Consciousness alterations in a cohort of young Swiss men: Associations with substance use and personality traits.

Substance-induced consciousness alterations (CA) have mainly been studied among users of psychedelics but not among people using street drugs. Explore occurrences of three different types of substance-induced CA [ego dissolution (ED), visual pseudo-hallucinations (VPH), anxiety/paranoia (A/P)] and their perceived influences on life, together with their associations with substance use and personality correlates in a general population sample of 25-year-old men. 2,796 young Swiss men lifetime substance users completed a self-report questionnaire including history of use (never, former, and current) of different substances categories (psychedelics, cocaine, psychostimulants, ecstasy, MDMA, and other drugs), substance-induced ego dissolution (ED), visual pseudo-hallucinations (VPH) and anxiety/paranoia (A/P), the influence of these CA experiences on life, and personality traits (sensation seeking, sociability, anxiety-neuroticism, and aggression-hostility). 32.2% reported at least one CA (i.e., ED, VPH or A/P), with 20.5% reporting ED, 16.7% VPH, and 14.6% A/P. Former and current use of psychedelics and ketamine was significantly associated with occurrences of all three types of CAs and with a positive influence of CA on life. Associations between the former and current use of other substances and the different types of CA were less consistent, and perceived influences on life were not statistically significant. Sociability was negatively associated with occurrences of all three types of CA. Positive associations were found between anxiety-neuroticism and ED and A/P, between aggression-hostility and A/P, and between sensation seeking and ED and VPH. This study supports the potential for psychedelics to induce CAs perceived as beneficial to life among people using street drugs, possibly reflecting the mechanism underlying the therapeutic potential of psychedelics

Unique versus shared associations between self-reported behavioral addictions and substance use disorders and mental health problems: A commonality analysis in a large sample of young Swiss men.

Behavioral addictions (BAs) and substance use disorders (SUDs) tend to co-occur; both are associated with mental health problems (MHPs). This study aimed to estimate the proportion of variance in the severity of MHPs explained by BAs and SUDs, individually and shared between addictions. A sample of 5,516 young Swiss men (mean = 25.47 years old; SD = 1.26) completed a self-reporting questionnaire assessing alcohol, cannabis, and tobacco use disorders, illicit drug use other than cannabis, six BAs (Internet, gaming, smartphone, Internet sex, gambling, and work) and four MHPs (major depression, attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder, social anxiety disorder, and borderline personality disorder). Commonality analysis was used to decompose the variance in the severity of MHPs explained (R <sup>2</sup> ) by BAs and SUDs into independent commonality coefficients. These were calculated for unique BA and SUD contributions and for all types of shared contributions. BAs and SUDs explained between a fifth and a quarter of the variance in severity of MHPs, but individual addictions explained only about half of this explained variance uniquely; the other half was shared between addictions. A greater proportion of variance was explained uniquely or shared within BAs compared to SUDs, especially for social anxiety disorder. The interactions of a broad range of addictions should be considered when investigating their associations with MHPs. BAs explain a larger part of the variance in MHPs than do SUDs and therefore play an important role in their interaction with MHPs

Image-guided Radiotherapy to Manage Respiratory Motion: Lung and Liver.

Organ motion as a result of respiratory and cardiac motion poses significant challenges for the accurate delivery of radiotherapy to both the thorax and the upper abdomen. Modern imaging techniques during radiotherapy simulation and delivery now permit better quantification of organ motion, which in turn reduces tumour and organ at risk position uncertainty. These imaging advances, coupled with respiratory correlated radiotherapy delivery techniques, have led to the development of a range of approaches to manage respiratory motion. This review summarises the key strategies of image-guided respiratory motion management with a focus on lung and liver radiotherapy

HARD PHOTON PRODUCTION IN NUCLEUS-NUCLEUS COLLISIONS AT 30 MeV/u AND 44 MeV/u

Doubly differential cross-sections for Bremsstrahlung production have been measured in the reactions 40Ar + 197Au at 30 MeV/u and 86Kr +12C, AgNat and 197Au at 44 MeV/u. A qualitative analysis of the characteristics of the γ-ray emission suggests strongly that the initial proton-neutron collisions are the main source of nuclear Bremsstrahlung

2013 Update in addiction medicine for the generalist.

Increasingly, patients with unhealthy alcohol and other drug use are being seen in primary care and other non-specialty addiction settings. Primary care providers are well positioned to screen, assess, and treat patients with alcohol and other drug use because this use, and substance use disorders, may contribute to a host of medical and mental health harms. We sought to identify and examine important recent advances in addiction medicine in the medical literature that have implications for the care of patients in primary care or other generalist settings. To accomplish this aim, we selected articles in the field of addiction medicine, critically appraised and summarized the manuscripts, and highlighted their implications for generalist practice. During an initial review, we identified articles through an electronic Medline search (limited to human studies and in English) using search terms for alcohol and other drugs of abuse published from January 2010 to January 2012. After this initial review, we searched for other literature in web-based or journal resources for potential articles of interest. From the list of articles identified in these initial reviews, each of the six authors independently selected articles for more intensive review and identified the ones they found to have a potential impact on generalist practice. The identified articles were then ranked by the number of authors who selected each article. Through a consensus process over 4 meetings, the authors reached agreement on the articles with implications for practice for generalist clinicians that warranted inclusion for discussion. The authors then grouped the articles into five categories: 1) screening and brief interventions in outpatient settings, 2) identification and management of substance use among inpatients, 3) medical complications of substance use, 4) use of pharmacotherapy for addiction treatment in primary care and its complications, and 5) integration of addiction treatment and medical care. The authors discuss each selected articles' merits, limitations, conclusions, and implication to advancing addiction screening, assessment, and treatment of addiction in generalist physician practice environments

The Swiss cohort study on substance use risk factors : findings of two waves

Aim: To summarize published findings in peer-reviewed journals of the first two waves of the Swiss Cohort Study on Substance Use Risk Factors (C-SURF), a longitudinal study assessing risk and protective factors of 5,987 young men during the phase of emerging adulthood (20 years at baseline, followed-up 15 months later). Methods: Included were 33 studies published until November 2014 focusing on substance use. Results: Substance use in early adulthood is a prevalent and stable behavior. The 12-month prevalence of nonmedical use of prescription drugs (10.6%) lies between that of cannabis (36.4%) and other illicit drugs such as ecstasy (3.7%) and cocaine (3.2%). Although peer pressure in the form of misconduct is associated with increased substance use, other aspects such as peer involvement in social activities may have beneficial effects. Regular sport activities are associated with reduced substance use, with the exception of alcohol use. Young men are susceptible to structural conditions such as the price of alcohol beverages or the density of on-premise alcohol outlets. Particularly alcohol use in public settings such as bars, discos or in parks (compared with private settings such as the home) is associated with alcohol-related harm, including injuries or violence. Being a single parent versus nuclear family has no effect on alcohol use, but active parenting does. Besides parenting, religiousness is an important protective factor for both legal and illegal substance use. Merely informing young men about the risks of substance use may not be an effective preventive measure. At-risk users of licit and illicit substances are more health literate, e. g., for example, they seek out more information on the internet than non-at-risk-users or abstainers. Discussion: There are a number of risk and protective substance use factors, but their associations with substance use do not necessarily agree with those found outside Europe. In the United States, for example, heavy alcohol use in this age group commonly takes place in private settings, whereas in Switzerland it more often takes place in public settings. Other behaviors, such as the nonmedical use of prescription drugs, appear to be similar to those found overseas, which may show the need for targeted preventive actions. C-SURF findings point to the necessity of establishing European studies to identify factors for designing specific preventive actions

Search for lepton-flavour-violating decays of Higgs-like bosons.

A search is presented for a Higgs-like boson with mass in the range 45 to 195 GeV/c2 decaying into a muon and a tau lepton. The dataset consists of proton-proton interactions at a centre-of-mass energy of 8 TeV , collected by the LHCb experiment, corresponding to an integrated luminosity of 2 fb-1 . The tau leptons are reconstructed in both leptonic and hadronic decay channels. An upper limit on the production cross-section multiplied by the branching fraction at 95% confidence level is set and ranges from 22 pb for a boson mass of 45 GeV/c2 to 4 pb for a mass of 195 GeV/c2

Observation of an Excited Bc+ State

Using pp collision data corresponding to an integrated luminosity of 8.5 fb-1 recorded by the LHCb experiment at center-of-mass energies of s=7, 8, and 13 TeV, the observation of an excited Bc+ state in the Bc+π+π- invariant-mass spectrum is reported. The observed peak has a mass of 6841.2±0.6(stat)±0.1(syst)±0.8(Bc+) MeV/c2, where the last uncertainty is due to the limited knowledge of the Bc+ mass. It is consistent with expectations of the Bc∗(2S31)+ state reconstructed without the low-energy photon from the Bc∗(1S31)+→Bc+γ decay following Bc∗(2S31)+→Bc∗(1S31)+π+π-. A second state is seen with a global (local) statistical significance of 2.2σ (3.2σ) and a mass of 6872.1±1.3(stat)±0.1(syst)±0.8(Bc+) MeV/c2, and is consistent with the Bc(2S10)+ state. These mass measurements are the most precise to date

Bose-Einstein correlations of same-sign charged pions in the forward region in pp collisions at √s=7 TeV

Bose-Einstein correlations of same-sign charged pions, produced in protonproton collisions at a 7 TeV centre-of-mass energy, are studied using a data sample collected by the LHCb experiment. The signature for Bose-Einstein correlations is observed in the form of an enhancement of pairs of like-sign charged pions with small four-momentum difference squared. The charged-particle multiplicity dependence of the Bose-Einstein correlation parameters describing the correlation strength and the size of the emitting source is investigated, determining both the correlation radius and the chaoticity parameter. The measured correlation radius is found to increase as a function of increasing charged-particle multiplicity, while the chaoticity parameter is seen to decreas