421 research outputs found
Mice carrying a complete deletion of the talin2 coding sequence are viable and fertile
AbstractMice homozygous for several Tln2 gene targeted alleles are viable and fertile. Here we show that although the expression of talin2 protein is drastically reduced in muscle from these mice, other tissues continue to express talin2 albeit at reduced levels. We therefore generated a Tln2 allele lacking the entire coding sequence (Tln2cd). Tln2cd/cd mice were viable and fertile, and the genotypes of Tln2cd/+ intercrosses were at the expected Mendelian ratio. Tln2cd/cd mice showed no major difference in body mass or the weight of the major organs compared to wild-type, although they displayed a mildly dystrophic phenotype. Moreover, Tln2cd/cd mouse embryo fibroblasts showed no obvious defects in cell adhesion, migration or proliferation. However, the number of Tln2cd/cd pups surviving to adulthood was variable suggesting that such mice have an underlying defect
Conformal field theory and edge excitations for the principal series of quantum Hall fluids
Motivated by recent experimental results, we reconsider the theory of the
edge excitations for the fractional Hall effect at filling factors
. We propose to modify the standard edge
theory for this series by introducing twist fields which change the boundary
conditions of the bosonic fields and simulate the effect of fractions of flux
quanta . This has the effect of removing the conserved charges
associated to the neutral modes while keeping the right statistics of the
particles. The Green function of the electron in presence of twists decays at
long distance with an exponent varying continuously with .Comment: 5 pages, latex; typos corrected and some references adde
Validation and Verification of High-Fidelity Simulations of Thoracic Stent-Graft Implantation
Thoracic Endovascular Aortic Repair (TEVAR) is the preferred treatment option for thoracic aortic pathologies and consists of inserting a self-expandable stent-graft into the pathological region to restore the lumen. Computational models play a significant role in procedural planning and must be reliable. For this reason, in this work, high-fidelity Finite Element (FE) simulations are developed to model thoracic stent-grafts. Experimental crimp/release tests are performed to calibrate stent-grafts material parameters. Stent pre-stress is included in the stent-graft model. A new methodology for replicating device insertion and deployment with explicit FE simulations is proposed. To validate this simulation, the stent-graft is experimentally released into a 3D rigid aortic phantom with physiological anatomy and inspected in a computed tomography (CT) scan at different time points during deployment with an ad-hoc set-up. A verification analysis of the adopted modeling features compared to the literature is performed. With the proposed methodology the error with respect to the CT is on average 0.92 +/- 0.64%, while it is higher when literature models are adopted (on average 4.77 +/- 1.83%). The presented FE tool is versatile and customizable for different commercial devices and applicable to patient-specific analyses
Functional trait effects on ecosystem stability: assembling the jigsaw puzzle
Under global change, how biological diversity and ecosystem services are maintained in time is a fundamental question. Ecologists have long argued about multiple mechanisms by which local biodiversity might control the temporal stability of ecosystem properties. Accumulating theories and empirical evidence suggest that, together with different population and community parameters, these mechanisms largely operate through differences in functional traits among organisms. We review potential trait-stability mechanisms together with underlying tests and associated metrics. We identify various trait-based components, each accounting for different stability mechanisms, that contribute to buffering, or propagating, the effect of environmental fluctuations on ecosystem functioning. This comprehensive picture, obtained by combining different puzzle pieces of trait-stability effects, will guide future empirical and modeling investigations.This study is the result of an international workshop financed by the Valencian government in Spain (Generalitat Valenciana, reference AORG/2018/) and was supported by Spanish Plan Nacional de I+D+i (project PGC2018-099027-B-I00). E.V. was supported by the 2017 program for attracting and retaining talent of Comunidad de Madrid (no. 2017-T2/ AMB-5406)
A quantitative study of O stars in NGC2244 and the Mon OB2 association
Our goal is to determine the stellar and wind properties of seven O stars in
the cluster NGC2244 and three O stars in the OB association MonOB2. These
properties give us insight into the mass loss rates of O stars, allow us to
check the validity of rotational mixing in massive stars, and to better
understand the effects of the ionizing flux and wind mechanical energy release
on the surrounding interstellar medium and its influence on triggered star
formation. We collect optical and UV spectra of the target stars which are
analyzed by means of atmosphere models computed with the code CMFGEN. The
spectra of binary stars are disentangled and the components are studied
separately. All stars have an evolutionary age less than 5 million years, with
the most massive stars being among the youngest. Nitrogen surface abundances
show no clear relation with projected rotational velocities. Binaries and
single stars show the same range of enrichment. This is attributed to the youth
and/or wide separation of the binary systems in which the components have not
(yet) experienced strong interaction. A clear trend of larger enrichment in
higher luminosity objects is observed, consistent with what evolutionary models
with rotation predict for a population of O stars at a given age. We confirm
the weakness of winds in late O dwarfs. In general, mass loss rates derived
from UV lines are lower than mass loss rates obtained from Ha. The UV mass loss
rates are even lower than the single line driving limit in the latest type
dwarfs. These issues are discussed in the context of the structure of massive
stars winds. The evolutionary and spectroscopic masses are in agreement above
25 Msun but the uncertainties are large. Below this threshold, the few
late-type O stars studied here indicate that the mass discrepancy still seems
to hold.Comment: 20 pages, 12 figures. A&A accepte
Integrin-induced epidermal growth factor (EGF) receptor activation requires c-Src and p130Cas and leads to phosphorylation of specific EGF receptor tyrosines.
Representations of Conformal Nets, Universal C*-Algebras and K-Theory
We study the representation theory of a conformal net A on the circle from a
K-theoretical point of view using its universal C*-algebra C*(A). We prove that
if A satisfies the split property then, for every representation \pi of A with
finite statistical dimension, \pi(C*(A)) is weakly closed and hence a finite
direct sum of type I_\infty factors. We define the more manageable locally
normal universal C*-algebra C*_ln(A) as the quotient of C*(A) by its largest
ideal vanishing in all locally normal representations and we investigate its
structure. In particular, if A is completely rational with n sectors, then
C*_ln(A) is a direct sum of n type I_\infty factors. Its ideal K_A of compact
operators has nontrivial K-theory, and we prove that the DHR endomorphisms of
C*(A) with finite statistical dimension act on K_A, giving rise to an action of
the fusion semiring of DHR sectors on K_0(K_A)$. Moreover, we show that this
action corresponds to the regular representation of the associated fusion
algebra.Comment: v2: we added some comments in the introduction and new references.
v3: new authors' addresses, minor corrections. To appear in Commun. Math.
Phys. v4: minor corrections, updated reference
Anatomy of a post-starburst minor merger: a multi-wavelength WFC3 study of NGC 4150
(Abridged) We present a spatially-resolved near-UV/optical study of NGC 4150,
using the Wide Field Camera 3 (WFC3) on board the Hubble Space Telescope.
Previous studies of this early-type galaxy (ETG) indicate that it has a large
reservoir of molecular gas, exhibits a kinematically decoupled core (likely
indication of recent merging) and strong, central H_B absorption (indicative of
young stars). The core of NGC 4150 shows ubiquitous near-UV emission and
remarkable dusty substructure. Our analysis shows this galaxy to lie in the
near-UV green valley, and its pixel-by-pixel photometry exhibits a narrow range
of near-UV/optical colours that are similar to those of nearby E+A
(post-starburst) galaxies. We parametrise the properties of the recent star
formation (age, mass fraction, metallicity and internal dust content) in the
NGC 4150 pixels by comparing the observed near-UV/optical photometry to stellar
models. The typical age of the recent star formation (RSF) is around 0.9 Gyrs,
consistent with the similarity of the near-UV colours to post-starburst
systems, while the morphological structure of the young component supports the
proposed merger scenario. The RSF metallicity, representative of the
metallicity of the gas fuelling star formation, is around 0.3 - 0.5 Zsun.
Assuming that this galaxy is a merger and that the gas is sourced mainly from
the infalling companion, these metallicities plausibly indicate the gas-phase
metallicity (GPM) of the accreted satellite. Comparison to the local mass-GPM
relation suggests (crudely) that the mass of the accreted system is around
3x10^8 Msun, making NGC 4150 a 1:20 minor merger. A summation of the pixel RSF
mass fractions indicates that the RSF contributes about 2-3 percent of the
stellar mass. This work reaffirms our hypothesis that minor mergers play a
significant role in the evolution of ETGs at late epochs.Comment: 28 pages, 2 tables, accepted for publication in Ap
First room temperature operation of the AURIGA optical readout
In the frame of the AURIGA collaboration, a readout scheme based on an optical resonant cavity has been implemented on a room temperature resonant bar detector of gravitational waves. The bar equipped with the optical readout has been operating for a few weeks and we report here the first results
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