Exact solutions for a type of electron pairing model with spin-orbit interactions and Zeeman coupling

A type of electron pairing model with spin-orbit interactions or Zeeman coupling is solved exactly in the framework of the Richardson ansatz. Based on the exact solutions for the case with spin-orbit interactions, it is shown rigorously that the pairing symmetry is of the p + ip wave and the ground state possesses time-reversal symmetry, regardless of the strength of the pairing interaction. Intriguingly, how Majorana fermions can emerge in the system is also elaborated. Exact results are illustrated for two systems, respectively, with spin-orbit interactions and Zeeman coupling. © 2011 American Physical Society.published_or_final_versio

Disturbance Observer

Disturbance observer is an inner-loop output-feedback controller whose role is to reject external disturbances and to make the outer-loop baseline controller robust against plant's uncertainties. Therefore, the closed-loop system with the DOB approximates the nominal closed-loop by the baseline controller and the nominal plant model with no disturbances. This article presents how the disturbance observer works under what conditions, and how one can design a disturbance observer to guarantee robust stability and to recover the nominal performance not only in the steady-state but also for the transient response under large uncertainty and disturbance

Pure-glue hidden valleys through the Higgs portal

We consider the possibility that the Higgs boson can act as a link to a hidden sector in the context of pure-glue hidden valley models. In these models the standard model is weakly coupled, through loops of heavy messengers fields, to a hidden sector whose low energy dynamics is described by a pure-Yang-Mills theory. Such a hidden sector contains several metastable hidden glueballs. In this work we shall extend earlier results on hidden valleys to include couplings of the messengers to the standard model Higgs sector. The effective interactions at one-loop couple the hidden gluons to the standard model particles through the Higgs sector. These couplings in turn induce hidden glueball decays to fermion pairs, or cascade decays with multiple Higgs emission. The presence of effective operators of different mass dimensions, often competing with each other, together with a great diversity of states, leads to a great variability in the lifetimes and decay modes of the hidden glueballs. We find that most of the operators considered in this paper are not heavily constrained by precision electroweak physics, therefore leaving plenty of room in the parameter space to be explored by the future experiments at the LHC.Comment: 44 pages, 16 figures. Major revision for JHEP, corrected an error in Eq. 5.1, comments adde

Regulation of the Cardiac Na+/K+ ATPase by Phospholemman

Hansraj Dhayan, Rajender Kumar, Andreas Kukol, ‘Regulation of the Cardiac Na+/K+ ATPase by Phospholemman’, in Sajal Chakraborti, Naranjan Dhalla, eds., Regulation of Membrane Na+-K+ ATPase, (Switzerland: Springer, 2016), ISBN 978-3-319-24748-9, eISBN 978-3-319-24750-2.Peer reviewe

Ipsilateral common iliac artery plus femoral artery clamping for inducing sciatic nerve ischemia/reperfusion injury in rats: a reliable and simple method

The aim of this study was to develop a practical model of sciatic ischemia reperfusion (I/R) injury producing serious neurologic deficits and being technically feasible compared with the current time consuming or ineffective models. Thirty rats were divided into 6 groups (n = 5). Animal were anesthetized by using ketamine (50 mg/kg) and xylazine (4 mg/kg). Experimental groups included a sham-operated group and five I/R groups with different reperfusion time intervals (0 h, 3 h, 1 d, 4 d, 7 d). In I/R groups, the right common iliac artery and the right femoral artery were clamped for 3 hrs. Sham-operated animals underwent only laparotomy without induction of ischemia. Just before euthanasia, behavioral scores (based on gait, grasp, paw position, and pinch sensitivity) were obtained and then sciatic nerves were removed for light-microscopy studies (for ischemic fiber degeneration (IFD) and edema). Behavioral score deteriorated among the ischemic groups compared with the control group (p < 0.01), with maximal behavioral deficit occurring at 4 days of reperfusion. Axonal swelling and IFD were found to happen only after 4 and 7 days, respectively. Our observations led to an easy-to-use but strong enough method for inducing and studying I/R injury in peripheral nerves

Quantum-Dot Light-Emitting Diodes with Nitrogen-Doped Carbon Nanodot Hole Transport and Electronic Energy Transfer Layer

Electroluminescence efficiency is crucial for the application of quantum-dot light-emitting diodes (QD-LEDs) in practical devices. We demonstrate that nitrogen-doped carbon nanodot (N-CD) interlayer improves electrical and luminescent properties of QD-LEDs. The N-CDs were prepared by solution-based bottom up synthesis and were inserted as a hole transport layer (HTL) between other multilayer HTL heterojunction and the red-QD layer. The QD-LEDs with N-CD interlayer represented superior electrical rectification and electroluminescent efficiency than those without the N-CD interlayer. The insertion of N-CD layer was found to provoke the Forster resonance energy transfer (FRET) from N-CD to QD layer, as confirmed by time-integrated and - resolved photoluminescence spectroscopy. Moreover, hole-only devices (HODs) with N-CD interlayer presented high hole transport capability, and ultraviolet photoelectron spectroscopy also revealed that the N-CD interlayer reduced the highest hole barrier height. Thus, more balanced carrier injection with sufficient hole carrier transport feasibly lead to the superior electrical and electroluminescent properties of the QD-LEDs with N-CD interlayer. We further studied effect of N-CD interlayer thickness on electrical and luminescent performances for high-brightness QD-LEDs. The ability of the N-CD interlayer to improve both the electrical and luminescent characteristics of the QD-LEDs would be readily exploited as an emerging photoactive material for high-efficiency optoelectronic devices.ope

RNAseq Analyses Identify Tumor Necrosis Factor-Mediated Inflammation as a Major Abnormality in ALS Spinal Cord

ALS is a rapidly progressive, devastating neurodegenerative illness of adults that produces disabling weakness and spasticity arising from death of lower and upper motor neurons. No meaningful therapies exist to slow ALS progression, and molecular insights into pathogenesis and progression are sorely needed. In that context, we used high-depth, next generation RNA sequencing (RNAseq, Illumina) to define gene network abnormalities in RNA samples depleted of rRNA and isolated from cervical spinal cord sections of 7 ALS and 8 CTL samples. We aligned \u3e50 million 2X150 bp paired-end sequences/sample to the hg19 human genome and applied three different algorithms (Cuffdiff2, DEseq2, EdgeR) for identification of differentially expressed genes (DEG’s). Ingenuity Pathways Analysis (IPA) and Weighted Gene Co-expression Network Analysis (WGCNA) identified inflammatory processes as significantly elevated in our ALS samples, with tumor necrosis factor (TNF) found to be a major pathway regulator (IPA) and TNFα-induced protein 2 (TNFAIP2) as a major network “hub” gene (WGCNA). Using the oPOSSUM algorithm, we analyzed transcription factors (TF) controlling expression of the nine DEG/hub genes in the ALS samples and identified TF’s involved in inflammation (NFkB, REL, NFkB1) and macrophage function (NR1H2::RXRA heterodimer). Transient expression in human iPSC-derived motor neurons of TNFAIP2 (also a DEG identified by all three algorithms) reduced cell viability and induced caspase 3/7 activation. Using high-density RNAseq, multiple algorithms for DEG identification, and an unsupervised gene co-expression network approach, we identified significant elevation of inflammatory processes in ALS spinal cord with TNF as a major regulatory molecule. Overexpression of the DEG TNFAIP2 in human motor neurons, the population most vulnerable to die in ALS, increased cell death and caspase 3/7 activation. We propose that therapies targeted to reduce inflammatory TNFα signaling may be helpful in ALS patients

No difference in stroke knowledge between Korean adherents to traditional and western medicine – the AGE study: an epidemiological study

BACKGROUND: Effective stroke intervention and risk reduction depend on the general public's awareness and knowledge of stroke. In Korea, where both traditional Oriental medicine and Western medicine are practiced, estimates of the general public's awareness and knowledge of stroke are poor. The present study sought to describe the inception cohort of the Ansan Geriatric Study (AGE study) and to determine baseline stroke awareness and preferred medical treatment for stroke in this Korean sample. METHODS: A total of 2,767 subjects selected randomly from the Ansan Geriatric Study in South Korea were questioned about stroke. Their answers were compared with their sociodemographic data and other variables. RESULTS: Only 44.8% of participants correctly identified stroke as a vascular disease in the human brain. Sudden numbness or weakness was the most frequently identified stroke warning sign (60.2%). Hypertension (66.7%) and mental stress (62.2%) were most frequently identified as stroke risk factors. The contributions of diabetes mellitus and cardiovascular disease to stroke were underestimated; they were identified as risk factors by 28.3% and 18.6% of participants, respectively. The predictors for poor knowledge of stroke warning signs and risk factors were similar irrespective of preference for Western or Oriental medical treatment, and included those with lower levels of education and inaccurate definition of stroke. Television and radio (40.3%) were the most frequent sources of stroke information for both groups. CONCLUSION: This study shows that knowledge of stroke is similar among Koreans with preferences for either Western or Oriental medical treatment and that misunderstandings about stroke are common among the Korean elderly. In order to prevent and manage stroke effectively, public health education regarding basic concepts of stroke is necessary. This should target those with a lower level of education and a misunderstanding of the definition of stroke

TreeGraph 2: Combining and visualizing evidence from different phylogenetic analyses

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>Today it is common to apply multiple potentially conflicting data sources to a given phylogenetic problem. At the same time, several different inference techniques are routinely employed instead of relying on just one. In view of both trends it is becoming increasingly important to be able to efficiently compare different sets of statistical values supporting (or conflicting with) the nodes of a given tree topology, and merging this into a meaningful representation. A tree editor supporting this should also allow for flexible editing operations and be able to produce ready-to-publish figures.</p> <p>Results</p> <p>We developed TreeGraph 2, a GUI-based graphical editor for phylogenetic trees (available from <url>http://treegraph.bioinfweb.info</url>). It allows automatically combining information from different phylogenetic analyses of a given dataset (or from different subsets of the dataset), and helps to identify and graphically present incongruences. The program features versatile editing and formatting options, such as automatically setting line widths or colors according to the value of any of the unlimited number of variables that can be assigned to each node or branch. These node/branch data can be imported from spread sheets or other trees, be calculated from each other by specified mathematical expressions, filtered, copied from and to other internal variables, be kept invisible or set visible and then be freely formatted (individually or across the whole tree). Beyond typical editing operations such as tree rerooting and ladderizing or moving and collapsing of nodes, whole clades can be copied from other files and be inserted (along with all node/branch data and legends), but can also be manually added and, thus, whole trees can quickly be manually constructed de novo. TreeGraph 2 outputs various graphic formats such as SVG, PDF, or PNG, useful for tree figures in both publications and presentations.</p> <p>Conclusion</p> <p>TreeGraph 2 is a user-friendly, fully documented application to produce ready-to-publish trees. It can display any number of annotations in several ways, and permits easily importing and combining them. Additionally, a great number of editing- and formatting-operations is available.</p