World Rabies Day - a decade of raising awareness

World Rabies Day was set up in 2007 to raise global awareness about rabies, to provide information on how to prevent the disease in at-risk communities and support advocacy for increased efforts in rabies control. It is held annually on September 28th, with events, media outreach and other initiatives carried out by individuals, professionals, organisations and governments from the local to the international level. The Global Alliance for Rabies Control coordinates World Rabies Day, amplifying the campaign's reach through the provision of a central event platform and resources to support events across the world, the promotion of messages through key rabies stakeholders, and the implementation of specific activities to highlight particular issues. Over the last decade, more than 1,700 registered events have been held across the world and shared with others in the global rabies community. Events in canine rabies endemic countries, particularly in Africa and Asia, have increased over time. Beyond the individual events, World Rabies Day has gained the support of governments and international agencies that recognise its value in supporting existing rabies control initiatives and advocating for improvements. As the rabies landscape has changed, World Rabies Day remains a general day of awareness but has also become an integral part of national, regional and global rabies elimination strategies. The global adoption of 2030 as the goal for the elimination of rabies as a public health threat has led to even greater opportunities for World Rabies Day to make a sustainable impact on rabies, by bringing the attention of policy makers and donors to the ongoing situation and elimination efforts in rabies-endemic countries

History of depression and survival after acute myocardial infarction

Objective: To compare survival in post-myocardial (MI) participants from the Enhancing Recovery In Coronary Heart Disease (ENRICHD) clinical trial with a first episode of major depression (MD) and those with recurrent MID, which is a risk factor for mortality after acute MI. Recent reports suggest that the level of risk may depend on whether the comorbid MD is a first or a recurrent episode. Methods: Survival was compared over a median of 29 months in 370 patients with an initial episode of MD, 550 with recurrent MD, and 408 who were free of depression. Results: After adjusting for an all-cause mortality risk score, initial Beck Depression Inventory score, and the use of selective serotonin reuptake inhibitor antidepressants, patients with a first episode of MD had poorer survival (18.4% all-cause mortality) than those with recurrent MD (11.8%) (hazard ratio (HR)=1.4; 95% Confidence Interval (CI)=1.0-2.0; p=.05). Both first depression (HR=3.1; 95% CI=1.6-6.1; p=.001) and recurrent MD (HR=2.2; 95% CI=1.1-4.4; p=.03) had significantly poorer survival than did the nondepressed patients (3.4%). A secondary analysis of deaths classified as probably due to a cardiovascular cause resulted in similar HRs, but the difference between depression groups was not significant. Conclusions: Both initial and recurrent episodes of MD predict shorter survival after acute MI, but initial MD episodes are more strongly predictive than recurrent episodes. Exploratory analyses suggest that this cannot be explained by more severe heart disease at index, poorer response to depression treatment, or a higher risk of cerebrovascular disease in patients with initial MD episodes

Reissner-Nordstrom and charged gas spheres

The main point of this paper is a suggestion about the proper treatment of the photon gas in a theory of stellar structure and other plasmas. This problem arises in the study of polytropic gas spheres, where we have already introduced some innovations. The main idea, already advanced in the contextof neutral, homogeneous, polytropic stellar models, is to base the theory firmly on a variational principle. Another essential novelty is to let mass distribution extend to infinity, the boundary between bulk and atmosphere being defined by an abrupt change in the polytropic index, triggered by the density. The logical next step in this program is to include the effect of radiation, which is a very significant complication since a full treatment would have to include an account of ionization, thus fieldsrepresenting electrons, ions, photons, gravitons and neutral atoms as well. In way of preparation, we consider models that are charged but homogeneous, involving only gravity, electromagnetism and a single scalar field that represents both the mass and the electric charge; in short, anon-neutral plasma. While this work only represents a stage in the development of a theory of stars, without direct application to physical systems, it does shed some light on the meaning of the Reissner-Nordstrom solution of the modified Einstein-Maxwell equations., with an application to a simple system.Comment: 19 pages, plain te

Neutrino masses in R-parity violating supersymmetric models

We study neutrino masses and mixing in R-parity violating supersymmetric models with generic soft supersymmetry breaking terms. Neutrinos acquire masses from various sources: Tree level neutrino--neutralino mixing and loop effects proportional to bilinear and/or trilinear R-parity violating parameters. Each of these contributions is controlled by different parameters and have different suppression or enhancement factors which we identified. Within an Abelian horizontal symmetry framework these factors are related and specific predictions can be made. We found that the main contributions to the neutrino masses are from the tree level and the bilinear loops and that the observed neutrino data can be accommodated once mild fine-tuning is allowed.Comment: 18 pages; minor typos corrected. To be published in Physical Review

Neutrino Oscillations and Collider Test of the R-parity Violating Minimal Supergravity Model

We study the R-parity violating minimal supergravity models accounting for the observed neutrino masses and mixing, which can be tested in future collider experiments. The bi-large mixing can be explained by allowing five dominant tri-linear couplings $\lambda'_{1,2,3}$ and $\lambda_{1,2}$. The desired ratio of the atmospheric and solar neutrino mass-squared differences can be obtained in a very limited parameter space where the tree-level contribution is tuned to be suppressed. In this allowed region, we quantify the correlation between the three neutrino mixing angles and the tri-linear R-parity violating couplings. Qualitatively, the relations $| \lambda'_1 | < | \lambda'_2| \sim | \lambda'_3|$, and $|\lambda_1| \sim |\lambda_2|$ are required by the large atmospheric neutrino mixing angle $\theta_{23}$ and the small angle $\theta_{13}$, and the large solar neutrino mixing angle $\theta_{12}$, respectively. Such a prediction on the couplings can be tested in the next linear colliders by observing the branching ratios of the lightest supersymmetric particle (LSP). For the stau or the neutralino LSP, the ratio $|\lambda_1|^2: |\lambda_2|^2: |\lambda_1|^2 + |\lambda_2|^2$ can be measured by establishing $Br(e\nu): Br(\mu\nu) : Br(\tau\nu)$ or $Br(\nu e^\pm \tau^\mp ): Br(\nu\mu^\pm\tau^\mp) : Br(\nu\tau^\pm\tau^\mp)$, respectively. The information on the couplings $\lambda'_i$ can be drawn by measuring $Br(l_i t \bar{b}) \propto |\lambda'_i|^2$ if the neutralino LSP is heavier than the top quark.Comment: RevTex, 25 pages, 8 eps figure

Creating the cultures of the future: cultural strategy, policy and institutions in Gramsci. Part two: Cultural strategy and institutions in Gramsci’s early writings and political practice

In this article, I consider Gramsci’s pre-prison writings and political practice in relation to questions of cultural strategy and institutions. I argue that the analysis of these early texts, which were written in the years in which Gramsci was active in party organisation and leadership, is fundamental not only for understanding the nature of Gramsci’s early and continued involvement with questions of cultural strategy and institutions, but also as a key for interpreting cultural policy themes that he later developed in the prison notebooks, and which originated in earlier debates

Non-linear doublon production in a Mott insulator --- Landau-Dykhne method applied to an integrable model

Doublon-hole pair production which takes place during dielectric breakdown in a Mott insulator subject to a strong laser or a static electric field is studied in the one-dimensional Hubbard model. Two nonlinear effects cause the excitation, i.e., multi-photon absorption and quantum tunneling. Keldysh crossover between the two mechanisms occurs as the field strength and photon energy is changed. The calculation is done analytically by the Landau-Dykhne method in combination with the Bethe ansatz solution and the results are compared with those of the time dependent density matrix renormalization group. Using this method, we calculate distribution function of the generated doublon-hole pairs and show that it drastically changes as we cross the Keldysh crossover line. After calculating the tunneling threshold for several representative one-dimensional Mott insulators, possible experimental tests of the theory is proposed such as angle resolved photoemission spectroscopy of the upper Hubbard band in the quantum tunneling regime. We also discuss the relation of the present theory with a many-body extension of electron-positron pair production in nonlinear quantum electrodynamics known as the Schwinger mechanism.Comment: 15 page

Decision theory in the study of national action: problems and a proposal

Peer Reviewedhttp://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/66743/2/10.1177_002200276500900202.pd

From weak-scale observables to leptogenesis

Thermal leptogenesis is an attractive mechanism for generating the baryon asymmetry of the Universe. However, in supersymmetric models, the parameter space is severely restricted by the gravitino bound on the reheat temperature $T_{RH}$. For hierarchical light neutrino masses, it is shown that thermal leptogenesis {\it can} work when $T_{RH} \sim 10^{9}$ GeV. The low-energy observable consequences of this scenario are $BR(\tau \to \ell \gamma) \sim 10^{-8} - 10^{-9}$. For higher $T_{RH}$, thermal leptogenesis works in a larger area of parameter space, whose observable consequences are more ambiguous. A parametrisation of the seesaw in terms of weak-scale inputs is used, so the results are independent of the texture chosen for the GUT-scale Yukawa matrices.Comment: a few references adde

Supersymmetry without R-parity : Constraints from Leptonic Phenomenology

R-parity conservation is an {\it ad hoc} assumption in the most popular version of the supersymmetric standard model. Most studies of models which do allow for R-parity violation have been restricted to various limiting scenarios. The single-VEV parametrization used in this paper provides a workable framework to analyze phenomenology of the most general theory of SUSY without R-parity. We perform a comprehensive study of leptonic phenomenology at tree-level. Experimental constraints on various processes are studied individually and then combined to yield regions of admissible parameter space. In particular, we show that large R-parity violating bilinear couplings are not ruled out, especially for large $\tan\beta$.Comment: 56 pages Revtex with figures incorporated; typos (including transcription typo in Table II) and minor corrections; proof-read version, to appear in Phys. Rev.