Pseudobinary Fe4Ti3S8 compound with a NiAs-type structure: Effect of Ti for Fe substitution

The transition metal sulfide Fe4Ti3S8 with 7:8 composition has been synthesized and studied by using X-ray diffraction, magnetization and electrical resistivity measurements. This compound exhibits a monoclinic crystal lattice (space group I12/m1). The substitution of Ti for Fe in Fe7S8 is found to result in a lowering of the Curie temperature (TC ≈ 205 K), in a larger value of the coercive field (Hc ∼ 9 kOe at low temperatures) and in a substantial growth of the resultant magnetic moment per formula unit (μFU) in comparison with Fe7S8. An enhanced value of μFU is attributed to the preferential substitution of Ti in alternating cation layers. From the paramagnetic susceptibility measured within temperature interval (250-350) K, a reduced value of the effective moment per iron (μFe ∼ 2.4μB) was determined. The electrical resistivity of Fe4Ti3S8 shows a non-metallic behavior and is affected by magnetic ordering. © 2013 Elsevier Masson SAS. All rights reserved

On the EDM Cancellations in D-brane models

We analyze the possibility of simultaneous electron, neutron, and mercury electric dipole moment (EDM) cancellations in the mSUGRA and D--brane models. We find that the mercury EDM constraint practically rules out the cancellation scenario in D-brane models whereas in the context of mSUGRA it is still allowed with some fine-tuning.Comment: 10 pages, to appear in Phys. Rev. Let

Effects of CP Violation on Event Rates in the Direct Detection of Dark Matter

A full analytic analysis of the effects of CP violating phases on the event rates in the direct detection of dark matter in the scattering of neutralinos from nuclear targets is given. The analysis includes CP violating phases in softly broken supersymmetry in the framework of the minimal supersymmetric standard model (MSSM) when generational mixings are ignored. A numerical analysis shows that large CP violating phases including the constraints from the experimental limits on the neutron and the electron electric dipole moment (EDM) can produce substantial effects on the event rates in dark matter detectors.Comment: 17 pages, LaTex, including 2 figures; revised version to appear in the Physical Review

Expression of biomarkers (p53, transforming growth factor alpha, epidermal growth factor receptor, c-erbB-2/neu and the proliferative cell nuclear antigen) in oropharyngeal squamous cell carcinomas

Using immunohistochemistry, expression of p53, transforming growth factor-alpha (TGF-α), epidermal growth factor receptor (EGFR), c-erbB-2/neu and proliferating cell nuclear antigen (PCNA) was examined in 26 fresh frozen tissue specimens of oropharyngeal squamous cell carcinomas (SCCs). p53 gene mutations were examined by polymerase chain reaction (PCR)/DNA sequencing methods in 22 carcinomas. The findings were examined for correlations with patients’ clinicopathological parameters. Expressions of p53 and PCNA were also examined in 21 formalin-fixed corresponding tissues. Of the fresh frozen tissue specimens, 77% (20/26) showed expression and 68% (15/22) showed mutations (substitutions) of the p53, with significant clustering of the mutations in exons 5 (8/22; 36%), 7 (4/22; 18%) and 8 (5/22; 23%). No mutations were found in exon 6. There was a discordance between expression of p53 protein and mutations of the gene. Parallel to expression and mutations of the p53 found in most of the specimens, expression of TGF-α, EGFR, c-erbB-2/neu and PCNA was found in 88% (22/25), 92% (23/25), 58% (14/24) and 91% (21/23) of the specimens, respectively. For the formalin-fixed tissue specimens, 62% (13/21) and 90% (19/21) expressed p53 and PCNA, respectively. Examining for correlations with patients’ clinicopathological parameters, expression of p53, TGF-α, EGFR and c-erbB-2/neu seemed to negatively correlate with the increase of the tumour grade. The present work suggests that: (1) lack of negative growth regulation due to inactivation of the p53 gene together with activation of other proto-oncogenes are necessary genetic events in the carcinogenesis of oropharyngeal SCCs; (2) in oropharyngeal SCCs, p53 gene mutations were clustered in exons 5 (codons 130–186), 7 (codons 230–248) and 8 (codons 271–282) which perhaps suggests that tobacco carcinogens probably affect the mutational hot spots of the p53 gene at codons 157, 175, 186, 248, 273 and 282; and (3) fresh frozen and formalin-fixed tissue specimens give similar results when an immunohistochemical method is applied. The importance of p53, TGF-α, EGFR, c-erbB-2/neu and PCNA as biomarkers in oropharyngeal SCCs deserves particular attention because it might offer further understanding of the development of these carcinomas

Development Of Al-B-C Master Alloy Under External Fields

This study investigates the application of external fields in the development of an Al-B-C alloy, with the aim of synthesizing in situ Al3BC particles. A combination of ultrasonic cavitation and distributive mixing was applied for uniform dispersion of insoluble graphite particles in the Al melt, improving their wettability and its subsequent incorporation into the Al matrix. Lower operating temperatures facilitated the reduction in the amount of large clusters of reaction phases, with Al3BC being identified as the main phase in XRD analysis. The distribution of Al3BC particles was quantitatively evaluated. Grain refinement experiments reveal that Al-B-C alloy can act as a master alloy for Al-4Cu and AZ91D alloys, with average grain size reduction around 50% each at 1wt%Al-1.5B-2C additions

Phases in the gaugino sector: direct reconstruction of the basic parameters and impact on the neutralino pair production

We consider recovering analytically the (generally complex) parameters $\mu$, $M_1$ and $M_2$ of the gaugino and Higgsino Lagrangian, from appropriate physical input in the chargino and neutralino sectors. For given $\tan\beta$, we obtain very simple analytic solutions for $M_2$, $| \mu|$, $Arg[\mu]$ in the chargino sector and a twofold $| M_1 |$, $Arg[M_1]$ analytic solution in the neutralino sector, assuming two chargino, two neutralino masses, and one of the chargino mixing angles as physical input. The twofold ambiguity in the neutralino parameters reconstruction may be essentially resolved by measuring the $e^+e^- \to \chi^0_1 \chi^0_2$ production cross-section at future linear collider energies, which we study explicitly with the phase dependences. Some salient features and specific properties of this complex case gaugino "spectrum inversion" are illustrated and compared with the similar inversion in the real case. In particular, our algorithms exhibit in a direct and transparent way the non-trivial theoretical correlation among the chargino and neutralino parameters, and the resulting allowed domains when only a subset of the required physical input masses and production cross-sections is known.Comment: Latex, 28 pages, 10 figure

Dynamical relaxation of the CP phases in next-to-minimal supersymmetry

After promoting the phases of the soft masses to dynamical fields corresponding to Goldstone bosons of spontaneously broken global symmetries in the supersymmetry breaking sector, the next-to-minimal supersymmetric model is found to solve the $\mu$ problem and the strong CP problem simultaneously with an invisible axion. The domain wall problem persists in the form of axionic domain formation. Relaxation dynamics of the physical CP-violating phases is determined only by the short-distance physics and their relaxation values are not necessarily close to the CP-conserving points. Having observable supersymmetric CP violation and avoiding the axionic domain walls both require nonminimal flavor structures.Comment: 13 pp, 3 figs, published versio

Effect of iron substitution by cobalt on the crystal structure and phase transition of Fe7-yCoyX8 (X = S, Se) compounds

This work was supported by RFBR (project 13-02-00364) and by the program of the Ural Branch of RAS (project No 15-17-2-22

μ→eγ\mu \to e \gamma and μ→3e\mu \to 3e processes with polarized muons and supersymmetric grand unified theories

$\mu^{+} \to e^{+} \gamma$ and $\mu^{+} \to e^{+}e^{+}e^{-}$ processes are analyzed in detail with polarized muons in supersymmetric grand unified theories. We first present Dalitz plot distribution for $\mu^{+} \to e^{+}e^{+}e^{-}$ decay based on effective Lagrangian with general lepton-flavor-violating couplings and define various P- and T-odd asymmetries. We calculate branching ratios and asymmetries in supersymmetric SU(5) and SO(10) models taking into account complex soft supersymmetry breaking terms. Imposing constraints from experimental bounds on the electron, neutron and atomic electric dipole moments, we find that the T-odd asymmetry for $\mu^{+} \to e^{+}e^{+}e^{-}$ can be 15% in the SU(5) case. P-odd asymmetry with respect to muon polarization for $\mu^{+} \to e^{+} \gamma$ varies from -20% to -100% for the SO(10) model while it is $+100$ in the SU(5) case. We also show that the P-odd asymmetries in $\mu^{+} \to e^{+}e^{+}e^{-}$ and the ratio of $\mu^{+} \to e^{+}e^{+}e^{-}$ and $\mu^{+} \to e^{+} \gamma$ branching fractions are useful to distinguish different models.Comment: 52 pages, 15 figure

An Efficient Metadynamics-Based Protocol To Model the Binding Affinity and the Transition State Ensemble of G-Protein-Coupled Receptor Ligands

A generally applicable metadynamics scheme for predicting the free energy profile of ligand binding to G-protein-coupled receptors (GPCRs) is described. A common and effective collective variable (CV) has been defined using the ideally placed and highly conserved Trp6.48 as a reference point for ligand–GPCR distance measurement and the common orientation of GPCRs in the cell membrane. Using this single CV together with well-tempered multiple-walker metadynamics with a funnel-like boundary allows an efficient exploration of the entire ligand binding path from the extracellular medium to the orthosteric binding site, including vestibule and intermediate sites. The protocol can be used with X-ray structures or high-quality homology models (based on a high-quality template and after thorough refinement) for the receptor and is universally applicable to agonists, antagonists, and partial and reverse agonists. The root-mean-square error (RMSE) in predicted binding free energies for 12 diverse ligands in five receptors (a total of 23 data points) is surprisingly small (less than 1 kcal mol–1). The RMSEs for simulations that use receptor X-ray structures and homology models are very similar