13,191 research outputs found
Experiments in Magneto-Fluid-Mechanic Natural and Forced Heat Transfer from Horizontal Hot-Film Probes
Experiments investigating magneto-fluid-mechanic effects on the heat transfer of quartz-coated hot-film probes are described. A standard heat transfer-velocity calibration curve is obtained by traversing a probe, whose axis is aligned horizontally, in the presence of a magnetic field parallel to the probe\u27s axis. The working medium is mercury. Results indicate a significant reduction of the probe1s heat transfer in both the free and forced convection regimes
Vacuum-UV negative photoion spectroscopy of CF3Cl, CF3Br and CF3I
Using synchrotron radiation negative ions have been detected by mass spectrometry following vacuum-UV photoexcitation of trifluorochloromethane (CFCl), trifluorobromomethane (CFBr) and trifluoroiodomethane (CFI). The anions F, X, F, FX, CF, CF and CF were observed from all three molecules, where X = Cl, Br or I, and their ion yields recorded in the range 8-35 eV. With the exception of Br and I, the anions observed show a linear dependence of signal with pressure, showing that they arise from unimolecular ion-pair dissociation. Dissociative electron attachment, following photoionization of CFBr and CFI as the source of low-energy electrons, is shown to dominate the observed Br and I signals, respectively. Cross sections for ion-pair formation are put on to an absolute scale by calibrating the signal strengths with those of F from both SF and CF. These anion cross sections are normalized to vacuum-UV absorption cross sections, where available, and the resulting quantum yields are reported. Anion appearance energies are used to calculate upper limits to 298 K bond dissociation energies for (CF-X) which are consistent with literature values. We report new data for (CFI-F) ≤ 2.7 ± 0.2 eV and (CFI) ≤ (598 ± 22) kJ mol. No ion-pair formation is observed below the ionization energy of the parent molecule for CFCl and CFBr, and only weak signals (in both I and F) are detected for CFI. These observations suggest neutral photodissociation is the dominant exit channel to Rydberg state photoexcitation at these lower energies
Modulation of tumour colony growth by irradiated accessory cells.
The ability of human tumour cells to form colonies in soft agar is enhanced by the presence of autologous phagocytic/adherent cells. We investigated the effect of irradiation on the ability of the adherent cells to support human tumour colony formation. Relatively low doses of irradiation significantly increased the growth enhancing ability of adherent cells in 17/19 cases. The possibility that the enhancement was mediated by inactivation of radiosensitive contaminating lymphocytes was explored. Depletion of T lymphocytes from unirradiated adherent cells by a monoclonal antibody and complement resulted in little overall change in tumour colony growth. However, elimination of only the suppressor subset (OKT8+) of T lymphocytes resulted in increased colony growth relative to control values obtained with unirradiated adherent cells. In contrast, depletion of T lymphocytes from irradiated adherent cells by a pan T monoclonal antibody and complement decreased colony formation. Thus, the ability of irradiated macrophages to enhance tumour colony growth appeared to be mediated by a T lymphocyte. The effect of irradiation on isolated populations of macrophages and T lymphocytes was also examined. The enhanced ability of irradiated adherent cells to support tumor colony growth appeared to have been due to treatment of T lymphocytes alone. The results indicate that both adherent macrophages and lymphocytes may influence the growth of clonogenic human tumour cells
Increased expression of programmed death ligand 1 (PD-L1) in human pituitary tumors
PURPOSE: Subsets of pituitary tumors exhibit an aggressive clinical courses and recur despite surgery, radiation, and chemotherapy. Because modulation of the immune response through inhibition of T-cell checkpoints has led to durable clinical responses in multiple malignancies, we explored whether pituitary adenomas express immune-related biomarkers that could suggest suitability for immunotherapy. Specifically, programmed death ligand 1 (PD-L1) has emerged as a potential biomarker whose expression may portend more favorable responses to immune checkpoint blockade therapies. We thus investigated the expression of PD-L1 in pituitary adenomas. METHODS: PD-L1 RNA and protein expression were evaluated in 48 pituitary tumors, including functioning and non-functioning adenomas as well as atypical and recurrent tumors. Tumor infiltrating lymphocyte populations were also assessed by immunohistochemistry. RESULTS: Pituitary tumors express variable levels of PD-L1 transcript and protein. PD-L1 RNA and protein expression were significantly increased in functioning (growth hormone and prolactin-expressing) pituitary adenomas compared to non-functioning (null cell and silent gonadotroph) adenomas. Moreover, primary pituitary adenomas harbored higher levels of PD-L1 mRNA compared to recurrent tumors. Tumor infiltrating lymphocytes were observed in all pituitary tumors and were positively correlated with increased PD-L1 expression, particularly in the functional subtypes. CONCLUSIONS: Human pituitary adenomas harbor PD-L1 across subtypes, with significantly higher expression in functioning adenomas compared to non-functioning adenomas. This expression is accompanied by the presence of tumor infiltrating lymphocytes. These findings suggest the existence of an immune response to pituitary tumors and raise the possibility of considering checkpoint blockade immunotherapy in cases refractory to conventional management
Concepts of mental disorders in the United Kingdom : Similarities and differences between the lay public and psychiatrists
BACKGROUND: The lay public often conceptualise mental disorders in a different way to mental health professionals, and this can negatively impact on outcomes when in treatment. AIMS: This study explored which disorders the lay public are familiar with, which theoretical models they understand, which they endorse and how they compared to a sample of psychiatrists. METHODS: The Maudsley Attitude Questionnaire (MAQ), typically used to assess mental health professional's concepts of mental disorders, was adapted for use by a lay community sample (N = 160). The results were compared with a sample of psychiatrists (N = 76). RESULTS: The MAQ appeared to be accessible to the lay public, providing some interesting preliminary findings: in order, the lay sample reported having the best understanding of depression followed by generalised anxiety, schizophrenia and finally antisocial personality disorder. They best understood spiritualist, nihilist and social realist theoretical models of these disorders, but were most likely to endorse biological, behavioural and cognitive models. The lay public were significantly more likely to endorse some models for certain disorders suggesting a nuanced understanding of the cause and likely cure, of various disorders. Ratings often differed significantly from the sample of psychiatrists who were relatively steadfast in their endorsement of the biological model. CONCLUSION: The adapted MAQ appeared accessible to the lay sample. Results suggest that the lay public are generally aligned with evidence-driven concepts of common disorders, but may not always understand or agree with how mental health professionals conceptualise them. The possible causes of these differences, future avenues for research and the implications for more collaborative, patient-clinician conceptualisations are discussed.Peer reviewedFinal Accepted Versio
Complete curvature homogeneous pseudo-Riemannian manifolds
We exhibit 3 families of complete curvature homogeneous pseudo-Riemannian
manifolds which are modeled on irreducible symmetric spaces and which are not
locally homogeneous. All of the manifolds have nilpotent Jacobi operators; some
of the manifolds are, in addition, Jordan Osserman and Jordan Ivanov-Petrova.Comment: Update paper to fix misprints in original versio
Generalized Gluon Currents and Applications in QCD
We consider the process containing two quark lines and an arbitrary number of
gluons in a spinor helicity framework. A current with two off-shell gluons
appears in the amplitude. We first study this modified gluon current using
recursion relations. The recursion relation for the modified gluon current is
solved for the case of like-helicity gluons. We apply the modified gluon
current to compute the amplitude for in the like-helicity gluon case.Comment: 80 pages, 2 figures (appended in pictex), CLNS 91/112
Noise in laser speckle correlation and imaging techniques
We study the noise of the intensity variance and of the intensity correlation
and structure functions measured in light scattering from a random medium in
the case when these quantities are obtained by averaging over a finite number N
of pixels of a digital camera. We show that the noise scales as 1/N in all
cases and that it is sensitive to correlations of signals corresponding to
adjacent pixels as well as to the effective time averaging (due to the finite
sampling time) and spatial averaging (due to the finite pixel size). Our
results provide a guide to estimation of noise level in such applications as
the multi-speckle dynamic light scattering, time-resolved correlation
spectroscopy, speckle visibility spectroscopy, laser speckle imaging etc.Comment: submitted 14 May 201
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