2,814 research outputs found
Test of LOX compatibility for asphalt and concrete runway materials
A literature survey and a telephone canvass of producers and users of LOX is reported which yielded one report of an accident resulting from a LOX spill on asphalt, one discussion of hazardous conditions, and an unreferenced mention of an incident. Laboratory tests using standard LOX impact apparatus yielded reactions with both old and new alphalt, but none with concrete. In the final test, using a larger sample of asphalt, the reaction caused extensive damage to equipment. Initial field experiments using 2-meter square asphalt slabs covered with LOX, conducted during rainy weather, achieved no reaction with plummets, and limited reaction with a blasting cap as a reaction initiator. In a final plummet-initiated test on a dry slab, a violent reaction, which appeared to have propagated over the entire slab surface, destroyed the plummet fixture and threw fragments as far as 48 meters
Preserving entanglement under decoherence and sandwiching all separable states
Every entangled state can be perturbed, for instance by decoherence, and stay
entangled. For a large class of pure entangled states, we show how large the
perturbation can be. Our class includes all pure bipartite and all maximally
entangled states. For an entangled state, E, the constucted neighborhood of
entangled states is the region outside two parallel hyperplanes, which sandwich
the set of all separable states. The states for which these neighborhoods are
largest are the maximally entangled ones. As the number of particles, or the
dimensions of the Hilbert spaces for two of the particles increases, the
distance between two of the hyperplanes which sandwich the separable states
goes to zero. It is easy to decide if a state Q is in the neighborhood of
entangled states we construct for an entangled state E. One merely has to check
if the trace of EQ is greater than a constant which depends upon E and which we
determine.Comment: Corrected first author's e-mail address. All the rest remains
unchange
Asymptotically cylindrical 7-manifolds of holonomy G_2 with applications to compact irreducible G_2-manifolds
We construct examples of exponentially asymptotically cylindrical Riemannian
7-manifolds with holonomy group equal to G_2. To our knowledge, these are the
first such examples. We also obtain exponentially asymptotically cylindrical
coassociative calibrated submanifolds. Finally, we apply our results to show
that one of the compact G_2-manifolds constructed by Joyce by desingularisation
of a flat orbifold T^7/\Gamma can be deformed to one of the compact
G_2-manifolds obtainable as a generalized connected sum of two exponentially
asymptotically cylindrical SU(3)-manifolds via the method given by the first
author (math.DG/0012189).Comment: 36 pages; v2: corrected trivial typos; v3: some arguments corrected
and improved; v4: a number of improvements on presentation, paritularly in
sections 4 and 6, including an added picture
Nonlinear software sensor for monitoring genetic regulation processes with noise and modeling errors
Nonlinear control techniques by means of a software sensor that are commonly
used in chemical engineering could be also applied to genetic regulation
processes. We provide here a realistic formulation of this procedure by
introducing an additive white Gaussian noise, which is usually found in
experimental data. Besides, we include model errors, meaning that we assume we
do not know the nonlinear regulation function of the process. In order to
illustrate this procedure, we employ the Goodwin dynamics of the concentrations
[B.C. Goodwin, Temporal Oscillations in Cells, (Academic Press, New York,
1963)] in the simple form recently applied to single gene systems and some
operon cases [H. De Jong, J. Comp. Biol. 9, 67 (2002)], which involves the
dynamics of the mRNA, given protein, and metabolite concentrations. Further, we
present results for a three gene case in co-regulated sets of transcription
units as they occur in prokaryotes. However, instead of considering their full
dynamics, we use only the data of the metabolites and a designed software
sensor. We also show, more generally, that it is possible to rebuild the
complete set of nonmeasured concentrations despite the uncertainties in the
regulation function or, even more, in the case of not knowing the mRNA
dynamics. In addition, the rebuilding of concentrations is not affected by the
perturbation due to the additive white Gaussian noise and also we managed to
filter the noisy output of the biological systemComment: 21 pages, 7 figures; also selected in vjbio of August 2005; this
version corrects a misorder in the last three references of the published
versio
Protein-membrane interaction and fatty acid transfer from intestinal fatty acid-binding protein to membranes: Support for a multistep process
Fatty acid transfer from intestinal fatty acid-binding protein (IFABP) to phospholipid membranes occurs during protein-membrane collisions. Electrostatic interactions involving the α-helical "portal" region of the protein have been shown to be of great importance. In the present study, the role of specific lysine residues in the α-helical region of IFABP was directly examined. A series of point mutants in rat IFABP was engineered in which the lysine positive charges in this domain were eliminated or reversed. Using a fluorescence resonance energy transfer assay, we analyzed the rates and mechanism of fatty acid transfer from wild type and mutant proteins to acceptor membranes. Most of the α-helical domain mutants showed slower absolute fatty acid transfer rates to zwitterionic membranes, with substitution of one of the lysines of the α2 helix, Lys27, resulting in a particularly dramatic decrease in the fatty acid transfer rate. Sensitivity to negatively charged phospholipid membranes was also reduced, with charge reversal mutants in the α2 helix the most affected. The results support the hypothesis that the portal region undergoes a conformational change during protein-membrane interaction, which leads to release of the bound fatty acid to the membrane and that the α2 segment is of particular importance in the establishment of charge-charge interactions between IFABP and membranes. Cross-linking experiments with a phospholipid-photoactivable reagent underscored the importance of charge-charge interactions, showing that the physical interaction between wild-type intestinal fatty acid-binding protein and phospholipid membranes is enhanced by electrostatic interactions. Protein-membrane interactions were also found to be enhanced by the presence of ligand, suggesting different collisional complex structures for holo- and apo-IFABP.Instituto de Investigaciones BioquĂmicas de La Plat
Sigmoid-colonic motility in health and irritable bowel syndrome: A role for 5-hydroxytryptamine
Treatment utilization and outcomes in elderly patients with locally advanced esophageal carcinoma: A review of the National Cancer Database
For elderly patients with locally advanced esophageal cancer, therapeutic approaches and outcomes in a modern cohort are not well characterized. Patients â„70Â years old with clinical stage II and III esophageal cancer diagnosed between 1998 and 2012 were identified from the National Cancer Database and stratified based on treatment type. Variables associated with treatment utilization were evaluated using logistic regression and survival evaluated using Cox proportional hazards analysis. Propensity matching (1:1) was performed to help account for selection bias. A total of 21,593 patients were identified. Median and maximum ages were 77 and 90, respectively. Treatment included palliative therapy (24.3%), chemoradiation (37.1%), trimodality therapy (10.0%), esophagectomy alone (5.6%), or no therapy (12.9%). Age â„80 (OR 0.73), female gender (OR 0.81), Charlson-Deyo comorbidity score â„2 (OR 0.82), and high-volume centers (OR 0.83) were associated with a decreased likelihood of palliative therapy versus no treatment. Age â„80 (OR 0.79) and Clinical Stage III (OR 0.33) were associated with a decreased likelihood, while adenocarcinoma histology (OR 1.33) and nonacademic cancer centers (OR 3.9), an increased likelihood of esophagectomy alone compared to definitive chemoradiation. Age â„80 (OR 0.15), female gender (OR 0.80), and non-Caucasian race (OR 0.63) were associated with a decreased likelihood, while adenocarcinoma histology (OR 2.10) and high-volume centers (OR 2.34), an increased likelihood of trimodality therapy compared to definitive chemoradiation. Each treatment type demonstrated improved survival compared to no therapy: palliative treatment (HR 0.49) to trimodality therapy (HR 0.25) with significance between all groups. Any therapy, including palliative care, was associated with improved survival; however, subsets of elderly patients with locally advanced esophageal cancer are less likely to receive aggressive therapy. Care should be taken to not unnecessarily deprive these individuals of treatment that may improve survival
Spheromak Merging And Field Reversed Configuration Formation At The Swarthmore Spheromak Experiment
The initial results of coaxial co- and counter-helicity spheromak merging studies at the Swarthmore Spheromak Experiment (SSX) [M. R. Brown, Phys. Plasmas 6, 1717 (1999)] are reported. In its new configuration, SSX is optimized to study field reversed configuration (FRC) formation and stability by counter-helicity spheromak merging. A pair of midplane coils magnetically restricts the merging process to determine how the stability of the resulting magnetic configuration depends upon the quantity of toroidal flux remaining from the initial spheromaks. The diagnostic set at SSX, featuring the capability of measuring up to 600 magnetic field components at 800 ns time resolution, permits detailed studies of the dynamic three-dimensional magnetic structures produced during these experiments. A compact array of magnetic probes examines the local reconnection process, while a distributed array of probes examines global magnetic structure. Counter-helicity merging produces a FRC that persists for several Alfvén times, although the oppositely directed toroidal field of the initial spheromaks does not completely annihilate. The m=1 (toroidal) mode dominates late in the evolution, and is consistent with the tilt instability. Co-helicity merging produces a single elongated spheromak that rapidly tilts
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