310 research outputs found
On the Initial Conditions for Brane Inflation
String theory gives rise to various mechanisms to generate primordial
inflation, of which ``brane inflation'' is one of the most widely considered.
In this scenario, inflation takes place while two branes are approaching each
other, and the modulus field representing the separation between the branes
plays the role of the inflaton field. We study the phase space of initial
conditions which can lead to a sufficiently long period of cosmological
inflation, and find that taking into account the possibility of nonvanishing
initial momentum can significantly change the degree of fine tuning of the
required initial conditions.Comment: 11 pages, 2 figure
Decay Constants and Semileptonic Decays of Heavy Mesons in Relativistic Quark Model
We investigate the and mesons in the relativistic quark model by
applying the variational method with the Gaussian wave function. We calculate
the Fermi momentum parameter , and obtain
GeV, which is almost independent of the input parameters, , ,
and . We then calculate the ratio /, and obtain the
result which is larger, by the factor of about 1.3, than
given by the naive nonrelativistic analogy. This result is in a good agreement
with the recent Lattice calculations. We also calculate the ratio
/. In these calculations the wave function at
origin is essential. We also determine by comparing the
theoretical prediction of the ACCMM model with the lepton energy spectrum of from the recent ARGUS analysis, and find that
GeV, when we use GeV. However, this
experimentally determined value of is strongly dependent on the value
of input parameter .Comment: 15 pages (Latex) (uses epsfig.sty, 1 figure appended as a uuencoded
compressed ps-file
Weighted maximal regularity estimates and solvability of non-smooth elliptic systems II
We continue the development, by reduction to a first order system for the
conormal gradient, of \textit{a priori} estimates and solvability for
boundary value problems of Dirichlet, regularity, Neumann type for divergence
form second order, complex, elliptic systems. We work here on the unit ball and
more generally its bi-Lipschitz images, assuming a Carleson condition as
introduced by Dahlberg which measures the discrepancy of the coefficients to
their boundary trace near the boundary. We sharpen our estimates by proving a
general result concerning \textit{a priori} almost everywhere non-tangential
convergence at the boundary. Also, compactness of the boundary yields more
solvability results using Fredholm theory. Comparison between classes of
solutions and uniqueness issues are discussed. As a consequence, we are able to
solve a long standing regularity problem for real equations, which may not be
true on the upper half-space, justifying \textit{a posteriori} a separate work
on bounded domains.Comment: 76 pages, new abstract and few typos corrected. The second author has
changed nam
Scale invariant scalar metric fluctuations during inflation: non-perturbative formalism from a 5D vacuum
We extend to 5D an approach of a 4D non-perturbative formalism to study
scalar metric fluctuations of a 5D Riemann-flat de Sitter background metric. In
contrast with the results obtained in 4D, the spectrum of cosmological scalar
metric fluctuations during inflation can be scale invariant and the background
inflaton field can take sub-Planckian values.Comment: final version to be published in Eur. Phys. J.
A confirmation of agreement of different approaches for scalar gauge-invariant metric perturbations during inflation
We revisit an extension of the well-known formalism for gauge-invariant
scalar metric fluctuations, to study the spectrums for both, the inflaton and
gauge invariant (scalar) metric fluctuations in the framework of a single field
inflationary model where the quasi-exponential expansion is driven by an
inflation which is minimally coupled to gravity. The proposal here examined is
valid also for fluctuations with large amplitude, but for cosmological scales,
where vector and tensor perturbations can be neglected and the fluid is
irrotacional.Comment: Version accepted in EPJC with new title. 11 pages, no figure
Lattice Study of the Decay B^0-bar -> rho^+ l^- nu_l-bar: Model-Independent Determination of |V_{ub}|
We present results of a lattice computation of the vector and axial-vector
current matrix elements relevant for the semileptonic decay B^0-bar -> rho^+
l^- nu_l-bar. The computations are performed in the quenched approximation of
lattice QCD on a 24^3 x 48 lattice at beta = 6.2, using an O(a) improved
fermionic action. Our principal result is for the differential decay rate,
dGamma/dq^2, for the decay B^0-bar -> rho^+ l^- nu_l-bar in a region beyond the
charm threshold, allowing a model-independent extraction of |V_{ub}| from
experimental measurements. Heavy quark symmetry relations between radiative and
semileptonic decays of B-bar mesons into light vector mesons are also
discussed.Comment: 22 pages LaTeX-209 (dependent on settings in a4.sty), 23 PostScript
figures included with epsf.sty. Complete PostScript file including figures
available at http://wwwhep.phys.soton.ac.uk/hepwww/papers/shep9518
Leptonic and Semileptonic Decays of Charm and Bottom Hadrons
We review the experimental measurements and theoretical descriptions of
leptonic and semileptonic decays of particles containing a single heavy quark,
either charm or bottom. Measurements of bottom semileptonic decays are used to
determine the magnitudes of two fundamental parameters of the standard model,
the Cabibbo-Kobayashi-Maskawa matrix elements and . These
parameters are connected with the physics of quark flavor and mass, and they
have important implications for the breakdown of CP symmetry. To extract
precise values of and from measurements, however,
requires a good understanding of the decay dynamics. Measurements of both charm
and bottom decay distributions provide information on the interactions
governing these processes. The underlying weak transition in each case is
relatively simple, but the strong interactions that bind the quarks into
hadrons introduce complications. We also discuss new theoretical approaches,
especially heavy-quark effective theory and lattice QCD, which are providing
insights and predictions now being tested by experiment. An international
effort at many laboratories will rapidly advance knowledge of this physics
during the next decade.Comment: This review article will be published in Reviews of Modern Physics in
the fall, 1995. This file contains only the abstract and the table of
contents. The full 168-page document including 47 figures is available at
http://charm.physics.ucsb.edu/papers/slrevtex.p
Nonresonant Three-body Decays of D and B Mesons
Nonresonant three-body decays of D and B mesons are studied. It is pointed
out that if heavy meson chiral perturbation theory (HMChPT) is applied to the
heavy-light strong and weak vertices and assumed to be valid over the whole
kinematic region, then the predicted decay rates for nonresonant charmless
3-body B decays will be too large and especially B^- --> pi^- K^+ K^- greatly
exceeds the current experimental limit. This can be understood as chiral
symmetry has been applied there twice beyond its region of validity. If HMChPT
is applied only to the strong vertex and the weak transition is accounted for
by the form factors, the dominant B^* pole contribution to the tree-dominated
direct three-body B decays will become small and the branching ratio will be of
order 10^{-6}. The decay modes B^- --> (K^- h^+ h^-)_{NR} and bar{B}^0 -->
(bar{K}^0 h^+h^-)_{NR} for h = pi, K are penguin dominated. We apply HMChPT in
two different cases to study the direct 3-body D decays and compare the results
with experiment. Theoretical uncertainties are discussed.Comment: 24 pages, 2 figures. New experimental results of direct 3-body D
decays as Reported at ICHEP2002 are included. To appear in Phys. Re
From the Big Bang Theory to the Theory of a Stationary Universe
We consider chaotic inflation in the theories with the effective potentials
phi^n and e^{\alpha\phi}. In such theories inflationary domains containing
sufficiently large and homogeneous scalar field \phi permanently produce new
inflationary domains of a similar type. We show that under certain conditions
this process of the self-reproduction of the Universe can be described by a
stationary distribution of probability, which means that the fraction of the
physical volume of the Universe in a state with given properties (with given
values of fields, with a given density of matter, etc.) does not depend on
time, both at the stage of inflation and after it. This represents a strong
deviation of inflationary cosmology from the standard Big Bang paradigm. We
compare our approach with other approaches to quantum cosmology, and illustrate
some of the general conclusions mentioned above with the results of a computer
simulation of stochastic processes in the inflationary Universe.Comment: No changes to the file, but original figures are included. They
substantially help to understand this paper, as well as eternal inflation in
general, and what is now called the "multiverse" and the "string theory
landscape." High quality figures can be found at
http://www.stanford.edu/~alinde/LLMbigfigs
The pandemic brain: Neuroinflammation in non-infected individuals during the COVID-19 pandemic
While COVID-19 research has seen an explosion in the literature, the impact of pandemic-related societal and lifestyle disruptions on brain health among the uninfected remains underexplored. However, a global increase in the prevalence of fatigue, brain fog, depression and other “sickness behavior”-like symptoms implicates a possible dysregulation in neuroimmune mechanisms even among those never infected by the virus.
We compared fifty-seven ‘Pre-Pandemic’ and fifteen ‘Pandemic’ datasets from individuals originally enrolled as control subjects for various completed, or ongoing, research studies available in our records, with a confirmed negative test for SARS-CoV-2 antibodies. We used a combination of multimodal molecular brain imaging (simultaneous positron emission tomography / magnetic resonance spectroscopy), behavioral measurements, imaging transcriptomics and serum testing to uncover links between pandemic-related stressors and neuroinflammation.
Healthy individuals examined after the enforcement of 2020 lockdown/stay-at-home measures demonstrated elevated brain levels of two independent neuroinflammatory markers (the 18 kDa translocator protein, TSPO, and myoinositol) compared to pre-lockdown subjects. The serum levels of two inflammatory markers (interleukin-16 and monocyte chemoattractant protein-1) were also elevated, although these effects did not reach statistical significance after correcting for multiple comparisons. Subjects endorsing higher symptom burden showed higher TSPO signal in the hippocampus (mood alteration, mental fatigue), intraparietal sulcus and precuneus (physical fatigue), compared to those reporting little/no symptoms. Post-lockdown TSPO signal changes were spatially aligned with the constitutive expression of several genes involved in immune/neuroimmune functions.
This work implicates neuroimmune activation as a possible mechanism underlying the non-virally-mediated symptoms experienced by many during the COVID-19 pandemic. Future studies will be needed to corroborate and further interpret these preliminary findings
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