Integrated HPAI control in kampong chicken in Indonesia—An overview on ILRI's research and lessons learned

poultry in Indonesia in 2003. HPAI affected all production systems from parent stocks to village (kampong) chickens. The island of Java hosts 60% of the poultry population of the country. Avian influenza in poultry is considered to be endemic and fatal cases in humans are sporadic since its introduction. In an attempt to support the Indonesian government in making decisions to limit the spread of HPAI while minimising its impact on different socio-economic groups, research by the International Livestock Research Institute (ILRI) has focused on two main areas: (a) village chicken vaccination and (b) risk reduction strategies suitable for pro-poor households with backyard chicken. The vaccination component, supported by the World Bank, the Indonesian government and the United States Agency for International Development (USAID), used an operational research approach, with the objective to determine the efficacy of backyard mass vaccination by testing alternative regimes under field conditions. The mass vaccination carried out between 2007 and 2009 in 16 districts of Java was supported by targeted studies such as, the value of booster vs. non-booster vaccination, the effect of single dosage (antigen content) vs. double dosage vaccine formulations and a cost-benefit analysis of backyard vaccination. Research on pro-poor HPAI risk reduction strategies, jointly carried out from 2007–2011 with the International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI) and supported by the UK Department for International Development (DFID), followed an integrated research design with four main components: disease risk, institutional analysis, livelihood impacts, and synthesis (risk mitigation analysis). Within the components a number of focused studies from epidemiology, to socio-economic and livelihood impacts were implemented focusing on the districts of Bogor and Bogor Kota. Key results indicate the need for an avian influenza booster vaccination with a quarterly re-vaccination schedule due to high population turnovers in kampong chicken. Risk assessment demonstrated the value of an appropriate biosecurity and visitor’s control

Population dynamics in Kampong chicken and consequences for HPAI vaccination: results of a field trial in Java

Until today HPAI in poultry is considered to be endemic in most of the Indonesian provinces since it was officially declared in 2004. Vaccination is used as one of the control strategies targeting layer and breeder farms but also Kampong (village) chicken. Limited information is available on the scope of off-take and replacement occurring in Kampong chicken populations under field condition and their effects on HPAI vaccination. To collate information on population dynamics in Kampong chicken, twelve communities with 300-500 chickens each have been enrolled in this trial. Chicken exit/entries as well as disease/mortality events were intensively monitored in weekly intervals. The trial was carried out between July 2008 and August 2009 in two Districts of Yogyakarta, Java. Results indicate that 39-44% of chickens were younger than two months of age over time and more than two-thirds of chickens were younger than four months, respectively. Adult chickens represented only 10% (male) and 20% (female) of the total population. Though overall population size within the selected communities was relatively stable, the number of chickens changed widely within age classes. In each observed quarter, there was a 43% or higher turnover of the population (43-72%). Observed changes were related to socio-cultural events such as holidays or begin of school. From our results we can conclude that approximately 40% of a natural backyard population will be un-vaccinated by 60 days after the onset of a vaccination campaign. Considering this high population turnover rate, even a quarterly vaccination regime including a booster round is required will have difficulty achieving effective flock immunity levels. This results in high costs, poses a significant logistical challenge and suggests mass vaccination is not a practical approach to sustained control of HPAI

Bose-Einstein condensation for interacting scalar fields in curved spacetime

We consider the model of self-interacting complex scalar fields with a rigid gauge invariance under an arbitrary gauge group $G$. In order to analyze the phenomenon of Bose-Einstein condensation finite temperature and the possibility of a finite background charge is included. Different approaches to derive the relevant high-temperature behaviour of the theory are presented.Comment: 28 pages, LaTe

Quantum Vacuum Experiments Using High Intensity Lasers

The quantum vacuum constitutes a fascinating medium of study, in particular since near-future laser facilities will be able to probe the nonlinear nature of this vacuum. There has been a large number of proposed tests of the low-energy, high intensity regime of quantum electrodynamics (QED) where the nonlinear aspects of the electromagnetic vacuum comes into play, and we will here give a short description of some of these. Such studies can shed light, not only on the validity of QED, but also on certain aspects of nonperturbative effects, and thus also give insights for quantum field theories in general.Comment: 9 pages, 8 figur

Effect of electromagnetic fields on the creation of scalar particles in a flat Robertson-Walker space-time

The influence of electromagnetic fields on the creation of scalar particles from vacuum in a flat Robertson-Walker space-time is studied. The Klein Gordon equation with varying electric field and constant magnetic one is solved. The Bogoliubov transformation method is applied to calculate the pair creation probability and the number density of created particles. It is shown that the electric field amplifies the creation of scalar particles while the magnetic field minimizes it.Comment: Important modifications, 20 pages, To appear in Eurpean Physical Journal C. arXiv admin note: text overlap with arXiv:1108.033

Uncomplicated moderate coronary artery dissections after balloon angioplasty: good outcome without stenting

OBJECTIVE: To study the relation between moderate coronary dissections, coronary flow velocity reserve (CFVR), and long term outcome. METHODS: 523 patients undergoing balloon angioplasty and sequential intracoronary Doppler measurements were examined as part of the DEBATE II trial (Doppler endpoints balloon angioplasty trial Europe). After successful balloon angioplasty, patients were randomised to stenting or no further treatment. Dissections were graded at the core laboratory by two observers and divided into four categories: none, mild (type A-B), moderate (type C), severe (types D to F). Patients with severe dissections (n = 128) or without available reference vessel CFVR (n = 139) were excluded. The remaining 256 patients were divided into two groups according to the presence (group A, n = 45) or absence (group B, n = 211) of moderate dissection. RESULTS: Following balloon angioplasty, there was no difference in CFVR between the two groups. At 12 months follow up, a higher rate of major adverse cardiac events was observed overall in group A than in group B (10 (22%) v 23 (11%), p = 0.041). However, the risk of major adverse events was similar in the subgroups receiving balloon angioplasty (group A, 6 (19%) v group B, 16 (16%), NS). Among group A patients, the adverse events risk was greater in those randomised to stenting (odds ratios 6.603 v 1.197, p = 0.046), whereas there was no difference in risk if the group was analysed according to whether the CFVR was /= 2.5 after balloon angioplasty. CONCLUSIONS: Moderate dissections left untreated result in no increased risk of major adverse cardiac events. Additional stenting does not improve the long term outcome

Lattice QCD Simulations in External Background Fields

We discuss recent results and future prospects regarding the investigation, by lattice simulations, of the non-perturbative properties of QCD and of its phase diagram in presence of magnetic or chromomagnetic background fields. After a brief introduction to the formulation of lattice QCD in presence of external fields, we focus on studies regarding the effects of external fields on chiral symmetry breaking, on its restoration at finite temperature and on deconfinement. We conclude with a few comments regarding the effects of electromagnetic background fields on gluodynamics.Comment: 31 pages, 10 figures, minor changes and references added. To appear in Lect. Notes Phys. "Strongly interacting matter in magnetic fields" (Springer), edited by D. Kharzeev, K. Landsteiner, A. Schmitt, H.-U. Ye

Electromagnetic superconductivity of vacuum induced by strong magnetic field

The quantum vacuum may become an electromagnetic superconductor in the presence of a strong external magnetic field of the order of 10^{16} Tesla. The magnetic field of the required strength (and even stronger) is expected to be generated for a short time in ultraperipheral collisions of heavy ions at the Large Hadron Collider. The superconducting properties of the new phase appear as a result of a magnetic-field-assisted condensation of quark-antiquark pairs with quantum numbers of electrically charged rho mesons. We discuss similarities and differences between the suggested superconducting state of the quantum vacuum, a conventional superconductivity and the Schwinger pair creation. We argue qualitatively and quantitatively why the superconducting state should be a natural ground state of the vacuum at the sufficiently strong magnetic field. We demonstrate the existence of the superconducting phase using both the Nambu-Jona-Lasinio model and an effective bosonic model based on the vector meson dominance (the rho-meson electrodynamics). We discuss various properties of the new phase such as absence of the Meissner effect, anisotropy of superconductivity, spatial inhomogeneity of ground state, emergence of a neutral superfluid component in the ground state and presence of new topological vortices in the quark-antiquark condensates.Comment: 37 pages, 14 figures, to appear in Lect. Notes Phys. "Strongly interacting matter in magnetic fields" (Springer), edited by D. Kharzeev, K. Landsteiner, A. Schmitt, H.-U. Ye

NN Core Interactions and Differential Cross Sections from One Gluon Exchange

We derive nonstrange baryon-baryon scattering amplitudes in the nonrelativistic quark model using the ``quark Born diagram" formalism. This approach describes the scattering as a single interaction, here the one-gluon-exchange (OGE) spin-spin term followed by constituent interchange, with external nonrelativistic baryon wavefunctions attached to the scattering diagrams to incorporate higher-twist wavefunction effects. The short-range repulsive core in the NN interaction has previously been attributed to this spin-spin interaction in the literature; we find that these perturbative constituent-interchange diagrams do indeed predict repulsive interactions in all I,S channels of the nucleon-nucleon system, and we compare our results for the equivalent short-range potentials to the core potentials found by other authors using nonperturbative methods. We also apply our perturbative techniques to the N$\Delta$ and $\Delta\Delta$ systems: Some $\Delta\Delta$ channels are found to have attractive core potentials and may accommodate ``molecular" bound states near threshold. Finally we use our Born formalism to calculate the NN differential cross section, which we compare with experimental results for unpolarised proton-proton elastic scattering. We find that several familiar features of the experimental differential cross section are reproduced by our Born-order result.Comment: 27 pages, figures available from the authors, revtex, CEBAF-TH-93-04, MIT-CTP-2187, ORNL-CCIP-93-0

Charge exchange ρ0π+\rho^0 \pi^+ photoproduction and implications for searches of exotic meson

We analyze the process $\vec \gamma +p\to \rho^0 \pi^{+}n$ at low momentum transfer focusing on a possibility of production of an exotic $J^{PC}=1^{-+}$ meson state. In particular we discuss polarization observables and conclude that linear photon polarization is instrumental for separating of the exotic wave.Comment: 23 pages, 6 figure