Relations among neutrino observables in the light of a large theta_13 angle

The recent T2K and MINOS indications for a "large" theta_13 neutrino mixing angle can be accommodated in principle by an infinite number of Yukawa flavour structures in the seesaw model. Without considering any explicit flavour symmetry, there is an instructive exercise one can do: to determine the simplest flavour structures which can account for the data with a minimum number of parameters, simply assuming these parameters to be uncorrelated. This approach points towards a limited number of simple structures which show the minimum complexity a neutrino mass model must generally involve to account for the data. These basic structures essentially lead to only 4 relations between the neutrino observables. We emphasize that 2 of these relations, |sin theta_13|=(tan theta_23/cos delta)*(1-tan theta_12)/(1+tan theta_12) and |sin theta_13| = sin theta_12 R^1/4, with R= Delta m^2_21/Delta m^2_32, have several distinctive properties. First, they hold not only with a minimum number of parameters, but also for complete classes of more general models. Second, any value of theta_13 within the T2K and MINOS ranges can be obtained from these relations by taking into account small perturbations. Third, they turn out to be the pivot relations of models with approximate conservation of lepton number, which allow the seesaw interactions to induce observable flavour violating processes, such as mu -> e gamma and tau -> mu gamma. Finally, in specific cases of this kind, these structures have the rather unique property to allow a full reconstruction of the seesaw Lagrangian from low energy data.Comment: 13 pages, 3 figure

The Hydration Structure at Yttria-Stabilized Cubic Zirconia (110)-Water Interface with Sub-Angstrom Resolution

The interfacial hydration structure of yttria-stabilized cubic zirconia (110) surface in contact with water was determined with ~0.5 Å resolution by high-resolution X-ray reflectivity measurement. The terminal layer shows a reduced electron density compared to the following substrate lattice layers, which indicates there are additional defects generated by metal depletion as well as intrinsic oxygen vacancies, both of which are apparently filled by water species. Above this top surface layer, two additional adsorbed layers are observed forming a characteristic interfacial hydration structure. The first adsorbed layer shows abnormally high density as pure water and likely includes metal species, whereas the second layer consists of pure water. The observed interfacial hydration structure seems responsible for local equilibration of the defective surface in water and eventually regulating the long-term degradation processes. The multitude of water interactions with the zirconia surface results in the complex but highly ordered interfacial structure constituting the reaction front.ope

The sudden change phenomenon of quantum discord

Even if the parameters determining a system's state are varied smoothly, the behavior of quantum correlations alike to quantum discord, and of its classical counterparts, can be very peculiar, with the appearance of non-analyticities in its rate of change. Here we review this sudden change phenomenon (SCP) discussing some important points related to it: Its uncovering, interpretations, and experimental verifications, its use in the context of the emergence of the pointer basis in a quantum measurement process, its appearance and universality under Markovian and non-Markovian dynamics, its theoretical and experimental investigation in some other physical scenarios, and the related phenomenon of double sudden change of trace distance discord. Several open questions are identified, and we envisage that in answering them we will gain significant further insight about the relation between the SCP and the symmetry-geometric aspects of the quantum state space.Comment: Lectures on General Quantum Correlations and their Applications, F. F. Fanchini, D. O. Soares Pinto, and G. Adesso (Eds.), Springer (2017), pp 309-33

Tracking the Evolution of HIV/AIDS in China from 1989–2009 to Inform Future Prevention and Control Efforts

BACKGROUND: To determine policy implications, this analysis tracks the evolution of HIV/AIDS infection across China to understand current trends and potential risk factors. METHODS AND PRINCIPAL FINDINGS: A retrospective study with spatial analytical model and multilevel spatial models was conducted among 326,157 HIV/AIDS cases reported from 1989-2009. The results indicate that the distribution of HIV/AIDS was clustered at the county level with different directional distributions across China from 2003 to 2009. Compared to 2003, by 2009 there was a 122% increase in HIV cases among rural residents, 294% increase among urban residents, 211% increase among migrants, and 237% increase among permanent residents. The overall proportion of HIV by different routes of transmission showed dramatic changes with a 504% increase in sexual transmission of HIV, 90% decrease in blood/plasma transmission, and 35% decrease in injecting drug user transmission. Sexual transmission was the major transmission route among women (44%) and the elderly (59% in men, 44% in women) as well as among permanent (36%) and urban residents (33%). Among those <65 years old, women increased more than men, but among those ≥ 65 years, men increased more than women. Migrants contributed to the variance of HIV infection between counties but not within counties. The length of highway and urbanization combined with illiteracy were risk factors for HIV/AIDS. CONCLUSIONS/SIGNIFICANCE: Rates of HIV/AIDS among permanent urban residents, particularly women and elderly men, have increased significantly in recent years. To prevent HIV from spreading further among the general population, additional attention should be paid to these populations as well as to migrants

A New Euler's Formula for DNA Polyhedra

DNA polyhedra are cage-like architectures based on interlocked and interlinked DNA strands. We propose a formula which unites the basic features of these entangled structures. It is based on the transformation of the DNA polyhedral links into Seifert surfaces, which removes all knots. The numbers of components , of crossings , and of Seifert circles are related by a simple and elegant formula: . This formula connects the topological aspects of the DNA cage to the Euler characteristic of the underlying polyhedron. It implies that Seifert circles can be used as effective topological indices to describe polyhedral links. Our study demonstrates that, the new Euler's formula provides a theoretical framework for the stereo-chemistry of DNA polyhedra, which can characterize enzymatic transformations of DNA and be used to characterize and design novel cages with higher genus

Genomic structure and insertion sites of Helicobacter pylori prophages from various geographical origins

We present the full genomic sequences, insertion sites and phylogenetic analysis of 28 prophages found in H. pylori isolates from patients of distinct disease types, ranging from gastritis to gastric cancer, and geographic origins, covering most continents. The gentic diversity of H pylori is known to be influenced by these genomic elements including prophages who’s geneomes range from 22.6 to 33.0 Kbp. There was a high conservation of integration site shared in over 50% of cases with greater than 40% or prophage genomes harbouring insertion sequences (IS). Furthermore prophage genomes present a robust phylogeographic pattern, revealing four distinct clusters: one African, one Asian and two European prophage populations. There was evidence of recombination within the genome of some prophages, which resulted in genome mosaics composed by different populations, which may yield additional H. pylori phenotypes

Spatial and Temporal Dynamics of Attentional Guidance during Inefficient Visual Search

Spotting a prey or a predator is crucial in the natural environment and relies on the ability to extract quickly pertinent visual information. The experimental counterpart of this behavior is visual search (VS) where subjects have to identify a target amongst several distractors. In difficult VS tasks, it has been found that the reaction time (RT) is influenced by salience factors, such as the target-distractor similarity, and this finding is usually regarded as evidence for a guidance of attention by preattentive mechanisms. However, the use of RT measurements, a parameter which depends on multiple factors, allows only very indirect inferences about the underlying attentional mechanisms. The purpose of the present study was to determine the influence of salience factors on attentional guidance during VS, by measuring directly attentional allocation. We studied attention allocation by using a dual covert VS task in subjects who had 1) to detect a target amongst different items and 2) to report letters briefly flashed inside those items at different delays. As predicted, we showed that parallel processes guide attention towards the most relevant item by virtue of both goal-directed and stimulus-driven factors, and we demonstrated that this attentional selection is a prerequisite for target detection. In addition, we show that when the target is characterized by two features (conjunction VS), the goal-directed effects of both features are initially combined into a unique salience value, but at a later stage, grouping phenomena interact with the salience computation, and lead to the selection of a whole group of items. These results, in line with Guided Search Theory, show that efficient and rapid preattentive processes guide attention towards the most salient item, allowing to reduce the number of attentional shifts needed to find the target

Dynamic probe selection for studying microbial transcriptome with high-density genomic tiling microarrays

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>Current commercial high-density oligonucleotide microarrays can hold millions of probe spots on a single microscopic glass slide and are ideal for studying the transcriptome of microbial genomes using a tiling probe design. This paper describes a comprehensive computational pipeline implemented specifically for designing tiling probe sets to study microbial transcriptome profiles.</p> <p>Results</p> <p>The pipeline identifies every possible probe sequence from both forward and reverse-complement strands of all DNA sequences in the target genome including circular or linear chromosomes and plasmids. Final probe sequence lengths are adjusted based on the maximal oligonucleotide synthesis cycles and best isothermality allowed. Optimal probes are then selected in two stages - sequential and gap-filling. In the sequential stage, probes are selected from sequence windows tiled alongside the genome. In the gap-filling stage, additional probes are selected from the largest gaps between adjacent probes that have already been selected, until a predefined number of probes is reached. Selection of the highest quality probe within each window and gap is based on five criteria: sequence uniqueness, probe self-annealing, melting temperature, oligonucleotide length, and probe position.</p> <p>Conclusions</p> <p>The probe selection pipeline evaluates global and local probe sequence properties and selects a set of probes dynamically and evenly distributed along the target genome. Unique to other similar methods, an exact number of non-redundant probes can be designed to utilize all the available probe spots on any chosen microarray platform. The pipeline can be applied to microbial genomes when designing high-density tiling arrays for comparative genomics, ChIP chip, gene expression and comprehensive transcriptome studies.</p

Search for CP violation in D+→ϕπ+ and D+s→K0Sπ+ decays

A search for CP violation in D + → ϕπ + decays is performed using data collected in 2011 by the LHCb experiment corresponding to an integrated luminosity of 1.0 fb−1 at a centre of mass energy of 7 TeV. The CP -violating asymmetry is measured to be (−0.04 ± 0.14 ± 0.14)% for candidates with K − K + mass within 20 MeV/c 2 of the ϕ meson mass. A search for a CP -violating asymmetry that varies across the ϕ mass region of the D + → K − K + π + Dalitz plot is also performed, and no evidence for CP violation is found. In addition, the CP asymmetry in the D+s→K0Sπ+ decay is measured to be (0.61 ± 0.83 ± 0.14)%