Review of the pharmacology and clinical studies of micafungin

Micafungin, like other members of the echinocandin class, has a unique mechanism of action that inhibits the synthesis of 1,3-β-D glucans in the fungal cell wall. It has been approved for treatment of esophageal candidiasis, invasive candidiasis including candidemia, and for prophylaxis of Candida infections in patients undergoing hematopoietic stem cell transplantation. Although efficacy and safety have also been demonstrated in pediatric populations, micafungin is approved for this indication in Europe and Japan, but not in the United States. It has demonstrated activity against Candida spp. including those that are azole-resistant as well as Aspergillus and a few other clinically important molds. It is administered intravenously as a once daily infusion and does not require dose adjustments for renal or moderate hepatic dysfunction. Its safety record, favorable tolerability profile, and few drug interactions make it an important agent for the treatment of invasive fungal infections

Harmonic behavior of metallic glasses up to the metastable melt

In two amorphous alloys ZrTiCuNiBe and ZrAlNiCu coherent neutron scattering has been measured over five decades in energy, including measurements in the metastable melt of a metallic alloy more than 80 K above Tg. In the vibrational spectra a pronounced "boson" peak is found: Even in crystallized samples the density of states exceeds the Debye ω2 model, and in the amorphous state low-frequency vibrations are further enhanced. The peak position shows no dispersion in q, while intensities are strongly correlated with the static structure factor. Over the full energy range the temperature dependence is strictly harmonic. From high-energy resolution measurements we establish lower bounds for the temperatures at which structural α and fast β relaxation become observable

Simulation of underground gravity gradients from stochastic seismic fields

We present results obtained from a finite-element simulation of seismic displacement fields and of gravity gradients generated by those fields. The displacement field is constructed by a plane wave model with a 3D isotropic stochastic field and a 2D fundamental Rayleigh field. The plane wave model provides an accurate representation of stationary fields from distant sources. Underground gravity gradients are calculated as acceleration of a free test mass inside a cavity. The results are discussed in the context of gravity-gradient noise subtraction in third generation gravitational-wave detectors. Error analysis with respect to the density of the simulated grid leads to a derivation of an improved seismometer placement inside a 3D array which would be used in practice to monitor the seismic field.Comment: 24 pages, 12 figure

Spirituality as an internal protective factor of resilience in children after exposing flood

Background: Flooding is recognizing as a risk element that effect many difficulties to children and could impact to their academic performance. In order to buffer such risk condition, some abilities are required to overcome that situation. One of abilities is resilience. The main purpose of this study was to investigate predictor of internal factors (age, illness, gender, emotion, behaviour, spirituality and physical activity) in resilience of elementary school-aged children who exposed the major flood in Serang, Indonesia. The framework used in this study was Resilience Model proposed by Karol Kumpfer.Methods: A cross-sectional correlation design was employed to accomplishing the study. The total final samples were 162 children who were 9-12 years and who were studied in 3rd to 6th years. All of them are those who were exposed to major flood in Undar Andir, Serang, Indonesia in 2013. The instruments used were self-report questionnaires. The Connor-Davidson Resilience Scale- 10, The Daily Spiritual Experience Scale, The Strengths and Difficulties Questionnaire and The Physical Activity Questionnaire were utilized in this study after the validity and reliability test. Pearson’s correlation, point biserial and multiple regressions were employed for analysing data.Results: The results showed that there were significant correlated between behaviour (r = 0.157, p <0.05), spirituality (r = 0.261, p<0.01), physical activity (r = 0.185, p<0.05), and resilience of children. However, age, illness, gender, and emotion were not significantly correlated with resilience. In multiple regressions, spirituality showed as a predictor of resilience (Beta = 0.213, p <0.05) in children after exposing the flood.Conclusions: In conclusions, flooding is considered as a risk for children. In order to prevent the potential problems due to flood, children need protective factor. This study discovered that high spirituality increases resilience of children. Therefore, spirituality is well thought-out as an internal protective factor of resilience. This study suggested the developing of nursing intervention with religion-activities

The dependence of strange hadron multiplicities on the speed of hadronization

Hadron multiplicities are calculated in the ALCOR model for the Pb+Pb collisions at CERN SPS energy. Considering the newest experimental results, we display our prediction obtained from the ALCOR model for stable hadrons including strange baryons and anti-baryons.Comment: 8 pages, LaTeX in IOP style, appeared in the Proceedings of Strangeness'97 Conference, Santorini, April 14-18 1997, J. of Physics G23 (1997) 194

Direct Emission of multiple strange baryons in ultrarelativistic heavy-ion collisions from the phase boundary

We discuss a model for the space-time evolution of ultrarelativistic heavy-ion collisions which employs relativistic hydrodynamics within one region of the forward light-cone, and microscopic transport theory (i.e. UrQMD) in the complement. Our initial condition consists of a quark-gluon plasma which expands hydrodynamically and hadronizes. After hadronization the solution eventually changes from expansion in local equilibrium to free streaming, as determined selfconsistently by the interaction rates between the hadrons and the local expansion rate. We show that in such a scenario the inverse slopes of the $m_T$-spectra of multiple strange baryons ($\Xi$, $\Omega$) are practically unaffected by the purely hadronic stage of the reaction, while the flow of $p$'s and $\Lambda$'s increases. Moreover, we find that the rather ``soft'' transverse expansion at RHIC energies (due to a first-order phase transition) is not washed out by strong rescattering in the hadronic stage. The earlier kinetic freeze-out as compared to SPS-energies results in similar inverse slopes (of the $m_T$-spectra of the hadrons in the final state) at RHIC and SPS energies.Comment: 4 pages, 3 figures, statistics for Omegas improved, slight revision of the manuscript (expansion of hadronization volume more emphasized, pi-Omega scattering is discussed very briefly

Hard and soft probe - medium interactions in a 3D hydro+micro approach at RHIC

We utilize a 3D hybrid hydro+micro model for a comprehensive and consistent description of soft and hard particle production in ultra-relativistic heavy-ion collisions at RHIC. In the soft sector we focus on the dynamics of (multi-)strange baryons, where a clear strangeness dependence of their collision rates and freeze-out is observed. In the hard sector we study the radiative energy loss of hard partons in a soft medium in the multiple soft scattering approximation. While the nuclear suppression factor $R_{AA}$ does not reflect the high quality of the medium description (except in a reduced systematic uncertainty in extracting the quenching power of the medium), the hydrodynamical model also allows to study different centralities and in particular the angular variation of $R_{AA}$ with respect to the reaction plane, allowing for a controlled variation of the in-medium path-length.Comment: 5 pages, 4 figures, Quark Matter 2006 proceedings, to appear in Journal of Physics

The influence of DACCIWA radiosonde data on the quality of ECMWF analyses and forecasts over southern West Africa

During the DACCIWA (Dynamics–Aerosol–Chemistry–Cloud Interactions in West Africa) field campaign ∼900 radiosondes were launched from 12 stations in southern West Africa from 15 June to 31 July 2016. Subsequently, data-denial experiments were conducted using the Integrated Forecasting System of the European Centre for Medium-range Weather Forecasts (ECMWF) to assess the radiosondes\u27 impact on the quality of analyses and forecasts. As observational reference, satellite-based estimates of rainfall and outgoing long-wave radiation (OLR) as well as the radiosonde measurements themselves are used. With regard to the analyses, the additional observations show positive impacts onwinds throughout the troposphere and lower stratosphere, while large lower-tropospheric cold and dry biases are hardly reduced. Nonetheless, downstream, that is farther inland from the radiosonde stations,we find a significant increase (decrease) in low-level night-time temperatures (monsoon winds) when incorporating the DACCIWA observations, suggesting a possible linkage via weaker cold air advection fromthe Gulf of Guinea. The associated lower relative humidity leads to reduced cloud cover in the DACCIWA analysis. Closer to the coast and over Benin and Togo, DACCIWA observations increase low-level specific humidity and precipitable water, possibly due to changes in advection and vertical mixing. During daytime, differences between the two analyses are generally smaller at low levels. With regard to the forecasts, the impact of the additional observations is lost after a day or less. Moderate improvements occur in low-level wind and temperature but also in rainfall over the downstream Sahel, while impacts on OLR are ambiguous. The changes in precipitation appear to also affect high-level cloud cover and the tropical easterly jet. The overall rather small observation impact suggests that model and data assimilation deficits are the main limiting factors for better forecasts inWest Africa. The new observations and physical understanding from DACCIWA can hopefully contribute to reducing these issues