894 research outputs found
Fluctuations in a general preferential attachment model via Stein's method
We consider a general preferential attachment model, where the probability
that a newly arriving vertex connects to an older vertex is proportional to a
sublinear function of the indegree of the older vertex at that time. It is well
known that the distribution of a uniformly chosen vertex converges to a
limiting distribution. Depending on the parameters, this model can show power
law, but also stretched exponential behaviour. Using Stein's method we provide
rates of convergence for the total variation distance. Our proof uses the fact
that the limiting distribution is the stationary distribution of a Markov chain
together with the generator method of Barbour
Protein sequence and structure: Is one more fundamental than the other?
We argue that protein native state structures reside in a novel "phase" of
matter which confers on proteins their many amazing characteristics. This phase
arises from the common features of all globular proteins and is characterized
by a sequence-independent free energy landscape with relatively few low energy
minima with funnel-like character. The choice of a sequence that fits well into
one of these predetermined structures facilitates rapid and cooperative
folding. Our model calculations show that this novel phase facilitates the
formation of an efficient route for sequence design starting from random
peptides.Comment: 7 pages, 4 figures, to appear in J. Stat. Phy
Diffractive Meson Production and the Quark-Pomeron Coupling
Diffractive meson production at HERA offers interesting possibilities to
investigate diffractive processes and thus to learn something about the
properties of the pomeron. The most succesful phenomenological description of
the pomeron so far assumes it to couple like a isoscalar photon to
single quarks. This coupling leads, however, to problems for exclusive
diffractive reactions. We propose a new phenomenological pomeron vertex, which
leads to very good fits to the known data, but avoids the problems of the old
vertex.Comment: 20 pages, latex with uuencoded postscript, revised versio
Tumor stroma-derived TGF-beta limits Myc-driven lymphomagenesis via Suv39h1-dependent senescence
Activated RAS/BRAF oncogenes induce cellular senescence as a tumor-suppressive barrier in early cancer development, at least in part, via an oncogene-evoked DNA damage response (DDR). In contrast, Myc activation-although producing a DDR as well-is known to primarily elicit an apoptotic countermeasure. Using the Emu-myc transgenic mouse lymphoma model, we show here in vivo that apoptotic lymphoma cells activate macrophages to secrete transforming growth factor beta (TGF-beta) as a critical non-cell-autonomous inducer of cellular senescence. Accordingly, neutralization of TGF-beta action, like genetic inactivation of the senescence-related histone methyltransferase Suv39h1, significantly accelerates Myc-driven tumor development via cancellation of cellular senescence. These findings, recapitulated in human aggressive B cell lymphomas, demonstrate that tumor-prompted stroma-derived signals may limit tumorigenesis by feedback senescence induction
Cash transfers in adolescence: a developmental perspective
Low-income and middle-income countries have increasingly relied on cash transfer programmes to expand social protection among the most poor and vulnerable people. Many of these cash transfer programmes have given cash directly to adolescents to incentivise behaviour that improve a range of health and social outcomes. The evidence for the effectiveness of these programmes has been mixed. Some studies show cash transfer to be effective in promoting desired behaviours among adolescentsâsuch as school participation and reducing sexually transmitted infectionsâwhereas others find no evidence for an effect. One possible reason for these mixed results is that cash transfer programmes targeting adolescents have not taken into account the many biological, cognitive, and social changes that occur during this transitional period, thus failing to incorporate a developmental perspective in the design
The Crossing Statistic: Dealing with Unknown Errors in the Dispersion of Type Ia Supernovae
We propose a new statistic that has been designed to be used in situations
where the intrinsic dispersion of a data set is not well known: The Crossing
Statistic. This statistic is in general less sensitive than `chi^2' to the
intrinsic dispersion of the data, and hence allows us to make progress in
distinguishing between different models using goodness of fit to the data even
when the errors involved are poorly understood. The proposed statistic makes
use of the shape and trends of a model's predictions in a quantifiable manner.
It is applicable to a variety of circumstances, although we consider it to be
especially well suited to the task of distinguishing between different
cosmological models using type Ia supernovae. We show that this statistic can
easily distinguish between different models in cases where the `chi^2'
statistic fails. We also show that the last mode of the Crossing Statistic is
identical to `chi^2', so that it can be considered as a generalization of
`chi^2'.Comment: 14 pages, 5 figures. Paper restructured and extended and new
interpretation of the method presented. New results concerning model
selection. Treatment and error-analysis made fully model independent.
References added. Accepted for publication in JCA
Transition from BCS pairing to Bose-Einstein condensation in low-density asymmetric nuclear matter
We study the isospin-singlet neutron-proton pairing in bulk nuclear matter as
a function of density and isospin asymmetry within the BCS formalism. In the
high-density, weak-coupling regime the neutron-proton paired state is strongly
suppressed by a minor neutron excess. As the system is diluted, the BCS state
with large, overlapping Cooper pairs evolves smoothly into a Bose-Einstein
condensate of tightly bound neutron-proton pairs (deuterons). In the resulting
low-density system a neutron excess is ineffective in quenching the pair
correlations because of the large spatial separation of the deuterons and
neutrons. As a result, the Bose-Einstein condensation of deuterons is weakly
affected by an additional gas of free neutrons even at very large asymmetries.Comment: 17 pages, uncluding 7 figures, PRC in pres
Percolating Reaction-Diffusion Waves (PERWAVES) â Sounding Rocket Combustion Experiments
Percolating reactionâdiffusion waves in disordered random media are encountered in many branches of modern science, ranging from physics and biology to material science and combustion. Most disordered reactionâdiffusion systems, however, have complex morphologies and reaction kinetics that complicate the study of the dynamics. Flames in suspensions of heterogeneously reacting metal-fuel particles is a rare example of a reactionâdiffusion wave with a simple structure formed by point-like heat sources having well-defined ignition temperature thresholds and combustion times. Particle sedimentation and natural convection can be suppressed in the free-fall conditions of sounding rocket experiments, enabling the properties of percolating flames in suspensions to be observed, studied, and compared with emerging theoretical models. The current paper describes the design of the European Space Agency PERWAVES microgravity combustion apparatus, built by the Airbus Defense and Space team from Bremen in collaboration with the scientific research teams from McGill University and the Technical University of Eindhoven, and discusses the results of two sounding-rocket flight experiments. The apparatus allows multiple flame experiments in quartz glass tubes filled with uniform suspensions of 25-micron iron particles in oxygen/xenon gas mixtures. The experiments performed during the MAXUS-9 (April 2017) and TEXUS-56 (November 2019) sounding rocket flights have confirmed flame propagation in the discrete mode, which is a pre-requisite for percolating-flame behavior, and have allowed observation of the flame structure in the vicinity of the propagation threshold
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