1,536 research outputs found
Dynamics of Triangulations
We study a few problems related to Markov processes of flipping
triangulations of the sphere. We show that these processes are ergodic and
mixing, but find a natural example which does not satisfy detailed balance. In
this example, the expected distribution of the degrees of the nodes seems to
follow the power law
An Inversion Disrupting FAM134B Is Associated with Sensory Neuropathy in the Border Collie Dog Breed
Sensory neuropathy in the Border Collie is a severe neurological disorder caused by the degeneration of sensory and, to a lesser extent, motor nerve cells with clinical signs starting between 2 and 7 months of age. Using a genome-wide association study approach with three cases and 170 breed matched controls, a suggestive locus for sensory neuropathy was identified that was followed up using a genome sequencing approach. An inversion disrupting the candidate gene FAM134B was identified. Genotyping of additional cases and controls and RNAseq analysis provided strong evidence that the inversion is causal. Evidence of cryptic splicing resulting in novel exon transcription for FAM134B was identified by RNAseq experiments. This investigation demonstrates the identification of a novel sensory neuropathy associated mutation, by mapping using a minimal set of cases and subsequent genome sequencing. Through mutation screening, it should be possible to reduce the frequency of or completely eliminate this debilitating condition from the Border Collie breed population
Functional determinants for general Sturm-Liouville problems
Simple and analytically tractable expressions for functional determinants are
known to exist for many cases of interest. We extend the range of situations
for which these hold to cover systems of self-adjoint operators of the
Sturm-Liouville type with arbitrary linear boundary conditions. The results
hold whether or not the operators have negative eigenvalues. The physically
important case of functional determinants of operators with a zero mode, but
where that mode has been extracted, is studied in detail for the same range of
situations as when no zero mode exists. The method of proof uses the properties
of generalised zeta-functions. The general form of the final results are the
same for the entire range of problems considered.Comment: 28 pages, LaTe
Adsorption models of hybridization and post-hybridisation behaviour on oligonucleotide microarrays
Analysis of data from an Affymetrix Latin Square spike-in experiment
indicates that measured fluorescence intensities of features on an
oligonucleotide microarray are related to spike-in RNA target concentrations
via a hyperbolic response function, generally identified as a Langmuir
adsorption isotherm. Furthermore the asymptotic signal at high spike-in
concentrations is almost invariably lower for a mismatch feature than for its
partner perfect match feature. We survey a number of theoretical adsorption
models of hybridization at the microarray surface and find that in general they
are unable to explain the differing saturation responses of perfect and
mismatch features. On the other hand, we find that a simple and consistent
explanation can be found in a model in which equilibrium hybridization followed
by partial dissociation of duplexes during the post-hybridization washing
phase.Comment: 26 pages, 6 figures, some rearrangement of sections and some
additions. To appear in J.Phys.(condensed matter
Confined two-dimensional fermions at finite density
We introduce the chemical potential in a system of two-dimensional massless
fermions, confined to a finite region, by imposing twisted boundary conditions
in the Euclidean time direction. We explore in this simple model the
application of functional techniques which could be used in more complicated
situations.Comment: 15 pages, LaTe
Comparison of an approximately isothermal gravitational potentials of elliptical galaxies based on X-ray and optical data
We analyze six X-ray bright elliptical galaxies, observed with Chandra and
XMM-Newton, and approximate their gravitational potentials by isothermal
spheres phi(r)=v_c^2 ln(r) over a range of radii from ~0.5 to ~25 kpc. We then
compare the circular speed v_c derived from X-ray data with the estimators
available from optical data. In particular we discuss two simple and robust
procedures for evaluating the circular speed of the galaxy using the observed
optical surface brightness and the line-of-sight velocity dispersion profiles.
The best fitting relation between the circular speeds derived from optical
observations of stars and X-ray observations of hot gas is v_{c,opt}~ \eta *
v_{c,X}, where \eta=1.10-1.15 (depending on the method), suggesting, albeit
with large statistical and systematic uncertainties, that non-thermal pressure
on average contributes ~20-30% of the gas thermal pressure.Comment: 24 pages, 15 figures; Accepted for publication in MNRA
NQO2 is a reactive oxygen species generating off-target for acetaminophen
[Image: see text] The analgesic and antipyretic compound acetaminophen (paracetamol) is one of the most used drugs worldwide. Acetaminophen overdose is also the most common cause for acute liver toxicity. Here we show that acetaminophen and many structurally related compounds bind quinone reductase 2 (NQO2) in vitro and in live cells, establishing NQO2 as a novel off-target. NQO2 modulates the levels of acetaminophen derived reactive oxygen species, more specifically superoxide anions, in cultured cells. In humans, NQO2 is highly expressed in liver and kidney, the main sites of acetaminophen toxicity. We suggest that NQO2 mediated superoxide production may function as a novel mechanism augmenting acetaminophen toxicity
Transport of Cosmic Rays in Chaotic Magnetic Fields
The transport of charged particles in disorganised magnetic fields is an
important issue which concerns the propagation of cosmic rays of all energies
in a variety of astrophysical environments, such as the interplanetary,
interstellar and even extra-galactic media, as well as the efficiency of Fermi
acceleration processes. We have performed detailed numerical experiments using
Monte-Carlo simulations of particle propagation in stochastic magnetic fields
in order to measure the parallel and transverse spatial diffusion coefficients
and the pitch angle scattering time as a function of rigidity and strength of
the turbulent magnetic component. We confirm the extrapolation to high
turbulence levels of the scaling predicted by the quasi-linear approximation
for the scattering frequency and parallel diffusion coefficient at low
rigidity. We show that the widely used Bohm diffusion coefficient does not
provide a satisfactory approximation to diffusion even in the extreme case
where the mean field vanishes. We find that diffusion also takes place for
particles with Larmor radii larger than the coherence length of the turbulence.
We argue that transverse diffusion is much more effective than predicted by the
quasi-linear approximation, and appears compatible with chaotic magnetic
diffusion of the field lines. We provide numerical estimates of the Kolmogorov
length and magnetic line diffusion coefficient as a function of the level of
turbulence. Finally we comment on applications of our results to astrophysical
turbulence and the acceleration of high energy cosmic rays in supernovae
remnants, in super-bubbles, and in jets and hot spots of powerful
radio-galaxies.Comment: To be published in Physical Review D, 20 pages 9 figure
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