Viscosity and the Soft Ridge at RHIC

Correlation studies exhibit a ridge-like feature in rapidity and azimuthal angle, with and without a jet trigger. We ask whether the feature in untriggered correlations can be a consequence of transverse flow and viscous diffusion.Comment: Proc. Quark Matter 2008, Jaipur, Indi

Selective and highly efficient dye scavenging by a pH-responsive molecular hydrogelator

A structurally simple low molecular weight hydrogelator derived from isophthalic acid forms robust pH-responsive hydrogels capable of highly efficient and selective dye adsorption

Antarctic Water Tracks: Microbial Community Responses to Variation in Soil Moisture, pH, and Salinity

Ice-free soils in the McMurdo Dry Valleys select for taxa able to cope with challenging environmental conditions, including extreme chemical water activity gradients, freeze-thaw cycling, desiccation, and solar radiation regimes. The low biotic complexity of Dry Valley soils makes them well suited to investigate environmental and spatial influences on bacterial community structure. Water tracks are annually wetted habitats in the cold-arid soils of Antarctica that form briefly each summer with moisture sourced from snow melt, ground ice thaw, and atmospheric deposition via deliquescence and vapor flow into brines. Compared to neighboring arid soils, water tracks are highly saline and relatively moist habitats. They represent a considerable area (&sim;5&ndash;10 km2) of the Dry Valley terrestrial ecosystem, an area that is expected to increase with ongoing climate change. The goal of this study was to determine how variation in the environmental conditions of water tracks influences the composition and diversity of microbial communities. We found significant differences in microbial community composition between on- and off-water track samples, and across two distinct locations. Of the tested environmental variables, soil salinity was the best predictor of community composition, with members of the Bacteroidetes phylum being relatively more abundant at higher salinities and the Actinobacteria phylum showing the opposite pattern. There was also a significant, inverse relationship between salinity and bacterial diversity. Our results suggest water track formation significantly alters dry soil microbial communities, likely influencing subsequent ecosystem functioning. We highlight how Dry Valley water tracks could be a useful model system for understanding the potential habitability of transiently wetted environments found on the surface of Mars. &nbsp;</p

Chlorpromazine for schizophrenia: a Cochrane systematic review of 50 years of randomised controlled trials

BACKGROUND: Chlorpromazine (CPZ) remains one of the most common drugs used for people with schizophrenia worldwide, and a benchmark against which other treatments can be evaluated. Quantitative reviews are rare; this one evaluates the effects of chlorpromazine in the treatment of schizophrenia in comparison with placebo. METHODS: We sought all relevant randomised controlled trials (RCT) comparing chlorpromazine to placebo by electronic and reference searching, and by contacting trial authors and the pharmaceutical industry. Data were extracted from selected trials and, where possible, synthesised and random effects relative risk (RR), the number needed to treat (NNT) and their 95% confidence intervals (CI) calculated. RESULTS: Fifty RCTs from 1955–2000 were included with 5276 people randomised to CPZ or placebo. They constitute 2008 person-years spent in trials. Meta-analysis of these trials showed that chlorpromazine promotes a global improvement (n = 1121, 13 RCTs, RR 0.76 CI 0.7 to 0.9, NNT 7 CI 5 to 10), although a considerable placebo response is also seen. People allocated to chlorpromazine tended not to leave trials early in both the short (n = 945, 16 RCTs, RR 0.74 CI 0.5 to 1.1) and medium term (n = 1861, 25 RCTs, RR 0.79 CI 0.6 to 1.1). There were, however, many adverse effects. Chlorpromazine is sedating (n = 1242, 18 RCTs, RR 2.3 CI 1.7 to 3.1, NNH 6 CI 5 to 8), increases a person's chances of experiencing acute movement disorders, Parkinsonism and causes low blood pressure with dizziness and dry mouth. CONCLUSION: It is understandable why the World Health Organization (WHO) have endorsed and included chlorpromazine in their list of essential drugs for use in schizophrenia. Low- and middle-income countries may have more complete evidence upon which to base their practice compared with richer nations using recent innovations

On Krein-like theorems for noncanonical Hamiltonian systems with continuous spectra: application to Vlasov-Poisson

The notions of spectral stability and the spectrum for the Vlasov-Poisson system linearized about homogeneous equilibria, f_0(v), are reviewed. Structural stability is reviewed and applied to perturbations of the linearized Vlasov operator through perturbations of f_0. We prove that for each f_0 there is an arbitrarily small delta f_0' in W^{1,1}(R) such that f_0+delta f_0$is unstable. When$f_0$ is perturbed by an area preserving rearrangement, f_0 will always be stable if the continuous spectrum is only of positive signature, where the signature of the continuous spectrum is defined as in previous work. If there is a signature change, then there is a rearrangement of f_0 that is unstable and arbitrarily close to f_0 with f_0' in W^{1,1}. This result is analogous to Krein's theorem for the continuous spectrum. We prove that if a discrete mode embedded in the continuous spectrum is surrounded by the opposite signature there is an infinitesimal perturbation in C^n norm that makes f_0 unstable. If f_0 is stable we prove that the signature of every discrete mode is the opposite of the continuum surrounding it.Comment: Submitted to the journal Transport Theory and Statistical Physics. 36 pages, 12 figure

Studies on Viruses in Water

A new procedure for the detection of viral antigens in fecal material was developed. The test is performed by first diluting a fecal sample with phosphate buffered saline to give a liquid consistency. The pH is then adjusted to 8.5-9.0 and the solids are allowed to settle for five minutes. Supernatant fluid from above the fecal sediment is placed on the upper surface of a well of an inverted Immulon microtiter plate and incubated for one hour at 37 degrees C to allow virus to adsorb to the plastic. The Immulon plate is then washed three times with a Tween 20 solution and dried. Adsorbed virus is stained with fluorescein labled antiviral antibody containing Evan\u27s Blue dye. The stained preparations are examined by epi-fluorescence microsopy for the presence of viral aggregates and virus-containing cellular membranes. The test is applied in a continuous water monitoring procedure that can be used to upplement methods in which infectious viruses are isolated from water. In another study a protamine sulfate procedure for concentrating and an immunofluorescent cell procedure for assaying infectious virus (IV, reovirus that is infectious without proteolytic enzyme treatment), and potentially infectious virus (PIV, enzyme enhanceable reovirus) from polluted waters have been developed. The presence of PIV inthe environment had not previously been investigated. In following these procedures, protamine sulfate concentratiosn of 0.005 percent for the first precipitation of the sample, and 0.0025 percent for the second were used. With these protamine concentrations and 0.25 percent fetal bovine serum, IV and PIV are concentrations over 500-fold from river water inoculated with virus. Virus recoveries are between 80 and 100 percent. The IV and PIV fractions are assayed respectively before and after treatment with 200 ug fo chymotrypsin per millileter. When PIV is precipitated from river water, and the precipitate is dissolved and stored at 20 degrees C as a protamine-virus concentrate, only 5 percent of the viral infectivity is lost after 14 days. Therefore, reovirus can be precipitated from water at the sampling site, and only the protamine concentrate needs to be taken to the laboratory to be examined for virus content. When reoviruses are treated with chlorine, PIV is more resistant to inactivation thatn IV, and PIV appears to be at least as resistant to chlorination as poliovirus and coxsackievirus A-2. Granular media filtration systems (i.e., sand, anthracite coal and sand; anthracite coal; sand and garnet) are ineffectual in the removal of the acteriophage MS 2 from water when used as in-line direct filters. Batch assays have indicated a 93 percent reduction of MS 2 can occur when polyelectrolytes are added to the water. In addition, alum concentrations of 20, 30, 40, and 50 mg/1 remove 80 to 98 percent of the virus by precipitation. No reduction of MS 2 was observed at alum concentrations from 1 to 10 mg/1

The Imprint of Gravitational Waves on the Cosmic Microwave Background

Long-wavelength gravitational waves can induce significant temperature anisotropy in the cosmic microwave background. Distinguishing this from anisotropy induced by energy density fluctuations is critical for testing inflationary cosmology and theories of large-scale structure formation. We describe full radiative transport calculations of the two contributions and show that they differ dramatically at angular scales below a few degrees. We show how anisotropy experiments probing large- and small-angular scales can combine to distinguish the imprint due to gravitational waves.Comment: 11 pages, Penn Preprint-UPR-