The STAR Photon Multiplicity Detector

Details concerning the design, fabrication and performance of STAR Photon Multiplicity Detector (PMD) are presented. The PMD will cover the forward region, within the pseudorapidity range 2.3--3.5, behind the forward time projection chamber. It will measure the spatial distribution of photons in order to study collective flow, fluctuation and chiral symmetry restoration.Comment: 15 pages, including 11 figures; to appear in a special NIM volume dedicated to the accelerator and detectors at RHI

Prevalence of high - risk human papillomavirus infections in women with benign cervical cytology: A hospital based study from North India

INTRODUCTION: Cervical cancer is the commonest cancer among Indian women. High-risk human papillomavirus (HPV) detection holds the potential to be used as a tool to identify women, at risk for subsequent development of cervical cancer. There is a pressing need for identifying prevalence of asymptomatic cervical HPV infection in the local population. OBJECTIVE: To determine the prevalence of high-risk HPV DNA in women with benign cervical cytology. MATERIALS AND METHODS: Women visiting the gynecology outpatient with varied complaints were subjected to Pap smear. Four hundred and seventy two samples were subjected to polymerase chain reaction, using consensus primers for low and high-risk HPV (types 6, 11, 16, 18, 31 and 33). The samples that were positive for HPV DNA were subsequently assessed for high-risk consensus primers, types 16, 18, 31 and 33 as well as for HPV type 16 and 18. RESULTS: One hundred and seventy four (36.8%) women tested positive for HPV DNA. Thirty nine (8.2%) of the entire cohort tested positive for high-risk HPV. Fifteen samples were positive for type 16, 22 for type 18 and two for both types 16 and 18. A statistically higher prevalence of high-risk HPV was observed in poorly educated and rural groups. No association of HPV prevalence was noted with age, parity and age at marriage. CONCLUSION: The study generates epidemiological data of prevalence of sub-clinical HPV in the women visiting a tertiary care institute as well as peripheral health centres. The data generated will be useful for laying guidelines for mass screening of HPV, treatment and prophylaxis in the local population

The Quark Gluon Plasma: lattice computations put to experimental test

I describe how lattice computations are being used to extract experimentally relevant features of the quark gluon plasma. I deal specifically with relaxation times, photon emissivity, strangeness yields, event by event fluctuations of conserved quantities and hydrodynamic flow. Finally I give evidence that the plasma is liquid-like in some ways.Comment: Review talk at the QCD02 meeting, IIT Kanpur, Indi

Search and study of Quark Gluon Plasma at the CERN-LHC

The major aim of nucleus-nucleus collisions at the LHC is to study the physics of strongly interacting matter and the quark gluon plasma (QGP), formed in extreme conditions of temperature and energy density. We give a brief overview of the experimental program and discuss the signatures and observables for a detailed study of QGP matter.Comment: 15 pages, Invited article for the volume on LHC physics to celebrate the Platinum Jubilee of the Indian National Science Academy, Edited by Amitava Datta, Biswarup Mukhopadhyaya and Amitava Raychaudhuri (Jan 2009

Multiplicity Distributions and Charged-neutral Fluctuations

Results from the multiplicity distributions of inclusive photons and charged particles, scaling of particle multiplicities, event-by-event multiplicity fluctuations, and charged-neutral fluctuations in 158$\cdot A$ GeV Pb+Pb collisions are presented and discussed. A scaling of charged particle multiplicity as $N_{part}^{1.07\pm 0.05}$ and photons as $N_{part}^{1.12\pm 0.03}$ have been observed, indicating violation of naive wounded nucleon model. The analysis of localized charged-neutral fluctuation indicates a model-independent demonstration of non-statistical fluctuations in both charged particles and photons in limited azimuthal regions. However, no correlated charged-neutral fluctuations are observed.Comment: Talk given at the International Symposium on Nuclear Physics (ISNP-2000), Mumbai, India, 18-22 Dec 2000, Proceedings to be published in Pramana, Journal of Physic

Study of knowledge, perception and attitude of adolescent girls towards STIs/HIV, safer sex and sex education: (A cross sectional survey of urban adolescent school girls in South Delhi, India)

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>Sexually Transmitted Infections (STI's), including HIV (Human Immunodeficiency Virus) mainly affects sexually active young people. Young adults aged 15–29 years, account for 32% of AIDS (Acquired Immunodeficiency Syndrome) cases reported in India and the number of young women living with HIV/AIDS is twice that of young men. The aim of the study was to evaluate adolescent school girls' knowledge, perceptions and attitudes towards STIs/HIV and safer sex practice and sex education and to explore their current sexual behaviour in India.</p> <p>Methods</p> <p>A cross sectional study was carried out in 2007 in South Delhi, India to investigate the perception, knowledge and attitude of adolescent urban schoolgirls towards sexually transmitted Infections (STIs), HIV/AIDS, safer sex practice and sex education. the self-administered questionnaire was completed by 251 female students from two senior secondary schools.</p> <p>Results</p> <p>More than one third of students in this study had no accurate understanding about the signs and symptoms of STIs other than HIV/AIDS. About 30% of respondents considered HIV/AIDS could be cured, 49% felt that condoms should not be available to youth, 41% were confused about whether the contraceptive pill could protect against HIV infection and 32% thought it should only be taken by married women.</p> <p>Conclusion</p> <p>Though controversial, there is an immense need to implement gender-based sex education regarding STIs, safe sex options and contraceptives in schools in India</p

Search for DCC in 158A GeV Pb+Pb Collisions

A detailed analysis of the phase space distributions of charged particles and photons have been carried out using two independent methods. The results indicate the presence of nonstatistical fluctuations in localized regions of phase space.Comment: Talk at the PANIC99 Conference, June 9-16, 199

Centrality Dependence of Neutral Pion Production in 158 A GeV Pb + Pb Collisions

The production of neutral pions in 158AGeV Pb+Pb collisions has been studied in the WA98 experiment at the CERN SPS. Transverse momentum spectra are studied for the range 0.3 GeV/c < mT-m0 < 4.0 GeV/c. The results for central collisions are compared to various models. The centrality dependence of the neutral pion spectral shape and yield is investigated. An invariance of the spectral shape and a simple scaling of the yield with the number of participating nucleons is observed for centralities with greater than about 30 participating nucleons which is most naturally explained by assuming an equilibrated system.Comment: 5 pages, Latex, including 3 eps figures, submitted to Phys.Rev.Lett; updated pQCD comparison due to new input from the author, updated references, corrected plotting error in figure

Clinical features and outcomes of patients with tubercular uveitis treated with antitubercular therapy in the collaborative ocular tuberculosis study (COTS)-1

IMPORTANCE Eradication of systemic tuberculosis (TB) has been limited by neglected populations and the HIV pandemic. Whereas ocular TB often presents as uveitis without any prior evidence of systemic TB, the existing uncertainty in the diagnosis of TB uveitis may perpetuate missed opportunities to address systemic TB. OBJECTIVE To examine the clinical features of TB uveitis and the associations with response to antitubercular therapy (ATT). DESIGN, SETTING, AND PARTICIPANTS This retrospective multinational cohort study included patients from 25 ophthalmology referral centers diagnosed with TB uveitis and treated with ATT from January 1, 2004, through December 31, 2014, with a minimum follow-up of 1 year. MAIN OUTCOMES AND MEASURES Treatment failure, defined as a persistence or recurrence of inflammation within 6 months of completing ATT, inability to taper oral corticosteroids to less than 10mg/d or topical corticosteroid drops to less than 2 drops daily, and/or recalcitrant inflammation necessitating corticosteroid-sparing immunosuppressive therapy. RESULTS A total of 801 patients (1272 eyes) were studied (mean [SD] age, 40.5 [14.8] years; 413 [51.6%] male and 388 [48.4%] female; 577 [73.6%] Asian). Most patients had no known history (498 of 661 [75.3%]) of systemic TB. Most patients had bilateral involvement (471 of 801 [58.8%]). Common clinical signs reported include vitreous haze (523 of 1153 [45.4%]), retinal vasculitis (374 of 874 [42.8%]), and choroidal involvement (419 of 651 [64.4%]). Treatment failure developed in 102 of the 801 patients (12.7%). On univariate regression analysis, the hazard ratios (HRs) associated with intermediate uveitis (HR, 2.21; 95%CI, 1.07-4.55; P = .03), anterior uveitis (HR, 2.68; 95%CI, 1.32-2.35; P = .006), and panuveitis (HR, 3.28; 95%CI, 1.89-5.67; P &lt; .001) were significantly higher compared with posterior distribution. The presence of vitreous haze had a statistically significant association (HR, 1.95; 95%CI, 1.26-3.02; P = .003) compared with absence of vitreous haze. Bilaterality had an associated HR of 1.50 (95%CI, 0.96-2.35) compared with unilaterality (HR, 1 [reference]), although this finding was not statistically significant (P = .07). On multivariate Cox proportional hazards regression analysis, the presence of vitreous haze had an adjusted HR of 2.98 (95%CI, 1.50-5.94; P = .002), presence of snow banking had an adjusted HR of 3.71 (95%CI, 1.18-11.62; P = .02), and presence of choroidal involvement had an adjusted HR of 2.88 (95%CI, 1.22-6.78; P = .02). CONCLUSIONS AND RELEVANCE A low treatment failure rate occurred in patients with TB uveitis treated with ATT. Phenotypes and test results are studied whereby patients with panuveitis having vitreous and choroidal involvement had a higher risk of treatment failure. These findings are limited by retrospectivemethods. A prospectively derived composite clinical risk score might address this diagnostic uncertainty through holistic and standardized assessment of the combinations of clinical features and investigation results that may warrant diagnosis of TB uveitis and treatment with ATT

Systematics of Inclusive Photon Production in 158 AGeV Pb Induced Reactions on Ni, Nb, and Pb Targets

The multiplicity of inclusive photons has been measured on an event-by-event basis for 158 AGeV Pb induced reactions on Ni, Nb, and Pb targets. The systematics of the pseudorapidity densities at midrapidity (rho_max) and the width of the pseudorapidity distributions have been studied for varying centralities for these collisions. A power law fit to the photon yield as a function of the number of participating nucleons gives a value of 1.13+-0.03 for the exponent. The mean transverse momentum, , of photons determined from the ratio of the measured electromagnetic transverse energy and photon multiplicity, remains almost constant with increasing rho_max. Results are compared with model predictions.Comment: 16 pages including 4 figure