Measurement of the WW Cross Section in 7 TeV pp Collisions with the ATLAS Detector

We report a measurement of the WW production cross section in pp collisions at 7 TeV. The WW leptonic decay channels are analyzed using data corresponding to 1.02 /fb of integrated luminosity collected by the ATLAS detector during 2011 at the CERN Large Hadron Collider. With 414 observed WW candidate events and an estimated background of 170$\pm$28 events, the measured WW production cross section is $48.2 \pm 4.0 {\rm(stat)} \pm 6.4 {\rm(syst)} \pm 1.8 {\rm(lumi)}$ pb, in agreement with the Standard Model NLO prediction of 46$\pm$3 pb.Comment: 9 pages, proceedings of the DPF-2011 Conference, Providence, RI, August 8-13, 201

Pulling hairpinned polynucleotide chains: Does base-pair stacking interaction matter?

Force-induced structural transitions both in relatively random and in designed single-stranded DNA (ssDNA) chains are studied theoretically. At high salt conditions, ssDNA forms compacted hairpin patterns stabilized by base-pairing and base-pair stacking interactions, and a threshold external force is needed to pull the hairpinned structure into a random coiled one. The base-pair stacking interaction in the ssDNA chain makes this hairpin-coil conversion a discontinuous (first-order) phase transition process characterized by a force plateau in the force-extension curve, while lowering this potential below some critical level turns this transition into continuous (second-order) type, no matter how strong the base-pairing interaction is. The phase diagram (including hairpin-I, -II, and random coil) is discussed as a function of stacking potential and external force. These results are in quantitative agreement with recent experimental observations of different ssDNA sequences, and they reveal the necessity to consider the base-pair stacking interactions in order to understand the structural formation of RNA, a polymer designed by nature itself. The theoretical method used may be extended to study the long-range interaction along double-stranded DNA caused by the topological constraint of fixed linking number.Comment: 8 pages using Revte

Collapse Transition of Two-Dimensional Flexible and Semiflexible Polymers

The nature of the globule-coil transition of surface-confined polymers has been an issue of debate. Here this 2D collapse transition is studied through a partially directed lattice model. In the general case of polymers with positive bending stiffness ($\Delta>0$), the collapse transition is {\em first-order}; it becomes {\em second-order} only in the limiting case of zero bending stiffness ($\Delta\equiv 0$). These analytical results are confirmed by Monte Carlo simulations. We also suggest some possible future experiments.Comment: 4 pages, 3 figure

Test of conformal gravity with astrophysical observations

Since it can describe the rotation curves of galaxies without dark matter and can give rise to accelerated expansion, conformal gravity attracts much attention recently. As a theory of modified gravity, it is important to test conformal gravity with astrophysical observations. Here we constrain conformal gravity with SNIa and Hubble parameter data and investigate whether it suffers from an age problem with the age of APM~08279+5255. We find conformal gravity can accommodate the age of APM~08279+5255 at 3 $\sigma$ deviation, unlike most of dark energy models which suffer from an age problem.Comment: 6 pages, 2 figure