15,900 research outputs found
Comment on: Kinetic Roughening in Slow Combustion of Paper
We comment on a recent Letter by Maunuksela et al. [Phys. Rev. Lett. 79, 1515
(1997)].Comment: 1 page, 1 figure, http://polymer.bu.edu/~hmakse/Home.htm
ERS international congress, Madrid, 2019: Highlights from the Epidemiology and Environment Assembly
At the European Respiratory Society's International Congress of 2019, which was held in Madrid, Spain, there were several sessions with exciting poster and oral presentations within the fields of epidemiology and tobacco control. This article is the summary of two of these sessions. One was on the use of Big Data in epidemiology and the other, on the global burden of respiratory disease and tobacco
Micro-bias and macro-performance
We use agent-based modeling to investigate the effect of conservatism and
partisanship on the efficiency with which large populations solve the density
classification task--a paradigmatic problem for information aggregation and
consensus building. We find that conservative agents enhance the populations'
ability to efficiently solve the density classification task despite large
levels of noise in the system. In contrast, we find that the presence of even a
small fraction of partisans holding the minority position will result in
deadlock or a consensus on an incorrect answer. Our results provide a possible
explanation for the emergence of conservatism and suggest that even low levels
of partisanship can lead to significant social costs.Comment: 11 pages, 5 figure
Directed Surfaces in Disordered Media
The critical exponents for a class of one-dimensional models of interface
depinning in disordered media can be calculated through a mapping onto directed
percolation (DP). In higher dimensions these models give rise to directed
surfaces, which do not belong to the directed percolation universality class.
We formulate a scaling theory of directed surfaces, and calculate critical
exponents numerically, using a cellular automaton that locates the directed
surfaces without making reference to the dynamics of the underlying interface
growth models.Comment: 4 pages, REVTEX, 2 Postscript figures avaliable from [email protected]
Processo sócio-educativo e a busca da cidadania
O presente estudo analisa uma experiência socioeducativa de mulheres incluídas no programa de transferência de renda da cidade de Londrina-Brasil. Nossa análise compreende que a construção de conhecimento deve considerar as dimensões científicas, sociais e políticas e que o ensino é um importante instrumento propiciador de participação e da construção de direitos sociais, aspectos centrais em países com quadro acintoso de desigualdade social. Os resultados foram coletados a partir de depoimentos dos participantes. No ano de implantação (2001) eram 18 grupos de aproximadamente 25 pessoas, posteriormente, em 2007, este número chegou a atingir 370 grupos que se reuniam quatro horas semanais, cujos resultados avaliaram a transformação cotidiana das famílias em situação de pobreza
Higher-Derivative Two-Dimensional Massive Fermion Theories
We consider the canonical quantization of a generalized two-dimensional
massive fermion theory containing higher odd-order derivatives. The
requirements of Lorentz invariance, hermiticity of the Hamiltonian and absence
of tachyon excitations suffice to fix the mass term, which contains a
derivative coupling. We show that the basic quantum excitations of a
higher-derivative theory of order 2N+1 consist of a physical usual massive
fermion, quantized with positive metric, plus 2N unphysical massless fermions,
quantized with opposite metrics. The positive metric Hilbert subspace, which is
isomorphic to the space of states of a massive free fermion theory, is selected
by a subsidiary-like condition. Employing the standard bosonization scheme, the
equivalent boson theory is derived. The results obtained are used as a
guideline to discuss the solution of a theory including a current-current
interaction.Comment: 23 pages, Late
Extended-release niacin increases anti-apolipoprotein A-I antibodies that block the antioxidant effect of high-density lipoprotein-cholesterol: the EXPLORE clinical trial.
Extended-release niacin (ERN) is the most effective agent for increasing high-density lipoprotein-cholesterol (HDL-C). Having previously identified anti-HDL antibodies, we investigated whether ERN affected the antioxidant capacity of HDL and whether ERN was associated with the production of antibodies against HDL (aHDL) and apolipoprotein A-I (aApoA-I).
METHODS:
Twenty-one patients older than 18 years, with HDL-C ≤40 mg dl-1 (men) or ≤50 mg dl-1 (women) were randomly assigned to receive daily ERN (n = 10) or placebo (n = 11) for two sequential 12-week periods, with 4 weeks of wash-out before cross-over. Primary outcome was change of paraoxonase-1 (PON1) activity and secondary outcomes were changes in aHDL and aApoA-I antibodies. Clinical Trial Unique Identifier: EudraCT 2006-006889-42.
RESULTS:
The effect of ERN on PON1 activity was nonsignificant (coefficient estimate 20.83 U l-1 , 95% confidence interval [CI] -9.88 to 51.53; P = 0.184). ERN was associated with an increase in HDL-C levels (coefficient estimate 5.21 mg dl-1 , 95% CI 1.16 to 9.25; P = 0.012) and its subclasses HDL2 (coefficient estimate 2.46 mg dl-1 , 95% CI 0.57 to 4.34; P = 0.011) and HDL3 (coefficient estimate 2.73 mg dl-1 , 95% CI 0.47 to 4.98; P = 0.018). ERN was significantly associated with the production of aApoA-I antibodies (coefficient estimate 0.25 μg ml-1 , 95% CI 0.09-0.40; P = 0.001). aApoA-I titres at baseline were correlated with decreased PON activity.
CONCLUSIONS:
The rise in HDL-C achieved with ERN was not matched by improved antioxidant capacity, eventually hampered by the emergence of aApoA-I antibodies. These results may explain why Niacin and other lipid lowering agents fail to reduce cardiovascular risk.info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio
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