The effects of mindfulness-based stress reduction program on the mental health of family caregivers: a randomized controlled trial

<b>Background</b> Caregivers of people with chronic conditions are more likely than non-caregivers to have depression and emotional problems. Few studies have examined the effectiveness of mindfulness-based stress reduction (MBSR) in improving their mental well-being. <p></p> <b>Methods</b> Caregivers of persons with chronic conditions who scored 7 or above in the Caregiver Strain Index were randomly assigned to the 8-week MBSR group (n = 70) or the self-help control group (n = 71). Validated instruments were used to assess the changes in depressive and anxiety symptoms, quality of life, self-efficacy, self-compassion and mindfulness. Assessments were conducted at baseline, post-intervention and at the 3-month follow-up. <p></p> <b>Results </b>Compared to the participants in the control group, participants in the MBSR group had a significantly greater decrease in depressive symptoms at post-intervention and at 3 months post-intervention (p < 0.01). The improvement in state anxiety symptoms was significantly greater among participants in the MBSR group than those of the control group at post-intervention (p = 0.007), although this difference was not statistically significant at 3 months post-intervention (p = 0.084). There was also a statistically significant larger increase in self-efficacy (controlling negative thoughts; p = 0.041) and mindfulness (p = 0.001) among participants in the MBSR group at the 3-month follow-up compared to the participants in the control group. No statistically significant group effects (MBSR vs. control) were found in perceived stress, quality of life or self-compassion. <p></p> <b>Conclusions </b>MBSR appears to be a feasible and acceptable intervention to improve mental health among family caregivers with significant care burden, although further studies that include an active control group are needed to make the findings more conclusive

Miniband-related 1.4–1.8 μm luminescence of Ge/Si quantum dot superlattices

The luminescence properties of highly strained, Sb-doped Ge/Si multi-layer heterostructures with incorporated Ge quantum dots (QDs) are studied. Calculations of the electronic band structure and luminescence measurements prove the existence of an electron miniband within the columns of the QDs. Miniband formation results in a conversion of the indirect to a quasi-direct excitons takes place. The optical transitions between electron states within the miniband and hole states within QDs are responsible for an intense luminescence in the 1.4–1.8 µm range, which is maintained up to room temperature. At 300 K, a light emitting diode based on such Ge/Si QD superlattices demonstrates an external quantum efficiency of 0.04% at a wavelength of 1.55 µm

Measurement of prompt D0^{0} and D‾\overline{D}0^{0} meson azimuthal anisotropy and search for strong electric fields in PbPb collisions at root SNN\sqrt{S_{NN}} = 5.02 TeV

The strong Coulomb field created in ultrarelativistic heavy ion collisions is expected to produce a rapiditydependent difference (Av2) in the second Fourier coefficient of the azimuthal distribution (elliptic flow, v2) between D0 (uc) and D0 (uc) mesons. Motivated by the search for evidence of this field, the CMS detector at the LHC is used to perform the first measurement of Av2. The rapidity-averaged value is found to be (Av2) = 0.001 ? 0.001 (stat)? 0.003 (syst) in PbPb collisions at ?sNN = 5.02 TeV. In addition, the influence of the collision geometry is explored by measuring the D0 and D0mesons v2 and triangular flow coefficient (v3) as functions of rapidity, transverse momentum (pT), and event centrality (a measure of the overlap of the two Pb nuclei). A clear centrality dependence of prompt D0 meson v2 values is observed, while the v3 is largely independent of centrality. These trends are consistent with expectations of flow driven by the initial-state geometry. ? 2021 The Author. Published by Elsevier B.V. This is an open access article under the CC BY licens

Observation of electroweak production of Wγ with two jets in proton-proton collisions at √s = 13 TeV

A first observation is presented for the electroweak production of a W boson, a photon, and two jets in proton-proton collisions. The W boson decays are selected by requiring one identified electron or muon and an imbalance in transverse momentum. The two jets are required to have a high dijet mass and a large separation in pseudorapidity. The measurement is based on data collected with the CMS detector at a center-of-mass energy of 13 TeV, corresponding to an integrated luminosity of 35.9 fb$^{-1}$. The observed (expected) significance for this process is 4.9 (4.6) standard deviations. After combining with previously reported CMS results at 8 TeV, the observed (expected) significance is 5.3 (4.8) standard deviations. The cross section for the electroweak W$_{γjj}$ production in a restricted fiducial region is measured as 20.4 +/- 4.5 fb and the total cross section for W$_{γ}$ production in association with 2 jets in the same fiducial region is 108 +/- 16 fb. All results are in good agreement with recent theoretical predictions. Constraints are placed on anomalous quartic gauge couplings in terms of dimension-8 effective field theory operators

Search for heavy resonances decaying into a Z or W boson and a Higgs boson in final states with leptons and b-jets in 139 fb−1 of pp collisions at s√ = 13 TeV with the ATLAS detector

This article presents a search for new resonances decaying into a Z or W boson and a 125 GeV Higgs boson h, and it targets the νν¯¯¯bb¯¯, ℓ+ℓ−bb¯¯, or ℓ±νbb¯¯ final states, where ℓ = e or μ, in proton-proton collisions at s√ = 13 TeV. The data used correspond to a total integrated luminosity of 139 fb−1 collected by the ATLAS detector during Run 2 of the LHC at CERN. The search is conducted by examining the reconstructed invariant or transverse mass distributions of Zh or Wh candidates for evidence of a localised excess in the mass range from 220 GeV to 5 TeV. No significant excess is observed and 95% confidence-level upper limits between 1.3 pb and 0.3 fb are placed on the production cross section times branching fraction of neutral and charged spin-1 resonances and CP-odd scalar bosons. These limits are converted into constraints on the parameter space of the Heavy Vector Triplet model and the two-Higgs-doublet model

Search for boosted diphoton resonances in the 10 to 70 GeV mass range using 138 fb−1 of 13 TeV pp collisions with the ATLAS detector

A search for diphoton resonances in the mass range between 10 and 70 GeV with the ATLAS experiment at the Large Hadron Collider (LHC) is presented. The analysis is based on pp collision data corresponding to an integrated luminosity of 138 fb−1 at a centre-of-mass energy of 13 TeV recorded from 2015 to 2018. Previous searches for diphoton resonances at the LHC have explored masses down to 65 GeV, finding no evidence of new particles. This search exploits the particular kinematics of events with pairs of closely spaced photons reconstructed in the detector, allowing examination of invariant masses down to 10 GeV. The presented strategy covers a region previously unexplored at hadron colliders because of the experimental challenges of recording low-energy photons and estimating the backgrounds. No significant excess is observed and the reported limits provide the strongest bound on promptly decaying axion-like particles coupling to gluons and photons for masses between 10 and 70 GeV

Evidence for the charge asymmetry in pp → tt¯ production at s√ = 13 TeV with the ATLAS detector

Inclusive and differential measurements of the top–antitop (tt¯) charge asymmetry Att¯C and the leptonic asymmetry Aℓℓ¯C are presented in proton–proton collisions at s√ = 13 TeV recorded by the ATLAS experiment at the CERN Large Hadron Collider. The measurement uses the complete Run 2 dataset, corresponding to an integrated luminosity of 139 fb−1, combines data in the single-lepton and dilepton channels, and employs reconstruction techniques adapted to both the resolved and boosted topologies. A Bayesian unfolding procedure is performed to correct for detector resolution and acceptance effects. The combined inclusive tt¯ charge asymmetry is measured to be Att¯C = 0.0068 ± 0.0015, which differs from zero by 4.7 standard deviations. Differential measurements are performed as a function of the invariant mass, transverse momentum and longitudinal boost of the tt¯ system. Both the inclusive and differential measurements are found to be compatible with the Standard Model predictions, at next-to-next-to-leading order in quantum chromodynamics perturbation theory with next-to-leading-order electroweak corrections. The measurements are interpreted in the framework of the Standard Model effective field theory, placing competitive bounds on several Wilson coefficients

Measurements of Zγ+jets differential cross sections in pp collisions at s√ = 13 TeV with the ATLAS detector

Differential cross-section measurements of Zγ production in association with hadronic jets are presented, using the full 139 fb−1 dataset of s√ = 13 TeV proton–proton collisions collected by the ATLAS detector during Run 2 of the LHC. Distributions are measured using events in which the Z boson decays leptonically and the photon is usually radiated from an initial-state quark. Measurements are made in both one and two observables, including those sensitive to the hard scattering in the event and others which probe additional soft and collinear radiation. Different Standard Model predictions, from both parton-shower Monte Carlo simulation and fixed-order QCD calculations, are compared with the measurements. In general, good agreement is observed between data and predictions from MATRIX and MiNNLOPS, as well as next-to-leading-order predictions from MADGRAPH5_AMC@NLO and SHERPA

Search for third-generation vector-like leptons in pp collisions at s√ = 13 TeV with the ATLAS detector

A search for vector-like leptons in multilepton (two, three, or four-or-more electrons plus muons) final states with zero or more hadronic τ-lepton decays is presented. The search is performed using a dataset corresponding to an integrated luminosity of 139 fb−1 of proton-proton collisions at a centre-of-mass energy of 13 TeV recorded by the ATLAS detector at the LHC. To maximize the separation of signal and background, a machine-learning classifier is used. No excess of events is observed beyond the Standard Model expectation. Using a doublet vector-like lepton model, vector-like leptons coupling to third-generation Standard Model leptons are excluded in the mass range from 130 GeV to 900 GeV at the 95% confidence level, while the highest excluded mass is expected to be 970 GeV