Circulating Biologically Active Adrenomedullin Predicts Organ Failure and Mortality in Sepsis

BACKGROUND: Sepsis is a life-threatening organ dysfunction caused by a dysregulated host response to infection. Biologically active adrenomedullin (bio-ADM) is an emerging biomarker for sepsis. We explored whether bio-ADM concentration could predict severity, organ failure, and 30-day mortality in septic patients. METHODS: In 215 septic patients (109 patients with sepsis; 106 patients with septic shock), bio-ADM concentration was measured at diagnosis of sepsis, using sphingotest bio-ADM (Sphingotec GmbH, Hennigsdorf, Germany) and analyzed in terms of sepsis severity, vasopressor use, and 30-day mortality. The number of organ failures, sequential (sepsis-related) organ failure assessment (SOFA) score, and 30-day mortality were compared according to bio-ADM quartiles. RESULTS: Bio-ADM concentration was significantly higher in patients with septic shock, vasopressor use, and non-survivors than in patients with solitary sepsis, no vasopressor use, and survivors, respectively (all P<0.0001). Bio-ADM quartiles were associated with the number of organ failures (P<0.0001), as well as SOFA cardiovascular, renal, coagulation, and liver subscores (all P<0.05). The 30-day mortality rate showed a stepwise increase in each bio-ADM quartile (all P<0.0001). Bio-ADM concentration and SOFA score equally predicted the 30-day mortality (area under the curve: 0.827 vs 0.830). CONCLUSIONS: Bio-ADM could serve as a useful and objective biomarker to predict severity, organ failure, and 30-day mortality in septic patients

Zeeman smearing of the Coulomb blockade

Charge fluctuations of a large quantum dot coupled to a two-dimensional lead via a single-mode good Quantum Point Contact (QPC) and capacitively coupled to a back-gate, are investigated in the presence of a parallel magnetic field. The Zeeman term induces an asymmetry between transmission probabilities for the spin-up and spin-down channels at the QPC, producing noticeable effects on the quantization of the grain charge already at low magnetic fields. Performing a quantitative analysis, I show that the capacitance between the gate and the lead exhibits - instead of a logarithmic singularity - a reduced peak as a function of gate voltage. Experimental applicability is discussed.Comment: 5 pages, 3 figures (Final version

Acute alcohol administration dampens central extended amygdala reactivity.

Alcohol use is common, imposes a staggering burden on public health, and often resists treatment. The central extended amygdala (EAc)-including the bed nucleus of the stria terminalis (BST) and the central nucleus of the amygdala (Ce)-plays a key role in prominent neuroscientific models of alcohol drinking, but the relevance of these regions to acute alcohol consumption in humans remains poorly understood. Using a single-blind, randomized-groups design, multiband fMRI data were acquired from 49 social drinkers while they performed a well-established emotional faces paradigm after consuming either alcohol or placebo. Relative to placebo, alcohol significantly dampened reactivity to emotional faces in the BST. To rigorously assess potential regional differences in activation, data were extracted from unbiased, anatomically predefined regions of interest. Analyses revealed similar levels of dampening in the BST and Ce. In short, alcohol transiently reduces reactivity to emotional faces and it does so similarly across the two major divisions of the human EAc. These observations reinforce the translational relevance of addiction models derived from preclinical work in rodents and provide new insights into the neural systems most relevant to the consumption of alcohol and to the initial development of alcohol abuse in humans

Critical Ising modes in low-dimensional Kondo insulators

We present an Ising-like intermediate phase for one-dimensional Kondo insulator systems. Resulting from a spinon splitting, its low-energy excitations are critical Ising modes, whereas the triplet sector has a spectral gap. It should occur as long as the RKKY oscillation amplitude dominates over any direct exchange between localized spins. The chiral fixed point, however, becomes unstable in the far Infra-Red limit due to prevalent fluctuations among localized spins which induce gapless triplet excitations in the spectrum. Based on previous numerical results, we obtain a paramagnetic disordered state ruled by the correlation length of the single impurity Kondo model.Comment: 7 pages, RevTeX; last version: to be published in Physical Review

Plasma density measurements using chirped pulse broad-band Raman amplification

Stimulated Raman backscattering is used as a non-destructive method to determine the density of plasma media at localized positions in space and time. By colliding two counter-propagating, ultra-short laser pulses with a spectral bandwidth larger than twice the plasma frequency, amplification occurs at the Stokes wavelengths, which results in regions of gain and loss separated by twice the plasma frequency, from which the plasma density can be deduced. By varying the relative delay between the laser pulses, and therefore the position and timing of the interaction, the spatio-temporal distribution of the plasma density can be mapped out

Simulation of electromagnetically and magnetically induced transparency in a magnetized plasma

Electromagnetically induced transparency (EIT), a phenomenon well known in atomic systems, has a natural analogy in a classical magnetized plasma. The magnetized plasma has a resonance for right-hand polarized electromagnetic waves at the electron cyclotron frequency Omega(0), so that a probe wave with frequency omega(1) = Omega(0) cannot propagate through the plasma. The plasma can be made transparent to such a probe by the presence of a pump wave. The pump may be an electromagnetic wave or magnetostatic wiggler. Simulations and theory show that the physical reason for the transparency is that the beating of the probe wave with the pump wave sets up a plasma oscillation, and the upper sideband of the pump wave cancels the resonant plasma current due to the probe. The theory of plasma EIT derived here extends that found in the earlier work to include the effects of the lower sideband of the pump and renormalization of the plasma frequency and an analysis of the transient response. A detailed comparison of theory to one-dimensional particle-in-cell simulations is presented and estimates for the performance ion accelerator using the EIT interaction are given. The dispersion relation and estimates for the phase velocity and amplitude of the plasma wave are in good agreement with particle-in-cell simulations.open151