A folded Fabry-Perot cavity for optical sensing in gravitational wave detectors

Abstract The sensitivity of standard optical schemes for the readout of weak vibrations is limited thermal and radiation pressure fluctuations induced by the small interrogation area. We propose and analyze an optical configuration allowing to overcome this problem and optimize the sensitivity of the new generation of massive gravitational wave detectors

An optical readout scheme for advanced acoustic GW detectors

We have recently proposed a large reading area, optical readout scheme for advanced acoustic gravitational wave (GW) detectors. In this work we focus the analysis on a dual-cylinder detector. A specific configuration is designed and the expected performance is calculated

Metacognition as a predictor of improvements in personality disorders

Personality Disorders (PDs) are particularly hard to treat and treatment drop-out rates are high. Several authors have agreed that psychotherapy is more successful when it focuses on the core of personality pathology. For this reason, therapists dealing with PDs need to understand the psychopathological variables that characterize this pathology and exactly what contributes to maintaining psychopathological processes. Moreover, several authors have noted that one key problem that characterizes all PDs is an impairment in understanding mental states - here termed metacognition - which could also be responsible for therapy failures. Unfortunately, a limited number of studies have investigated the role of mentalization in the process of change during psychotherapy. In this paper, we assume that poor metacognition corresponds to a core element of the general pathology of personality, impacts a series of clinical variables, generates symptoms and interpersonal problems, and causes treatment to be slower and less effective. We explored whether changes in metacognition predicted an improvement among different psychopathological variables characterizing PDs; 193 outpatients were treated at the Third Center of Cognitive Psychotherapy in Rome, Italy, and followed a structured path tailored for the different psychopathological variables that emerged from a comprehensive psychodiagnostic assessment that considered patients' symptoms, metacognitive abilities, interpersonal relationships, personality psychopathology, and global functioning. The measurements were repeated after a year of treatment. The results showed that changes in metacognitive abilities predicted improvements in the analyzed variable

Perspectives on barriers to treatment engagement of people with eating disorder symptoms who have not undergone treatment : a qualitative study

Background: Many people with an eating disorder (ED) never engage with an evidence-based ED treatment. Of the few studies that have qualitatively explored barriers to receiving treatment, some do so in relation to mental health conditions in general, and others focus on participants who have already undergone treatment. This study aims to address this gap in the literature by exploring the barriers to ED treatment engagement from the perspectives of individuals in the community with an ED (either self-identified or professionally diagnosed) and had not received ED treatment/s. Method: Fifty-six of 772 participants in an online Eating Disorders Treatment Experience survey had self-identified as having symptoms consistent with an ED, or had received a diagnosis of an ED and indicated that they had never undergone treatment for an ED. They were asked to share the reasons for which they did not receive treatment with an open-ended question. Qualitative analysis of survey responses was completed using the Framework Method to generate overarching themes that encapsulated the diverse participant accounts. Results: The thematic analysis generated two main themes, each with two subthemes. The first theme was the negotiation of the need for treatment within oneself (intrapersonal factors; theme 1). The second theme explored interpersonal contexts that shaped the participant’s decision not to seek treatment (interpersonal/external factors; theme 2). Two cross-cutting subthemes of fear and health literacy were also generated that demonstrated a high degree of overlap with the aforementioned main themes. Conclusions: The process by which individuals decide whether or not to engage with ED treatment services is complex and involves intra- and interpersonal negotiations intertwined with health literacy and fear. A factor not prominent in previous research was negative self-perceptions and the belief of being undeserving of treatment. These factors have implications for ongoing community and clinical interventions to further address barriers to ED treatment engagement

Principles of wide bandwidth acoustic detectors and the single-mass DUAL detector

We apply the standard theory of the elastic body to obtain a set of equations describing the behavior of an acoustic Gravitational Wave detector, fully taking into account the 3-dimensional properties of the mass, the readout and the signal. We show that the advantages given by a Dual detector made by two nested oscillators can also be obtained by monitoring two different acoustic modes of the same oscillator, thus easing the detector realization. We apply these concepts and by means of an optimization process we derive the main figures of such a single-mass Dual detector designed specifically for the frequency interval 2-5kHz. Finally we calculate the SQL sensitivity of this detector.Comment: 29 pages, 10 figure

Stem Cells Grown in Osteogenic Medium on PLGA, PLGA/HA, and Titanium Scaffolds for Surgical Application

Abstract Pluripotent adipose tissue-derived stem cells (hASCs) can differentiate into various mesodermal cell types such as osteoblasts, chondroblasts, and myoblasts. We isolated hASCs from subcutaneous adipose tissue during orthopaedic surgery and induced the osteogenic differentiation for 28 days on three different synthetic scaffolds such as polylactide-co-glycolide (PLGA), polylactide-co-glycolide/hydroxyapatite (PLGA/HA), and trabecular titanium scaffolds (Ti6Al4V). Pore size can influence certain criteria such as cell attachment, infiltration, and vascularization. The aim of this study was to investigate the performance of PLGA and PLGA/HA scaffolds with a higher porosity, ranging between 75% and 84%, with respect to Ti scaffolds but with smaller pore size, seeded with hASCs to develop a model that could be used in the treatment of bone defects and fractures. Osteogenesis was assessed by ELISA quantitation of extracellular matrix protein expression, von Kossa staining, X-ray microanalysis, and scanning electron microscopy. The higher amount of protein matrix on the Ti scaffold with respect to PLGA and PLGA/HA leads to the conclusion that not only the type of material but the structure significantly affects cell proliferation

Efficient characterisation of large deviations using population dynamics

We consider population dynamics as implemented by the cloning algorithm for analysis of large deviations of time-averaged quantities. We use the simple symmetric exclusion process with periodic boundary conditions as a prototypical example and investigate the convergence of the results with respect to the algorithmic parameters, focussing on the dynamical phase transition between homogeneous and inhomogeneous states, where convergence is relatively difficult to achieve. We discuss how the performance of the algorithm can be optimised, and how it can be efficiently exploited on parallel computing platforms