2,282 research outputs found
Contrast-enhanced micro-CT imaging in murine carotid arteries : a new protocol for computing wall shear stress
Background: Wall shear stress (WSS) is involved in the pathophysiology of atherosclerosis. The correlation between WSS and atherosclerosis can be investigated over time using a WSS-manipulated atherosclerotic mouse model. To determine WSS in vivo, detailed 3D geometry of the vessel network is required. However, a protocol to reconstruct 3D murine vasculature using this animal model is lacking. In this project, we evaluated the adequacy of eXIA 160, a small animal contrast agent, for assessing murine vascular network on micro-CT. Also, a protocol was established for vessel geometry segmentation and WSS analysis. Methods: A tapering cast was placed around the right common carotid artery (RCCA) of ApoE(-/-) mice (n = 8). Contrast-enhanced micro-CT was performed using eXIA 160. An innovative local threshold-based segmentation procedure was implemented to reconstruct 3D geometry of the RCCA. The reconstructed RCCA was compared to the vessel geometry using a global threshold-based segmentation method. Computational fluid dynamics was applied to compute the velocity field and WSS distribution along the RCCA. Results: eXIA 160-enhanced micro-CT allowed clear visualization and assessment of the RCCA in all eight animals. No adverse biological effects were observed from the use of eXIA 160. Segmentation using local threshold values generated more accurate RCCA geometry than the global threshold-based approach. Mouse-specific velocity data and the RCCA geometry generated 3D WSS maps with high resolution, enabling quantitative analysis of WSS. In all animals, we observed low WSS upstream of the cast. Downstream of the cast, asymmetric WSS patterns were revealed with variation in size and location between animals. Conclusions: eXIA 160 provided good contrast to reconstruct 3D vessel geometry and determine WSS patterns in the RCCA of the atherosclerotic mouse model. We established a novel local threshold-based segmentation protocol for RCCA reconstruction and WSS computation. The observed differences between animals indicate the necessity to use mouse-specific data for WSS analysis. For our future work, our protocol makes it possible to study in vivo WSS longitudinally over a growing plaque
Wigner Trajectory Characteristics in Phase Space and Field Theory
Exact characteristic trajectories are specified for the time-propagating
Wigner phase-space distribution function. They are especially simple---indeed,
classical---for the quantized simple harmonic oscillator, which serves as the
underpinning of the field theoretic Wigner functional formulation introduced.
Scalar field theory is thus reformulated in terms of distributions in field
phase space. Applications to duality transformations in field theory are
discussed.Comment: 9 pages, LaTex2
Direct Detection of Electroweak-Interacting Dark Matter
Assuming that the lightest neutral component in an SU(2)L gauge multiplet is
the main ingredient of dark matter in the universe, we calculate the elastic
scattering cross section of the dark matter with nucleon, which is an important
quantity for the direct detection experiments. When the dark matter is a real
scalar or a Majorana fermion which has only electroweak gauge interactions, the
scattering with quarks and gluon are induced through one- and two-loop quantum
processes, respectively, and both of them give rise to comparable contributions
to the elastic scattering cross section. We evaluate all of the contributions
at the leading order and find that there is an accidental cancellation among
them. As a result, the spin-independent cross section is found to be
O(10^-(46-48)) cm^2, which is far below the current experimental bounds.Comment: 19 pages, 7 figures, published versio
The Phase Transition to a Square Vortex Lattice in Type-II Superconductors with Fourfold Anisotropy
We investigate the stability of the square vortex lattice which has been
recently observed in experiments on the borocarbide family of superconductors.
Taking into account the tetragonal symmetry of these systems, we add fourfold
symmetric fourth-derivative terms to the Ginzburg-Landau(GL) free energy. At
these terms may be treated perturbatively to lowest order to locate
the transition from a distorted hexagonal to a square vortex lattice. We also
solve for this phase boundary numerically in the strongly type-II limit,
finding large corrections to the lowest-order perturbative results. We
calculate the relative fourfold anisotropy for field in the plane
to be 4.5% at the temperature, , where the transition occurs at
for field along the axis. This is to be compared to the 3.6%
obtained in the perturbative calculation. Furthermore, we find that the phase
boundary in the phase diagram has positive slope near .Comment: 15 pages including 2 figures, LaTe
Effect of transport-induced charge inhomogeneity on point-contact Andreev reflection spectra at ferromagnet-superconductor interfaces
We investigate the transport properties of a ferromagnet-superconductor
interface within the framework of a modified three-dimensional
Blonder-Tinkham-Klapwijk formalism. In particular, we propose that charge
inhomogeneity forms via two unique transport mechanisms, namely, evanescent
Andreev reflection and evanescent quasiparticle transmission. Furthermore, we
take into account the influence of charge inhomogeneity on the interfacial
barrier potential and calculate the conductance as a function of bias voltage.
Point-contact Andreev reflection (PCAR) spectra often show dip structures,
large zero-bias conductance enhancement, and additional zero-bias conductance
peak. Our results indicate that transport-induced charge inhomogeneity could be
a source of all these anomalous characteristics of the PCAR spectra.Comment: 9 pages, 6 figure
A Path Integral Approach To Noncommutative Superspace
A path integral formula for the associative star-product of two superfields
is proposed. It is a generalization of the Kontsevich-Cattaneo-Felder's formula
for the star-product of functions of bosonic coordinates. The associativity of
the star-product imposes certain conditions on the background of our sigma
model. For generic background the action is not supersymmetric. The
supersymmetry invariance of the action constrains the background and leads to a
simple formula for the star-product.Comment: Latex 13 pages. v2: references and footnotes adde
Vortex lattice structure in a d_{x^2-y^2}-wave superconductor
The vortex lattice structure in a d_{x^2-y^2}-wave superconductor is
investigated near the upper critical magnetic field in the framework of the
Ginzburg Landau theory extended by including the correction terms such as the
higher order derivatives derived from the Gor'kov equation. On lowering
temperature, the unit cell shape of the vortex lattice gradually varies from a
regular triangular lattice to a square lattice through the shape of an
isosceles triangle. As for the orientation of the vortex lattice, the base of
an isosceles triangle is along the a axis or the b axis of the crystal. The
fourfold symmetric structure around a vortex core is also studied in the vortex
lattice case. It is noted that these characteristic features appear even in the
case the induced s-wave order parameter is absent around the vortex of the
d_{x^2-y^2}-wave superconductivity. We also investigate the effect of the
induced s-wave order parameter. It enhances (suppresses) these characteristic
features of the d_{x^2-y^2}-wave superconductor when the s-wave component of
the interaction is attractive (repulsive).Comment: 20 pages, RevTex, 9 figures in 3 PS-files and 5 GIF-file
Determination of the Coherence Length and the Cooper-Pair Size in Unconventional Superconductors by Tunnelling Spectroscopy
The main purpose of the paper is to discuss a possibility of the
determination of the values of the coherence length and the Cooper-pair size in
unconventional superconductors by using tunnelling spectroscopy. In the mixed
state of type-II superconductors, an applied magnetic field penetrates the
superconductor in the form of vortices which form a regular lattice. In
unconventional superconductors, the inner structure of a vortex core has a
complex structure which is determined by the order parameter of the
superconducting state and by the pairing wavefunction of the Cooper pairs. In
clean superconductors, the spatial variations of the order parameter and the
pairing wavefunction occur over the distances of the order of the coherence
length and the Cooper-pair size, respectively. Therefore, by performing
tunnelling spectroscopy along a line passing through a vortex core, one is
able, in principle, to estimate the values of the coherent length and the
Cooper-pair size.Comment: 13 pages, including 17 figure
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