Inclusive Semileptonic B Decays at BABAR

We report updates on two analyses of inclusive semileptonic B decays based on a dataset of 89 million BB events recorded with the BABAR detector at the Y(4S) resonance. Events are selected by fully reconstructing the decay of one B meson and identifying a charged lepton from the decay of the other B meson. In the first analysis, the measurement of the first and second moment of the hadronic mass distribution in Cabibbo-favored B ->X_c l nu decays allows for the determination of the nonperturbative parameters $\bar{\Lambda}$ and $\lambda_1$ of Heavy Quark Effective Theory (HQET) and |Vcb|. In the second analysis, the hadronic mass distribution is used to measure the inclusive charmless semileptonic branching fraction and to determine |Vub|.Comment: 3 pages, 4 postscript figures, submitted to EPS 200

A modular LHC built on the DNA three-way junction

A light-harvesting complex composed of a p-stacked multichromophoric array in a DNA three-way junction is described. The modular design allows for a ready exchange of non-covalently attached energy acceptor

Qualification Procedures of the CMS Pixel Barrel Modules

The CMS pixel barrel system will consist of three layers built of about 800 modules. One module contains 66560 readout channels and the full pixel barrel system about 48 million channels. It is mandatory to test each channel for functionality, noise level, trimming mechanism, and bump bonding quality. Different methods to determine the bump bonding yield with electrical measurements have been developed. Measurements of several operational parameters are also included in the qualification procedure. Among them are pixel noise, gains and pedestals. Test and qualification procedures of the pixel barrel modules are described and some results are presented.Comment: 7 Pages, 7 Figures. Contribution to Pixel 2005, September 5-8, 2005, Bonn, Germna

Effectiveness of talent management strategies

This paper investigates the effects of different types of talent management strategies on organisational performance. We introduce four different strategies and show how they affect organisational performance. For this purpose, we use a particularly detailed dataset of 138 Swiss companies. We find that talent management focusing on retaining and developing talents as job satisfaction, motivation, commitment and trust in leaders. Moreover, talent management practices with a strong focus on corporate strategy have a statistically higher significant impact on organisational outcomes such as company attractiveness, the achievement of business goals, customer satisfaction and, above all, corporate profit, more so than any other areas that talent management focuses upon

Somatostatin receptors differentially affect spontaneous epileptiform activity in mouse hippocampal slices

Somatostatin-14 (SRIF) reduces hippocampal epileptiform activity but the contribution of its specific receptors (sst1-5) is poorly understood. We have focused on sst1 and sst2 role in mediating SRIF modulation of epilepsy using hippocampal slices of wild type (WT) and sst1 or sst2 knock out (KO) mice. Recordings of epileptiform discharge induced by Mg2+-free medium with 4-aminopyridine were performed from the CA3 region before and after the application of SRIF compounds. In WT mice, SRIF and the sst1 agonist CH-275 reduce epilepsy whereas sst1 blockade with its antagonist SRA-880 increases bursting discharge. Activation of sst2 does not affect bursting frequency unless its agonist octreotide is applied with SRA-880, indicating that sst1 masks sst2-mediated modulation of epilepsy. In sst1 KO mice: i. bursting frequency is lower than in WT; ii. SRIF, CH-275 and SRA-880 are ineffective on epilepsy; iii. octreotide is also devoid of effects, whereas blockade of sst2 with the antagonist D-Tyr8 Cyn 154806 increases bursting frequency. In sst2 KO mice, SRIF ligand effects are similar to those in WT. In the whole hippocampus of sst1 KO mice, sst2 mRNA, protein and binding are higher than in WT and RT-PCR of the CA3 subarea confirms an increase of the sst2 messenger. We conclude that sst1 mediates inhibitory actions of SRIF and that interactions between sst1 and sst2 may prevent sst2 modulation of epilepsy. We suggest that, in sst1 KO mice, activation of over-expressed sst2 reduces bursting frequency, indicating that sst2 density represents the rate-limiting factor for sst2-mediated modulation of epilepsy.L'articolo è disponibile sul sito dell'editore http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com

SM and MSSM Higgs Boson Production: Spectra at large transverse Momentum

Strategies for Higgs boson searches require the knowledge of the total production cross section and the transverse momentum spectrum. The large transverse momentum spectrum of the Higgs boson produced in gluon fusion can be quite different in the Standard Model and the Minimal Supersymmetric Standard Model. In this paper we present a comparison of the Higgs transverse momentum spectrum obtained using the PYTHIA event generator and the HIGLU program as well as the program HQT, which includes NLO corrections and a soft gluon resummation for the region of small transverse momenta. While the shapes of the spectra are similar for the Standard Model, significant differences are observed in the spectra of Minimal Supersymmetric Standard Model benchmark scenarios with large tan(beta).Comment: 8 pages, 13 figure