High-Definition Optical Coherence Tomography for the in vivo Detection of Demodex Mites

Background: Demodex mites are involved in different skin diseases and are commonly detected by skin scrape tests or superficial biopsies. A new high-definition optical coherence tomography (HD-OCT) with high lateral and axial resolution in a horizontal (en-face) and vertical (slice) imaging mode might offer the possibility of noninvasive and fast in vivo examination of demodex mites. Methods: Twenty patients with demodex-related skin diseases and 20 age- and gender-matched healthy controls were examined by HD-OCT. Mites per follicle and follicles per field of view were counted and compared to skin scrape tests. Results: HD-OCT images depicted mites in the en-face mode as bright round dots in groups of 3-5 mites per hair follicle. In the patients with demodex-related disease, a mean number of 3.4 mites per follicle were detected with a mean number of 2.9 infested follicles per area of view compared to a mean of 0.6 mites in 0.4 infested follicles in the controls. The skin scrape tests were negative in 21% of the patients. Conclusion: The innovative HD-OCT enables fast and noninvasive in vivo recognition of demodex mites and might become a useful tool in the diagnosis and treatment monitoring of demodex-related skin diseases. Copyright (C) 2012 S. Karger AG, Base

Simultaneous Water Vapor and Dry Air Optical Path Length Measurements and Compensation with the Large Binocular Telescope Interferometer

The Large Binocular Telescope Interferometer uses a near-infrared camera to measure the optical path length variations between the two AO-corrected apertures and provide high-angular resolution observations for all its science channels (1.5-13 $\mu$m). There is however a wavelength dependent component to the atmospheric turbulence, which can introduce optical path length errors when observing at a wavelength different from that of the fringe sensing camera. Water vapor in particular is highly dispersive and its effect must be taken into account for high-precision infrared interferometric observations as described previously for VLTI/MIDI or the Keck Interferometer Nuller. In this paper, we describe the new sensing approach that has been developed at the LBT to measure and monitor the optical path length fluctuations due to dry air and water vapor separately. After reviewing the current performance of the system for dry air seeing compensation, we present simultaneous H-, K-, and N-band observations that illustrate the feasibility of our feedforward approach to stabilize the path length fluctuations seen by the LBTI nuller.Comment: SPIE conference proceeding

Associations between anxiety, body mass index, and sex hormones in women

Background: Several studies have shown a positive association between anxiety and obesity, particularly in women. We aimed to study whether sex hormone alterations related to obesity might play a role in this association. Patients and methods: Data for this study were obtained from a population-based cohort study (the LIFE-Adult-Study). A total of 3,124 adult women (970 premenopausal and 2,154 postmenopausal) were included into the analyses. The anxiety symptomatology was assessed using the GAD-7 questionnaire (cut-off ≥ 10 points). Sex hormones were measured from fasting serum samples. Results: We did not find significant differences in anxiety prevalence in premenopausal obese women compared with normal-weight controls (4.8% vs. 5.5%). Both obesity and anxiety symptomatology were separately associated with the same sex hormone alteration in premenopausal women: higher total testosterone level (0.97 ± 0.50 in obese vs. 0.86 ± 0.49 nmol/L in normal-weight women, p = 0.026 and 1.04 ± 0.59 in women with vs. 0.88 ± 0.49 nmol/L in women without anxiety symptomatology, p = 0.023). However, women with anxiety symptomatology had non-significantly higher estradiol levels than women without anxiety symptomatology (548.0 ± 507.6 vs. 426.2 ± 474.0 pmol/L), whereas obesity was associated with lower estradiol levels compared with those in normal-weight group (332.7 ± 386.5 vs. 470.8 ± 616.0 pmol/L). Women with anxiety symptomatology had also significantly higher testosterone and estradiol composition (p = 0.006). No associations of sex hormone levels and BMI with anxiety symptomatology in postmenopausal women were found. Conclusions: Although both obesity and anxiety symptomatology were separately associated with higher testosterone level, there was an opposite impact of anxiety and obesity on estradiol levels in premenopausal women. We did not find an evidence that the sex hormone alterations related to obesity are playing a significant role in anxiety symptomatology in premenopausal women. This could be the explanation why we did not find an association between obesity and anxiety. In postmenopausal women, other mechanisms seem to work than in the premenopausal group

LBT observations of the HR 8799 planetary system: First detection of HR8799e in H band

We have performed H and Ks band observations of the planetary system around HR 8799 using the new AO system at the Large Binocular Telescope and the PISCES Camera. The excellent instrument performance (Strehl ratios up to 80% in H band) enabled detection the inner planet HR8799e in the H band for the first time. The H and Ks magnitudes of HR8799e are similar to those of planets c and d, with planet e slightly brighter. Therefore, HR8799e is likely slightly more massive than c and d. We also explored possible orbital configurations and their orbital stability. We confirm that the orbits of planets b, c and e are consistent with being circular and coplanar; planet d should have either an orbital eccentricity of about 0.1 or be non-coplanar with respect to b and c. Planet e can not be in circular and coplanar orbit in a 4:2:1 mean motion resonances with c and d, while coplanar and circular orbits are allowed for a 5:2 resonance. The analysis of dynamical stability shows that the system is highly unstable or chaotic when planetary masses of about 5 MJup for b and 7 MJup for the other planets are adopted. Significant regions of dynamical stability for timescales of tens of Myr are found when adopting planetary masses of about 3.5, 5, 5, and 5 Mjup for HR 8799 b, c, d, and e respectively. These masses are below the current estimates based on the stellar age (30 Myr) and theoretical models of substellar objects.Comment: 13 pages, 10 figures, A&A, accepte

Heavy Quark Spectroscopy -- Theory Overview

Some recent discoveries in the spectroscopy of hadrons containing heavy quarks, and some of their theoretical interpretations, are reviewed.Comment: 13 pages, 6 figures. Presented at Second Meeting of APS Topical Group on Hadron Physics, Nashville, TN, 22-24. Proceedings to be published by Journal of Physics (UK), Conference Series. Uses jpconf.cls, jpconf11.clo. Some corrections; references update

Improved Upper Limit on the Neutrino Mass from a Direct Kinematic Method by KATRIN.

We report on the neutrino mass measurement result from the first four-week science run of the Karlsruhe Tritium Neutrino experiment KATRIN in spring 2019. Beta-decay electrons from a high-purity gaseous molecular tritium source are energy analyzed by a high-resolution MAC-E filter. A fit of the integrated electron spectrum over a narrow interval around the kinematic end point at 18.57 keV gives an effective neutrino mass square value of (-1.0_{-1.1}^{+0.9})  eV^{2}. From this, we derive an upper limit of 1.1 eV (90% confidence level) on the absolute mass scale of neutrinos. This value coincides with the KATRIN sensitivity. It improves upon previous mass limits from kinematic measurements by almost a factor of 2 and provides model-independent input to cosmological studies of structure formation

Observation of a near-threshold omega-J/psi mass enhancement in exclusive B-->K omega J/psi decays

We report the observation of a near-threshold enhancement in the omega-J/psi invariant mass distribution for exclusive B-->K omega J/psi decays. The results are obtained from a 253 fb-1 data sample that contains 275 million BB-bar meson pairs that were collected near the Upsilon(4S) resonance with the Belle detector at the KEKB asymmetric energy e+e- collider. The statistical significance of the omega-J/psi mass enhancement is estimated to be greater than 8 sigma.Comment: 12 pages, 4 figures, submitted to Physical Review Letter

Observation of B0->pi0pi0

We report the first observation of the decay B0->pi0pi0, using a 253/fb data sample collected at the Upsilon(4S) resonance with the Belle detector at the KEKB e+e- collider. The measured branching fraction is BF(B0->pi0pi0) = {2.32 +0.4-0.5(stat) +0.2-0.3(syst)} x 10^-6, with a significance of 5.8 standard deviations including systematic uncertainties. We also make the first measurement of the direct CP violating asymmetry in this mode.Comment: 6 pages, 2 figures, submitted to ICHEP04, Beijing and Physical Review Letters. v2: a possible pile-up background is checked and a systematic error for it is include