380 research outputs found
Testing the limits of particle acceleration in cygnus OB2 with HAWC
Star forming regions (SFRs) have been postulated as possible sources of cosmic rays (CRs) in our galaxy. One example of a gamma-ray source associated with an SFR is the Fermi-LAT cocoon, an extended region of gamma-ray emission in the Cygnus X region and attributed to a possible superbubble with freshly accelerated CRs. Because the emission region is surrounded by ionization fronts, it has been named the Cygnus cocoon. CRs in the cocoon could have originated in the OB2 association and been accelerated at the interaction sites of stellar winds of massive O type stars. So far, there is no clear association at TeV energies. Spectral and morphological studies of TeV gamma-ray emission detected by the High Altitude Water Cherenkov (HAWC) observatory at the 2HWC J2031+415 region reveal that the spectral energy distribution of the cocoon extends from GeV to at least tens of TeV. Using HAWC data, we are able to study the acceleration of particles to highest energies in the Cygnus OB2 SFR
Towards new background independent representations for Loop Quantum Gravity
Recently, uniqueness theorems were constructed for the representation used in
Loop Quantum Gravity. We explore the existence of alternate representations by
weakening the assumptions of the so called LOST uniqueness theorem. The
weakened assumptions seem physically reasonable and retain the key requirement
of explicit background independence. For simplicity, we restrict attention to
the case of gauge group U(1).Comment: 22 pages, minor change
Representations of the Weyl Algebra in Quantum Geometry
The Weyl algebra A of continuous functions and exponentiated fluxes,
introduced by Ashtekar, Lewandowski and others, in quantum geometry is studied.
It is shown that, in the piecewise analytic category, every regular
representation of A having a cyclic and diffeomorphism invariant vector, is
already unitarily equivalent to the fundamental representation. Additional
assumptions concern the dimension of the underlying analytic manifold (at least
three), the finite wide triangulizability of surfaces in it to be used for the
fluxes and the naturality of the action of diffeomorphisms -- but neither any
domain properties of the represented Weyl operators nor the requirement that
the diffeomorphisms act by pull-backs. For this, the general behaviour of
C*-algebras generated by continuous functions and pull-backs of homeomorphisms,
as well as the properties of stratified analytic diffeomorphisms are studied.
Additionally, the paper includes also a short and direct proof of the
irreducibility of A.Comment: 71 pages, 1 figure, LaTeX. Changes v2 to v3: previous results
unchanged; some addings: inclusion of gauge transforms, several comments,
Subsects. 1.5, 3.7, 3.8; comparison with LOST paper moved to Introduction;
Def. 2.5 modified; some typos corrected; Refs. updated. Article now as
accepted by Commun. Math. Phy
BET bromodomain protein inhibition is a therapeutic option for medulloblastoma
Medulloblastoma is the most common malignant brain tumor of childhood, and represents a significant clinical challenge in pediatric oncology, since overall survival currently remains under 70%. Patients with tumors overexpressing MYC or harboring a MYC oncogene amplification have an extremely poor prognosis. Pharmacologically inhibiting MYC expression may, thus, have clinical utility given its pathogenetic role in medulloblastoma. Recent studies using the selective small molecule BET inhibitor, JQ1, have identified BET bromodomain proteins, especially BRD4, as epigenetic regulatory factors for MYC and its targets. Targeting MYC expression by BET inhibition resulted in antitumoral effects in various cancers. Our aim here was to evaluate the efficacy of JQ1 against preclinical models for high-risk MYC-driven medulloblastoma. Treatment of medulloblastoma cell lines with JQ1 significantly reduced cell proliferation and preferentially induced apoptosis in cells expressing high levels of MYC. JQ1 treatment of medulloblastoma cell lines downregulated MYC expression and resulted in a transcriptional deregulation of MYC targets, and also significantly altered expression of genes involved in cell cycle progression and p53 signalling. JQ1 treatment prolonged the survival of mice harboring medulloblastoma xenografts and reduced the tumor burden in these mice. Our preclinical data provide evidence to pursue testing BET inhibitors, such as JQ1, as molecular targeted therapeutic options for patients with high-risk medulloblastomas overexpressing MYC or harboring MYC amplifications
Developing the future of gamma-ray astrophysics with monolithic silicon pixels
This paper explores the potential of AstroPix, a project to develop Complementary Metal Oxide Semiconductor (CMOS) pixels for the next generation of space-based high-energy astrophysics experiments. Multimessenger astrophysics is a rapidly developing field whose upcoming missions need support from new detector technology such as AstroPix. ATLASPix, a monolithic silicon detector optimized for the ATLAS particle detector at CERN, is the beginning of the larger AstroPix project. Energy resolution is a driving parameter in the reconstruction of gamma-ray events, and therefore the characterization of ATLASPix energy resolution is the focus of this paper. The intrinsic energy resolution of the detector exceeded our baseline requirements of <10% at 60 keV. The digital output of ATLASPix results in energy resolutions insufficient to advance gamma-ray astronomy. However, the results from the intrinsic energy resolution indicate the digital capability of the detector can be redesigned, and the next generation of pixels for the larger AstroPix project have already been constructed. Iterations of AstroPix-type pixels are an exciting new technology candidate to support new space-based missions
Background independent quantizations: the scalar field I
We are concerned with the issue of quantization of a scalar field in a
diffeomorphism invariant manner. We apply the method used in Loop Quantum
Gravity. It relies on the specific choice of scalar field variables referred to
as the polymer variables. The quantization, in our formulation, amounts to
introducing the `quantum' polymer *-star algebra and looking for positive
linear functionals, called states. The assumed in our paper homeomorphism
invariance allows to determine a complete class of the states. Except one, all
of them are new. In this letter we outline the main steps and conclusions, and
present the results: the GNS representations, characterization of those states
which lead to essentially self adjoint momentum operators (unbounded),
identification of the equivalence classes of the representations as well as of
the irreducible ones. The algebra and topology of the problem, the derivation,
all the technical details and more are contained in the paper-part II.Comment: 13 pages, minor corrections were made in the revised versio
Searching for dark matter sub-structure with HAWC
Numerical simulations show that the dark matter halos surrounding galaxies are expected to contain many over-densities or sub-halos. The most massive of these sub-halos can be optically observed in the form of dwarf galaxies. However, most lower mass sub-halos are predicted to exist as dark dwarf galaxies: sub-halos like dwarf galaxies with no luminous counterpart. It may be possible to detect these unseen sub-halos from gamma-ray signals originating from dark matter annihilation. The High Altitude Water Cherenkov Observatory (HAWC) is a very high energy (500 GeV to \u3e100 TeV) gamma ray detector with a wide field-of-view and near continuous duty cycle, making HAWC ideal for unbiased sky surveys. We perform a search for gamma ray signals from dark dwarfs in the Milky Way halo with HAWC. We perform a targeted search of HAWC gamma-ray sources which have no known association with lower-energy counterparts, based on an unbiased survey of the entire sky. With no sources found to strongly prefer dark matter models, we calculate the ability of HAWC to observe dark dwarfs. We also compute the HAWC sensitivity to potential future detections for a given model of dark matter substructure. Assuming thermal dark matter, we find the corresponding J-factor of a dark dwarf required to reach the HAWC detection criterion is 5.79× 1020 GeV2 cm−5 sr for one particular set of dark matter assumptions. HAWC is found to be able to competitively constrain dark matter annihilation from discovered halos with J-factors on the scale of 1019 GeV2 cm−5 sr or greater, with better constraints obtained on dark matter models with \u3e10 TeV masses and sources that transit overhead
Background independent quantizations: the scalar field II
We are concerned with the issue of quantization of a scalar field in a
diffeomorphism invariant manner. We apply the method used in Loop Quantum
Gravity. It relies on the specific choice of scalar field variables referred to
as the polymer variables. The quantization, in our formulation, amounts to
introducing the `quantum' polymer *-star algebra and looking for positive
linear functionals, called states. Assumed in our paper homeomorphism
invariance allows to derive the complete class of the states. They are
determined by the homeomorphism invariant states defined on the CW-complex
*-algebra. The corresponding GNS representations of the polymer *-algebra and
their self-adjoint extensions are derived, the equivalence classes are found
and invariant subspaces characterized. In the preceding letter (the part I) we
outlined those results. Here, we present the technical details.Comment: 51 pages, LaTeX, no figures, revised versio
The Early Universe in Loop Quantum Cosmology
Loop quantum cosmology applies techniques derived for a background
independent quantization of general relativity to cosmological situations and
draws conclusions for the very early universe. Direct implications for the
singularity problem as well as phenomenology in the context of inflation or
bouncing universes result, which will be reviewed here. The discussion focuses
on recent new results for structure formation and generalizations of the
methods.Comment: 10 pages, 3 figures, plenary talk at VI Mexican School on Gravitation
and Mathematical Physics, Nov 21-27, 200
Quantum Spin Dynamics VIII. The Master Constraint
Recently the Master Constraint Programme (MCP) for Loop Quantum Gravity (LQG)
was launched which replaces the infinite number of Hamiltonian constraints by a
single Master constraint. The MCP is designed to overcome the complications
associated with the non -- Lie -- algebra structure of the Dirac algebra of
Hamiltonian constraints and was successfully tested in various field theory
models. For the case of 3+1 gravity itself, so far only a positive quadratic
form for the Master Constraint Operator was derived. In this paper we close
this gap and prove that the quadratic form is closable and thus stems from a
unique self -- adjoint Master Constraint Operator. The proof rests on a simple
feature of the general pattern according to which Hamiltonian constraints in
LQG are constructed and thus extends to arbitrary matter coupling and holds for
any metric signature. With this result the existence of a physical Hilbert
space for LQG is established by standard spectral analysis.Comment: 19p, no figure
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