Nuclear and Non-Ionizing Energy-Loss for Coulomb Scattered Particles from Low Energy up to Relativistic Regime in Space Radiation Environment

In the space environment, instruments onboard of spacecrafts can be affected by displacement damage due to radiation. The differential scattering cross section for screened nucleus--nucleus interactions - i.e., including the effects due to screened Coulomb nuclear fields -, nuclear stopping powers and non-ionization energy losses are treated from about 50 keV/nucleon up to relativistic energies.Comment: Accepted for publication in the Proceedings of the ICATPP Conference on Cosmic Rays for Particle and Astroparticle Physics, Villa Olmo (Como, Italy), 7--8 October, 2010, to be published by World Scientifi

Antiproton modulation in the Heliosphere and AMS-02 antiproton over proton ratio prediction

We implemented a quasi time-dependent 2D stochastic model of solar modulation describing the transport of cosmic rays (CR) in the heliosphere. Our code can modulate the Local Interstellar Spectrum (LIS) of a generic charged particle (light cosmic ions and electrons), calculating the spectrum at 1AU. Several measurements of CR antiparticles have been performed. Here we focused our attention on the CR antiproton component and the antiproton over proton ratio. We show that our model, using the same heliospheric parameters for both particles, fit the observed anti-p/p ratio. We show a good agreement with BESS-97 and PAMELA data and make a prediction for the AMS-02 experiment

Microplastics, microfibres and nanoplastics cause variable sub-lethal responses in mussels (Mytilus spp.)

We compare the toxicity of microplastics, microfibres and nanoplastics on mussels. Mussels (Mytilus spp.) were exposed to 500 ng mL-1 of 20 µm polystyrene microplastics, 10x30 µm polyamide microfibres or 50 nm polystyrene nanoplastics for 24 h or 7 days. Biomarkers of immune response, oxidative stress response, lysosomal destabilisation and genotoxic damage were measured in haemolymph, digestive gland and gills. Microplastics and microfibres were observed in the digestive glands, with significantly higher plastic concentrations after 7-days exposure (ANOVA, P<0.05). Nanoplastics had a significant effect on hyalinocyte-granulocyte ratios (ANOVA, P<0.05), indicative of a heightened immune response. SOD activity was significantly increased followed 24 h exposure to plastics (two-way ANOVA, P<0.05), but returned to normal levels after 7-days exposure. No evidence of lysosomal destabilisation or genotoxic damage was observed from any form of plastic. The study highlights how particle size is a key factor in plastic particulate toxicity

Electrical Characterization of SiPM as a Function of Test Frequency and Temperature

Silicon Photomultipliers (SiPM) represent a promising alternative to classical photomultipliers, for instance, for the detection of photons in high energy physics and medical physics. In the present work, electrical characterizations of test devices - manufactured by ST Microelectronics - are presented. SiPMs with an area of 3.5x3.5 micron^2 and a cell pitch of 54 micron were manufactured as arrays of 64x64 cells and exhibiting a fill factor of 31%. The capacitance of SiPMs was measured as a function of reverse bias voltage at frequencies ranging from from 20 Hz up to 1 MHz and temperatures from 300 K down to 85 K. While leakage currents were measured at temperatures from 400 K down to 85 K. Thus, the threshold voltage - i.e., voltage corresponding to that at which the multiplication regime for the leakage current begins - could be determined as a function of temperature. Finally, an electrical model suited to reproduce the dependence of the frequency dependence of capacitance is presented.Comment: To appear on the Proceedings of the 13th ICATPP Conference on Astroparticle, Particle, Space Physics and Detectors for Physics Applications, Villa Olmo (Como, Italy), 3-7 October, 2011, to be published by World Scientific (Singapore

Proton Modulation in the Heliosphere for Different Solar Conditions and Prediction for AMS-02

Spectra of Galactic Cosmic Rays (GCRs) measured at the Earth are the combination of several processes: sources production and acceleration, propagation in the interstellar medium and propagation in the heliosphere. Inside the solar cavity the flux of GCRs is reduced due to the solar modulation, the interaction which they have with the interplanetary medium. We realized a 2D stochastic simulation of solar modulation to reproduce CR spectra at the Earth, and evaluated the importance in our results of the Local Interstellar Spectrum (LIS) model and its agreement with data at high energy. We show a good agreement between our model and the data taken by AMS-01 and BESS experiments during periods with different solar activity conditions. Furthermore we made a prediction for the flux which will be measured by AMS-02 experiment.Comment: Accepted for publication in the Proceedings of the ICATPP Conference on Cosmic Rays for Particle and Astroparticle Physics, Villa Olmo (Como, Italy), 7-8 October, 2010, to be published by World Scientific (Singapore

Latitudinal Dependence of Cosmic Rays Modulation at 1 AU and Interplanetary-Magnetic-Field Polar Correction

The cosmic rays differential intensity inside the heliosphere, for energy below 30 GeV/nuc, depends on solar activity and interplanetary magnetic field polarity. This variation, termed solar modulation, is described using a 2-D (radius and colatitude) Monte Carlo approach for solving the Parker transport equation that includes diffusion, convection, magnetic drift and adiabatic energy loss. Since the whole transport is strongly related to the interplanetary magnetic field (IMF) structure, a better understanding of his description is needed in order to reproduce the cosmic rays intensity at the Earth, as well as outside the ecliptic plane. In this work an interplanetary magnetic field model including the standard description on ecliptic region and a polar correction is presented. This treatment of the IMF, implemented in the HelMod Monte Carlo code (version 2.0), was used to determine the effects on the differential intensity of Proton at 1\,AU and allowed one to investigate how latitudinal gradients of proton intensities, observed in the inner heliosphere with the Ulysses spacecraft during 1995, can be affected by the modification of the IMF in the polar regions.Comment: accepted for publication inAdvances in Astronom

Suprathermal particle addition to solar wind pressure: possible influence on magnetospheric transmissivity of low energy cosmic rays?

Energetic (suprathermal) solar particles, accelerated in the interplanetary medium, contribute to the solar wind pressure, in particular during high solar activity periods. We estimated the effect of the increase of solar wind pressure due to suprathermal particles on magnetospheric transmissivity of galactic cosmic rays in the case of one recent solar event

Diversity of vaginal microbiome and metabolome during genital infections

We characterized the vaginal ecosystem during common infections of the female genital tract, as vulvovaginal candidiasis (VVC, n\u2009=\u200918) and Chlamydia trachomatis infection (CT, n\u2009=\u200920), recruiting healthy (HC, n\u2009=\u200921) and bacterial vaginosis-affected (BV, n\u2009=\u200920) women as references of eubiosis and dysbiosis. The profiles of the vaginal microbiome and metabolome were studied in 79 reproductive-aged women, by means of next generation sequencing and proton based-nuclear magnetic resonance spectroscopy. Lactobacillus genus was profoundly depleted in all the genital infections herein considered, and species-level analysis revealed that healthy vaginal microbiome was dominated by L. crispatus. In the shift from HC to CT, VVC, and BV, L. crispatus was progressively replaced by L. iners. CT infection and VVC, as well as BV condition, were mainly characterised by anaerobe genera, e.g. Gardnerella, Prevotella, Megasphaera, Roseburia and Atopobium. The changes in the bacterial communities occurring during the genital infections resulted in significant alterations in the vaginal metabolites composition, being the decrease of lactate a common marker of all the pathological conditions. In conclusion, according to the taxonomic and metabolomics analysis, we found that each of the four conditions is characterized by a peculiar vaginal microbiome/metabolome fingerprint