133 research outputs found
Viscosity of Silica and Doped Silica Melts: Evidence for a Crossover Temperature
Silica is known as the archetypal strong liquid, exhibiting an Arrhenius
viscosity curve with a high glass transition temperature and constant
activation energy. However, given the ideally isostatic nature of the silica
network, the presence of even a small concentration of defects can lead to a
significant decrease in both the glass transition temperature and activation
energy for viscous flow. To understand the impact of trace level dopants on the
viscosity of silica, we measure the viscosity-temperature curves for seven
silica glass samples having different impurities, including four natural and
three synthetic samples. Depending on the type of dopant, the glass transition
temperature can vary by nearly 300 K. A common crossover is found for all
viscosity curves around ~2200-2500 K, which we attribute to a change of the
transport mechanism in the melt from being dominated by intrinsic defects at
high temperature to dopant-induced defects at low temperatures
In-beam internal conversion electron spectroscopy with the SPICE detector
The SPectrometer for Internal Conversion Electrons (SPICE) has been
commissioned for use in conjunction with the TIGRESS -ray spectrometer
at TRIUMF's ISAC-II facility. SPICE features a permanent rare-earth magnetic
lens to collect and direct internal conversion electrons emitted from nuclear
reactions to a thick, highly segmented, lithium-drifted silicon detector. This
arrangement, combined with TIGRESS, enables in-beam -ray and internal
conversion electron spectroscopy to be performed with stable and radioactive
ion beams. Technical aspects of the device, capabilities, and initial
performance are presented
Neurology
Contains reports on eleven research projects.U.S. Air Force (AF49(638)-1130)Army Chemical Corps (DA-18-108-405-Cml-942)U.S. Public Health Service (B-3055)National Science Foundation (Grant G-16526)U.S. Public Health Service (B-3090)U.S. Air Force (AF33(616)-7588)Office of Naval Research (Nonr-1841(70)
Waveguide-integrated silicon T centres
The performance of modular, networked quantum technologies will be strongly
dependent upon the quality of their quantum light-matter interconnects.
Solid-state colour centres, and in particular T centres in silicon, offer
competitive technological and commercial advantages as the basis for quantum
networking technologies and distributed quantum computing. These newly
rediscovered silicon defects offer direct telecommunications-band photonic
emission, long-lived electron and nuclear spin qubits, and proven native
integration into industry-standard, CMOS-compatible, silicon-on-insulator (SOI)
photonic chips at scale. Here we demonstrate further levels of integration by
characterizing T centre spin ensembles in single-mode waveguides in SOI. In
addition to measuring long spin T_1 times, we report on the integrated centres'
optical properties. We find that the narrow homogeneous linewidth of these
waveguide-integrated emitters is already sufficiently low to predict the future
success of remote spin-entangling protocols with only modest cavity Purcell
enhancements. We show that further improvements may still be possible by
measuring nearly lifetime-limited homogeneous linewidths in isotopically pure
bulk crystals. In each case the measured linewidths are more than an order of
magnitude lower than previously reported and further support the view that
high-performance, large-scale distributed quantum technologies based upon T
centres in silicon may be attainable in the near term
Neurology
Contains research objectives and reports on six research projects.U.S. Public Health Service (B-3055)U.S. Public Health Service (B-3090)Office of Naval Research (Nonr-1841 (70))Air Force (AF33(616)-7588)Air Force (AFAFOSR-155-63)Air Force (AFAFOSR-155-63)Army Chemical Corps (DA-18-108-405-Cml-942)National Science Foundation (Grant G-16526
Digital Signal Processing
Contains a research summary and reports on fifteen research projects.National Science Foundation FellowshipJoint Services Electronics Program (Contract DAAG29-78-C-0020)National Science Foundation (Grant ENG76-24117)U.S. Navy - Office of Naval Research (Contract N00014-75-C-0951)National Science Foundation (Grant ENG76-24117)Schlumberger-Doll Research Center FellowshipHertz Foundation FellowshipNational Aeronautics and Space Administration (Grant NSG-5157)U.S. Navy - Office of Naval Research (Contract N00014-77-C-0196
Leishmania infantum Amastigotes Enhance HIV-1 Production in Cocultures of Human Dendritic Cells and CD4+ T Cells by Inducing Secretion of IL-6 and TNF-α
Visceral leishmaniasis (VL) is a potentially deadly parasitic disease afflicting millions worldwide. Although itself an important infectious illness, VL has also emerged as an opportunistic disease among patients infected with HIV-1. This is partly due to the increasing overlap between urban regions of high HIV-1 transmission and areas where Leishmania is endemic. Furthermore, VL increases the development and clinical progression of AIDS-related diseases. Conversely, HIV-1-infected individuals are at greater risk of developing VL or suffering relapse. Finally, HIV-1 and Leishmania can both productively infect cells of the macrophage-dendritic cell lineage, resulting in a cumulative deficiency of the immune response. We therefore studied the effect of Leishmania infantum on HIV-1 production when dendritic cells (DCs) are cocultured with autologous CD4+ T cells. We show that amastigotes promote virus replication in both DCs and lymphocytes, due to a parasite-mediated production of soluble factors by DCs. Micro-beads array analyses indicate that Leishmania infantum amastigotes infection induces a higher secretion of several cytokines in these cells, and use of specific neutralizing antibodies revealed that the Leishmania-induced increase in HIV-1 replication is due to IL-6 and TNF-α. These findings suggest that Leishmania's presence within DC/T-cell conjugates leads to an enhanced HIV-1 production
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