First demonstration of a Compton gamma imager based on silicon photomultipliers

We are developing a rugged and person-transportable Compton gamma imager for use in security investigations of radioactive materials, and for radiological incident remediation. The imager is composed of layers of scintillator with light collection for the forward layers provided by silicon photomultipliers and for the rear layer by photomultiplier tubes. As a first step, we have developed a 1/5th-scale demonstration unit of the final imager. We present the imaging performance of this demonstration unit for Cs-137 at angles of up to 30 degrees off-axis. Results are also presented for Sn-113 and Na-22. This represents the first demonstration of the use of silicon photomultipliers as an embedded component for light collection in a Compton gamma imager.Comment: 19 pages, 6 figure

Colossal dielectric constants in transition-metal oxides

Many transition-metal oxides show very large ("colossal") magnitudes of the dielectric constant and thus have immense potential for applications in modern microelectronics and for the development of new capacitance-based energy-storage devices. In the present work, we thoroughly discuss the mechanisms that can lead to colossal values of the dielectric constant, especially emphasising effects generated by external and internal interfaces, including electronic phase separation. In addition, we provide a detailed overview and discussion of the dielectric properties of CaCu3Ti4O12 and related systems, which is today's most investigated material with colossal dielectric constant. Also a variety of further transition-metal oxides with large dielectric constants are treated in detail, among them the system La2-xSrxNiO4 where electronic phase separation may play a role in the generation of a colossal dielectric constant.Comment: 31 pages, 18 figures, submitted to Eur. Phys. J. for publication in the Special Topics volume "Cooperative Phenomena in Solids: Metal-Insulator Transitions and Ordering of Microscopic Degrees of Freedom

Observation of Scaling Violations in Scaled Momentum Distributions at HERA

Charged particle production has been measured in deep inelastic scattering (DIS) events over a large range of $x$ and $Q^2$ using the ZEUS detector. The evolution of the scaled momentum, $x_p$, with $Q^2,$ in the range 10 to 1280 $GeV^2$, has been investigated in the current fragmentation region of the Breit frame. The results show clear evidence, in a single experiment, for scaling violations in scaled momenta as a function of $Q^2$.Comment: 21 pages including 4 figures, to be published in Physics Letters B. Two references adde

D* Production in Deep Inelastic Scattering at HERA

This paper presents measurements of D^{*\pm} production in deep inelastic scattering from collisions between 27.5 GeV positrons and 820 GeV protons. The data have been taken with the ZEUS detector at HERA. The decay channel $D^{*+}\to (D^0 \to K^- \pi^+) \pi^+$ (+ c.c.) has been used in the study. The $e^+p$ cross section for inclusive D^{*\pm} production with $5<Q^2<100 GeV^2$ and $y<0.7$ is 5.3 \pms 1.0 \pms 0.8 nb in the kinematic region {$1.3<p_T(D^{*\pm})<9.0$ GeV and $| \eta(D^{*\pm}) |<1.5$}. Differential cross sections as functions of p_T(D^{*\pm}), $\eta(D^{*\pm}), W$ and $Q^2$ are compared with next-to-leading order QCD calculations based on the photon-gluon fusion production mechanism. After an extrapolation of the cross section to the full kinematic region in p_T(D^{*\pm}) and $\eta$(D^{*\pm}), the charm contribution $F_2^{c\bar{c}}(x,Q^2)$ to the proton structure function is determined for Bjorken $x$ between 2 $\cdot$ 10$^{-4}$ and 5 $\cdot$ 10$^{-3}$.Comment: 17 pages including 4 figure

Dynamic Acetylation of Phosphoenolpyruvate Carboxykinase Toggles Enzyme Activity between Gluconeogenic and Anaplerotic Reactions

Cytosolic phosphoenolpyruvate carboxykinase (PCK1) is considered a gluconeogenic enzyme; however, its metabolic functions and regulatory mechanisms beyond gluconeogenesis are poorly understood. Here, we describe that dynamic acetylation of PCK1 interconverts the enzyme between gluconeogenic and anaplerotic activities. Under high glucose, p300-dependent hyperacetylation of PCK1 did not lead to protein degradation but instead increased the ability of PCK1 to perform the anaplerotic reaction, converting phosphoenolpyruvate to oxaloacetate. Lys91 acetylation destabilizes the active site of PCK1 and favors the reverse reaction. At low energy input, we demonstrate that SIRT1 deacetylates PCK1 and fully restores the gluconeogenic ability of PCK1. Additionally, we found that GSK3 beta-mediated phosphorylation of PCK1 decreases acetylation and increases ubiquitination. Biochemical evidence suggests that serine phosphorylation adjacent to Lys91 stimulates SIRT1-dependent deacetylation of PCK1. This work reveals an unexpected capacity of hyper-acetylated PCK1 to promote anaplerotic activity, and the intersection of post-translational control of PCK1 involving acetylation, phosphorylation, and ubiquitination

Glauber Dynamics for the mean-field Potts Model

We study Glauber dynamics for the mean-field (Curie-Weiss) Potts model with $q\geq 3$ states and show that it undergoes a critical slowdown at an inverse-temperature $\beta_s(q)$ strictly lower than the critical $\beta_c(q)$ for uniqueness of the thermodynamic limit. The dynamical critical $\beta_s(q)$ is the spinodal point marking the onset of metastability. We prove that when $\beta<\beta_s(q)$ the mixing time is asymptotically $C(\beta, q) n \log n$ and the dynamics exhibits the cutoff phenomena, a sharp transition in mixing, with a window of order $n$. At $\beta=\beta_s(q)$ the dynamics no longer exhibits cutoff and its mixing obeys a power-law of order $n^{4/3}$. For $\beta>\beta_s(q)$ the mixing time is exponentially large in $n$. Furthermore, as $\beta \uparrow \beta_s$ with $n$, the mixing time interpolates smoothly from subcritical to critical behavior, with the latter reached at a scaling window of $O(n^{-2/3})$ around $\beta_s$. These results form the first complete analysis of mixing around the critical dynamical temperature --- including the critical power law --- for a model with a first order phase transition.Comment: 45 pages, 5 figure

Measurement of the reaction γ∗p→ϕp\gamma^*p \rightarrow \phi p in deep inelastic e+pe^+p scattering at HERA

The production of phi mesons in the reaction e(+)p --> e(+)phi p (phi --> K+K-), for 7 phi p cross section rises strongly with W. This behaviour is similar to that previously found for the gamma*p --> rho(0)p cross section. This strong dependence cannot be explained by production through soft pomeron exchange, It is, however, consistent with perturbative QCD expectations, where it reflects the rise of the gluon momentum density in the proton at small x. The ratio of sigma(phi)/sigma(rho(0)), which has previously been determined by ZEUS to be 0.065 +/- 0.013 (stat.) in photoproduction at a mean W of 70 GeV, is measured to be 0.18 +/- 0.05 (stat.) +/- 0.03 (syst.) at a mean Q(2) of 12.3 GeV2 and mean W of approximate to 100 GeV and is thus approaching at large Q(2) the value of 2/9 predicted from the quark charges of the vector mesons and a flavour independent production mechanism

Observation of Events with an Energetic Forward Neutron in Deep Inelastic Scattering at HERA

In deep inelastic neutral current scattering of positrons and protons at the center of mass energy of 300 GeV, we observe, with the ZEUS detector, events with a high energy neutron produced at very small scattering angles with respect to the proton direction. The events constitute a fixed fraction of the deep inelastic, neutral current event sample independent of Bjorken x and Q2 in the range 3 · 10-4 \u3c xBJ \u3c 6 · 10-3 and 10 \u3c Q2 \u3c 100 GeV2