269 research outputs found
Channeling Effect and Improvement of the Efficiency of Charged Particle Registration with Crystal Scintillators
The importance is emphasized of taking into account the channeling along the
low index crystallographic axes and planes of a part of low-energy (1-10 keV)
recoil ions in measurements of their parameters with crystal scintillators of
the type of NaI(Tl) etc. Because the nucleus stopping power in channels is low
as compared with electronic stopping power, the light yield of the scintillator
must be, accordingly, higher in the given case than that for ions having higher
energy (tens keV and more), which lose most part of their energy via nuclear
collisions outside channels. Hence, in particular, it follows that the DAMA/NaI
observations in Gran Sasso of the annual modulation of the signal frequency in
a narrow range of scintillations with an amplitude of 2-6 keV electron
equivalent may be due to incidence onto the Earth of exceedingly massive
particles (of the type of Planckian objects) from elongated Earth-crossing
heliocentric orbits at a velocity of 30-50 km/s. In NaI(Tl), these particles
create the iodine recoil ions with just the energy of 2-6 keV.Comment: 10 page
Simulation of phosphorus implantation into silicon with a single-parameter electronic stopping power model
We simulate dopant profiles for phosphorus implantation into silicon using a
new model for electronic stopping power. In this model, the electronic stopping
power is factorized into a globally averaged effective charge Z1*, and a local
charge density dependent electronic stopping power for a proton. There is only
a single adjustable parameter in the model, namely the one electron radius rs0
which controls Z1*. By fine tuning this parameter, we obtain excellent
agreement between simulated dopant profiles and the SIMS data over a wide range
of energies for the channeling case. Our work provides a further example of
implant species, in addition to boron and arsenic, to verify the validity of
the electronic stopping power model and to illustrate its generality for
studies of physical processes involving electronic stopping.Comment: 11 pages, 7 figures. See http://bifrost.lanl.gov/~reed
Influence of Collision Cascade Statistics on Pattern Formation of Ion-Sputtered Surfaces
Theoretical continuum models that describe the formation of patterns on
surfaces of targets undergoing ion-beam sputtering, are based on Sigmund's
formula, which describes the spatial distribution of the energy deposited by
the ion. For small angles of incidence and amorphous or polycrystalline
materials, this description seems to be suitable, and leads to the classic BH
morphological theory [R.M. Bradley and J.M.E. Harper, J. Vac. Sci. Technol. A
6, 2390 (1988)]. Here we study the sputtering of Cu crystals by means of
numerical simulations under the binary-collision approximation. We observe
significant deviations from Sigmund's energy distribution. In particular, the
distribution that best fits our simulations has a minimum near the position
where the ion penetrates the surface, and the decay of energy deposition with
distance to ion trajectory is exponential rather than Gaussian. We provide a
modified continuum theory which takes these effects into account and explores
the implications of the modified energy distribution for the surface
morphology. In marked contrast with BH's theory, the dependence of the
sputtering yield with the angle of incidence is non-monotonous, with a maximum
for non-grazing incidence angles.Comment: 12 pages, 13 figures, RevTe
Charge gap in the one--dimensional dimerized Hubbard model at quarter-filling
We propose a quantitative estimate of the charge gap that opens in the
one-dimensional dimerized Hubbard model at quarter-filling due to dimerization,
which makes the system effectively half--filled, and to repulsion, which
induces umklapp scattering processes. Our estimate is expected to be valid for
any value of the repulsion and of the parameter describing the dimerization. It
is based on analytical results obtained in various limits (weak coupling,
strong coupling, large dimerization) and on numerical results obtained by exact
diagonalization of small clusters. We consider two models of dimerization:
alternating hopping integrals and alternating on--site energies. The former
should be appropriate for the Bechgaard salts, the latter for compounds where
the stacks are made of alternating and molecules. % and ( denotes , , ...).Comment: 33 pages, RevTeX 3.0, figures on reques
Urine Fetuin-A is a biomarker of autosomal dominant polycystic kidney disease progression.
BACKGROUND: Autosomal dominant polycystic kidney disease (ADPKD) is a genetic disorder characterized by numerous fluid-filled cysts that frequently result in end-stage renal disease. While promising treatment options are in advanced clinical development, early diagnosis and follow-up remain a major challenge. We therefore evaluated the diagnostic value of Fetuin-A as a new biomarker of ADPKD in human urine.
RESULTS: We found that renal Fetuin-A levels are upregulated in both Pkd1 and Bicc1 mouse models of ADPKD. Measurement by ELISA revealed that urinary Fetuin-A levels were significantly higher in 66 ADPKD patients (17.5 ± 12.5 μg/mmol creatinine) compared to 17 healthy volunteers (8.5 ± 3.8 μg/mmol creatinine) or 50 control patients with renal diseases of other causes (6.2 ± 2.9 μg/mmol creatinine). Receiver operating characteristics (ROC) analysis of urinary Fetuin-A levels for ADPKD rendered an optimum cut-off value of 12.2 μg/mmol creatinine, corresponding to 94% of sensitivity and 60% of specificity (area under the curve 0.74 ; p = 0.0019). Furthermore, urinary Fetuin-A levels in ADPKD patients correlated with the degree of renal insufficiency and showed a significant increase in patients with preserved renal function followed for two years.
CONCLUSIONS: Our findings establish urinary Fetuin-A as a sensitive biomarker of the progression of ADPKD. Further studies are required to examine the pathogenic mechanisms of elevated renal and urinary Fetuin-A in ADPKD
Absolute instruments and perfect imaging in geometrical optics
We investigate imaging by spherically symmetric absolute instruments that
provide perfect imaging in the sense of geometrical optics. We derive a number
of properties of such devices, present a general method for designing them and
use this method to propose several new absolute instruments, in particular a
lens providing a stigmatic image of an optically homogeneous region and having
a moderate refractive index range.Comment: 20 pages, 9 image
Non-equilibrium polaron hopping transport through DNA
We study the electronic transport through short DNA chains with various
sequences of base pairs between voltage-biased leads. The strong coupling of
the charge carriers to local vibrations of the base pairs leads to the
formation of polarons, and in the relevant temperature range the transport is
accomplished by sequential polaron hopping. We calculate the rates for these
processes, extending what is known as the -theory of single-electron
tunneling to the situation with site-specific local oscillators. The
non-equilibrium charge rearrangement along the DNA leads to sequence-dependent
current thresholds of the `semi-conducting' current-voltage characteristics
and, except for symmetric sequences, to rectifying behavior. The current is
thermally activated with activation energy approaching for voltages above the
threshold the bulk value (polaron shift or reorganization energy). Our results
are consistent with some recent experiments.Comment: 8 pages, 5 figures, submitted to PRB, References adde
An Efficient Molecular Dynamics Scheme for the Calculation of Dopant Profiles due to Ion Implantation
We present a highly efficient molecular dynamics scheme for calculating the
concentration depth profile of dopants in ion irradiated materials. The scheme
incorporates several methods for reducing the computational overhead, plus a
rare event algorithm that allows statistically reliable results to be obtained
over a range of several orders of magnitude in the dopant concentration.
We give examples of using this scheme for calculating concentration profiles
of dopants in crystalline silicon. Here we can predict the experimental profile
over five orders of magnitude for both channeling and non-channeling implants
at energies up to 100s of keV.
The scheme has advantages over binary collision approximation (BCA)
simulations, in that it does not rely on a large set of empirically fitted
parameters. Although our scheme has a greater computational overhead than the
BCA, it is far superior in the low ion energy regime, where the BCA scheme
becomes invalid.Comment: 17 pages, 21 figures, 2 tables. See: http://bifrost.lanl.gov/~reed
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