6,500 research outputs found
Critical Behaviour of Superfluid He in Aerogel
We report on Monte Carlo studies of the critical behaviour of superfluid
He in the presence of quenched disorder with long-range fractal
correlations. According to the heuristic argument by Harris, uncorrelated
disorder is irrelevant when the specific heat critical exponent is
negative, which is the case for the pure He. However, experiments on helium
in aerogel
have shown that the superfluid density critical exponent changes. We
hypothesize that this is a cross-over effect due to the fractal nature of
aerogel. Modelling the aerogel as an incipient percolating cluster in 3D and
weakening the bonds at the fractal sites, we perform XY-model simulations,
which demonstrate an increase in from
for the pure case to an apparent value of in the presence of
the fractal disorder, provided that the helium correlation length does not
exceed the fractal correlation length.Comment: 4 pages, RevTex, 3 postscript figures, LaTeX file and figures have
been uuencoded
Dwarf Galaxy Discoveries from the KMTNet Supernova Program III. the Milky-Way Analog NGC~2997 Group
We present the discovery of 48 new and the analysis of 55, including 7
previously discovered, dwarf galaxy candidates around the giant spiral galaxy
NGC~2997 using deep images from the KMTNet Supernova Program. Their
-band central surface brightness and total absolute magnitudes range between
20.3--26.7 mag arcsec and --(8.02--17.69) mag, respectively, while the
-band effective radii are between 0.14 and 2.97 kpc. We obtain
--1.43 0.02 for the faint-end slope of their luminosity
function, comparable to previously measured values but shallower than
theoretical predictions based on CDM models. The distance-independent
distributions of their mass and color from the host galaxy NGC~2997 suggest
that the group could be dynamically young, prior to the development of
significant mass segregation or radial color gradients. The systematically
bluer colors of the brighter candidates than the fainter ones indicate higher
star formation activities in brighter members. We suggest that the higher-mass
dwarf galaxies in the group have maintained star-formation activities by
effectively retaining gas content, while environmental quenching is only
effective for the lower-mass galaxies. The interpretation of early evolutionary
stage of this group is also consistent with the overall morphological
distribution of the dwarf galaxy candidates showing a lack of morphologically
evolved candidates but a plethora of irregularly shaped ones. Our detection
rate of dwarf galaxy candidates in the NGC~2997 group and their inferred star
formation activities are largely comparable to those found in Milky Way analog
systems from the SAGA survey within the magnitude limit M --13
mag, as well as those found in the ELVES survey
Genetic load and transgenic mitigating genes in transgenic \u3ci\u3eBrassica rapa\u3c/i\u3e (field mustard) × \u3ci\u3eBrassica napus\u3c/i\u3e (oilseed rape) hybrid populations
Abstract Background
One theoretical explanation for the relatively poor performance of Brassica rapa (weed) × Brassica napus (crop) transgenic hybrids suggests that hybridization imparts a negative genetic load. Consequently, in hybrids genetic load could overshadow any benefits of fitness enhancing transgenes and become the limiting factor in transgenic hybrid persistence. Two types of genetic load were analyzed in this study: random/linkage-derived genetic load, and directly incorporated genetic load using a transgenic mitigation (TM) strategy. In order to measure the effects of random genetic load, hybrid productivity (seed yield and biomass) was correlated with crop- and weed-specific AFLP genomic markers. This portion of the study was designed to answer whether or not weed × transgenic crop hybrids possessing more crop genes were less competitive than hybrids containing fewer crop genes. The effects of directly incorporated genetic load (TM) were analyzed through transgene persistence data. TM strategies are proposed to decrease transgene persistence if gene flow and subsequent transgene introgression to a wild host were to occur. Results
In the absence of interspecific competition, transgenic weed × crop hybrids benefited from having more crop-specific alleles. There was a positive correlation between performance and number of B. napus crop-specific AFLP markers [seed yield vs. marker number (r = 0.54, P = 0.0003) and vegetative dry biomass vs. marker number (r = 0.44, P = 0.005)]. However under interspecific competition with wheat or more weed-like conditions (i.e. representing a situation where hybrid plants emerge as volunteer weeds in subsequent cropping systems), there was a positive correlation between the number of B. rapa weed-specific AFLP markers and seed yield (r = 0.70, P = 0.0001), although no such correlation was detected for vegetative biomass. When genetic load was directly incorporated into the hybrid genome, by inserting a fitness-mitigating dwarfing gene that that is beneficial for crops but deleterious for weeds (a transgene mitigation measure), there was a dramatic decrease in the number of transgenic hybrid progeny persisting in the population. Conclusion
The effects of genetic load of crop and in some situations, weed alleles might be beneficial under certain environmental conditions. However, when genetic load was directly incorporated into transgenic events, e.g., using a TM construct, the number of transgenic hybrids and persistence in weedy genomic backgrounds was significantly decreased
Statistical Modeling of Single Target Cell Encapsulation
High throughput drop-on-demand systems for separation and encapsulation of individual target cells from heterogeneous mixtures of multiple cell types is an emerging method in biotechnology that has broad applications in tissue engineering and regenerative medicine, genomics, and cryobiology. However, cell encapsulation in droplets is a random process that is hard to control. Statistical models can provide an understanding of the underlying processes and estimation of the relevant parameters, and enable reliable and repeatable control over the encapsulation of cells in droplets during the isolation process with high confidence level. We have modeled and experimentally verified a microdroplet-based cell encapsulation process for various combinations of cell loading and target cell concentrations. Here, we explain theoretically and validate experimentally a model to isolate and pattern single target cells from heterogeneous mixtures without using complex peripheral systems.Wallace H. Coulter Foundation (Young Investigator in Bioengineering Award)National Institutes of Health (U.S.) (Grant R01AI081534)National Institutes of Health (U.S.) (Grant R21AI087107
- …