The Goddess of Love in Sadomasochistic Costume: Roman Polanski\u27s \u3cem\u3eVenus in Fur\u3c/em\u3e

Throughout his career as a filmmaker, Roman Polanski has circled the subject of sex, its aberrations, its delights, and its risks. His twenty feature films are remarkably varied, yet characteristically probe the compelling, contradictory, and enchanting nature of human sexual behavior. He develops a cluster of images or tropes that appear across his films—from knives to claustrophobic settings—that advance his enquiry. Venus in Fur is Polanski’s most comprehensive portrayal of the intricacies of sexual conduct, employing a theatrical setting (rehearsing an adaptation of a notorious classic novel), amplified with cultural allusions and exploring the limits of role-playing. Normality and contentment, in his world, lack intensity and excitement, but erotic abandon, for all its allure, exacts extraordinary costs

The Precision Determination of Invisible-Particle Masses at the LHC

We develop techniques to determine the mass scale of invisible particles pair-produced at hadron colliders. We employ the constrained mass variable m_2C, which provides an event-by-event lower-bound to the mass scale given a mass difference. We complement this variable with a new variable m_2C,UB which provides an additional upper bound to the mass scale, and demonstrate its utility with a realistic case study of a supersymmetry model. These variables together effectively quantify the `kink' in the function Max m_T2 which has been proposed as a mass-determination technique for collider-produced dark matter. An important advantage of the m_2C method is that it does not rely simply on the position at the endpoint, but it uses the additional information contained in events which lie far from the endpoint. We found the mass by comparing the HERWIG generated m_2C distribution to ideal distributions for different masses. We find that for the case studied, with 100 fb^-1 of integrated luminosity (about 400 signal events), the invisible particle's mass can be measured to a precision of 4.1 GeV. We conclude that this technique's precision and accuracy is as good as, if not better than, the best known techniques for invisible-particle mass-determination at hadron colliders.Comment: 20 pages, 11 figures, minor correction

The race for supersymmetry: using mT2 for discovery

We describe how one may employ a very simple event selection, using only the kinematic variable mT2, to search for new particles at the LHC. The method is useful when searching for evidence of models (such as R-parity conserving supersymmetry) which have a Z2 parity and a weakly-interacting lightest parity-odd particle. We discuss the kinematic properties which make this variable an excellent discriminant against the great majority of Standard Model backgrounds. Monte Carlo simulations suggest that this approach could be used to discover supersymmetry with somewhat smaller integrated luminosities (or perhaps lower center-of-mass energies) than would be required for other comparable analyses.Comment: 8 page

Repeat Organ Transplantation in the United States, 1996–2005

Peer Reviewedhttp://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/72698/1/j.1600-6143.2007.01786.x.pd

Modeling Analysis of Primary Controls on Net Ecosystem Productivity of Seven Boreal and Temperate Coniferous Forests Across a Continental Transect

Process-based models are effective tools to synthesize and/or extrapolate measured carbon (C) exchanges from individual sites to large scales. In this study, we used a C- and nitrogen (N)-cycle coupled ecosystem model named CN-CLASS (Carbon Nitrogen-Canadian Land Surface Scheme) to study the role of primary climatic controls and site-specific C stocks on the net ecosystem productivity (NEP) of seven intermediate-aged to mature coniferous forest sites across an east–west continental transect in Canada. The model was parameterized using a common set of parameters, except for two used in empirical canopy conductance–assimilation, and leaf area–sapwood relationships, and then validated using observed eddy covariance flux data. Leaf Rubisco-N dynamics that are associated with soil–plant N cycling, and depend on canopy temperature, enabled the model to simulate site-specific gross ecosystem productivity (GEP) reasonably well for all seven sites. Overall GEP simulations had relatively smaller differences compared with observations vs. ecosystem respiration (RE), which was the sum of many plant and soil components with larger variability and/or uncertainty associated with them. Both observed and simulated data showed that, on an annual basis, boreal forest sites were either carbon-neutral or a weak C sink, ranging from 30 to 180 g C m−2 yr−1; while temperate forests were either a medium or strong C sink, ranging from 150 to 500 g C m−2 yr−1, depending on forest age and climatic regime. Model sensitivity tests illustrated that air temperature, among climate variables, and aboveground biomass, among major C stocks, were dominant factors impacting annual NEP. Vegetation biomass effects on annual GEP, RE and NEP showed similar patterns of variability at four boreal and three temperate forests. Air temperature showed different impacts on GEP and RE, and the response varied considerably from site to site. Higher solar radiation enhanced GEP, while precipitation differences had a minor effect. Magnitude of forest litter content and soil organic matter (SOM) affected RE. SOM also affected GEP, but only at low levels of SOM, because of low N mineralization that limited soil nutrient (N) availability. The results of this study will help to evaluate the impact of future climatic changes and/or forest C stock variations on C uptake and loss in forest ecosystems growing in diverse environments.Earth and Planetary Science

SUSY parameter determination at the LHC using cross sections and kinematic edges

We study the determination of supersymmetric parameters at the LHC from a global fit including cross sections and edges of kinematic distributions. For illustration, we focus on a minimal supergravity scenario and discuss how well it can be constrained at the LHC operating at 7 and 14 TeV collision energy, respectively. We find that the inclusion of cross sections greatly improves the accuracy of the SUSY parameter determination, and allows to reliably extract model parameters even in the initial phase of LHC data taking with 7 TeV collision energy and 1/fb integrated luminosity. Moreover, cross section information may be essential to study more general scenarios, such as those with non-universal gaugino masses, and distinguish them from minimal, universal, models.Comment: 22 pages, 8 figure

Signals for CPT and Lorentz Violation in Neutral-Meson Oscillations

Experimental signals for indirect CPT violation in the neutral-meson systems are studied in the context of a general CPT- and Lorentz-violating standard-model extension. In this explicit theory, some CPT observables depend on the meson momentum and exhibit diurnal variations. The consequences for CPT tests vary significantly with the specific experimental scenario. The wide range of possible effects is illustrated for two types of CPT experiment presently underway, one involving boosted uncorrelated kaons and the other involving unboosted correlated kaon pairs.Comment: Accepted in Physical Review D, scheduled for December 1999 issu

Dark matter searches at LHC

Besides Standard Model measurements and other Beyond Standard Model studies, the ATLAS and CMS experiments at the LHC will search for Supersymmetry, one of the most attractive explanation for dark matter. The SUSY discovery potential with early data is presented here together with some first results obtained with 2010 collision data at 7 TeV. Emphasis is placed on measurements and parameter determination that can be performed to disentangle the possible SUSY models and SUSY look-alike and the interpretation of a possible positive supersymmetric signal as an explanation of dark matter.Comment: 15 pages, 14 figures, Invited plenary talk given at DISCRETE 2010: Symposium On Prospects In The Physics Of Discrete Symmetries, 6-11 Dec 2010, Rome, Ital

Recombination is a key driver of genomic and phenotypic diversity in a Pseudomonas aeruginosa population during cystic fibrosis infection

Peer reviewe

Large-scale genome-wide association studies and meta-analyses of longitudinal change in adult lung function.

BACKGROUND: Genome-wide association studies (GWAS) have identified numerous loci influencing cross-sectional lung function, but less is known about genes influencing longitudinal change in lung function. METHODS: We performed GWAS of the rate of change in forced expiratory volume in the first second (FEV1) in 14 longitudinal, population-based cohort studies comprising 27,249 adults of European ancestry using linear mixed effects model and combined cohort-specific results using fixed effect meta-analysis to identify novel genetic loci associated with longitudinal change in lung function. Gene expression analyses were subsequently performed for identified genetic loci. As a secondary aim, we estimated the mean rate of decline in FEV1 by smoking pattern, irrespective of genotypes, across these 14 studies using meta-analysis. RESULTS: The overall meta-analysis produced suggestive evidence for association at the novel IL16/STARD5/TMC3 locus on chromosome 15 (P  =  5.71 × 10(-7)). In addition, meta-analysis using the five cohorts with ≥3 FEV1 measurements per participant identified the novel ME3 locus on chromosome 11 (P  =  2.18 × 10(-8)) at genome-wide significance. Neither locus was associated with FEV1 decline in two additional cohort studies. We confirmed gene expression of IL16, STARD5, and ME3 in multiple lung tissues. Publicly available microarray data confirmed differential expression of all three genes in lung samples from COPD patients compared with controls. Irrespective of genotypes, the combined estimate for FEV1 decline was 26.9, 29.2 and 35.7 mL/year in never, former, and persistent smokers, respectively. CONCLUSIONS: In this large-scale GWAS, we identified two novel genetic loci in association with the rate of change in FEV1 that harbor candidate genes with biologically plausible functional links to lung function