19,363 research outputs found
The interpretation of brain natriuretic peptide in critical care patients; will it ever be useful?
The measurement of B-type natriuretic peptide (BNP) is recommended for the diagnosis of decompensated heart failure, the prognosis of chronic heart failure is worse if BNP is increased and studies suggest that BNP is useful to guide therapy. A study by Di Somma and colleagues adds to the body of evidence showing that patients with a marked decrease in BNP concentrations during their hospital admission are less likely to be readmitted with a further adverse cardiac event than patients in whom BNP fails to decrease. However, the wider interpretation of BNP concentrations in critically ill patients with other conditions remains uncertain
Maxillary nerve blocks in horses: an experimental comparison of surface landmark and ultrasound-guided techniques
Classical String in Curved Backgrounds
The Mathisson-Papapetrou method is originally used for derivation of the
particle world line equation from the covariant conservation of its
stress-energy tensor. We generalize this method to extended objects, such as a
string. Without specifying the type of matter the string is made of, we obtain
both the equations of motion and boundary conditions of the string. The world
sheet equations turn out to be more general than the familiar minimal surface
equations. In particular, they depend on the internal structure of the string.
The relevant cases are classified by examining canonical forms of the effective
2-dimensional stress-energy tensor. The case of homogeneously distributed
matter with the tension that equals its mass density is shown to define the
familiar Nambu-Goto dynamics. The other three cases include physically relevant
massive and massless strings, and unphysical tahyonic strings.Comment: 12 pages, REVTeX 4. Added a note and one referenc
Atmospheric effects on remote sensing of non-uniform temperature sources
The equations of transfer, for a plane-parallel scattering atmosphere with a point source of energy on the lower bounding surface, were solved for various values of sensor/point source orientation and optical depths. Applications of this analysis to Skylab and ERTS mission are discussed, and requirements for atmospheric property data and radiation transfer properties are considered
Canadian national sport organisations’ use of the web for relationship marketing in promoting sport participation
Sport participation development requires a systematic process which involves knowledge creation, dissemination and interactions between National Sport Organisations, participants, clubs and associations as well as other agencies. Using a relationship marketing approach (Grönroos, 1997, Gummesson, 2002, Olkkonen, 1999), this paper addressed the question ‘How do Canadian NSOs use the Web, in terms of functionality and services offered, to create and maintain relationships with sport participants and their sport delivery partners?’ Ten Canadian NSOs’ websites were examined: functionality was analysed using Burgess and Cooper’s (2000) eMICA model, while NSOs’ utilisation of the Internet to establish and maintain relationships with sport participants was analysed using Wang, Head and Archer’s (2000) relationship-building process model for the Web. It was found that Canadian NSOs were receptive to the use of the Web, but their information-gathering and dissemination activities, which make-up the relationship-building process, appear sparse, and in some cases are lagging behind the voluntary sector in the country
Speckle-visibility spectroscopy: A tool to study time-varying dynamics
We describe a multispeckle dynamic light scattering technique capable of
resolving the motion of scattering sites in cases that this motion changes
systematically with time. The method is based on the visibility of the speckle
pattern formed by the scattered light as detected by a single exposure of a
digital camera. Whereas previous multispeckle methods rely on correlations
between images, here the connection with scattering site dynamics is made more
simply in terms of the variance of intensity among the pixels of the camera for
the specified exposure duration. The essence is that the speckle pattern is
more visible, i.e. the variance of detected intensity levels is greater, when
the dynamics of the scattering site motion is slow compared to the exposure
time of the camera. The theory for analyzing the moments of the spatial
intensity distribution in terms of the electric field autocorrelation is
presented. It is demonstrated for two well-understood samples, a colloidal
suspension of Brownian particles and a coarsening foam, where the dynamics can
be treated as stationary. However, the method is particularly appropriate for
samples in which the dynamics vary with time, either slowly or rapidly, limited
only by the exposure time fidelity of the camera. Potential applications range
from soft-glassy materials, to granular avalanches, to flowmetry of living
tissue.Comment: review - theory and experimen
Metastasis of a transplantable mammary tumour in rats treated with cyclophosphamide and/or irradiation.
We report observations on the spread by metastasis and infiltration of a transplantable tumour in rats treated by 60Co gamma-irradiation of the primary, irradiation plus parenteral cyclophosphamide, or parenteral cyclophosphamide alone. The proportion of animals with overt disseminated disease and the extent of spread were measured with respect to the time elapsed after implantation and treatment of the primary tumour. The incidence of metastatic disease was broadly similar for all treatment groups, but the extent of dissemination was greater in rats whose treatment included cyclophosphamide
Closed String Tachyons on C/Z_N
We analyse the condensation of closed string tachyons on the
orbifold. We construct the potential for the tachyons upto the quartic
interaction term in the large limit. In this limit there are near marginal
tachyons. The quartic coupling for these tachyons is calculated by subtracting
from the string theory amplitude for the tachyons, the contributions from the
massless exchanges, computed from the effective field theory. We argue that
higher point interaction terms are are also of the same order in 1/N as the
quartic term and are necessary for existence of the minimum of the tachyon
potential that is consistent with earlier analysis.Comment: 19 pages, 1 figure; comments added about dependence of contact
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