Investigating pathogen burden in relation to a cumulative deficits index in a representative sample of US adults

Pathogen burden is a construct developed to assess the cumulative effects of multiple, persistent pathogens on morbidity and mortality. Despite the likely biological wear and tear on multiple body systems caused by persistent infections, few studies have examined the impact of total pathogen burden on such outcomes and specifically on preclinical markers of dysfunction. Using data from two waves of the National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey, we compared three alternative methods for measuring pathogen burden, composed of mainly persistent viral infections, using a cumulative deficits index (CDI) as an outcome: single pathogen associations, a pathogen burden summary score and latent class analyses. We found significant heterogeneity in the distribution of the CDI by age, sex, race/ethnicity and education. There was an association between pathogen burden and the CDI by all three metrics. The latent class classification of pathogen burden showed particularly strong associations with the CDI; these associations remained after controlling for age, sex, body mass index, smoking, race/ethnicity and education. Our results suggest that pathogen burden may influence early clinical indicators of poor health as measured by the CDI. Our results are salient since we were able to detect these associations in a relatively young population. These findings suggest that reducing pathogen burden and the specific pathogens that drive the CDI may provide a target for preventing the early development of age-related physiological changes. © 2018 Cambridge University Press

Avoiding Chaos in Wonderland

Wonderland, a compact, integrated economic, demographic and environmental model is investigated using methods developed for studying critical phenomena. Simulation results show the parameter space separates into two phases, one of which contains the property of long term, sustainable development. By employing information contain in the phase diagram, an optimal strategy involving pollution taxes is developed as a means of moving a system initially in a unsustainable region of the phase diagram into a region of sustainability while ensuring minimal regret with respect to long term economic growth.Comment: 22 pages, 9 figures. Submitted to Physica

Coercive redistribution and public agreement: re-evaluating the libertarian challenge of charity

In this article, we evaluate the capacity of liberal egalitarianism to rebut what we call the libertarian challenge of charity. This challenge states that coercive redistributive taxation is neither needed nor justified, since those who endorse redistribution can give charitably, and those who do not endorse redistribution cannot justifiably be coerced. We argue that contemporary developments in liberal political thought render liberalism more vulnerable to this libertarian challenge. Many liberals have, in recent years, sought to recast liberalism such that it is more hospitable to cultural, religious, and ethnic diversity. This move has resulted in increased support for the claim that liberalism should be understood as a political rather than comprehensive doctrine, and that liberal institutions should draw their legitimacy from agreements made among members of an appropriately conceived deliberative community, rather than from controversial liberal principles like individual autonomy. We argue that, while this move may indeed make liberalism more compatible with cultural diversity, it also makes it more vulnerable to the libertarian challenge of charity. Not all versions of liberalism are troubled by the challenge, but those that are troubled by it are increasingly dominant. We also discuss G. A. Cohen’s claim that liberal equality requires an ‘egalitarian ethos’ and argue that, if Cohen is right, it is difficult to see how there can be an adequate response to the libertarian challenge of charity. In general, our argument can be summarised as follows: the more that liberalism is concerned accurately to model the actual democratic wishes and motivations of the people it governs, the less it is able to justify coercively imposing redistributive principles of justice

ON THE INTRINSIC CHARM COMPONENT OF THE NUCLEON

Using a $\overline D$ meson cloud model we calculate the squared charm radius of the nucleon . The ratio between this squared radius and the ordinary baryon squared radius is identified with the probability of ``seeing'' the intrinsic charm component of the nucleon. Our estimate is compatible with those used to successfully describe the charm production phenomenology.Comment: 9 pages, 2 figures not included, avaiable from the author

Complete next-to-leading order calculation for pion production in nucleon-nucleon collisions at threshold

Based on a counting scheme that explicitly takes into account the large momentum sqrt(M m_pi) characteristic for pion production in nucleon-nucleon collisions we calculate all diagrams for the reaction NN --> NN pi at threshold up to next-to-leading order. At this order there are no free parameters and the size of the next-to-leading order contributions is in line with the expectation from power counting. The sum of loop corrections at that order vanishes for the process pp --> pp pi^0 at threshold. The total contribution at next-to-leading order from loop diagrams that include the delta degree of freedom vanishes at threshold in both reaction channels pp --> pp pi^0, pn pi^+.Comment: 9 pages, 4 figure

Nonmonotonic inelastic tunneling spectra due to surface spin excitations in ferromagnetic junctions

The paper addresses inelastic spin-flip tunneling accompanied by surface spin excitations (magnons) in ferromagnetic junctions. The inelastic tunneling current is proportional to the magnon density of states which is energy-independent for the surface waves and, for this reason, cannot account for the bias-voltage dependence of the observed inelastic tunneling spectra. This paper shows that the bias-voltage dependence of the tunneling spectra can arise from the tunneling matrix elements of the electron-magnon interaction. These matrix elements are derived from the Coulomb exchange interaction using the itinerant-electron model of magnon-assisted tunneling. The results for the inelastic tunneling spectra, based on the nonequilibrium Green's function calculations, are presented for both parallel and antiparallel magnetizations in the ferromagnetic leads.Comment: 9 pages, 4 figures, version as publishe

Multibeam Maser Survey of methanol and excited OH in the Magellanic clouds: new detections and maser abundance estimates

‘The definitive version is available at www.blackwell-synergy.com.’ Copyright Blackwell Publishing DOI: 10.1111/j.1365-2966.2008.12888.xPeer reviewe

Higher-order mutual coherence of optical and matter waves

We use an operational approach to discuss ways to measure the higher-order cross-correlations between optical and matter-wave fields. We pay particular attention to the fact that atomic fields actually consist of composite particles that can easily be separated into their basic constituents by a detection process such as photoionization. In the case of bosonic fields, that we specifically consider here, this leads to the appearance in the detection signal of exchange contributions due to both the composite bosonic field and its individual fermionic constituents. We also show how time-gated counting schemes allow to isolate specific contributions to the signal, in particular involving different orderings of the Schr\"odinger and Maxwell fields.Comment: 11 pages, 2 figure

Giant magnetothermopower of magnon-assisted transport in ferromagnetic tunnel junctions

We present a theoretical description of the thermopower due to magnon-assisted tunneling in a mesoscopic tunnel junction between two ferromagnetic metals. The thermopower is generated in the course of thermal equilibration between two baths of magnons, mediated by electrons. For a junction between two ferromagnets with antiparallel polarizations, the ability of magnon-assisted tunneling to create thermopower $S_{AP}$ depends on the difference between the size $\Pi_{\uparrow, \downarrow}$ of the majority and minority band Fermi surfaces and it is proportional to a temperature dependent factor $(k_{B}T/\omega_{D})^{3/2}$ where $\omega_{D}$ is the magnon Debye energy. The latter factor reflects the fractional change in the net magnetization of the reservoirs due to thermal magnons at temperature $T$ (Bloch's $T^{3/2}$ law). In contrast, the contribution of magnon-assisted tunneling to the thermopower $S_P$ of a junction with parallel polarizations is negligible. As the relative polarizations of ferromagnetic layers can be manipulated by an external magnetic field, a large difference $\Delta S = S_{AP} - S_P \approx S_{AP} \sim - (k_B/e) f (\Pi_{\uparrow},\Pi_{\downarrow}) (k_BT/\omega_{D})^{3/2}$ results in a magnetothermopower effect. This magnetothermopower effect becomes giant in the extreme case of a junction between two half-metallic ferromagnets, $\Delta S \sim - k_B/e$.Comment: 9 pages, 4 eps figure