Comment on "Neutron Interferometric Observation of Noncyclic Phase"

A critique of a recent experiment [Wagh et.al., Phys.Rev.Lett.81, 1992 (7 Sep 1998)] to measure the noncyclic phase associated with a precessing neutron spin in a neutron interferometer, as given by the Pancharatnam criterion, is presented. It is pointed out that since the experiment measures, not the noncyclic phase itself, but a quantity derived from it, it misses the most interesting feature of such a phase, namely the different sign associated with states lying in the upper and the lower hemispheres, a feature originating in the existence of a phase singularity. Such effects have earlier been predicted and seen in optical interference experiments using polarization of light as the spinor [Bhandari, Phys.Rep.281, 1 (Mar 1997)].Comment: 5 pages, 0 figures, submitted to Phys.Rev.Let

Rice landscape management for raising water productivity, conserving resources, and improving livelihoods, in upper catchments of the Mekong and Red River basins

The project validated and disseminated a large number of improved rice-based cropping systems technologies suited to upland agro-ecologies. These improved technologies have good potentials to raise the productivity of water, land, and labor. The innovative strategies employed by the project including the paradigm of landscape management, multi-institutional partnership, multidisciplinary teamwork, farmer participatory approach to technology validation, and community-based seed production led to successful generation and dissemination of technologies. Initial monitoring to adoption of technologies showed good indications of spread and promising impacts on food security, poverty reduction, and environmental protection

Divergent mutational processes distinguish hypoxic and normoxic tumours.

Many primary tumours have low levels of molecular oxygen (hypoxia), and hypoxic tumours respond poorly to therapy. Pan-cancer molecular hallmarks of tumour hypoxia remain poorly understood, with limited comprehension of its associations with specific mutational processes, non-coding driver genes and evolutionary features. Here, as part of the ICGC/TCGA Pan-Cancer Analysis of Whole Genomes (PCAWG) Consortium, which aggregated whole genome sequencing data from 2658 cancers across 38 tumour types, we quantify hypoxia in 1188 tumours spanning 27 cancer types. Elevated hypoxia associates with increased mutational load across cancer types, irrespective of underlying mutational class. The proportion of mutations attributed to several mutational signatures of unknown aetiology directly associates with the level of hypoxia, suggesting underlying mutational processes for these signatures. At the gene level, driver mutations in TP53, MYC and PTEN are enriched in hypoxic tumours, and mutations in PTEN interact with hypoxia to direct tumour evolutionary trajectories. Overall, hypoxia plays a critical role in shaping the genomic and evolutionary landscapes of cancer

Evaluation of Box Type Paddy Dryers in South Sumatra, Indonesia

Indonesia is the third biggest paddy producing country worldwide with its annual production of around 54 million ton. South Sumatra Province has an annual paddy production of around 2.32 million ton. Paddy has high moisture content, up to 24%, when it is harvested. Moist paddy needs immediate drying after it is harvested to reduce its moisture content to 14% or less for milling or for safe storage, respectively. Sun drying of paddy has been practiced for years despite many problems associated with it. Different studies show that the post harvest loss of the paddy lies in between 10% and 37%, in which drying related losses might be from 1% up to 10%. Like in any other parts of the country, South Sumatra Province also has no commercial paddy drying systems in practice. In 2004, as a first prototype of such type, a box type paddy dryer with a rice husk burning oven was introduced in Upang village. Now there are already more than 30 box dryers installed in three neighbouring villages – Muliasari, Upang and Upangceria - where this study was carried out. The drying capacity of each dryer varies between 3.5 ton and 10 ton of harvested paddy. Although the widespread of dryers is rapid in these villages, none of the field experiments were carried out so far to evaluate their technical, economical and social performances. This study aimed to conduct the experiments on the selected dryers and to assess their technical performances at first. Three dryers were chosen for the experiments and altogether eight experiments were carried out. Parallel sun drying experiments were carried out for quality test of rice yielded from milling the paddy dried in box dryer and dried in sun drying. Based on the observed data, economic analysis of paddy drying considering two important stakeholders – investors and farmers is presented in this paper

Internet Versus Mailed Questionnaires: A Randomized Comparison (2)

BACKGROUND Low response rates among surgeons can threaten the validity of surveys. Internet technologies may reduce the time, effort, and financial resources needed to conduct surveys. OBJECTIVE We investigated whether using Web-based technology could increase the response rates to an international survey. METHODS We solicited opinions from the 442 surgeon–members of the Orthopaedic Trauma Association regarding the treatment of femoral neck fractures. We developed a self-administered questionnaire after conducting a literature review, focus groups, and key informant interviews, for which we used sampling to redundancy techniques. We administered an Internet version of the questionnaire on a Web site, as well as a paper version, which looked similar to the Internet version and which had identical content. Only those in our sample could access the Web site. We alternately assigned the participants to receive the survey by mail (n=221) or an email invitation to participate on the Internet (n=221). Non-respondents in the mail arm received up to three additional copies of the survey, while non-respondents in the Internet arm received up to three additional requests, including a final mailed copy. All participants in the Internet arm had an opportunity to request an emailed Portable Document Format (PDF) version. RESULTS The Internet arm demonstrated a lower response rate (99/221, 45%) than the mail questionnaire arm (129/221, 58%) (absolute difference 13%, 95% confidence interval 4%-22%, P<0.01). CONCLUSIONS. Our Internet-based survey to surgeons resulted in a significantly lower response rate than a traditional mailed survey. Researchers should not assume that the widespread availability and potential ease of Internet-based surveys will translate into higher response rates.Department of Surgery, McMaster University, Hamilton, Ontario, Canad

Relation between geometric phases of entangled bi-partite systems and their subsystems

This paper focuses on the geometric phase of entangled states of bi-partite systems under bi-local unitary evolution. We investigate the relation between the geometric phase of the system and those of the subsystems. It is shown that (1) the geometric phase of cyclic entangled states with non-degenerate eigenvalues can always be decomposed into a sum of weighted non-modular pure state phases pertaining to the separable components of the Schmidt decomposition, though the same cannot be said in the non-cyclic case, and (2) the geometric phase of the mixed state of one subsystem is generally different from that of the entangled state even by keeping the other subsystem fixed, but the two phases are the same when the evolution operator satisfies conditions where each component in the Schmidt decomposition is parallel transported