A theoretical investigation of the M2 constituent of the tide in the Gulf of Mexico.

An ability to predict tides in the open sea is of value to oceanographers and coastal engineers. This study attempts to attain this goal of deep-sea tidal prediction by application of the hydrodynamic equations to individual tidal constituents. Similar treatments by Hansen and Rossiter with less general application were very successful. Adaptation of the method to the digital computer contributes considerably to its usefulness and versatility. Specific solutions are sought in the Gulf of Mexico for the M2 tidal constituent in an attempt to explain abrupt shifts in tidal forms along the Gulf Coast. One hand calculation solution using relaxation techniques on a coarse grid was undertaken. Computer solutions were obtained for actual depths with a coarse grid and for constant depth with a much finer grid. Cotidal and corange analyses of the computer solutions both fit well with coastal data indicating that bathymetry is not as influential in the tidal form shifts as expected. The technique utilized is judged effective and its refinement and application to other basins is recommended.http://www.archive.org/details/theoreticalinves00gainLieutenant, United States NavyApproved for public release; distribution is unlimited

Long-term treatment of uterine fibroids with ulipristal acetate

Objective: To investigate the efficacy and safety of ulipristal acetate (UPA) for long-term treatment of symptomatic uterine fibroids.<p></p> Design: Repeated intermittent open-label UPA courses, each followed by randomized double-blind norethisterone acetate (NETA) or placebo.<p></p> Setting: European clinical gynecology centers.<p></p> Patient(s): Two hundred and nine women with symptomatic fibroids including heavy menstrual bleeding.<p></p> Intervention(s): Patients received up to four 3-month courses of UPA 10 mg daily, immediately followed by 10-day double-blind treatment with NETA (10 mg daily) or placebo.<p></p> Main Outcome Measure(s): Amenorrhea, fibroid volume, endometrial histology.<p></p> Result(s): After the first UPA course, amenorrhea occurred in 79% of women, with median onset (from treatment start) of 4 days (interquartile range, 2–6 days). Median fibroid volume change was −45% (interquartile range, −66%; −25%). Amenorrhea rates were 89%, 88%, and 90% for the 131, 119, and 107 women who received treatment courses 2, 3, and 4, respectively. Median times to amenorrhea were 2, 3, and 3 days for treatment courses 2, 3, and 4, respectively. Median fibroid volume changes from baseline were −63%, −67%, and −72% after treatment courses 2, 3, and 4, respectively. All endometrial biopsies showed benign histology without hyperplasia; NETA did not affect fibroid volume or endometrial histology.<p></p> Conclusion(s): Repeated 3-month UPA courses effectively control bleeding and shrink fibroids in patients with symptomatic fibroids

An Alternative Yukawa Unified SUSY Scenario

Supersymmetric SO(10) Grand Unified Theories with Yukawa unification represent an appealing possibility for physics beyond the Standard Model. However Yukawa unification is made difficult by large threshold corrections to the bottom mass. Generally one is led to consider models where the sfermion masses are large in order to suppress these corrections. Here we present another possibility, in which the top and bottom GUT scale Yukawa couplings are equal to a component of the charged lepton Yukawa matrix at the GUT scale in a basis where this matrix is not diagonal. Physically, this weak eigenstate Yukawa unification scenario corresponds to the case where the charged leptons that are in the 16 of SO(10) containing the top and bottom quarks mix with their counterparts in another SO(10) multiplet. Diagonalizing the resulting Yukawa matrix introduces mixings in the neutrino sector. Specifically we find that for a large region of parameter space with relatively light sparticles, and which has not been ruled out by current LHC or other data, the mixing induced in the neutrino sector is such that $sin^2 2\Theta_{23} \approx 1$, in agreement with data. The phenomenological implications are analyzed in some detail.Comment: 32 pages, 22 Figure

Genetic validation of bipolar disorder identified by automated phenotyping using electronic health records

Bipolar disorder (BD) is a heritable mood disorder characterized by episodes of mania and depression. Although genomewide association studies (GWAS) have successfully identified genetic loci contributing to BD risk, sample size has become a rate-limiting obstacle to genetic discovery. Electronic health records (EHRs) represent a vast but relatively untapped resource for high-throughput phenotyping. As part of the International Cohort Collection for Bipolar Disorder (ICCBD), we previously validated automated EHR-based phenotyping algorithms for BD against in-person diagnostic interviews (Castro et al. Am J Psychiatry 172:363–372, 2015). Here, we establish the genetic validity of these phenotypes by determining their genetic correlation with traditionally ascertained samples. Case and control algorithms were derived from structured and narrative text in the Partners Healthcare system comprising more than 4.6 million patients over 20 years. Genomewide genotype data for 3330 BD cases and 3952 controls of European ancestry were used to estimate SNP-based heritability (h2g) and genetic correlation (rg) between EHR-based phenotype definitions and traditionally ascertained BD cases in GWAS by the ICCBD and Psychiatric Genomics Consortium (PGC) using LD score regression. We evaluated BD cases identified using 4 EHR-based algorithms: an NLP-based algorithm (95-NLP) and three rule-based algorithms using codified EHR with decreasing levels of stringency—“coded-strict”, “coded-broad”, and “coded-broad based on a single clinical encounter” (coded-broad-SV). The analytic sample comprised 862 95-NLP, 1968 coded-strict, 2581 coded-broad, 408 coded-broad-SV BD cases, and 3 952 controls. The estimated h2g were 0.24 (p = 0.015), 0.09 (p = 0.064), 0.13 (p = 0.003), 0.00 (p = 0.591) for 95-NLP, coded-strict, coded-broad and coded-broad-SV BD, respectively. The h2g for all EHR-based cases combined except coded-broad-SV (excluded due to 0 h2g) was 0.12 (p = 0.004). These h2g were lower or similar to the h2g observed by the ICCBD + PGCBD (0.23, p = 3.17E−80, total N = 33,181). However, the rg between ICCBD + PGCBD and the EHR-based cases were high for 95-NLP (0.66, p = 3.69 × 10–5), coded-strict (1.00, p = 2.40 × 10−4), and coded-broad (0.74, p = 8.11 × 10–7). The rg between EHR-based BD definitions ranged from 0.90 to 0.98. These results provide the first genetic validation of automated EHR-based phenotyping for BD and suggest that this approach identifies cases that are highly genetically correlated with those ascertained through conventional methods. High throughput phenotyping using the large data resources available in EHRs represents a viable method for accelerating psychiatric genetic research

Dark Matter in the MSSM

We have recently examined a large number of points in the parameter space of the phenomenological MSSM, the 19-dimensional parameter space of the CP-conserving MSSM with Minimal Flavor Violation. We determined whether each of these points satisfied existing experimental and theoretical constraints. This analysis provides insight into general features of the MSSM without reference to a particular SUSY breaking scenario or any other assumptions at the GUT scale. This study opens up new possibilities for SUSY phenomenology both in colliders and in astrophysical experiments. Here we shall discuss the implications of this analysis relevant to the study of dark matter.Comment: 27 pages, 19 figs; Journal version in NJP issue "Focus on Dark Matter and Particle Physics". Previous version had 26 pages, 19 figures. Text and some figures have been update