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Osteoblastoma in the occipital bone: A case report of a rare tumor in the calvarium
Osteoblastomas infrequently occur in the calvarium, displaying a preference for temporal and frontal bones when it does. We present an unusual case of a large, expansile osteoblastoma in the occipital bone of a 23-year-old man who presented with a nontender lump at the back of his head. Initial computed tomography scan showed a large occipital bone mass, and after additional imaging, a gross total resection was performed. Histopathological examination revealed an osteoblastoma. Although these tumors are benign, overlapping imaging characteristics of lesions affecting the calvarium often present a diagnostic dilemma. This case emphasizes the importance of imaging in the management and work-up of these patients to decrease the risk of complications and assists surgeons in their preoperative planning
Heterotic M-Theory Cosmology in Four and Five Dimensions
We study rolling radii solutions in the context of the four- and
five-dimensional effective actions of heterotic M-theory. For the standard
four-dimensional solutions with varying dilaton and T-modulus, we find
approximate five-dimensional counterparts. These are new, generically
non-separating solutions corresponding to a pair of five-dimensional domain
walls evolving in time. Loop corrections in the four-dimensional theory are
described by certain excitations of fields in the fifth dimension. We point out
that the two exact separable solutions previously discovered are precisely the
special cases for which the loop corrections are time-independent. Generically,
loop corrections vary with time. Moreover, for a subset of solutions they
increase in time, evolving into complicated, non-separating solutions. In this
paper we compute these solutions to leading, non-trivial order. Using the
equations for the induced brane metric, we present a general argument showing
that the accelerating backgrounds of this type cannot evolve smoothly into
decelerating backgrounds.Comment: 15 pages, Latex, 1 eps figur
Cosmological Solutions of Horava-Witten Theory
We discuss simple cosmological solutions of Horava-Witten theory describing
the strongly coupled heterotic string. At energies below the grand-unified
scale, the effective theory is five- not four-dimensional, where the additional
coordinate parameterizes a S^1/Z_2 orbifold. Furthermore, it admits no
homogeneous solutions. Rather, the vacuum state, appropriate for a reduction to
four-dimensional supersymmetric models, is a BPS domain wall. Relevant
cosmological solutions are those associated with this BPS state. In particular,
such solutions must be inhomogeneous, depending on the orbifold coordinate as
well as on time. We present two examples of this new type of cosmological
solution, obtained by separation of variables rather that by exchange of time
and radius coordinate applied to a brane solution, as in previous work. The
first example represents the analog of a rolling radii solution with the radii
specifying the geometry of the domain wall. This is generalized in the second
example to include a nontrivial ``Ramond-Ramond'' scalar.Comment: 21 pages, Latex 2e with amsmath, minor addition
Kink-boundary collisions in a two dimensional scalar field theory
In a two-dimensional toy model, motivated from five-dimensional heterotic
M-theory, we study the collision of scalar field kinks with boundaries. By
numerical simulation of the full two-dimensional theory, we find that the kink
is always inelastically reflected with a model-independent fraction of its
kinetic energy converted into radiation. We show that the reflection can be
analytically understood as a fluctuation around the scalar field vacuum. This
picture suggests the possibility of spontaneous emission of kinks from the
boundary due to small perturbations in the bulk. We verify this picture
numerically by showing that the radiation emitted from the collision of an
initial single kink eventually leads to a bulk populated by many kinks.
Consequently, processes changing the boundary charges are practically
unavoidable in this system. We speculate that the system has a universal final
state consisting of a stack of kinks, their number being determined by the
initial energy
Moving Five-Branes in Low-Energy Heterotic M-Theory
We construct cosmological solutions of four-dimensional effective heterotic
M-theory with a moving five-brane and evolving dilaton and T modulus. It is
shown that the five-brane generates a transition between two asymptotic
rolling-radii solutions. Moreover, the five-brane motion always drives the
solutions towards strong coupling asymptotically. We present an explicit
example of a negative-time branch solution which ends in a brane collision
accompanied by a small-instanton transition. The five-dimensional origin of
some of our solutions is also discussed.Comment: 16 pages, Latex, 3 eps figure
Statistical periodicity in driven quantum systems: General formalism and application to noisy Floquet topological chains
Much recent experimental effort has focused on the realization of exotic
quantum states and dynamics predicted to occur in periodically driven systems.
But how robust are the sought-after features, such as Floquet topological
surface states, against unavoidable imperfections in the periodic driving? In
this work, we address this question in a broader context and study the dynamics
of quantum systems subject to noise with periodically recurring statistics. We
show that the stroboscopic time evolution of such systems is described by a
noise-averaged Floquet superoperator. The eigenvectors and -values of this
superoperator generalize the familiar concepts of Floquet states and
quasienergies and allow us to describe decoherence due to noise efficiently.
Applying the general formalism to the example of a noisy Floquet topological
chain, we re-derive and corroborate our recent findings on the noise-induced
decay of topologically protected end states. These results follow directly from
an expansion of the end state in eigenvectors of the Floquet superoperator.Comment: 13 pages, 5 figures. This is the final, published versio
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