9,647 research outputs found
A new perspective on metformin therapy in type 1 diabetes
Metformin is quite frequently used off-label in type 1 diabetes to limit insulin dose requirement. Guidelines recommend that it can improve glucose control in those who are overweight and obese but evidence in support of this is limited. Recently-published findings from the REducing with MetfOrmin Vascular Adverse Lesions (REMOVAL) trial suggest that metformin therapy in type 1 diabetes can reduce atherosclerosis progression, weight and LDL-cholesterol levels. This provides a new perspective on metformin therapy in type 1 diabetes and suggests a potential role for reducing the long-term risk of cardiovascular disease
Electron scattering and transport in liquid argon
The transport of excess electrons in liquid argon driven out of equilibrium
by an applied electric field is revisited using a multi-term solution of
Boltzmann's equation together with ab initio liquid phase cross-sections
calculated using the Dirac-Fock scattering equations. The calculation of liquid
phase cross-sections extends previous treatments to consider multipole
polarisabilities and a non-local treatment of exchange while the accuracy of
the electron-argon potential is validated through comparison of the calculated
gas phase cross-section with experiment. The results presented highlight the
inadequacy of local treatments of exchange that are commonly used in liquid and
cluster phase cross-section calculations. The multi-term Boltzmann equation
framework accounting for coherent scattering enables the inclusion of the full
anisotropy in the differential cross-section arising from the interaction and
the structure factor, without an a priori assumption of quasi-isotropy in the
velocity distribution function. The model, which contains no free parameters
and accounts for both coherent scattering and liquid phase screening effects,
was found to reproduce well the experimental drift velocities and
characteristic energies.Comment: 32 pages, 16 figures; minor corrections, added 1 figur
Method of test administration as a factor in test validity:The use of a personality questionnaire in the prediction of cancer and coronary heart disease
The Cambridge-Cambridge ROSAT Serendipity Survey - I. X-ray-luminous galaxies
We report on the first results obtained from a new optical identification
programme of 123 faint X-ray sources with (0.5--2ergscm serendipitously detected in {\it ROSAT}
PSPC pointed observations. We have spectroscopically identified the optical
counterparts to more than 100 sources in this survey. Although the majority of
the sample (68 objects) are QSOs, we have also identified 12 narrow emission
line galaxies which have extreme X-ray luminosities (ergs). Subsequent spectroscopy reveals them to be a
mixture of starburst galaxies and Seyfert 2 galaxies in approximately equal
numbers. Combined with potentially similar objects identified in the {\it
Einstein} Extended Medium Sensitivity Survey, these X-ray-luminous galaxies
exhibit a rate of cosmological evolution, , consistent with that derived for X-ray QSOs. This
evolution, coupled with the steep slope determined for the faint end of the
X-ray luminosity function (), implies
that such objects could comprise 15--35 per cent of the soft (1--2keV)Comment: Accepted for publication in MNRAS. 7 pages including 5 figures;
uuencoded compressed postscript; RGO-21
Registration of retinal images from Public Health by minimising an error between vessels using an affine model with radial distortions
In order to estimate a registration model of eye fundus images made of an
affinity and two radial distortions, we introduce an estimation criterion based
on an error between the vessels. In [1], we estimated this model by minimising
the error between characteristics points. In this paper, the detected vessels
are selected using the circle and ellipse equations of the overlap area
boundaries deduced from our model. Our method successfully registers 96 % of
the 271 pairs in a Public Health dataset acquired mostly with different
cameras. This is better than our previous method [1] and better than three
other state-of-the-art methods. On a publicly available dataset, ours still
better register the images than the reference method
Gravitational Lensing of the X-Ray Background by Clusters of Galaxies
Gravitational lensing by clusters of galaxies affects the cosmic X-ray
background (XRB) by altering the observed density and flux distribution of
background X-ray sources. At faint detection flux thresholds, the resolved
X-ray sources appear brighter and diluted, while the unresolved component of
the XRB appears dimmer and more anisotropic, due to lensing. The diffuse X-ray
intensity in the outer halos of clusters might be lower than the sky-averaged
XRB, after the subtraction of resolved sources. Detection of the lensing signal
with a wide-field X-ray telescope could probe the mass distribution of a
cluster out to its virialization boundary. In particular, we show that the
lensing signature imprinted on the resolved component of the XRB by the cluster
A1689, should be difficult but possible to detect out to 8' at the 2-4 sigma
level, after 10^6 seconds of observation with the forthcoming AXAF satellite.
The lensing signal is fairly insensitive to the lens redshift in the range
0.1<z<0.6. The amplitude of the lensing signal is however sensitive to the
faint end slope of the number-flux relation for unresolved X-ray sources, and
can thus help constrain models of the XRB. A search for X-ray arcs or arclets
could identify the fraction of all faint sources which originate from extended
emission of distant galaxies. The probability for a 3 sigma detection of an
arclet which is stretched by a factor of about 3 after a 10^6 seconds
observation of A1689 with AXAF, is roughly comparable to the fraction of all
background X-ray sources that have an intrinsic size of order 1''.Comment: 41 LaTeX pages, 11 postscript figures, 1 table, in AASTeX v4.0
format. To appear in ApJ, April 1, 1997, Vol. 47
QSO clustering and the AAT 2dF redshift survey
We review previous results on the clustering and environments of QSOs. We
show that the correlation length for QSOs derived from existing surveys is
r~5/h Mpc, similar to the observed correlation length for field galaxies at the
present epoch. The galaxy environment for z<1 radio-quiet QSOs is also
consistent with field galaxies. The evolution of the QSO correlation length
with redshift is currently uncertain, largely due to the small numbers of QSOs
(~2000) in surveys suitable for clustering analysis. We report on intial
progress with the AAT 2dF QSO redshift survey, which, once completed will
comprise almost 30000 QSOs. With over 1000 QSOs already observed, it is already
the largest single homogeneous QSO survey. We discuss prospects for deriving
limits on cosmological parameters from this survey, and on the evolution of
large-scale structure in the Universe.Comment: Invited talk at RS meeting on 'Large Scale Structure in the Universe'
held at the Royal Society on 25-26 March 1998 14 pages, 11 figre
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