Thermal quenches in N=2* plasmas

We exploit gauge/gravity duality to study `thermal quenches' in a plasma of the strongly coupled N=2* gauge theory. Specifically, we consider the response of an initial thermal equilibrium state of the theory under variations of the bosonic or fermionic mass, to leading order in m/T<<1. When the masses are made to vary in time, novel new counterterms must be introduced to renormalize the boundary theory. We consider transitions the conformal super-Yang-Mills theory to the mass deformed gauge theory and also the reverse transitions. By construction, these transitions are controlled by a characteristic time scale \calt and we show how the response of the system depends on the ratio of this time scale to the thermal time scale 1/T. The response shows interesting scaling behaviour both in the limit of fast quenches with T\calt<<1 and slow quenches with T\calt>>1. In the limit that T\calt\to\infty, we observe the expected adiabatic response. For fast quenches, the relaxation to the final equilibrium is controlled by the lowest quasinormal mode of the bulk scalar dual to the quenched operator. For slow quenches, the system relaxes with a (nearly) adiabatic response that is governed entirely by the late time profile of the mass. We describe new renormalization scheme ambiguities in defining gauge invariant observables for the theory with time dependant couplings.Comment: 78 pages, 17 figure

Predictors of nursing home admission of individuals without a dementia diagnosis before admission - results from the Leipzig Longitudinal Study of the Aged (LEILA 75+)

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>In previous decades a substantial number of community-based studies mostly including dementia cases examined predictors of nursing home admission (NHA) among elderly people. However, no one study has analysed predictors of NHA for individuals without developing dementia before NHA.</p> <p>Methods</p> <p>Data were derived from the Leipzig Longitudinal Study of the Aged, a population-based study of individuals aged 75 years and older. 1,024 dementia-free older adults were interviewed six times on average every 1.4 years. Socio-demographic, clinical, and psychometric variables were obtained. Kaplan-Meier estimates were used to determine mean time to NHA. Cox proportional hazards regression was used to examine predictors of long-term NHA.</p> <p>Results</p> <p>Of the overall sample, 7.8 percent of the non-demented elderly (n = 59) were admitted to nursing home (NH) during the study period. The mean time to NHA in the dementia-free sample was 7.6 years. Characteristics associated with a shorter time to NHA were increased age, living alone, functional and cognitive impairment, major depression, stroke, myocardial infarction, a low number of specialist visits and paid home helper use.</p> <p>Conclusions</p> <p>Severe physical or psychiatric diseases and living alone have a significant effect on NHA for dementia-free individuals. The findings offer potentialities of secondary prevention to avoid or delay NHA for these elderly individuals. Further investigation of predictors of institutionalization is warranted to advance understanding of the process leading to NHA for this important group.</p

The stigma of obesity in the general public and its implications for public health - a systematic review

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>Up to this date, prevalence rates of obesity are still rising. Aside from co-morbid diseases, perceived discrimination and stigmatization leads to worsen outcomes in obese individuals. Higher stigmatizing attitudes towards obese individuals may also result in less support of preventive and interventive measures. In light of the immense burden of obesity on health care systems and also on the individuals' quality of life, accepted and subsidized preventive measures are needed. Policy support might be determined by views of the lay public on causes of obesity and resulting weight stigma. This study seeks to answer how representative samples of the lay public perceive people with obesity or overweight status (stigmatizing attitudes); what these samples attribute obesity to (causal attribution) and what types of interventions are supported by the lay public and which factors determine that support (prevention support).</p> <p>Methods</p> <p>A systematic literature search was conducted. All studies of representative samples reporting results on (a) stigmatizing attitudes towards overweight and obese individuals, (b) causal beliefs and (c) prevention support were included.</p> <p>Results</p> <p>Only 7 articles were found. One study reported prevalence rates of stigmatizing attitudes. About a quarter of the population in Germany displayed definite stigmatizing attitudes. Other studies reported causal attributions. While external influences on weight are considered as well, it seems that internal factors are rated to be of higher importance. Across the studies found, regulative prevention is supported by about half of the population, while childhood prevention has highest approval rates. Results on sociodemographic determinants differ substantially.</p> <p>Conclusions</p> <p>Further research on public attitudes toward and perception of overweight and obesity is urgently needed to depict the prevailing degree of stigmatization. Introducing a multidimensional concept of the etiology of obesity to the lay public might be a starting point in stigma reduction.</p

On holographic thermalization and gravitational collapse of massless scalar fields

In this paper we study thermalization in a strongly coupled system via AdS/CFT. Initially, the energy is injected into the system by turning on a spatially homogenous scalar source coupled to a marginal composite operator. The thermalization process is studied by numerically solving Einstein's equations coupled to a massless scalar field in the Poincare patch of AdS_5. We define a thermalization time t_T on the AdS side, which has an interpretation in terms of a spacelike Wilson loop in CFT. Here T is the thermal equilibrium temperature. We study both cases with the source turned on in short(Delta t = 1/T) durations. In the former case, the thermalization time t_T = g_t/T <= 1/T and the coefficient g_t = 0.73 in the limit Delta t <= 0.02/T. In the latter case, we find double- and multiple-collapse solutions, which may be interpreted as the gravity duals of two- or multi-stage thermalization in CFT. In all the cases our results indicate that such a strongly coupled system thermalizes in a typical time scale t_T=O(1)/T.Comment: 25 papers, 13 figures, Minor modifications, details of numerics added, references added, final version to appear in JHE

Insulin degludec is not associated with a delayed or diminished response to hypoglycaemia compared with insulin glargine in type 1 diabetes: a double-blind randomised crossover study

Aims/hypothesis: Insulin degludec (Des(B30)LysB29(γ-Glu Nε-hexadecandioyl) human insulin; IDeg) is a new basal insulin with an ultra-long flat action profile. The acute physiological responses to hypoglycaemia with IDeg and insulin glargine (A21Gly,B31Arg,B32Arg human insulin; IGlar) were compared. Methods: Twenty-eight adult type 1 diabetic patients with normal hypoglycaemia awareness (age = 41 ± 12 years, HbA1c = 7.8 ± 0.6% [62.8 ± 7 mmol/mol]) were randomised to once-daily IDeg or IGlar for 5 days in a two-period crossover design. Participants and research staff were blinded to group assignment. Patients were assigned the lowest available randomisation number from a set of blinded randomisation codes provided by the trial sponsor. Hypoglycaemia was induced by administering three times the usual daily insulin dose at midnight on day 5. Plasma glucose (PG) was stabilised by glucose clamp (5.5 mmol/l) for 7–9 h post dosing. Next morning, PG was allowed to decrease stepwise from 5.5 to 3.5 mmol/l (maintained for 30 min) to 2.5 mmol/l (for 15 min). PG was then increased to 3.9 mmol/l (for 120 min), before being returned to baseline. Hypoglycaemic symptom score (HSS), hypoglycaemic awareness, cognitive function, counter-regulatory hormones and vital signs were assessed during each glucose plateau. The primary analysis was to compare IDeg vs IGlar with respect to HSS at nadir PG concentration (2.5 mmol/l). Results: The full analysis set for treatment comparisons comprised data from all 28 exposed patients. Rates of PG decline and PG at nadir were similar for IDeg and IGlar. No treatment differences in HSS (estimated difference: 0.17 [95% CI −1.71, 2.05]; p > 0.05), cognitive function or awareness were observed at any time. Growth hormone and cortisol responses during hypoglycaemia were greater with IDeg than IGlar (AUC treatment ratio [IDeg/IGlar]: 2.44 [1.30, 4.60], p < 0.01; and 1.23 [1.01, 1.50]; p < 0.05), and adrenaline (epinephrine) responses trended higher (1.40 [0.96, 2.04], p = 0.07). The rates of recovery from hypoglycaemia were similar. Conclusions/interpretation: IDeg and IGlar elicit comparable symptomatic and cognitive responses to induced hypoglycaemia. IDeg may elicit a moderately greater endocrine response, but times to PG recovery were similar for the two insulins

Walk well:a randomised controlled trial of a walking intervention for adults with intellectual disabilities: study protocol

Background - Walking interventions have been shown to have a positive impact on physical activity (PA) levels, health and wellbeing for adult and older adult populations. There has been very little work carried out to explore the effectiveness of walking interventions for adults with intellectual disabilities. This paper will provide details of the Walk Well intervention, designed for adults with intellectual disabilities, and a randomised controlled trial (RCT) to test its effectiveness. Methods/design - This study will adopt a RCT design, with participants allocated to the walking intervention group or a waiting list control group. The intervention consists of three PA consultations (baseline, six weeks and 12 weeks) and an individualised 12 week walking programme. A range of measures will be completed by participants at baseline, post intervention (three months from baseline) and at follow up (three months post intervention and six months from baseline). All outcome measures will be collected by a researcher who will be blinded to the study groups. The primary outcome will be steps walked per day, measured using accelerometers. Secondary outcome measures will include time spent in PA per day (across various intensity levels), time spent in sedentary behaviour per day, quality of life, self-efficacy and anthropometric measures to monitor weight change. Discussion - Since there are currently no published RCTs of walking interventions for adults with intellectual disabilities, this RCT will examine if a walking intervention can successfully increase PA, health and wellbeing of adults with intellectual disabilities

Primary de novo malignant giant cell tumor of kidney: a case report

BACKGROUND: Osteoclast-like giant cell tumors are usually observed in osseous tissue or as tumors of tendon sheath, characterized by the presence of multinucleated giant cells and mononuclear stromal cells. It has been reported in various extraosseous sites including breast, skin, soft tissue, salivary glands, lung, pancreas, female genital tract, thyroid, larynx and heart. However, extraosseus occurrence of such giant cell tumors in the kidney is extremely rare and is usually found in combination with a conventional malignancy. De-novo primary malignant giant cell tumors of the kidney are unusual lesions and to our knowledge this is the second such case. CASE PRESENTATION: We report a rare case of extraosseous primary denovo malignant giant cell tumor of the renal parenchyma in a 39-year-old Caucasian female to determine the histogenesis of this neoplasm with a detailed literature review. CONCLUSION: Primary denovo malignant giant cell tumor of the kidney is extremely rare. The cellular origin of this tumor is favored to be a pluripotential mesenchymal stromal cell of the mononuclear/phagocytic cellular lineage. Awareness of this neoplasm is important in the pathological interpretation of unusual findings at either fine needle aspiration or frozen section of solid renal masses

Phosphorus and Calcium

Peer Reviewedhttps://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/142245/1/ncp0021.pd

Pichinde virus induces microvascular endothelial cell permeability through the production of nitric oxide

This report is the first to demonstrate infection of human endothelial cells by Pichinde virus (PIC). PIC infection induces an upregulation of the inducible nitric oxide synthase gene; as well as an increase in detectable nitric oxide (NO). PIC induces an increase in permeability in endothelial cell monolayers which can be abrogated at all measured timepoints with the addition of a nitric oxide synthase inhibitor, indicating a role for NO in the alteration of endothelial barrier function. Because NO has shown antiviral activity against some viruses, viral titer was measured after addition of the NO synthase inhibitor and found to have no effect in altering virus load in infected EC. The NO synthase inhibition also has no effect on levels of activated caspases induced by PIC infection. Taken together, these data indicate NO production induced by Pichinde virus infection has a pathogenic effect on endothelial cell monolayer permeability