17,190 research outputs found
Public Release of 2dF data from the Fornax Cluster Spectroscopic Survey
Thanks to the 2dF spectrograph on the Anglo-Australian Telescope, we have
recently completed the first stage of a complete spectroscopic survey more than
one order of magnitude larger than any previous study, measuring 7000 spectra
in a 6 sq.deg. area as part of our study of the Fornax Cluster. In this article
we describe the public release of 3600 spectra from our first field. We hope
that this public release will encourage colleagues making surveys for rare
objects to choose these fields, as much of the follow-up spectroscopy that
might be required is available from our data.Comment: To appear in the AAO Newsletter. Data online at
http://astro.ph.unimelb.edu.au/data
Ab Initio Treatment of Collective Correlations and the Neutrinoless Double Beta Decay of Ca
Working with Hamiltonians from chiral effective field theory, we develop a
novel framework for describing arbitrary deformed medium-mass nuclei by
combining the in-medium similarity renormalization group with the generator
coordinate method. The approach leverages the ability of the first method to
capture dynamic correlations and the second to include collective correlations
without violating symmetries. We use our scheme to compute the matrix element
that governs the neutrinoless double beta decay of Ca to Ti, and
find it to have the value , near or below the predictions of most
phenomenological methods. The result opens the door to ab initio calculations
of the matrix elements for the decay of heavier nuclei such as Ge,
Te, and Xe.Comment: 6 pages, 4 figures and 1 table. supplementary material included.
version to be publishe
Population-based patient care study for breast cancer
Background: Different approaches for an effective quality management are funded by the Ministry of Health to verify, to assess and, if necessary to optimize the quality of health care using the tracer diagnoses of breast, rectal, and lung cancer in eight regions in Germany. The conception of these observational studies and initial findings are shown here, using breast cancer in the region of Munich (population 2.4 million) as an example. Patients and Methods: The study started on April 1, 1996. The recruitment phase for all primary boast cancer patients in this region is planned for 2 years with a 3-5-year follow-up. Established documentation sheets are used to document basic medical information of each patient, along with the original reports (pathology: radiotherapy, doctors' reports, etc.), follow-up reports and quality of life questionnaires (QLQ, including the EORTC QLQ C30). Results: In 1996, the Munich region has a crude incidence of 125/100,000 women (world standard 71.5). After almost complete documentation the incidence is 10-15% higher. In the period from April 1 1996 to June 30, 1997 1,360 patients have been recruited into the study. 79% of the patients were 50 years of age or older. pT stages are distributed as follows: pTIS 5%, pT1 54%, pT2 32%, pT3 4%, pT4 6%. 4.5% had primary metastases. Breast-conserving therapy (BCT) was performed in 57% of patients. Five of the 46 departments involved recruited more than 50 patients each within these 14 months. These larger departments treat 59% of all patients. The proportion of older patients and pT4 stages is significantly higher in the smaller departments. BCT is performed significantly more often in the larger departments. First results of quality of life show dependencies on age, but no differences between mastectomy and BCT 3 months after operation. Not only the addressed patients (response rate to QLQ over 80%) but also almost all hospitals and many physicians are milling to support and to partake in quality assurance. 35 hospitals, 46 surgical departments. 80 heads of department and surgically: active general practioners, 330 general practioners. 7 radiotherapy departments, and 13 pathology departments have so far documented for this study. Conclusions: An effective quality management in oncology needs a modern cancer registry which uses documentation sheets as well as original reports and organizes the complicated infrastructure for an interdisciplinary cooperation. To be able to evaluate the health care reality it is necessary to carry out a data analysis and assess each individual case. A feedback of the results have to be available for each physician and each department. The cost of this information management is approximately 0.3% of the health care cost for this group of patients
Trispectrum versus Bispectrum in Single-Field Inflation
In the standard slow-roll inflationary cosmology, quantum fluctuations in a
single field, the inflaton, generate approximately Gaussian primordial density
perturbations. At present, the bispectrum and trispectrum of the density
perturbations have not been observed and the probability distribution for these
perturbations is consistent with Gaussianity. However, Planck satellite data
will bring a new level of precision to bear on this issue, and it is possible
that evidence for non-Gaussian effects in the primordial distribution will be
discovered. One possibility is that a trispectrum will be observed without
evidence for a non-zero bispectrum. It is not difficult for this to occur in
inflationary models where quantum fluctuations in a field other than the
inflaton contribute to the density perturbations. A natural question to ask is
whether such an observation would rule out the standard scenarios. We explore
this issue and find that it is possible to construct single-field models in
which inflaton-generated primordial density perturbations have an observable
trispectrum, but a bispectrum that is too small to be observed by the Planck
satellite. However, an awkward fine tuning seems to be unavoidable.Comment: 15 pages, 3 figures; journal versio
Changes in r-process abundances at late times
We explore changes in abundance patterns that occur late in the r process. As
the neutrons available for capture begin to disappear, a quasiequilibrium
funnel shifts material into the large peaks at A=130 and A=195, and into the
rare-earth "bump" at A=160. A bit later, after the free-neutron abundance has
dropped and beta-decay has begun to compete seriously with neutron capture, the
peaks can widen. The degree of widening depends largely on neutron-capture
rates near closed neutron shells and relatively close to stability. We identify
particular nuclei the capture rates of which should be examined experimentally,
perhaps at a radioactive beam facility.Comment: 8 pages, 14 figures included in tex
The Effect of Fatigue on Essential Element Distribution in the Rabbit Masseter
The rabbit masseter is composed of mainly fast fatiguable type IIB fibers which give a positive mATPase reaction at pH 9.3. To study the effect of fatigue on the distribution of some crucial elements, the masseter was stimulated electrically for 45 minutes. The contralateral muscle served as a control. Control and experimental tissues were rapidly excised, and frozen in isopentane cooled to -150°C in liquid nitrogen. Sections were cut in a cryostat and prepared by freeze-drying. Water content of fatigued muscle was significantly higher than controls: 79.3% versus 77.3%. The fatigued state was verified by glycogen depletion viewed in PAS-stained sections. Ice crystal artifacts were more prominent in stimulated muscle, suggesting cytoplasmic edema and/or a change in water state. Element analysis of myofibers, using an scanning electron microscope equipped with a computer assisted energy dispersive X-ray spectrometer was performed at 15 kV for 100 seconds. Counts were recorded for Na, Mg, P, S, Cl, K and Ca ( Mg and Ca counts were too low to evaluate). Counts were converted to concentrations using a gelatin element standard. The most striking finding in fatigued muscle was a decrease in K concentration (33%) and an increase in Na (100%) and Cl (75%). P and S values were slightly lower. An interpretation of these findings is made in relation to a) changes in water structure and b) conformational changes in myofibril macromolecules
Post-training load-related changes of auditory working memory: An EEG study
Working memory (WM) refers to the temporary retention and manipulation of information, and its capacity is highly susceptible to training. Yet, the neural mechanisms that allow for increased performance under demanding conditions are not fully understood. We expected that post-training efficiency in WM performance modulates neural processing during high load tasks. We tested this hypothesis, using electroencephalography (EEG) (N = 39), by comparing source space spectral power of healthy adults performing low and high load auditory WM tasks. Prior to the assessment, participants either underwent a modality-specific auditory WM training, or a modality-irrelevant tactile WM training, or were not trained (active control). After a modality-specific training participants showed higher behavioral performance, compared to the control. EEG data analysis revealed general effects of WM load, across all training groups, in the theta-, alpha-, and beta-frequency bands. With increased load theta-band power increased over frontal, and decreased over parietal areas. Centro-parietal alpha-band power and central beta-band power decreased with load. Interestingly, in the high load condition a tendency toward reduced beta-band power in the right medial temporal lobe was observed in the modality-specific WM training group compared to the modality-irrelevant and active control groups. Our finding that WM processing during the high load condition changed after modality-specific WM training, showing reduced beta-band activity in voice-selective regions, possibly indicates a more efficient maintenance of task-relevant stimuli. The general load effects suggest that WM performance at high load demands involves complementary mechanisms, combining a strengthening of task-relevant and a suppression of task-irrelevant processing
Measurement and simulation of anisotropic magnetoresistance in single GaAs/MnAs core/shell nanowires
We report four probe measurements of the low field magnetoresistance in
single core/shell GaAs/MnAs nanowires synthesized by molecular beam epitaxy,
demonstrating clear signatures of anisotropic magnetoresistance that track the
field-dependent magnetization. A comparison with micromagnetic simulations
reveals that the principal characteristics of the magnetoresistance data can be
unambiguously attributed to the nanowire segments with a zinc blende GaAs core.
The direct correlation between magnetoresistance, magnetization and crystal
structure provides a powerful means of characterizing individual hybrid
ferromagnet/semiconductor nanostructures.Comment: Submitted to Applied Physics Letters; some typos corrected and a
defective figure replace
Evaluation of advanced geopotential models for operational orbit determination
To meet future orbit determination accuracy requirements for different NASA projects, analyses are performed using Tracking and Data Relay Satellite System (TDRSS) tracking measurements and orbit determination improvements in areas such as the modeling of the Earth's gravitational field. Current operational requirements are satisfied using the Goddard Earth Model-9 (GEM-9) geopotential model with the harmonic expansion truncated at order and degree 21 (21-by-21). This study evaluates the performance of 36-by-36 geopotential models, such as the GEM-10B and Preliminary Goddard Solution-3117 (PGS-3117) models. The Earth Radiation Budget Satellite (ERBS) and LANDSAT-5 are the spacecraft considered in this study
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