Cardiovascular, respiratory, gastrointestinal and behavioral effects of intravenous lidocaine in healthy, conscious horses and evaluation of the relationship with lidocaine and monoethylglycinexylidide serum concentrations

This study aimed to evaluate the relationship between the serum concentrations of lidocaine/ monoethylglycinexylidide (MEGX) and their effects on several systems in horses. Five healthy, conscious horses received a two-hour placebo intravenous infusion followed by a two-hour lidocaine infusion (bolus of 1.3 mg/kg over ten minutes followed by a continuous rate infusion of 0.05 mg/kg/min). Lidocaine and MEGX serum concentrations were sampled every ten to fifteen minutes during the experiment, and the presence of muscle fasciculations and loss of balance as well as the respiratory, digestive and cardiovascular systems of the five horses were evaluated by means of different non-invasive methods. During the lidocaine infusion, the mean (f SD) lidocaine and MEGX concentrations were respectively 768.88 +/- 93.32ng/ml and 163.08 +/- 108.98 ng/ml. The infusion of lidocaine significantly influenced the presence of fasciculations, caused a statistically but non-clinically significant decrease of systolic and diastolic blood pressures, which were both correlated with lidocaine and MEGX serum concentrations, and it increased the duodenal contractions frequency, which was correlated with the serum lidocaine concentration. In this study, mild hypotensive and prokinetic effects of short-term lidocaine infusion were observed

Prevalence of radiographic findings in candidate sires (2001-2008)

Radiographic screening of horses prior to purchase or admission to studbooks has become an important tool for evaluating the osteo-articular status of the animals. Developmental orthopedic disorders (DOD) are the main cause of potential lameness in youngsters. The genetic factor associated with DOD has been established, and specific selection schemes have been developed to diminish the prevalence of lesions. Increasing knowledge of prevalence in different breeds may help in developing specific breeding strategies. This article presents the results of the radiographic screening of 676 stallions presented for sire admission to the Royal Belgian Sports Horse Society (Studbook sBs). On average, two radiographic findings were noted per horse. The prevalence of DOD in this population was 38.9%. A high percentage of horses showed radiographic signs of effusion of the distal interphalangeal joint. An uncommon fragment location at the proximal tubercle of the talus was found in 7 horses. The present paper presents a review and discussion of all the radiographic findings

The absolute age of the globular cluster M15 using near-infrared adaptive optics images from PISCES/LBT

We present deep near-infrared (NIR) J, Ks photometry of the old, metal-poor Galactic globular cluster M\,15 obtained with images collected with the LUCI1 and PISCES cameras available at the Large Binocular Telescope (LBT). We show how the use of First Light Adaptive Optics system coupled with the (FLAO) PISCES camera allows us to improve the limiting magnitude by ~2 mag in Ks. By analyzing archival HST data, we demonstrate that the quality of the LBT/PISCES color magnitude diagram is fully comparable with analogous space-based data. The smaller field of view is balanced by the shorter exposure time required to reach a similar photometric limit. We investigated the absolute age of M\,15 by means of two methods: i) by determining the age from the position of the main sequence turn-off; and ii) by the magnitude difference between the MSTO and the well-defined knee detected along the faint portion of the MS. We derive consistent values of the absolute age of M15, that is 12.9+-2.6 Gyr and 13.3+-1.1 Gyr, respectively.Comment: 13 pages, 8 figures, ApJ accepte

LHC phenomenology of dark matter with a color-octet partner

Colored dark sectors where the dark matter particle is accompanied by colored partners have recently attracted theoretical and phenomenological interest. We explore the possibility that the dark sector consists of the dark matter particle and a color-octet partner, where the interaction with the Standard Model is governed by an effective operator involving gluons. The resulting interactions resemble the color analogues of electric and magnetic dipole moments. Although many phenomenological features of this kind of model only depend on the group representation of the partner under SU(3)c, we point out that interesting collider signatures such as R-hadrons are indeed controlled by the interaction operator between the dark and visible sector. We perform a study of the current constraints and future reach of LHC searches, where the complementarity between different possible signals is highlighted and exploited

LBT observations of the HR 8799 planetary system: First detection of HR8799e in H band

We have performed H and Ks band observations of the planetary system around HR 8799 using the new AO system at the Large Binocular Telescope and the PISCES Camera. The excellent instrument performance (Strehl ratios up to 80% in H band) enabled detection the inner planet HR8799e in the H band for the first time. The H and Ks magnitudes of HR8799e are similar to those of planets c and d, with planet e slightly brighter. Therefore, HR8799e is likely slightly more massive than c and d. We also explored possible orbital configurations and their orbital stability. We confirm that the orbits of planets b, c and e are consistent with being circular and coplanar; planet d should have either an orbital eccentricity of about 0.1 or be non-coplanar with respect to b and c. Planet e can not be in circular and coplanar orbit in a 4:2:1 mean motion resonances with c and d, while coplanar and circular orbits are allowed for a 5:2 resonance. The analysis of dynamical stability shows that the system is highly unstable or chaotic when planetary masses of about 5 MJup for b and 7 MJup for the other planets are adopted. Significant regions of dynamical stability for timescales of tens of Myr are found when adopting planetary masses of about 3.5, 5, 5, and 5 Mjup for HR 8799 b, c, d, and e respectively. These masses are below the current estimates based on the stellar age (30 Myr) and theoretical models of substellar objects.Comment: 13 pages, 10 figures, A&A, accepte

Recommendations of the LHC Dark Matter Working Group: Comparing LHC searches for dark matter mediators in visible and invisible decay channels and calculations of the thermal relic density

Weakly-coupled TeV-scale particles may mediate the interactions between normal matter and dark matter. If so, the LHC would produce dark matter through these mediators, leading to the familiar “mono-X” search signatures, but the mediators would also produce signals without missing momentum via the same vertices involved in their production. This document from the LHC Dark Matter Working Group suggests how to compare searches for these two types of signals in case of vector and axial-vector mediators, based on a workshop that took place on September 19/20, 2016 and subsequent discussions. These suggestions include how to extend the spin-1 mediated simplified models already in widespread use to include lepton couplings. This document also provides analytic calculations of the relic density in the simplified models and reports an issue that arose when ATLAS and CMS first began to use preliminary numerical calculations of the dark matter relic density in these models

Optical design of the post-focal relay of MAORY

The Multi Conjugate Adaptive Optics RelaY (MAORY) for the European Extremely Large Telescope is planned to be located on the straight-through port of the telescope Nasmyth platform and shall re-image the telescope focal plane to a wide field camera (MICADO) and a possible future second instrument. By means of natural and artificial (laser) reference sources for wavefront sensing, and of deformable mirrors for wavefront correction, MAORY shall be able to compensate the wavefront disturbances affecting the scientific observations, achieving high Strehl ratio and high sky coverage. A trade-off study among different design options has been carried out addressing optical performance at the exit ports (wave front error, field distortion, throughput), structure stability, interface constraints (mass, size, location and accessibility of the two client instruments), and the overall adaptive optics performance. We discuss the baseline configuration of the opto-mechanical design. <P /

ARGOS: the laser guide star system for the LBT

ARGOS is the Laser Guide Star adaptive optics system for the Large Binocular Telescope. Aiming for a wide field adaptive optics correction, ARGOS will equip both sides of LBT with a multi laser beacon system and corresponding wavefront sensors, driving LBT's adaptive secondary mirrors. Utilizing high power pulsed green lasers the artificial beacons are generated via Rayleigh scattering in earth's atmosphere. ARGOS will project a set of three guide stars above each of LBT's mirrors in a wide constellation. The returning scattered light, sensitive particular to the turbulence close to ground, is detected in a gated wavefront sensor system. Measuring and correcting the ground layers of the optical distortions enables ARGOS to achieve a correction over a very wide field of view. Taking advantage of this wide field correction, the science that can be done with the multi object spectrographs LUCIFER will be boosted by higher spatial resolution and strongly enhanced flux for spectroscopy. Apart from the wide field correction ARGOS delivers in its ground layer mode, we foresee a diffraction limited operation with a hybrid Sodium laser Rayleigh beacon combination.12 page(s