966 research outputs found
Charge Stripe in an Antiferromagnet: 1d Band of Composite Excitations
With the help of analytical and numerical studies of the - model we
argue that the charge stripe in an antiferromagnetic insulator should be
understood as a system of holon-spin-polaron excitations condensed at the
self-induced antiphase domain wall. The structure of such a charge excitation
is studied in detail with numerical and analytical results for various
quantities being in a very close agreement. An analytical picture of these
excitations occupying an effective 1D stripe band is also in a very good accord
with numerical data. The emerging concept advocates the primary role of the
kinetic energy in favoring the stripe as a ground state. A comparative analysis
suggests the effect of pairing and collective meandering on the energetics of
the stripe formation to be secondary.Comment: 5 pages, 3 figures, proceedings of SCES'01 conference, Ann Arbor,
2001, to be published in Physica
Does the MK2-dependent production of TNFα regulate mGluR-dependent synaptic plasticity?
The molecular mechanisms and signalling cascades that trigger the induction of group I metabotropic glutamate receptor (GI-mGluR)-dependent long-term depression (LTD) have been the subject of intensive investigation for nearly two decades. The generation of genetically modified animals has played a crucial role in elucidating the involvement of key molecules regulating the induction and maintenance of mGluR-LTD. In this review we will discuss the requirement of the newly discovered MAPKAPK-2 (MK2) and MAPKAPK-3 (MK3) signalling cascade in regulating GI-mGluR-LTD. Recently, it has been shown that the absence of MK2 impaired the induction of GI-mGluR-dependent LTD, an effect that is caused by reduced internalization of AMPA receptors (AMPAR). As the MK2 cascade directly regulates tumour necrosis factor alpha (TNFα) production, this review will examine the evidence that the release of TNFα acts to regulate glutamate receptor expression and therefore may play a functional role in the impairment of GI-mGluRdependent LTD and the cognitive deficits observed in MK2/3 double knockout animals. The strong links of increased TNFα production in both aging and neurodegenerative disease could implicate the action of MK2 in these processes
Wave function recombination instability in cold atom interferometers
Cold atom interferometers use guiding potentials that split the wave function
of the Bose-Einstein condensate and then recombine it. We present theoretical
analysis of the wave function recombination instability that is due to the weak
nonlinearity of the condensate. It is most pronounced when the accumulated
phase difference between the arms of the interferometer is close to an odd
multiple of PI and consists in exponential amplification of the weak ground
state mode by the strong first excited mode. The instability exists for both
trapped-atom and beam interferometers.Comment: 4 pages, 5 figure
Proximity-induced screening and its magnetic breakdown in mesoscopic hybrid structures
We derive a general microscopic expression for the non-linear diamagnetic
current in a clean superconductor-insulator-normal metal structure with an
arbitrary interface transmission. In the absence of electron-electron
interactions in the normal metal the diamagnetic response increases
monotonously with decreasing temperature showing no sign of paramagnetic
reentrance down to T=0. We also analyze the magnetic breakdown of proximity
induced Meissner screening. We demonstrate that the magnetic breakdown field
should be strongly suppressed in the limit of small interface transmissions
while the linear diamagnetic current does not depend on the transmission of the
insulating barrier at low enough temperatures.Comment: 7 pages, 2 figure
Isovector and isoscalar superfluid phases in rotating nuclei
The subtle interplay between the two nuclear superfluids, isovector T=1 and
isoscalar T=0 phases, are investigated in an exactly soluble model. It is shown
that T=1 and T=0 pair-modes decouple in the exact calculations with the T=1
pair-energy being independent of the T=0 pair-strength and vice-versa. In the
rotating-field, the isoscalar correlations remain constant in contrast to the
well known quenching of isovector pairing. An increase of the isoscalar (J=1,
T=0) pair-field results in a delay of the bandcrossing frequency. This
behaviour is shown to be present only near the N=Z line and its experimental
confirmation would imply a strong signature for isoscalar pairing collectivity.
The solutions of the exact model are also discussed in the
Hartree-Fock-Bogoliubov approximation.Comment: 5 pages, 4 figures, submitted to PR
NMDA receptor-dependent signalling pathways regulate arginine vasopressin expression in the paraventricular nucleus of the rat
YesThe antidiuretic hormone arginine vasopressin (AVP) regulates water homeostasis, blood pressure and a range of stress responses. It is synthesized in the hypothalamus and released from the posterior pituitary into the general circulation upon a range of stimuli. While the mechanisms leading to AVP secretion have been widely investigated, the molecular mechanisms regulating AVP gene expression are mostly unclear. Here we investigated the neurotransmitters and signal transduction pathways that activate AVP gene expression in the paraventricular nucleus (PVN) of the rat using acute brain slices and quantitative real-time PCR. We show that stimulation with l-glutamate robustly induced AVP gene expression in acute hypothalamic brain slices containing the PVN. More specifically, we show that AVP transcription was stimulated by NMDA. Using pharmacological treatments, our data further reveal that the activation of ERK1/2 (PD184352), CaMKII (KN-62) and PI3K (LY294002; 740 Y-P) is involved in the NMDA-induced AVP gene expression in the PVN. Together, this study identifies NMDA-mediated cell signalling pathways that regulate AVP gene expression in the rat PVN.Supported by a generous donation from Jonathan Feuer
Mitochondrial DNA variation in Parkinson’s disease: Analysis of “out-of-place” population variants as a risk factor
Mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA), a potential source of mitochondrial dysfunction, has been implicated in Parkinson’s disease (PD). However, many previous studies investigating associations between mtDNA population variation and PD reported inconsistent or contradictory findings. Here, we investigated an alternative hypothesis to determine whether mtDNA variation could play a significant role in PD risk. Emerging evidence suggests that haplogroup-defining mtDNA variants may have pathogenic potential if they occur “out-of-place” on a different maternal lineage. We hypothesized that the mtDNA of PD cases would be enriched for out-of-place variation in genes encoding components of the oxidative phosphorylation complexes. We tested this hypothesis with a unique dataset comprising whole mitochondrial genomes of 70 African ancestry PD cases, two African ancestry control groups (n = 78 and n = 53) and a replication group of 281 European ancestry PD cases and 140 controls from the Parkinson’s Progression Markers Initiative cohort. Significantly more African ancestry PD cases had out-of-place variants than controls from the second control group (P < 0.0125), although this association was not observed in the first control group nor the replication group. As the first mtDNA study to include African ancestry PD cases and to explore out-of-place variation in a PD context, we found evidence that such variation might be significant in this context, thereby warranting further replication in larger cohorts
Femtosecond pump/supercontinuum-probe spectroscopy: Optimized setup and signal analysis for single-shot spectral referencing
A setup for pump/supercontinuum-probe spectroscopy is described which (i) is optimized to cancel fluctuations of the probe light by single-shot referencing, and (ii) extends the probe range into the near-uv (1000–270 nm). Reflective optics allow 50 μm spot size in the sample and upon entry into two separate spectrographs. The correlation γsame between sample and reference readings of probe light level at every pixel exceeds 0.99, compared to γconsec<0.92 reported for consecutive referencing. Statistical analysis provides the confidence interval of the induced optical density, ΔOD. For demonstration we first examine a dye (Hoechst 33258) bound in the minor groove of double-stranded DNA. A weak 1.1 ps spectral oscillation in the fluorescence region, assigned to DNA breathing, is shown to be significant. A second example concerns the weak vibrational structure around t=0 which reflects stimulated Raman processes. With 1% fluctuations of probe power, baseline noise for a transient absorption spectrum becomes 25 μOD rms in 1 s at 1 kHz, allowing to record resonance Raman spectra of flavine adenine dinucleotide in the S0 and S1 stateWe are grateful to the Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft for support (SFB 450 and Cluster of Excellence “Unifying Concepts in Catalysis”)S
Overscreening Diamagnetism in Cylindrical Superconductor-Normal Metal-Heterostructures
We study the linear diamagnetic response of a superconducting cylinder coated
by a normal-metal layer due to the proximity effect using the clean limit
quasiclassical Eilenberger equations. We compare the results for the
susceptibility with those for a planar geometry. Interestingly, for
the cylinder exhibits a stronger overscreening of the magnetic field, i.e., at
the interface to the superconductor it can be less than (-1/2) of the applied
field. Even for , the diamagnetism can be increased as compared to the
planar case, viz. the magnetic susceptibility becomes smaller than
-3/4. This behaviour can be explained by an intriguing spatial oscillation of
the magnetic field in the normal layer
The excitation spectrum of mesoscopic proximity structures
We investigate one aspect of the proximity effect, viz., the local density of
states of a superconductor-normal metal sandwich. In contrast to earlier work,
we allow for the presence of an arbitrary concentration of impurities in the
structure. The superconductor induces a gap in the normal metal spectrum that
is proportional to the inverse of the elastic mean free path l_N for rather
clean systems. For a mean free path much shorter than the thickness of the
normal metal, we find a gap size proportional to l_N that approaches the
behavior predicted by the Usadel equation (diffusive limit). We also discuss
the influence of interface and surface roughness, the consequences of a
non-ideal transmittivity of the interface, and the dependence of our results on
the choice of the model of impurity scattering.Comment: 7 pages, 8 figures (included), submitted to PR
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