Influence of correlations on the velocity statistics of scalar granular gases

The free evolution of inelastic particles in one dimension is studied by means of Molecular Dynamics (MD), of an inelastic pseudo-Maxwell model and of a lattice model, with emphasis on the role of spatial correlations. We present an exact solution of the 1d granular pseudo-Maxwell model for the scaling distribution of velocities and discuss how this model fails to describe correctly the homogeneous cooling stage of the 1d granular gas. Embedding the pseudo-Maxwell gas on a lattice (hence allowing for the onset of spatial correlations), we find a much better agreement with the MD simulations even in the inhomogeneous regime. This is seen by comparing the velocity distributions, the velocity profiles and the structure factors of the velocity field.Comment: Latex file: 6 pages, 5 figures (.eps). See also http://axtnt3.phys.uniroma1.it/Maxwel

Analytical results for generalized persistence properties of smooth processes

We present a general scheme to calculate within the independent interval approximation generalized (level-dependent) persistence properties for processes having a finite density of zero-crossings. Our results are especially relevant for the diffusion equation evolving from random initial conditions, one of the simplest coarsening systems. Exact results are obtained in certain limits, and rely on a new method to deal with constrained multiplicative processes. An excellent agreement of our analytical predictions with direct numerical simulations of the diffusion equation is found.Comment: 21 pages, 4 figures, to appear in Journal of Physics

Spontaneous Polarisation Build up in a Room Temperature Polariton Laser

We observe the build up of strong (~50%) spontaneous vector polarisation in emission from a GaN-based polariton laser excited by short optical pulses at room temperature. The Stokes vector of emitted light changes its orientation randomly from one excitation pulse to another, so that the time-integrated polarisation remains zero. This behaviour is completely different to any previous laser. We interpret this observation in terms of the spontaneous symmetry breaking in a Bose-Einstein condensate of exciton-polaritons

Melatonin prevents chemical-induced Haemopoietic cell death

Melatonin (MEL), a methoxyindole synthesized by the pineal gland, is a powerful antioxidant in tissues as well as within cells, with a fundamental role in ameliorating homeostasis in a number of specific pathologies. It acts both as a direct radical scavenger and by stimulating production/activity of intracellular antioxidant enzymes. In this work, some chemical triggers, with different mechanisms of action, have been chosen to induce cell death in U937 hematopoietic cell line. Cells were pre-treated with 100 μM MEL and then exposed to hydrogen peroxide or staurosporine. Morphological analyses, TUNEL reaction and Orange/PI double staining have been used to recognize ultrastructural apoptotic patterns and to evaluate DNA behavior. Chemical damage and potential MEL anti-apoptotic effects were quantified by means of Tali® Image-Based Cytometer, able to monitor cell viability and apoptotic events. After trigger exposure, chromatin condensation, micronuclei formation and DNA fragmentation have been observed, all suggesting apoptotic cell death. These events underwent a statistically significant decrease in samples pre-treated with MEL. After caspase inhibition and subsequent assessment of cell viability, we demonstrated that apoptosis occurs, at least in part, through the mitochondrial pathway and that MEL interacts at this level to rescue U937 cells from death. © 2014 by the authors; licensee MDPI, Basel, Switzerland

Brownian forces in sheared granular matter

We present results from a series of experiments on a granular medium sheared in a Couette geometry and show that their statistical properties can be computed in a quantitative way from the assumption that the resultant from the set of forces acting in the system performs a Brownian motion. The same assumption has been utilised, with success, to describe other phenomena, such as the Barkhausen effect in ferromagnets, and so the scheme suggests itself as a more general description of a wider class of driven instabilities.Comment: 4 pages, 5 figures and 1 tabl

Steady state properties of a mean field model of driven inelastic mixtures

We investigate a Maxwell model of inelastic granular mixture under the influence of a stochastic driving and obtain its steady state properties in the context of classical kinetic theory. The model is studied analytically by computing the moments up to the eighth order and approximating the distributions by means of a Sonine polynomial expansion method. The main findings concern the existence of two different granular temperatures, one for each species, and the characterization of the distribution functions, whose tails are in general more populated than those of an elastic system. These analytical results are tested against Monte Carlo numerical simulations of the model and are in general in good agreement. The simulations, however, reveal the presence of pronounced non-gaussian tails in the case of an infinite temperature bath, which are not well reproduced by the Sonine method.Comment: 23 pages, 10 figures, submitted for publicatio

Engineered Sleeping Beauty Transposon as Efficient System to Optimize Chimp Adenoviral Production

Sleeping Beauty (SB) is the first DNA transposon employed for efficient transposition in vertebrate cells, opening new applications for genetic engineering and gene therapies. A transposon-based gene delivery system holds the favourable features of non-viral vectors and an attractive safety profile. Here, we employed SB to engineer HEK293 cells for optimizing the production of a chimpanzee Adenovector (chAd) belonging to the Human Mastadenovirus C species. To date, chAd vectors are employed in several clinical settings for infectious diseases, last but not least COVID-19. A robust, efficient and quick viral vector production could advance the clinical application of chAd vectors. To this aim, we firstly swapped the hAd5 E1 with chAd-C E1 gene by using the CRISPR/Cas9 system. We demonstrated that in the absence of human Ad5 E1, chimp Ad-C E1 gene did not support HEK293 survival. To improve chAd-C vector production, we engineered HEK293 cells to stably express the chAd-C precursor terminal protein (ch.pTP), which plays a crucial role in chimpanzee Adenoviral DNA replication. The results indicate that exogenous ch.pTP expression significantly ameliorate the packaging and amplification of recombinant chAd-C vectors thus, the engineered HEK293ch.pTP cells could represent a superior packaging cell line for the production of these vectors