Sleep Strategies: Sleep in Women A Changing Perspective

As with many other specialties, sleep medicine has been shifting toward helping clinicians obtain a better understanding of gender-specific issues in disorders and disturbances. It is easier today to appreciate the complex dynamics of biological, psychosocial, and cultural factors that define sleep patterns and problems in women. Sleep in women changes across their life spans, with three major shifts likely due to hormonal differences: at the onset of the menstrual cycle, during pregnancy, and during the perimenopausal period

How to change the oligomeric state of a circular protein assembly: switch from 11-subunit to 12-subunit TRAP suggests a general mechanism

Many critical cellular functions are performed by multisubunit circular protein oligomers whose internal geometry has evolved to meet functional requirements. The subunit number is arguably the most critical parameter of a circular protein assembly, affecting the internal and external diameters of the assembly and often impacting on the protein's function. Although accurate structural information has been obtained for several circular proteins, a lack of accurate information on alternative oligomeric states has prevented engineering such transitions. In this study we used the bacterial transcription regulator TRAP as a model system to investigate the features that define the oligomeric state of a circular protein and to question how the subunit number could be manipulated.We find that while Bacillus subtilis and Bacillus stearothermophilus TRAP form 11-subunit oligomers, the Bacillus halodurans TRAP exclusively forms 12-subunit assemblies. Significantly, the two states of TRAP are related by a simple rigid body rotation of individual subunits around inter-subunit axes. We tested if such a rotation could be induced by insertion or deletion mutations at the subunit interface. Using wild type 11-subunit TRAP, we demonstrate that removal of five C-terminal residues at the outer side of the inter-subunit axis or extension of an amino acid side chain at the opposite, inner side, increased the subunit number from 11 to 12. Our findings are supported by crystal structures of TRAP oligomers and by native mass spectrometry data.The subunit number of the TRAP oligomer can be manipulated by introducing deletion or addition mutations at the subunit interface. An analysis of available and emerging structural data on alternative oligomeric states indicates that the same principles may also apply to the subunit number of other circular assemblies suggesting that the deletion/addition approach could be used generally to engineer transitions between different oligomeric states

Intertwining operator for AG2AG_2 Calogero-Moser-Sutherland system

We consider generalised Calogero-Moser-Sutherland quantum Hamiltonian $H$ associated with a configuration of vectors $AG_2$ on the plane which is a union of $A_2$ and $G_2$ root systems. The Hamiltonian $H$ depends on one parameter. We find an intertwining operator between $H$ and the Calogero-Moser-Sutherland Hamiltonian for the root system $G_2$. This gives a quantum integral for $H$ of order 6 in an explicit form thus establishing integrability of $H$.Comment: 24 page

Antenna using a magnetic-slab located in the principal magnetic-field region beneath the patch

This paper presents an analysis of microstrip patch antennas with different dielec-tric/magnetic substrate profiles in an attempt to obtain operating frequency reduction. Initially, different ridge shapes in the substrate were examined. An in-depth investigation of the ridge shape and its dimensions on the antenna performance has been carried out. Subsequently an antenna with a magnetic-slab loaded in the prime magnetic-field region beneath the patch is proposed. The new magnetic loaded antenna design is aimed to reduce the resonant frequency of a conventional patch and reduce the profile of an earlier design with a substrate ridge. Various magnetic materials have been embedded within the original dielectric substrate of the patch antenna. Measured results validated the hypothesis that this frequency can be reduced by placing magnetic materials at the centre of the patch. The achieved gain is expected to be further enhanced by using forthcoming magnetic materials with improved performance

Implications of exclusive J/ψJ/\psi photoproduction in a tamed collinear factorisation approach to NLO

We discuss exclusive $J/\psi$ photoproduction, initially in conventional collinear factorisation at NLO and then subsequently in a refined approach with a programme of low $x$ resummation and implementation of a crucial low $Q_0$ subtraction included. We compare and contrast predictions in both frameworks and remark about the possibility to constrain and ultimately determine the low $x$ and low scale gluon PDF, emphasising the significance of this for future global PDF analyses.Comment: 6 pages, 4 figures. Presented by C. Flett at the 51st International Symposium on Multiparticle Dynamics (ISMD2022) Pitlochry, Scottish Highlands, 1-5 August 202

Using Higher Moments of Fluctuations and their Ratios in the Search for the QCD Critical Point

The QCD critical point can be found in heavy ion collision experiments via the non-monotonic behavior of many fluctuation observables as a function of the collision energy. The event-by-event fluctuations of various particle multiplicities are enhanced in those collisions that freeze out near the critical point. Higher, non-Gaussian, moments of the event-by-event distributions of such observables are particularly sensitive to critical fluctuations, since their magnitude depends on the critical correlation length to a high power. We present quantitative estimates of the contribution of critical fluctuations to the third and fourth moments of the pion, proton and net proton multiplicities, as well as estimates of various measures of pion-proton correlations, all as a function of the same five non-universal parameters, one of which is the correlation length that parametrizes proximity to the critical point. We show how to use nontrivial but parameter independent ratios among these more than a dozen fluctuation observables to discover the critical point. We also construct ratios that, if the critical point is found, can be used to overconstrain the values of the non-universal parameters.Comment: 16 pages, 5 figures. Version to appear in PRD. Footnote and reference adde