9,713 research outputs found
A semi-analytical approach to perturbations in mutated hilltop inflation
We study cosmological perturbations and observational aspects for mutated
hilltop model of inflation. Employing mostly analytical treatment, we evaluate
observable parameters during inflation as well as post-inflationary
perturbations. This further leads to exploring observational aspects related to
Cosmic Microwave Background (CMB) radiation. This semi-analytical treatment
reduces complications related to numerical computation to some extent for
studying the different phenomena related to CMB angular power spectrum for
mutated hilltop inflation.Comment: 7 pages, 2 figures. Improved version to appear in IJMP
Hysteretic Optimization
We propose a new optimization method based on a demagnetization procedure
well known in magnetism. We show how this procedure can be applied as a general
tool to search for optimal solutions in any system where the configuration
space is endowed with a suitable `distance'. We test the new algorithm on
frustrated magnetic models and the traveling salesman problem. We find that the
new method successfully competes with similar basic algorithms such as
simulated annealing.Comment: 5 pages, 5 figure
The 10Be contents of SNC meteorites
Several authors have explored the possibility that the Shergottites, Nakhlites, and Chassigny (SNC) came from Mars. The spallogenic gas contents of the SNC meteorites have been used to: constrain the sizes of the SNC's during the last few million years; to establish groupings independent of the geochemical ones; and to estimate the likelihood of certain entries in the catalog of all conceivable passages from Mars to Earth. The particular shielding dependence of Be-10 makes the isotope a good probe of the irradiation conditions experienced by the SNC meteorites. The Be-10 contents of nine members of the group were measured using the technique of accelerator mass spectrometry. The Be-10 contents of Nakhla, Governador Valadares, Chassigny, and probably Lafayette, about 20 dpm/kg, exceed the values expected from irradiation of the surface of a large body. The Be-10 data therfore do not support scenario III of Bogard et al., one in which most of the Be-10 in the SNC meteorites would have formed on the Martian surface; they resemble rather the Be-10 contents found in many ordinary chondrites subjected to 4 Pi exposures. The uncertainties of the Be-10 contents lead to appreciable errors in the Be-10 ages, t(1) = -1/lambda ln(1 Be-10/Be-10). Nonetheless, the Be-10 ages are consistent with the Ne-21 ages calculated assuming conventional, small-body production rates and short terrestrial ages for the finds. It is believed that this concordance strengthens the case for at least 3 different irradiation ages for the SNC meteorites. Given the similar half-thicknesses of the Be-10 and Ne-21 production rates, the ratios of the Be-10 and Ne-21 contents do not appear consistent with common ages for any of the groups. In view of the general agreement between the Be-10 and Ne-21 ages it does not seem useful at this time to construct multiple-stage irradiation histories for the SNC meteorites
The Nature of Electronic States in Atomically Thin MoS2 Field-Effect Transistors
We present low temperature electrical transport experiments in five field
effect transistor devices consisting of monolayer, bilayer and trilayer MoS2
films, mechanically exfoliated onto Si/SiO2 substrate. Our experiments reveal
that the electronic states in all films are localized well up to the room
temperature over the experimentally accessible range of gate voltage. This
manifests in two dimensional (2D) variable range hopping (VRH) at high
temperatures, while below \sim 30 K the conductivity displays oscillatory
structures in gate voltage arising from resonant tunneling at the localized
sites. From the correlation energy (T0) of VRH and gate voltage dependence of
conductivity, we suggest that Coulomb potential from trapped charges in the
substrate are the dominant source of disorder in MoS2 field effect devices,
which leads to carrier localization as well.Comment: 10 pages, 5 figures; ACS Nano (2011
Supermetallic conductivity in bromine-intercalated graphite
Exposure of highly oriented pyrolytic graphite to bromine vapor gives rise to
in-plane charge conductivities which increase monotonically with intercalation
time toward values (for ~6 at% Br) that are significantly higher than Cu at
temperatures down to 5 K. Magnetotransport, optical reflectivity and magnetic
susceptibility measurements confirm that the Br dopes the graphene sheets with
holes while simultaneously increasing the interplanar separation. The increase
of mobility (~ 5E4 cm^2/Vs at T=300 K) and resistance anisotropy together with
the reduced diamagnetic susceptibility of the intercalated samples suggests
that the observed supermetallic conductivity derives from a parallel
combination of weakly-coupled hole-doped graphene sheets.Comment: 5 pages, 4 figure
A comparison of severe pre-eclampsia/eclampsia in patients with and without HELLP syndrome
Background: The relationship of Haemolysis, Elevated Liver Enzymes and Low Platelets (HELLP) syndrome with maternal and perinatal health and its presentation in Pakistani population is not known.Purpose: To determine the mode of presentation along with maternal and perinatal outcome of patients with HELLP syndrome.Methods: Case records of patients with severe hypertension in pregnancy who delivered between January 1, 1989 and December 31, 1994 at The Aga Khan University Hospital, Karachi. Out of 120 cases of severe pre-eclampsia/eclampsia, there were 36 cases of HELLP syndrome (Group-A). These were then compared with cases without HELLP syndrome (Group B) for their mode of presentation along with maternal and perinatal morbidity and mortality.Results: The overall incidence of HELLP syndrome was 0.4%. In the antepartum factors; unbooked status (66% vs 30%; p \u3c 0.05), diastolic B.P. \u3e 120 mmHg (61% vs 16%; p \u3c 0.05) DIC (13% vs 2%; p = 0.03), seizures (40% vs 16%, p = 0.01) and ARF (11% vs 1%, p = 0.07) were significantly raised. In the intrapartum factors there were no significant differences between the two groups in mode of delivery and complications of delivery. Neonatal outcomes did not differ significantly in the two groups.Conclusions: Women with severe hypertension in pregnancy manifesting with HELLP syndrome show a significantly greater frequency of developing DIC, seizures and acute renal failure. Therefore, their care necessitates intensive monitoring to preclude development of these complications
Hydrogen Bond Dynamics Near A Micellar Surface: Origin of the Universal Slow Relaxation at Complex Aqueous Interfaces
The dynamics of hydrogen bonds among water molecules themselves and with the
polar head groups (PHG) at a micellar surface have been investigated by long
molecular dynamics simulations. The lifetime of the hydrogen bond between a PHG
and a water molecule is found to be much longer than that between any two water
molecules, and is likely to be a general feature of hydrophilic surfaces of
organized assemblies. Analyses of individual water trajectories suggest that
water molecules can remain bound to the micellar surface for more than a
hundred picosecond. The activation energy for such a transition from the bound
to a free state for the water molecules is estimated to be about 3.5kcal/mole.Comment: 12 pages. Phys. Rev. Lett. (Accepted) (2002
Dark Matter at the Center and in the Halo of the Galaxy
All presently known stellar-dynamical constraints on the size and mass of the
supermassive compact dark object at the Galactic center are consistent with a
ball of self-gravitating, nearly non-interacting, degenerate fermions with mass
between 76 and 491 keV, for degeneracy factor g=2. Sterile neutrinos of 76 keV
mass, which are mixed with at least one of the active neutrinos with a mixing
angele ~10^{-7}, are produced in about the right amount in the early Universe
by incoherent resonant and non-resonant scattering of active neutrinos having
asymmetry of ~0.01. The former process yields sterile neutrinos with a
quasi-degenerate spectrum while the latter leads to a thermal spectrum. As the
production mechanism of the sterile neutrino is consistent with the constraints
from large scale structure formation, core collapse supernovae, and diffuse
X-ray background, it could be the dark matter particle of the Universe.Comment: 6 pages, to appear in the Beyond 2003 conference proceeding
Abundant and equipotent founder cells establish and maintain acute lymphoblastic leukaemia
High frequencies of blasts in primary acute lymphoblastic leukaemia (ALL) samples have the potential to induce leukaemia and to engraft mice. However, it is unclear how individual ALL cells each contribute to drive leukaemic development in a bulk transplant and the extent to which these blasts vary functionally. We used cellular barcoding as a fate mapping tool to track primograft ALL blasts in vivo. Our results show that high numbers of ALL founder cells contribute at similar frequencies to leukaemic propagation over serial transplants, without any clear evidence of clonal succession. These founder cells also exhibit equal capacity to home and engraft to different organs, although stochastic processes may alter the composition in restrictive niches. Our findings enhance the stochastic stem cell model of ALL by demonstrating equal functional abilities of singular ALL blasts and show that successful treatment strategies must eradicate the entire leukaemic cell population
Tripartite thermal correlations in an inhomogeneous spin-star system
We exploit the tripartite negativity to study the thermal correlations in a
tripartite system, that is the three outer spins interacting with the central
one in a spin-star system. We analyze the dependence of such correlations on
the homogeneity of the interactions, starting from the case where central-outer
spin interactions are identical and then focusing on the case where the three
coupling constants are different. We single out some important differences
between the negativity and the concurrence.Comment: 8 pages, 9 figure
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