Cross Section Measurements of Hard Diffraction at the SPS-Collider

The UA8 experiment previously reported the observation of jets in diffractive events containing leading protons (``hard diffraction''), which was interpreted as evidence for the partonic structure of an exchanged Reggeon, believed to be the Pomeron . In the present Letter, we report the final UA8 hard-diffractive (jet) cross section results and their interpretation. After corrections, the fraction of single diffractive events with mass from 118 to 189 GeV that have two scattered partons, each with Et_jet > 8 GeV, is in the range 0.002 to 0.003 (depending on x_p). We determine the product, fK, of the fraction by which the Pomeron's momentum sum rule is violated and the normalization constant of the Pomeron-Flux-Factor of the proton. For a pure gluonic- or a pure qqbar-Pomeron , respectively: fK = 0.30 +- 0.05 +- 0.09) and (0.56 +- 0.09 +- 0.17) GeV^-2.Comment: 20 pages, 5 Encapsulated Postscript figures, LaTex, Final Version, Physics Letters B (in Pess 1998

A Study of Inclusive Double-Pomeron-Exchange in p pbar -> p X pbar at root s = 630 GeV

We report measurements of the inclusive reaction, p pbar -> p X pbar, in events where either or both the beam-like final-state baryons were detected in Roman-pot spectrometers and the central system was detected in the UA2 calorimeter. A Double-Pomeron-Exchange (DPE) analysis of these data and single diffractive data from the same experiment demonstrates that, for central masses of a few GeV, the extracted Pomeron-Pomeron total cross section exhibits an enhancement which exceeds factorization expectations by an order-of-magnitude. This may be a signature for glueball production. The enhancement is shown to be independent of uncertainties connected with possible non-universality of the Pomeron flux factor. Based on our analysis, we present DPE cross section predictions, for unit (1 mb) Pomeron-Pomeron total cross section, at the Tevatron, LHC and the 920 GeV fixed-target experiment, HERA-B.Comment: 52 pages, 27 Encapsulated Postscript figures, 3 Tables, LaTex, Revised version as it will appear in European Physics Journal

Quantum Transduction of Telecommunications-band Single Photons from a Quantum Dot by Frequency Upconversion

The ability to transduce non-classical states of light from one wavelength to another is a requirement for integrating disparate quantum systems that take advantage of telecommunications-band photons for optical fiber transmission of quantum information and near-visible, stationary systems for manipulation and storage. In addition, transducing a single-photon source at 1.3 {\mu}m to visible wavelengths for detection would be integral to linear optical quantum computation due to the challenges of detection in the near-infrared. Recently, transduction at single-photon power levels has been accomplished through frequency upconversion, but it has yet to be demonstrated for a true single-photon source. Here, we transduce the triggered single-photon emission of a semiconductor quantum dot at 1.3 {\mu}m to 710 nm with a total detection (internal conversion) efficiency of 21% (75%). We demonstrate that the 710 nm signal maintains the quantum character of the 1.3 {\mu}m signal, yielding a photon anti-bunched second-order intensity correlation, g^(2)(t), that shows the optical field is composed of single photons with g^(2)(0) = 0.165 < 0.5.Comment: 7 pages, 4 figure

Age- and region-specific hepatitis B prevalence in Turkey estimated using generalized linear mixed models: a systematic review

Toy M, Önder FO, Wörmann T, et al. Age- and region-specific hepatitis B prevalence in Turkey estimated using generalized linear mixed models: a systematic review. BMC infectious diseases. 2011;11(1): 337.BACKGROUND: To provide a clear picture of the current hepatitis B situation, the authors performed a systematic review to estimate the age- and region-specific prevalence of chronic hepatitis B (CHB) in Turkey. METHODS: A total of 339 studies with original data on the prevalence of hepatitis B surface antigen (HBsAg) in Turkey and published between 1999 and 2009 were identified through a search of electronic databases, by reviewing citations, and by writing to authors. After a critical assessment, the authors included 129 studies, divided into categories: 'age-specific'; 'region-specific'; and 'specific population group'. To account for the differences among the studies, a generalized linear mixed model was used to estimate the overall prevalence across all age groups and regions. For specific population groups, the authors calculated the weighted mean prevalence. RESULTS: The estimated overall population prevalence was 4.57, 95% confidence interval (CI): 3.58, 5.76, and the estimated total number of CHB cases was about 3.3 million. The outcomes of the age-specific groups varied from 2.84, (95% CI: 2.60, 3.10) for the 0-14-year olds to 6.36 (95% CI: 5.83, 6.90) in the 25-34-year-old group. CONCLUSION: There are large age-group and regional differences in CHB prevalence in Turkey, where CHB remains a serious health problem

Design, Performance, and Calibration of CMS Hadron-Barrel Calorimeter Wedges

Extensive measurements have been made with pions, electrons and muons on four production wedges of the Compact Muon Solenoid (CMS) hadron barrel (HB) calorimeter in the H2 beam line at CERN with particle momenta varying from 20 to 300 GeV/c. Data were taken both with and without a prototype electromagnetic lead tungstate crystal calorimeter (EB) in front of the hadron calorimeter. The time structure of the events was measured with the full chain of preproduction front-end electronics running at 34 MHz. Moving-wire radioactive source data were also collected for all scintillator layers in the HB. These measurements set the absolute calibration of the HB prior to first pp collisions to approximately 4%

Design, Performance and Calibration of the CMS Forward Calorimeter Wedges

We report on the test beam results and calibration methods using charged particles of the CMS Forward Calorimeter (HF). The HF calorimeter covers a large pseudorapidity region (3\l |\eta| \le 5), and is essential for large number of physics channels with missing transverse energy. It is also expected to play a prominent role in the measurement of forward tagging jets in weak boson fusion channels. The HF calorimeter is based on steel absorber with embedded fused-silica-core optical fibers where Cherenkov radiation forms the basis of signal generation. Thus, the detector is essentially sensitive only to the electromagnetic shower core and is highly non-compensating (e/h \approx 5). This feature is also manifest in narrow and relatively short showers compared to similar calorimeters based on ionization. The choice of fused-silica optical fibers as active material is dictated by its exceptional radiation hardness. The electromagnetic energy resolution is dominated by photoelectron statistics and can be expressed in the customary form as a/\sqrt{E} + b. The stochastic term a is 198% and the constant term b is 9%. The hadronic energy resolution is largely determined by the fluctuations in the neutral pion production in showers, and when it is expressed as in the electromagnetic case, a = 280% and b = 11%