Multi-Atom Quasiparticle Scattering Interference for Superconductor Energy-Gap Symmetry Determination

Complete theoretical understanding of the most complex superconductors requires a detailed knowledge of the symmetry of the superconducting energy-gap $\Delta_\mathbf{k}^\alpha$, for all momenta $\mathbf{k}$ on the Fermi surface of every band $\alpha$. While there are a variety of techniques for determining $|\Delta_\mathbf{k}^\alpha|$, no general method existed to measure the signed values of $\Delta_\mathbf{k}^\alpha$. Recently, however, a new technique based on phase-resolved visualization of superconducting quasiparticle interference (QPI) patterns centered on a single non-magnetic impurity atom, was introduced. In principle, energy-resolved and phase-resolved Fourier analysis of these images identifies wavevectors connecting all k-space regions where $\Delta_\mathbf{k}^\alpha$ has the same or opposite sign. But use of a single isolated impurity atom, from whose precise location the spatial phase of the scattering interference pattern must be measured is technically difficult. Here we introduce a generalization of this approach for use with multiple impurity atoms, and demonstrate its validity by comparing the $\Delta_\mathbf{k}^\alpha$ it generates to the $\Delta_\mathbf{k}^\alpha$ determined from single-atom scattering in FeSe where $s_{\pm}$ energy-gap symmetry is established. Finally, to exemplify utility, we use the multi-atom technique on LiFeAs and find scattering interference between the hole-like and electron-like pockets as predicted for $\Delta_\mathbf{k}^\alpha$ of opposite sign

Актуальные цели и задачи стратегического развития отечественной индустрии

The article justifies that in the conditions of stagnation in the Russian economy and the absence of prerequisites for its breakthrough development, it is necessary to seek new approaches in managing the development of economic systems.The purpose of this article is to set the correct goal for the development of the domestic industry and to justify the mechanism for achieving it. A new approach is proposed in managing the strategic development of industrial enterprises, aimed at long-term growth of the quality of their technologies. It is proved that the implementation of such a strategy provides a benchmark for a quantitative indicator of the quality of human-machine systems – the economic level of their technology.A number of methods for the strategic development of individual industrial enterprises and their systems based on economic and technological modeling of the development of industrial production are proposed. The tasks of managing the development of enterprises based on the criterion of maximizing their economic and technological quality and the need for state participation in the directed transformation of the country’s industrial complex are substantiated.The need to ensure the linkage of strategies for the development of industrial enterprises with the strategy for the development of the economy as a whole is stressed.В статье обосновывается, что в условиях стагнации в российской экономике и отсутствия предпосылок для ее прорывного развития, необходимо искать новые подходы в управлении развитием экономических систем, успешность которых во многом зависит от корректной постановки цели развития и обоснования механизма ее достижения.Обосновывается, что применяемые на данный момент такие критерии развития на макроуровне, как максимизация внутреннего валового продукта, и максимизация прибыли – на микроуровне – не отражают сущность экономического развития, следовательно, не могут рассматриваться в качестве показателя экономического развития любой экономической системы. Максимизация прибыли зачастую не означает развитие предприятия, как и рост ВВП не означает развитие экономики.В данной статье предлагается постановка новой цели развития отечественной индустрии, обосновывается механизм ее достижения и предлагается новый подход в управлении стратегическим развитием промышленных предприятий, направленный на долгосрочный рост качества их технологий. Доказывается, что реализацию такой стратегии обеспечивает ориентир на количественный показатель качества человека-машинных систем – экономический уровень их технологии. Указываются основания для признания экономического уровня технологий критерием эффективности развития. Обосновывается возможность применение данного обобщенного показателя качества экономической системы возможно на микро-, мезо- и макроуровне.Предлагается ряд методов стратегического развития отдельных промышленных предприятий и их систем, базирующихся на экономико-технологическом моделировании развития промышленного производства. Обосновываются задачи управления развитием предприятий по критерию максимизации их экономико-технологического качества и необходимость участия государства в направленной трансформации промышленного комплекса страны. Решение задач основывается на представлении о двух типах технологического развития – рационалистическом и эвристическом, реализация которых сопровождается количественными ориентирами затрат и ожидаемых результатов.Использование данного показателя позволит не только повысить величину инвестиций в основной капитал, но и обеспечит эффективное расходование государственных средств, т.е. позволит осуществлять целесообразные капитальные вложения.Подчеркивается необходимость взаимосвязи стратегий развития промышленных предприятий со стратегией развития экономики в целом. Обозначаются направления дальнейшего развития данного подхода, одним из которых является разработка прикладных программных средств развития промышленных предприятий, что позволяет на основе универсальных подходов выработать уникальные для каждого предприятия стратегии развития

Gene-Activated Materials in Regenerative Dentistry: Narrative Review of Technology and Study Results

Treatment of a wide variety of defects in the oral and maxillofacial regions requires the use of innovative approaches to achieve best outcomes. One of the promising directions is the use of gene-activated materials (GAMs) that represent a combination of tissue engineering and gene therapy. This approach implies that biocompatible materials will be enriched with gene-carrying vectors and implanted into the defect site resulting in transfection of the recipient’s cells and secretion of encoded therapeutic protein in situ. GAMs may be presented in various designs depending on the type of material, encoded protein, vector, and way of connecting the vector and the material. Thus, it is possible to choose the most suitable GAM design for the treatment of a particular pathology. The use of plasmids for delivery of therapeutic genes is of particular interest. In the present review, we aimed to delineate the principle of work and various designs of plasmid-based GAMs and to highlight results of experimental and clinical studies devoted to the treatment of periodontitis, jaw bone defects, teeth avulsion, and other pathologies in the oral and maxillofacial regions

Refinement of Animal Experiments: Replacing Traumatic Methods of Laboratory Animal Marking with Non-Invasive Alternatives

Reliable methods for identifying rodents play an important role in ensuring the success of preclinical studies. However, animal identification remains a trivial laboratory routine that is not often discussed, despite the fact that more than 6 million rodents are used in animal studies each year. Currently, there are extensive regulations in place to ensure adequate anesthesia and to reduce animal suffering during experiments. At the same time, not enough attention is paid to the comfort of rodents during routine identification procedures, which can be painful and cause some complications. In order to achieve the highest ethical standards in laboratory research, we must minimize animal discomfort during the identification phase. In this article, we discuss traumatic methods of identification and describe several painless methods for marking in long-term experimental studies. The use of non-traumatic and non-invasive methods requires the renewal of marks as they fade and additional handling of the rodents. Laboratory personnel must be trained in stress-minimizing handling techniques to make mark renewal less stressful

Severe dirac mass gap suppression in Sb 2 Te 3-based quantum anomalous Hall materials

The quantum anomalous Hall (QAH) effect appears in ferromagnetic topological insulators (FMTIs) when a Dirac mass gap opens in the spectrum of the topological surface states (SSs). Unaccountably, although the mean mass gap can exceed 28 meV (or ∼320 K), the QAH effect is frequently only detectable at temperatures below 1 K. Using atomic-resolution Landau level spectroscopic imaging, we compare the electronic structure of the archetypal FMTI Cr0.08(Bi0.1Sb0.9)1.92Te3 to that of its nonmagnetic parent (Bi0.1Sb0.9)2Te3, to explore the cause. In (Bi0.1Sb0.9)2Te3, we find spatially random variations of the Dirac energy. Statistically equivalent Dirac energy variations are detected in Cr0.08(Bi0.1Sb0.9)1.92Te3 with concurrent but uncorrelated Dirac mass gap disorder. These two classes of SS electronic disorder conspire to drastically suppress the minimum mass gap to below 100 μeV for nanoscale regions separated by <1 μm. This fundamentally limits the fully quantized anomalous Hall effect in Sb2Te3-based FMTI materials to very low temperatures

Post-Implantation Inflammatory Responses to Xenogeneic Tissue-Engineered Cartilage Implanted in Rabbit Trachea: The Role of Cultured Chondrocytes in the Modification of Inflammation

Immune responses to tissue-engineered grafts made of xenogeneic materials remain poorly studied. The scope of current investigations is limited by the lack of information on orthotopically implanted grafts. A deeper understanding of these processes is of great importance since innovative surgical approaches include the implantation of xenogeneic decellularized scaffolds seeded by cells. The purpose of our work is to study the immunological features of tracheal repair during the implantation of tissue-engineered constructs based on human xenogeneic scaffolds modified via laser radiation in rabbits. The samples were stained with hematoxylin and Safranin O, and they were immunostained with antibodies against tryptase, collagen II, vimentin, and CD34. Immunological and inflammatory responses were studied by counting immune cells and evaluating blood vessels and collagen. Leukocyte-based inflammation prevailed during the implantation of decellularized unseeded scaffolds; meanwhile, plasma cells were significantly more abundant in tissue-engineered constructs. Mast cells were insignificantly more abundant in tissue-engineered construct samples. Conclusions: The seeding of decellularized xenogeneic cartilage with chondrocytes resulted in a change in immunological reactions upon implantation, and it was associated with plasma cell infiltration. Tissue-engineered grafts widely differed in design, including the type of used cells. The question of immunological response depending on the tissue-engineered graft composition requires further investigation

Радионуклидная визуализация молочной железы с использованием специализированной гаммакамеры высокого разрешения CZT в диагностике и оценке эффективности лечения больных раком молочной железы (обзор литературы)

Breast Specific Gamma Imaging (BSGI) or Molecular Breast Imaging (MBI) is a highly sensitive and specific diagnostic method in activity assessment of pathological lesion including breast cancer and its metastases. Not being a competitor to X-ray mammography this technology provides more information in case of patients with dense breast glandular tissue and it can also be an additional diagnostic method in the algorithm of early diagnosis of breast cancer.Планарная маммосцинтиграфия по методике Breast Specific Gamma Imaging (BSGI) является высокочувствительным и специфичным методом диагностики активности патологического очага, в том числе первичного рака молочной железы и его метастазов. Не являясь конкурентом рентгеновской маммографии, технология позволяет получить дополнительную информацию при плотной железистой ткани и может служить дополнительным диагностическим методом в алгоритме ранней диагностики рака молочной железы

Albiglutide and cardiovascular outcomes in patients with type 2 diabetes and cardiovascular disease (Harmony Outcomes): a double-blind, randomised placebo-controlled trial

Background: Glucagon-like peptide 1 receptor agonists differ in chemical structure, duration of action, and in their effects on clinical outcomes. The cardiovascular effects of once-weekly albiglutide in type 2 diabetes are unknown. We aimed to determine the safety and efficacy of albiglutide in preventing cardiovascular death, myocardial infarction, or stroke. Methods: We did a double-blind, randomised, placebo-controlled trial in 610 sites across 28 countries. We randomly assigned patients aged 40 years and older with type 2 diabetes and cardiovascular disease (at a 1:1 ratio) to groups that either received a subcutaneous injection of albiglutide (30–50 mg, based on glycaemic response and tolerability) or of a matched volume of placebo once a week, in addition to their standard care. Investigators used an interactive voice or web response system to obtain treatment assignment, and patients and all study investigators were masked to their treatment allocation. We hypothesised that albiglutide would be non-inferior to placebo for the primary outcome of the first occurrence of cardiovascular death, myocardial infarction, or stroke, which was assessed in the intention-to-treat population. If non-inferiority was confirmed by an upper limit of the 95% CI for a hazard ratio of less than 1·30, closed testing for superiority was prespecified. This study is registered with ClinicalTrials.gov, number NCT02465515. Findings: Patients were screened between July 1, 2015, and Nov 24, 2016. 10 793 patients were screened and 9463 participants were enrolled and randomly assigned to groups: 4731 patients were assigned to receive albiglutide and 4732 patients to receive placebo. On Nov 8, 2017, it was determined that 611 primary endpoints and a median follow-up of at least 1·5 years had accrued, and participants returned for a final visit and discontinuation from study treatment; the last patient visit was on March 12, 2018. These 9463 patients, the intention-to-treat population, were evaluated for a median duration of 1·6 years and were assessed for the primary outcome. The primary composite outcome occurred in 338 (7%) of 4731 patients at an incidence rate of 4·6 events per 100 person-years in the albiglutide group and in 428 (9%) of 4732 patients at an incidence rate of 5·9 events per 100 person-years in the placebo group (hazard ratio 0·78, 95% CI 0·68–0·90), which indicated that albiglutide was superior to placebo (p&lt;0·0001 for non-inferiority; p=0·0006 for superiority). The incidence of acute pancreatitis (ten patients in the albiglutide group and seven patients in the placebo group), pancreatic cancer (six patients in the albiglutide group and five patients in the placebo group), medullary thyroid carcinoma (zero patients in both groups), and other serious adverse events did not differ between the two groups. There were three (&lt;1%) deaths in the placebo group that were assessed by investigators, who were masked to study drug assignment, to be treatment-related and two (&lt;1%) deaths in the albiglutide group. Interpretation: In patients with type 2 diabetes and cardiovascular disease, albiglutide was superior to placebo with respect to major adverse cardiovascular events. Evidence-based glucagon-like peptide 1 receptor agonists should therefore be considered as part of a comprehensive strategy to reduce the risk of cardiovascular events in patients with type 2 diabetes. Funding: GlaxoSmithKline