Intra-seasonal oscillations during monsoon 2002 and 2003

Features of the intra-seasonal oscillations during monsoon 2002, a drought year, and monsoon 2003, a normal year, have been examined by applying a frequency filter and the technique of wavelet analysis to rainfall data. Analysis reveals that while the faster 10-20 days mode dominated monsoon 2003, the slower 30-60 days mode dominated monsoon 2002

Artery tertiary lymphoid organs control multi-layered territorialized atherosclerosis B cell responses in aged ApoE-/- mice

Objective: Explore aorta B cell immunity in aged ApoE-/- mice. Approach and Results: Transcript maps, FACS, immunofluorescence analyses, cell transfers, and Ig-ELISPOT assays showed multi-layered atherosclerosis B cell responses in artery tertiary lymphoid organs (ATLOs). Aging-associated aorta B cell-related transcriptomes were identified and transcript atlases revealed highly territorialized B cell responses in ATLOs versus atherosclerotic lesions: ATLOs showed upregulation of bona fide B cell genes including Cd19, Ms4a1 (Cd20), Cd79a/b, and Ighm though intima plaques preferentially expressed molecules involved in non-B effector responses towards B cell-derived mediators, i.e. Fcgr3 (Cd16), Fcer1g (Cd23), and the C1q family. ATLOs promoted B cell recruitment. ATLO B-2 B cells included naïve, transitional, follicular, germinal center, switched IgG1+, IgA+, and IgE+ memory cells, plasmablasts, and long-lived plasma cells (PCs). ATLOs recruited large numbers of B-1 cells whose subtypes were skewed towards IL-10+ B-1b cells versus IL-10- B-1a cells. ATLO B-1 cells and PCs constitutively produced IgM and IgG and a fraction of PCs expressed IL-10. Moreover, ApoE-/- mice showed increased germinal center B cells in renal lymph nodes, IgM-producing PCs in the bone marrow, and higher IgM and anti-MDA-LDL IgG serum titers. Conclusions: ATLOs orchestrate dichotomic, territorialized, and multi-layered B cell responses in the diseased aorta; germinal center reactions indicate generation of autoimmune B cells within the diseased arterial wall during aging

Trade-offs in the performance of workflows - quantifying the impact of best practices

Business process redesign is one of the most powerful ways to boost business performance and to improve customer satisfaction [14]. A possible approach to business process redesign is using redesign best practices. A previous study identified a set of 29 different redesign best practices [18]. However, little is known about the exact impact of these redesign best practices on workflow performance. This study proposes an approach that can be used to quantify the impact of a business process redesign project on all dimensions of workflow performance. The approach consists of a large set of performance measures and a simulation toolkit. It supports the quantification of the impact of the implementation of redesign best practices, in order to determine what best practice or combination of best practices leads to the most favorable effect in a specific business process. The approach is developed based on a quantification project for the parallel best practice [8] and is validated with two other quantification projects, namely for the knockout and triage best practices

Theory of asymmetric non-additive binary hard-sphere mixtures

We show that the formal procedure of integrating out the degrees of freedom of the small spheres in a binary hard-sphere mixture works equally well for non-additive as it does for additive mixtures. For highly asymmetric mixtures (small size ratios) the resulting effective Hamiltonian of the one-component fluid of big spheres, which consists of an infinite number of many-body interactions, should be accurately approximated by truncating after the term describing the effective pair interaction. Using a density functional treatment developed originally for additive hard-sphere mixtures we determine the zero, one, and two-body contribution to the effective Hamiltonian. We demonstrate that even small degrees of positive or negative non-additivity have significant effect on the shape of the depletion potential. The second virial coefficient $B_2$, corresponding to the effective pair interaction between two big spheres, is found to be a sensitive measure of the effects of non-additivity. The variation of $B_2$ with the density of the small spheres shows significantly different behavior for additive, slightly positive and slightly negative non-additive mixtures. We discuss the possible repercussions of these results for the phase behavior of binary hard-sphere mixtures and suggest that measurements of $B_2$ might provide a means of determining the degree of non-additivity in real colloidal mixtures

Assessing the utility of low resolution brain imaging: treatment of infant hydrocephalus

As low-field MRI technology is being disseminated into clinical settings around the world, it is important to assess the image quality required to properly diagnose and treat a given disease and evaluate the role of machine learning algorithms, such as deep learning, in the enhancement of lower quality images. In this post hoc analysis of an ongoing randomized clinical trial, we assessed the diagnostic utility of reduced-quality and deep learning enhanced images for hydrocephalus treatment planning. CT images of post-infectious infant hydrocephalus were degraded in terms of spatial resolution, noise, and contrast between brain and CSF and enhanced using deep learning algorithms. Both degraded and enhanced images were presented to three experienced pediatric neurosurgeons accustomed to working in low-to middle-income countries (LMIC) for assessment of clinical utility in treatment planning for hydrocephalus. In addition, enhanced images were presented alongside their ground truth CT counterparts in order to assess whether reconstruction errors caused by the deep learning enhancement routine were acceptable to the evaluators. Results indicate that image resolution and contrast-to-noise ratio between brain and CSF predict the likelihood of an image being characterized as useful for hydrocephalus treatment planning. Deep learning enhancement substantially increases contrast-to-noise ratio improving the apparent likelihood of the image being useful; however, deep learning enhancement introduces structural errors which create a substantial risk of misleading clinical interpretation. We find that images with lower quality than is customarily acceptable can be useful for hydrocephalus treatment planning. Moreover, low quality images may be preferable to images enhanced with deep learning, since they do not introduce the risk of misleading information which could misguide treatment decisions. These findings advocate for new standards in assessing acceptable image quality for clinical use.Neuro Imaging Researc

Black Hole Spin via Continuum Fitting and the Role of Spin in Powering Transient Jets

The spins of ten stellar black holes have been measured using the continuum-fitting method. These black holes are located in two distinct classes of X-ray binary systems, one that is persistently X-ray bright and another that is transient. Both the persistent and transient black holes remain for long periods in a state where their spectra are dominated by a thermal accretion disk component. The spin of a black hole of known mass and distance can be measured by fitting this thermal continuum spectrum to the thin-disk model of Novikov and Thorne; the key fit parameter is the radius of the inner edge of the black hole's accretion disk. Strong observational and theoretical evidence links the inner-disk radius to the radius of the innermost stable circular orbit, which is trivially related to the dimensionless spin parameter a_* of the black hole (|a_*| < 1). The ten spins that have so far been measured by this continuum-fitting method range widely from a_* \approx 0 to a_* > 0.95. The robustness of the method is demonstrated by the dozens or hundreds of independent and consistent measurements of spin that have been obtained for several black holes, and through careful consideration of many sources of systematic error. Among the results discussed is a dichotomy between the transient and persistent black holes; the latter have higher spins and larger masses. Also discussed is recently discovered evidence in the transient sources for a correlation between the power of ballistic jets and black hole spin.Comment: 30 pages. Accepted for publication in Space Science Reviews. Also to appear in hard cover in the Space Sciences Series of ISSI "The Physics of Accretion onto Black Holes" (Springer Publisher). Changes to Sections 5.2, 6.1 and 7.4. Section 7.4 responds to Russell et al. 2013 (MNRAS, 431, 405) who find no evidence for a correlation between the power of ballistic jets and black hole spi

Influence of Anodic Conditions on Self-ordered Growth of Highly Aligned Titanium Oxide Nanopores

Self-aligned nanoporous TiO2templates synthesized via dc current electrochemical anodization have been carefully analyzed. The influence of environmental temperature during the anodization, ranging from 2 °C to ambient, on the structure and morphology of the nanoporous oxide formation has been investigated, as well as that of the HF electrolyte chemical composition, its concentration and their mixtures with other acids employed for the anodization. Arrays of self-assembled titania nanopores with inner pores diameter ranging between 50 and 100 nm, wall thickness around 20–60 nm and 300 nm in length, are grown in amorphous phase, vertical to the Ti substrate, parallel aligned to each other and uniformly disordering distributed over all the sample surface. Additional remarks about the photoluminiscence properties of the titania nanoporous templates and the magnetic behavior of the Ni filled nanoporous semiconductor Ti oxide template are also included

Fermi acceleration in astrophysical jets

We consider the acceleration of energetic particles by Fermi processes (i.e., diffusive shock acceleration, second order Fermi acceleration, and gradual shear acceleration) in relativistic astrophysical jets, with particular attention given to recent progress in the field of viscous shear acceleration. We analyze the associated acceleration timescales and the resulting particle distributions, and discuss the relevance of these processes for the acceleration of charged particles in the jets of AGNs, GRBs and microquasars, showing that multi-component powerlaw-type particle distributions are likely to occur.Comment: 6 pages, one figure; based on talk at "The multimessenger approach to unidentified gamma-ray sources", Barcelona/Spain, July 2006; accepted for publication in Astrophysics and Space Scienc

Global Search for New Physics with 2.0/fb at CDF

Data collected in Run II of the Fermilab Tevatron are searched for indications of new electroweak-scale physics. Rather than focusing on particular new physics scenarios, CDF data are analyzed for discrepancies with the standard model prediction. A model-independent approach (Vista) considers gross features of the data, and is sensitive to new large cross-section physics. Further sensitivity to new physics is provided by two additional algorithms: a Bump Hunter searches invariant mass distributions for "bumps" that could indicate resonant production of new particles; and the Sleuth procedure scans for data excesses at large summed transverse momentum. This combined global search for new physics in 2.0/fb of ppbar collisions at sqrt(s)=1.96 TeV reveals no indication of physics beyond the standard model.Comment: 8 pages, 7 figures. Final version which appeared in Physical Review D Rapid Communication