12,622 research outputs found
An efficient protocol to perform genetic traceability of tissue and foods from Geoffroea decorticans
The quality of a DNA isolation method depends, among others, on the target tissue and the metabolites therein. Geoffroea decorticans Burkart (chanar) is a species that has nutritional and pharmacological potential. However, an effective method of DNA extraction capable of facilitating population studies and food genetic traceability has not been studied yet. The objective of the present work was to evaluate four methods of DNA extraction from leaves and chanar-based foods. The methods were evaluated based on yield, DNA purity, and molecular markers. The CCI-P (CTAB/Chloroform-Isoamylalcohol/pellet) method showed the highest yield of DNA obtained from leaves. However, the CPCI-SC (CTAB/Phenol-Chloroform-Isoamylalcohol/silica-column) method was the only one that resulted in acceptable DNA quality with both parameters (A260/A280 and A260/A230). The leaf DNA obtained with this method showed a greater amount of fragments with RAPD, and an acceptable amount of fragments with ISSR. On the other hand, the CCI-P method showed a higher yield of DNA from arrope de chanar (syrup). However, the CPCI-SC method was the only one that had relatively better DNA quality, which allowed the amplification of molecular markers. Regarding chanar flour, the CPCI-SC method showed the highest yield, DNA quality and good amplification with molecular markers. Therefore, the CPCI-SC extraction method is efficient for obtaining DNA from different matrices, and can support studies for a possible designation of origin of chanar-based foods
Holographic model for heavy vector meson masses
The experimentally observed spectra of heavy vector meson radial excitations
show a dependence on two different energy parameters. One is associated with
the quark mass and the other with the binding energy levels of the quark
anti-quark pair. The first is present in the large mass of the first state
while the other corresponds to the small mass splittings between radial
excitations. In this article we show how to reproduce such a behavior with
reasonable precision using a holographic model. In the dual picture, the large
energy scale shows up from a bulk mass and the small scale comes from the
position of anti-de Sitter (AdS) space where field correlators are calculated.
The model determines the masses of four observed S-wave states of charmonium
and six S-wave states of bottomonium with , 6.1 % rms error. In consistency
with the physical picture, the large energy parameter is flavor dependent,
while the small parameter, associated with quark anti-quark interaction is the
same for charmonium and bottomonium states.Comment: In V5 we just added some clarifying explanations about the model. 5
tables, no figure. Version published in Europhysics Letter
Holographic Picture of Heavy Vector Meson Melting
The fraction of heavy vector mesons produced in a heavy ion collision, as
compared to a proton proton collision, serves as an important indication of the
formation of a thermal medium, the quark gluon plasma. This sort of analysis
strongly depends on understanding the thermal effects of a medium like the
plasma on the states of heavy mesons. In particular, it is crucial to know the
temperature ranges where they undergo a thermal dissociation, or melting.
AdS/QCD models are know to provide an important tool for the calculation of
hadronic masses, but in general are not consistent with the observation that
decay constants of heavy vector mesons decrease with excitation level. It has
recently been shown that this problem can be overcome using a soft wall
background and introducing an extra energy parameter, through the calculation
of correlation functions at a finite position of anti-de Sitter space. This
approach leads to the evaluation of masses and decay constants of S wave
quarkonium states with just one flavor dependent and one flavor independent
parameters. Here we extend this more realistic model to finite temperatures and
analyse the thermal behavior of the states and of bottomonium
and charmonium. The corresponding spectral function exhibits a consistent
picture for the melting of the states where, for each flavor, the higher
excitations melt at lower temperatures. We estimate for these six states, the
energy ranges in which the heavy vector mesons undergo a transition from a well
defined peak in the spectral function to complete melting in the thermal
medium. A very clear distinction between the heavy flavors emerges, with
bottomonium state surviving deconfinemet transition at
temperatures much larger than the critical deconfinement temperature of the
medium.Comment: 20 pages, 7 figure
Decay constants in soft wall AdS/QCD revisited
Phenomenological AdS/QCD models, like hard wall and soft wall, provide
hadronic mass spectra in reasonable consistency with experimental and (or)
lattice results. These simple models are inspired in the AdS/CFT correspondence
and assume that gauge/ gravity duality holds in a scenario where conformal
invariance is broken through the introduction of an energy scale.
Another important property of hadrons: the decay constant, can also be
obtained from these models. However, a consistent formulation of an AdS/QCD
model that reproduces the observed behavior of decay constants of vector meson
excited states is still lacking. In particular: for radially excited states of
heavy vector mesons, the experimental data lead to decay constants that
decrease with the radial excitation level.
We show here that a modified framework of soft wall AdS/QCD involving an
additional dimensionfull parameter, associated with an ultraviolet energy
scale, provides decay constants decreasing with radial excitation level. In
this version of the soft wall model the two point function of gauge theory
operators is calculated at a finite position of the anti-de Sitter space radial
coordinate.Comment: Shorter (letter) version. Results unchanged. More references
included. We now explain that the large UV scale of the model is associated
with the non-hadronic decay of the heavy vector meson into light leptons.
Version Published in Phys. Lets.
Bulge RR Lyrae stars in the VVV tile
The VISTA Variables in the V\'ia L\'actea (VVV) Survey is one of the six ESO
public surveys currently ongoing at the VISTA telescope on Cerro Paranal,
Chile. VVV uses near-IR () filters that at present provide
photometry to a depth of mag in up to 36 epochs spanning
over four years, and aim at discovering more than 10 variable sources as
well as trace the structure of the Galactic bulge and part of the southern
disk. A variability search was performed to find RR Lyrae variable stars. The
low stellar density of the VVV tile , which is centered at
() (), makes it suitable to search for
variable stars. Previous studies have identified some RR Lyrae stars using
optical bands that served to test our search procedure. The main goal is to
measure the reddening, interstellar extinction, and distances of the RR Lyrae
stars and to study their distribution on the Milky Way bulge. A total of 1.5 sq
deg were analyzed, and we found 39 RR Lyrae stars, 27 of which belong to the
ab-type and 12 to the c-type. Our analysis recovers all the previously
identified RR Lyrae variables in the field and discovers 29 new RR Lyrae stars.
The reddening and extinction toward all the RRab stars in this tile were
derived, and distance estimations were obtained through the period--luminosity
relation. Despite the limited amount of RR Lyrae stars studied, our results are
consistent with a spheroidal or central distribution around and
kpc. for either the Cardelli or Nishiyama extinction law.Comment: 10 pages, 8 figures, accepted for publication in Astronomy and
Astrophysic
Radiative non-isothermal Bondi accretion onto a massive black hole
In this paper, we present the classical Bondi accretion theory for the case
of non-isothermal accretion processes onto a supermassive black hole (SMBH),
including the effects of X-ray heating and the radiation force due to electron
scattering and spectral lines. The radiation field is calculated by considering
an optically thick, geometrically thin, standard accretion disk as the emitter
of UV photons and a spherical central object as a source of X-ray emission. In
the present analysis, the UV emission from the accretion disk is assumed to
have an angular dependence, while the X-ray/central object radiation is assumed
to be isotropic. This allows us to build streamlines in any angular direction
we need to. The influence of both types of radiation is evaluated for different
flux fractions of the X-ray and UV emissions with and without the effects of
spectral line driving. We find that the radiation emitted near the SMBH
interacts with the infalling matter and modifies the accretion dynamics. In the
presence of line driving, a transition resembles from pure type 1 & 2 to type 5
solutions (see Fig2.1 of Frank etal. 2002), which takes place regardless of
whether or not the UV emission dominates over the X-ray emission. We compute
the radiative factors at which this transition occurs, and discard type 5
solution from all our models. Estimated values of the accretion radius and
accretion rate in terms of the classical Bondi values are also given. The
results are useful for the construction of proper initial conditions for
time-dependent hydrodynamical simulations of accretion flows onto SMBH at the
centre of galaxies.Comment: 10 pages, 10 figures, Accepted to be published in A&
Variable stars in Terzan 5: additional evidence of multi-age and multi-iron stellar populations
Terzan 5 is a complex stellar system in the Galactic bulge, harboring stellar
populations with very different iron content ({\Delta}[Fe/H] ~1 dex) and with
ages differing by several Gyrs. Here we present an investigation of its
variable stars. We report on the discovery and characterization of three RR
Lyrae stars. For these newly discovered RR Lyrae and for six Miras of known
periods we provide radial velocity and chemical abundances from spectra
acquired with X-SHOOTER at the VLT. We find that the three RR Lyrae and the
three short period Miras (P<300 d) have radial velocity consistent with being
Terzan 5 members. They have sub-solar iron abundances and enhanced
[{\alpha}/Fe], well matching the age and abundance patterns of the 12 Gyr
metal-poor stellar populations of Terzan 5. Only one, out of the three long
period (P>300 d) Miras analyzed in this study, has a radial velocity consistent
with being Terzan 5 member. Its super-solar iron abundance and solar-scaled
[{\alpha}/Fe] nicely match the chemical properties of the metal rich stellar
population of Terzan 5 and its derived mass nicely agrees with being several
Gyrs younger than the short period Miras. This young variable is an additional
proof of the surprising young sub-population discovered in Terzan 5.Comment: 20 pages, 4 figures, in press on the Ap
New type II Cepheids from VVV data towards the Galactic center
The Galactic center (GC) is the densest region of the Milky Way. Variability
surveys towards the GC potentially provide the largest number of variable stars
per square degree within the Galaxy. However, high stellar density is also a
drawback due to blending. Moreover, the GC is affected by extreme reddening,
therefore near infrared observations are needed. We plan to detect new variable
stars towards the GC, focusing on type II Cepheids (T2Cs) which have the
advantage of being brighter than RR Lyrae stars. We perform parallel
Lomb-Scargle and Generalized Lomb-Scargle periodogram analysis of the
-band time series of the VISTA variables in the Via Lactea survey, to
detect periodicities. We employ statistical parameters to clean our sample. We
take account of periods, light amplitudes, distances, and proper motions to
provide a classification of the candidate variables. We detected 1,019 periodic
variable stars, of which 164 are T2Cs, 210 are Miras and 3 are classical
Cepheids. We also found the first anomalous Cepheid in this region. We compare
their photometric properties with overlapping catalogs and discuss their
properties on the color-magnitude and Bailey diagrams. We present the most
extensive catalog of T2Cs in the GC region to date. Offsets in E() and
in the reddening law cause very large (1-2 kpc) uncertainties on
distances in this region. We provide a catalog which will be the starting point
for future spectroscopic surveys in the innermost regions of the Galaxy.Comment: A&A, accepte
Poisson smooth structures on stratified symplectic spaces
In this paper we introduce the notion of a smooth structure on a stratified
space, the notion of a Poisson smooth structure and the notion of a weakly
symplectic smooth structure on a stratified symplectic space, refining the
concept of a stratified symplectic Poisson algebra introduced by Sjamaar and
Lerman. We show that these smooth spaces possess several important properties,
e.g. the existence of smooth partitions of unity. Furthermore, under mild
conditions many properties of a symplectic manifold can be extended to a
symplectic stratified space provided with a smooth Poisson structure, e.g. the
existence and uniqueness of a Hamiltonian flow, the isomorphism between the
Brylinski-Poisson homology and the de Rham homology, the existence of a
Leftschetz decomposition on a symplectic stratified space. We give many
examples of stratified symplectic spaces possessing a Poisson smooth structure
which is also weakly symplectic.Comment: 21 page, final version, to appear in the Proceedings of the 6-th
World Conference on 21st Century Mathematic
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