Wang-Landau sampling in three-dimensional polymers

Monte Carlo simulations using Wang-Landau sampling are performed to study three-dimensional chains of homopolymers on a lattice. We confirm the accuracy of the method by calculating the thermodynamic properties of this system. Our results are in good agreement with those obtained using Metropolis importance sampling. This algorithm enables one to accurately simulate the usually hardly accessible low-temperature regions since it determines the density of states in a single simulation.Comment: 5 pages, 9 figures arch-ive/Brazilian Journal of Physic

Short-time behavior of a classical ferromagnet with double-exchange interaction

We investigate the critical dynamics of a classical ferromagnet on the simple cubic lattice with double-exchange interaction. Estimates for the dynamic critical exponents $z$ and $\theta$ are obtained using short-time Monte Carlo simulations. We also estimate the static critical exponents $\nu$ and $\beta$ studying the behavior of the samples at an early time. Our results are in good agreement with available estimates and support the assertion that this model and the classical Heisenberg model belong to the same universality class

What Is the Real Impact of Estrogen Receptor Status on the Prognosis and Treatment of HER2-Positive Early Breast Cancer?

HER2+ early breast cancer is a heterogeneous disease, comprising all the intrinsic breast cancer subtypes. The only biomarker available nowadays for anti-HER2 treatment selection is HER2 status itself, but estrogen receptor (ER) status is emerging as a robust predictive marker within HER2+ disease. In this Perspective, we discuss the biological and clinical differences between patients with HER2+/ER-positive (ER+) disease versus those with HER2+/ ER-negative (ER-neg) tumors, namely, short-term and long-term (>5 years after diagnosis) prognosis, response to neoadjuvant treatment and benefit from adjuvant anti-HER2–targeted therapies. We also address other possible biomarkers to be used for patient selection in future clinical trials, such as gene signatures, PAM50 subtypes, tumor-infiltrating lymphocytes, PIK3CA mutations, and changes in Ki67 score during treatment and discuss their limitations. Finally, we suggest new clinical trial designs that can have an impact on clinical practice, aiming to test treatment deescalation separately for patients with HER2+/ER+ and HER2+/ER-neg tumors. We also propose an integrated classification of HER2+ disease, comprising DNA, RNA, protein expression, and microenvironment characteristics, in order to identify those tumors that are truly “HER2-addicted” and may benefit the most from anti-HER2 treatment

Quasicondensate and superfluid fraction in the 2D charged-boson gas at finite temperature

The Bogoliubov - de Gennes equations are solved for the Coulomb Bose gas describing a fluid of charged bosons at finite temperature. The approach is applicable in the weak coupling regime and the extent of its quantitative usefulness is tested in the three-dimensional fluid, for which diffusion Monte Carlo data are available on the condensate fraction at zero temperature. The one-body density matrix is then evaluated by the same approach for the two-dimensional fluid with e^2/r interactions, to demonstrate the presence of a quasi-condensate from its power-law decay with increasing distance and to evaluate the superfluid fraction as a function of temperature at weak coupling.Comment: 9 pages, 2 figure

Critical exponents and equation of state of the three-dimensional Heisenberg universality class

We improve the theoretical estimates of the critical exponents for the three-dimensional Heisenberg universality class. We find gamma=1.3960(9), nu=0.7112(5), eta=0.0375(5), alpha=-0.1336(15), beta=0.3689(3), and delta=4.783(3). We consider an improved lattice phi^4 Hamiltonian with suppressed leading scaling corrections. Our results are obtained by combining Monte Carlo simulations based on finite-size scaling methods and high-temperature expansions. The critical exponents are computed from high-temperature expansions specialized to the phi^4 improved model. By the same technique we determine the coefficients of the small-magnetization expansion of the equation of state. This expansion is extended analytically by means of approximate parametric representations, obtaining the equation of state in the whole critical region. We also determine a number of universal amplitude ratios.Comment: 40 pages, final version. In publication in Phys. Rev.

The Ising model with a periodic spin-lattice coupling on the triangular lattice

In this work, we study and evaluate the impact of a periodic spin-lattice coupling in an Ising-like system on a 2D triangular lattice. Our proposed simple Hamiltonian considers this additional interaction as an effect of preferential phonon propagation direction augmented by the symmetry of the underline lattice. The simplified analytical description of this new model brought us consistent information about its ground state and thermal behavior, and allowed us to highlight a singularity where the model behaves as several decoupled one-dimensional Ising systems. A thorough analysis was obtained via numerical simulations using the Wang-Landau Monte Carlo method that estimates the density of states g(E) to explore the phase diagram and other thermodynamic properties of interest. Also, we used the finite size scaling technique to characterize the critical exponents and the nature of the phase transitions that, despite the strong influence of the spin-lattice coupling, turned out to be within the same universality class as the original 2D Ising model