are quite different from each other.

    37. radiative perturbations

      Radiative perturbations are changes to the balance of light energy exchanged between Earth and space.

    38. atmospheric "window"

      The atmospheric window refers to the range of wavelengths of light that are emitted from Earth to space with little absorption by atmospheric gases.

      Radiation in this range allows the Earth to get rid of excess heat energy from the Sun and maintain a constant temperature.

    39. anthropogenic carbon dioxide

      Anthropogenic pollutants are harmful substances released into the environment from human activities.

      Carbon dioxide is one such pollutant, and is released from the burning of fossil fuels, such as coal and gasoline.

    40. parts per million

      If a gas has a concentration in a mixture of one part per million (ppm), there is one particle of that gas for every million particles in the mixture.

    41. Northwest Passage

      The Northwest Passage is the sea route that connects the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans along the northern coast of North America.

      Early European explorers believed the Northwest Passage could allow easy access to Asia, but the waters were too shallow and icy to be navigable.

    42. noise level

      The noise level in a dataset refers to the amount of natural variation that is present.