On the electronic structure of CaCuO2 and SrCuO2

Recent electronic structure calculations for the prototypical lowdimensional cuprate compounds CaCuO2 ans SrCuO2 performed by Wu et. al. (J. Phys.: Condens. Matter v. 11 p.4637 (1999))are critically reconsidered, applying high precision full-potential bandstructure methods. It is shown that the bandstructure calculations presented by the authors contain several important inconsistencies, which make their main conclusions highly questionable.Comment: 4 pages, 3 figures, submitted to J. Phys. Condens. Matte

The influence of intervening tasks on memory

Learning new information is rarely done in isolation outside the laboratory. What one does between study sessions is important for later retrieval of the studied material. Previous research has shown that interleaved semantic retrieval leads to enhanced memory for later-learned items but to reduced memory for earlier-learned items (Divis & Benjamin, 2014). Retrieval-induced distinction provides one account for the opposite effects of retrieval on memory for early versus later material. By that view, retrieval serves to "spread out" the memory representations, making them (1) more distinct and less likely to interfere with each other and (2) rendering earlier events mentally more distant and harder to access at the time of test. Here, I expand on prior work examining the influence of intervening tasks on memory. Experiment 1 examines the effect of interleaved periods of task switching on memory for materials learned prior to or following the task switching intervention. Switching tasks (50% retrieval and 50% control) between periods of learning leads to similar benefits as those provided by a retrieval intervention. Experiments 2A and 2B examine the effects of intervening task on interlist intrusions. List distinction is enhanced when lists are separated by retrieval tasks, as seen by a reduction in interlist intrusions. Experiment 3 integrates and extends many of the components of prior studies by examining the influence of intervening retrieval on memory for complex, narrative text materials that share repeated, conflicting, and unique information. It highlights important boundaries to the influence of retrieval-induced distinction and provides a launching point for future studies examining the application of these intervening tasks in more ecologically relevant settings

Clinical and parasitological response to oral chloroquine and primaquine in uncomplicated human Plasmodium knowlesi infections

Background: Plasmodium knowlesi is a cause of symptomatic and potentially fatal infections in humans. There are no studies assessing the detailed parasitological response to treatment of knowlesi malaria infections in man and whether antimalarial resistance occurs. Methods: A prospective observational study of oral chloroquine and primaquine therapy was conducted in consecutive patients admitted to Kapit Hospital, Sarawak, Malaysian Borneo with PCR-confirmed single P. knowlesi infections. These patients were given oral chloroquine for three days, and at 24 hours oral primaquine was administered for two consecutive days, primarily as a gametocidal agent. Clinical and parasitological responses were recorded at 6-hourly intervals during the first 24 hours, daily until discharge and then weekly to day 28. Vivax malaria patients were studied as a comparator group. Results: Of 96 knowlesi malaria patients who met the study criteria, 73 were recruited to an assessment of the acute response to treatment and 60 completed follow-up over 28 days. On admission, the mean parasite stage distributions were 49.5%, 41.5%, 4.0% and 5.6% for early trophozoites, late trophozoites, schizonts and gametocytes respectively. The median fever clearance time was 26.5 [inter-quartile range 16-34] hours. The mean times to 50% (PCT50) and 90% (PCT90) parasite clearance were 3.1 (95% confidence intervals [CI] 2.8-3.4) hours and 10.3 (9.4-11.4) hours. These were more rapid than in a group of 23 patients with vivax malaria 6.3 (5.3-7.8) hours and 20.9 (17.6-25.9) hours; P = 0.02). It was difficult to assess the effect of primaquine on P. knowlesi parasites, due to the rapid anti-malarial properties of chloroquine and since primaquine was administered 24 hours after chloroquine. No P. knowlesi recrudescences or re-infections were detected by PCR. Conclusions: Chloroquine plus primaqine is an inexpensive and highly effective treatment for uncomplicated knowlesi malaria infections in humans and there is no evidence of drug resistance. Further studies using alternative anti-malarial drugs, including artemisinin derivatives, would be desirable to define optimal management strategies for P. knowlesi.Publisher PDFPeer reviewe

Severe malaria - a case of fatal Plasmodium knowlesi infection with post-mortem findings: a case report.

BACKGROUND: Zoonotic malaria caused by Plasmodium knowlesi is an important, but newly recognized, human pathogen. For the first time, post-mortem findings from a fatal case of knowlesi malaria are reported here. CASE PRESENTATION: A formerly healthy 40 year-old male became symptomatic 10 days after spending time in the jungle of North Borneo. Four days later, he presented to hospital in a state of collapse and died within two hours. He was hyponatraemic and had elevated blood urea, potassium, lactate dehydrogenase and amino transferase values; he was also thrombocytopenic and eosinophilic. Dengue haemorrhagic shock was suspected and a post-mortem examination performed. Investigations for dengue virus were negative. Blood for malaria parasites indicated hyperparasitaemia and single species P. knowlesi infection was confirmed by nested-PCR. Macroscopic pathology of the brain and endocardium showed multiple petechial haemorrhages, the liver and spleen were enlarged and lungs had features consistent with ARDS. Microscopic pathology showed sequestration of pigmented parasitized red blood cells in the vessels of the cerebrum, cerebellum, heart and kidney without evidence of chronic inflammatory reaction in the brain or any other organ examined. Brain sections were negative for intracellular adhesion molecule-1. The spleen and liver had abundant pigment containing macrophages and parasitized red blood cells. The kidney had evidence of acute tubular necrosis and endothelial cells in heart sections were prominent. CONCLUSIONS: The overall picture in this case was one of systemic malaria infection that fit the WHO classification for severe malaria. Post-mortem findings in this case were unexpectedly similar to those that define fatal falciparum malaria, including cerebral pathology. There were important differences including the absence of coma despite petechial haemorrhages and parasite sequestration in the brain. These results suggest that further study of knowlesi malaria will aid the interpretation of, often conflicting, information on malaria pathophysiology in humans

Evolution of ferromagnetic and non-Fermi liquid state with doping:the case of Ru doped UCoGe

We have investigated the impact of Ru substitution for Co on the behavior of the ferromagnetic superconductor UCoGe by performing x-ray diffraction, magnetization, specific heat and electrical resistivity measurements on polycrystalline samples of the $\mathrm{UCo}_{1-x}\mathrm{Ru}_{x}\mathrm{Ge}$ series ($0\geq x\leq0.9$). The initial Ru substitution up to $x\approx0.1$ leads to a simultaneous sharp increase of the Curie temperature and spontaneous magnetization up to maximum values of $T_{\mathrm{C}}=8.6 K$ and $M_{\mathrm{S}}=0.1 \mu_{\mathrm{B}}$ per formula unit, respectively, whereas superconductivity vanishes already for $x\approx0.03$. Further increase of the Ru content beyond $x\approx0.1$ leads to a precipitous decrease of both, $T_{\mathrm{C}}$ and $M_{\mathrm{S}}$ towards a ferromagnetic quantum critical point (QCP) at $x_{\mathrm{cr}}=0.31$. Consequently the $T-x$ magnetic phase diagram consists of a well-developed ferromagnetic dome. We discuss the evolution of ferromagnetism with $x$ on the basis of band structure changes due to varying 5$f$-ligand hybridization. This scenario is supported by the results of electronic structure calculations and consideration of the simplified periodic Anderson model. The analysis of the temperature dependencies of the electrical resistivity and heat capacity at low temperatures of the samples in the vicinity of the QCP reveals a non-Fermi liquid behavior and assigns the ferromagnetic quantum phase transition to be most likely of a continuous Hertz-Millis type.Comment: accepted for publication in PR

Dilatometry study of the ferromagnetic order in single-crystalline URhGe

Thermal expansion measurements have been carried out on single-crystalline URhGe in the temperature range from 2 to 200 K. At the ferromagnetic transition (Curie temperature T_C = 9.7 K), the coefficients of linear thermal expansion along the three principal orthorhombic axes all exhibit pronounced positive peaks. This implies that the uniaxial pressure dependencies of the Curie temperature, determined by the Ehrenfest relation, are all positive. Consequently, the calculated hydrostatic pressure dependence dT_C/dp is positive and amounts to 0.12 K/kbar. In addition, the effective Gruneisen parameter was determined. The low-temperature electronic Gruneisen parameter \Gamma_{sf} = 14 indicates an enhanced volume dependence of the ferromagnetic spin fluctuations at low temperatures. Moreover, the volume dependencies of the energy scales for ferromagnetic order and ferromagnetic spin fluctuations were found to be identical.Comment: 5 page

Magnetism, Spin-Orbit Coupling, and Superconducting Pairing in UGe2_2

A consistent picture on the mean-field level of the magnetic properties and electronic structure of the superconducting itinerant ferromagnet UGe$_2$ is shown to require inclusion of correlation effects beyond the local density approximation (LDA). The "LDA+U" approach reproduces both the magnitude of the observed moment, composed of strongly opposing spin and orbital parts, and the magnetocrystalline anisotropy. The largest Fermi surface sheet is comprised primarily of spin majority states with orbital projection $m_{\ell}$=0, suggesting a much simpler picture of the pairing than is possible for general strong spin-orbit coupled materials. This occurrence, and the quasi-two-dimensional geometry of the Fermi surface, support the likelihood of magnetically mediated p-wave triplet pairing.Comment: accepted for publication in Phys. Rev. Lett; URL for better quality image of Fig.3 (2MB) at http://yammer.ucdavis.edu/public/UGe2/fig3.ep

Plasmodium knowlesi Genome Sequences from Clinical Isolates Reveal Extensive Genomic Dimorphism.

Plasmodium knowlesi is a newly described zoonosis that causes malaria in the human population that can be severe and fatal. The study of P. knowlesi parasites from human clinical isolates is relatively new and, in order to obtain maximum information from patient sample collections, we explored the possibility of generating P. knowlesi genome sequences from archived clinical isolates. Our patient sample collection consisted of frozen whole blood samples that contained excessive human DNA contamination and, in that form, were not suitable for parasite genome sequencing. We developed a method to reduce the amount of human DNA in the thawed blood samples in preparation for high throughput parasite genome sequencing using Illumina HiSeq and MiSeq sequencing platforms. Seven of fifteen samples processed had sufficiently pure P. knowlesi DNA for whole genome sequencing. The reads were mapped to the P. knowlesi H strain reference genome and an average mapping of 90% was obtained. Genes with low coverage were removed leaving 4623 genes for subsequent analyses. Previously we identified a DNA sequence dimorphism on a small fragment of the P. knowlesi normocyte binding protein xa gene on chromosome 14. We used the genome data to assemble full-length Pknbpxa sequences and discovered that the dimorphism extended along the gene. An in-house algorithm was developed to detect SNP sites co-associating with the dimorphism. More than half of the P. knowlesi genome was dimorphic, involving genes on all chromosomes and suggesting that two distinct types of P. knowlesi infect the human population in Sarawak, Malaysian Borneo. We use P. knowlesi clinical samples to demonstrate that Plasmodium DNA from archived patient samples can produce high quality genome data. We show that analyses, of even small numbers of difficult clinical malaria isolates, can generate comprehensive genomic information that will improve our understanding of malaria parasite diversity and pathobiology

Disease progression in Plasmodium knowlesi malaria is linked to variation in invasion gene family members.

Emerging pathogens undermine initiatives to control the global health impact of infectious diseases. Zoonotic malaria is no exception. Plasmodium knowlesi, a malaria parasite of Southeast Asian macaques, has entered the human population. P. knowlesi, like Plasmodium falciparum, can reach high parasitaemia in human infections, and the World Health Organization guidelines for severe malaria list hyperparasitaemia among the measures of severe malaria in both infections. Not all patients with P. knowlesi infections develop hyperparasitaemia, and it is important to determine why. Between isolate variability in erythrocyte invasion, efficiency seems key. Here we investigate the idea that particular alleles of two P. knowlesi erythrocyte invasion genes, P. knowlesi normocyte binding protein Pknbpxa and Pknbpxb, influence parasitaemia and human disease progression. Pknbpxa and Pknbpxb reference DNA sequences were generated from five geographically and temporally distinct P. knowlesi patient isolates. Polymorphic regions of each gene (approximately 800 bp) were identified by haplotyping 147 patient isolates at each locus. Parasitaemia in the study cohort was associated with markers of disease severity including liver and renal dysfunction, haemoglobin, platelets and lactate, (r = ≥ 0.34, p =  <0.0001 for all). Seventy-five and 51 Pknbpxa and Pknbpxb haplotypes were resolved in 138 (94%) and 134 (92%) patient isolates respectively. The haplotypes formed twelve Pknbpxa and two Pknbpxb allelic groups. Patients infected with parasites with particular Pknbpxa and Pknbpxb alleles within the groups had significantly higher parasitaemia and other markers of disease severity. Our study strongly suggests that P. knowlesi invasion gene variants contribute to parasite virulence. We focused on two invasion genes, and we anticipate that additional virulent loci will be identified in pathogen genome-wide studies. The multiple sustained entries of this diverse pathogen into the human population must give cause for concern to malaria elimination strategists in the Southeast Asian region