The Metabolic Syndrome and Mind-Body Therapies: A Systematic Review

The metabolic syndrome, affecting a substantial and increasing percentage of the worldwide population, is comprised of a cluster of symptoms associated with increased risk of type 2 diabetes, cardiovascular disease, and other chronic conditions. Mind-body modalities based on Eastern philosophy, such as yoga, tai chi, qigong, and meditation, have become increasingly popular worldwide. These complementary therapies have many reported benefits for improving symptoms and physiological measures associated with the metabolic syndrome. However, clinical trial data concerning the effectiveness of these practices on the syndrome as a whole have not been evaluated using a systematic and synthesizing approach. A systematic review was conducted to critically evaluate the data from clinical trials examining the efficacy of mind-body therapies as supportive care modalities for management of the metabolic syndrome. Three clinical trials addressing the use of mind-body therapies for management of the metabolic syndrome were identified. Findings from the studies reviewed support the potential clinical effectiveness of mind-body practices in improving indices of the metabolic syndrome

The Critical Temperature of an Anisotropic Superconductor in the Presence of a Homogeneous Magnetic Field and Impurities

The effect of a homogeneous magnetic field and nonmagnetic impurities on the critical temperature of an anisotropic superconductor has been investigated. The role of these pair-breakers in relation to the anisotropy of the order parameter is clarified.Comment: 7 pages, RevTeX, 1 PostScript figur

Gauge Invariant Effective Stress-Energy Tensors for Gravitational Waves

It is shown that if a generalized definition of gauge invariance is used, gauge invariant effective stress-energy tensors for gravitational waves and other gravitational perturbations can be defined in a much larger variety of circumstances than has previously been possible. In particular it is no longer necessary to average the stress-energy tensor over a region of spacetime which is larger in scale than the wavelengths of the waves and it is no longer necessary to restrict attention to high frequency gravitational waves.Comment: 11 pages, RevTe

A new approach for performing contamination control bakeouts in JPL thermal vacuum test chambers

Contamination control requirements for the Wide Field/Planetary Camera II (WF/PC II) are necessarily stringent to protect against post-launch contamination of the sensitive optical surfaces, particularly the cold charge coupled device (CCD) imaging surfaces. Typically, thermal vacuum test chambers have employed a liquid nitrogen (LN2) cold trap to collect outgassed contaminants. This approach has the disadvantage of risking recontamination of the test article from shroud offgassing during post-test warmup of the chamber or from any shroud warming of even a few degrees during the bakeout process. By using an enclave, essentially a chamber within a chamber, configured concentrically and internally within an LN2 shroud, a method was developed, based on a design concept by Taylor, for preventing recontamination of test articles during bakeouts and subsequent post-test warmup of the vacuum chamber. Enclaves for testing WF/PC II components were designed and fabricated, then installed in three of JPL's Environmental Test Lab chambers. The design concepts, operating procedures, and test results of this development are discussed

A thrips vector of tomato spotted wilt virus responds to tomato acylsugar chemical diversity with reduced oviposition and virus inoculation.

There is increasing evidence that acylsugars deter insect pests and plant virus vectors, including the western flower thrips (WFT), Frankliniella occidentalis (Pergande), vector of tomato spotted wilt virus (TSWV). Acylsugars are sugar-polyesters composed of saturated, un-saturated, and variously branched short and long chain fatty acids (FAs) esterified to a glucose (acylglucose) or sucrose (acylsucrose) moiety. We sought to understand how acylsucrose amount and composition of associated FA profiles interacted to mediate resistance to WFT oviposition and TSWV inoculation on tomato leaves. Towards this goal, we examined WFT oviposition and TSWV inoculation behavior on tomato lines bred to exude varying amounts of acylsucrose in association with diverse FA profiles. Our data show that as acylsucrose amounts increased, WFT egg-laying (oviposition) decreased and TSWV inoculation was suppressed. Western flower thrips also responded to FA profiles that included iC4, iC11, nC12 and nC10 FA. These findings support improving acylsugar-mediated resistance against WFT by breeding tomatoes exuding greater amounts of acylsucrose associated with specific FA profiles. We show that increasing acylsucrose amount output by type IV trichomes and selecting for particular FA profiles through advanced breeding profoundly affects WFT behavior in ways that benefit management of WFT as direct pests and as TSWV vectors

Deformation of the Planetary Orbits Caused by the Time Dependent Gravitational Potential in the Universe

In the paper are studied the deformations of the planetary orbits caused by the time dependent gravitational potential in the universe. It is shown that the orbits are not axially symmetric and the time dependent potential does not cause perihelion precession. It is found a simple formula for the change of the orbit period caused by the time dependent gravitational potential and it is tested for two binary pulsars.Comment: 7 page

Vacuum polarization of massive scalar fields in the spacetime of the electrically charged nonlinear black hole

The approximate renormalized stress-energy tensor of the quantized massive conformally coupled scalar field in the spacetime of electrically charged nonlinear black hole is constructed. It is achieved by functional differentiation of the lowest order of the DeWitt-Schwinger effective action involving coincidence limit of the Hadamard-Minakshisundaram-DeWitt-Seely coefficient $a_{3}.$ The result is compared with the analogous result derived for the Reissner-Nordstr\"om black hole. It is shown that the most important differences occur in the vicinity of the event horizon of the black hole near the extremality limit. The structure of the nonlinear black hole is briefly studied by means of the Lambert functions.Comment: 22 pages, 10 figure

Wavefunction considerations for the central spin decoherence problem in a nuclear spin bath

Decoherence of a localized electron spin in a solid state material (the ``central spin'' problem) at low temperature is believed to be dominated by interactions with nuclear spins in the lattice. This decoherence is partially suppressed through the application of a large magnetic field that splits the energy levels of the electron spin and prevents depolarization. However, dephasing decoherence resulting from a dynamical nuclear spin bath cannot be removed in this way. Fluctuations of the nuclear field lead to uncertainty of the electron's precessional frequency in a process known as spectral diffusion. This article considers the effect of the electron's wavefunction shape upon spectral diffusion and provides wavefunction dependent decoherence time formulas for free induction decay as well as spin echoes and concatenated dynamical decoupling schemes for enhancing coherence. We also discuss dephasing of a qubit encoded in singlet-triplet states of a double quantum dot. A central theoretical result of this work is the development of a continuum approximation for the spectral diffusion problem which we have applied to GaAs and InAs materials specifically

School-based intervention to reduce anxiety in children: study protocol for a randomized controlled trial (PACES)

This is the final version of the article. Available from the publisher via the DOI in this record.BACKGROUND: Emotional problems such as anxiety and low mood in children are common, impair everyday functioning and increase the risk of severe mental health disorders in adulthood. Relatively few children with emotional health problems are identified and referred for treatment indicating the need to investigate preventive approaches. METHODS/DESIGN: The study is designed to be a pragmatic cluster randomized controlled trial evaluating the effectiveness of an efficacious school-based cognitive behavior therapy (CBT) prevention program (FRIENDS) on symptoms of anxiety and low mood in children 9 to 10 years of age. The unit of allocation is schools which are assigned to one of three conditions: school-led FRIENDS, health-led FRIENDS or treatment as usual. Assessments will be undertaken at baseline, 6 months and 12 months. The primary outcome measure is change on the Revised Child Anxiety and Depression Scale. Secondary outcome measures assess changes in self-esteem, worries, bullying and life satisfaction. An economic evaluation will be undertaken. DISCUSSION: As of September 2011, 41 schools have been recruited and randomized. Final 12-month assessments are scheduled to be completed by May 2013. TRIAL REGISTRATION: ISRCTN23563048.The project is funded by the NIHR Public Health Research Programme (09/3000/03

The metabolic syndrome and mind-body therapies: a systematic review,”

The metabolic syndrome, affecting a substantial and increasing percentage of the worldwide population, is comprised of a cluster of symptoms associated with increased risk of type 2 diabetes, cardiovascular disease, and other chronic conditions. Mindbody modalities based on Eastern philosophy, such as yoga, tai chi, qigong, and meditation, have become increasingly popular worldwide. These complementary therapies have many reported benefits for improving symptoms and physiological measures associated with the metabolic syndrome. However, clinical trial data concerning the effectiveness of these practices on the syndrome as a whole have not been evaluated using a systematic and synthesizing approach. A systematic review was conducted to critically evaluate the data from clinical trials examining the efficacy of mind-body therapies as supportive care modalities for management of the metabolic syndrome. Three clinical trials addressing the use of mind-body therapies for management of the metabolic syndrome were identified. Findings from the studies reviewed support the potential clinical effectiveness of mind-body practices in improving indices of the metabolic syndrome