An experimental investigation of the influence of intermittent and continuous operating modes on the thermal behaviour of a full scale geothermal energy pile

Heat pumps connected to geothermal energy piles have variable operating hours. These variable hours can affect the thermal behaviour of these piles. Some key findings are presented for intermittent (16 hour) and continuous (24 hour) cooling modes in this abstract. It is found that the 16 hour cooling mode is more beneficial in terms of energy extraction, ground recovery, pile temperature and strain recovery

Bilateral redundancy gain and callosal integrity in a man with callosal lipoma: a diffusion-tensor imaging study

We investigated whether abnormalities in the structural organisation of the corpus callosum in the presence of curvilinear lipoma are associated with increased facilitation of response time to bilateral stimuli, an effect known as the redundancy gain. A patient (A.J.) with a curvilinear lipoma of the corpus callosum, his genetically-identical twin, and age-matched control participants made speeded responses to luminant stimuli. Structural organisation of callosal regions was assessed with diffusion-tensor imaging. A.J. was found to have reduced structural integrity in the splenium of the corpus callosum and produced a large redundancy gain suggestive of neural summation

A randomized, controlled trial of the pan-PPAR agonist lanifibranor in NASH

BACKGROUND Management of nonalcoholic steatohepatitis (NASH) is an unmet clinical need. Lanifibranor is a pan-PPAR (peroxisome proliferator–activated receptor) agonist that modulates key metabolic, inflammatory, and fibrogenic pathways in the pathogenesis of NASH. METHODS In this phase 2b, double-blind, randomized, placebo-controlled trial, patients with noncirrhotic, highly active NASH were randomly assigned in a 1:1:1 ratio to receive 1200 mg or 800 mg of lanifibranor or placebo once daily for 24 weeks. The pri- mary end point was a decrease of at least 2 points in the SAF-A score (the activity part of the Steatosis, Activity, Fibrosis [SAF] scoring system that incorporates scores for ballooning and inflammation) without worsening of fibrosis; SAF-A scores range from 0 to 4, with higher scores indicating more-severe disease activity. Secondary end points included resolution of NASH and regression of fibrosis. RESULTS A total of 247 patients underwent randomization, of whom 103 (42%) had type 2 diabetes mellitus and 188 (76%) had significant (moderate) or advanced fibrosis. The percentage of patients who had a decrease of at least 2 points in the SAF-A score without worsening of fibrosis was significantly higher among those who received the 1200-mg dose, but not among those who received the 800-mg dose, of lanifibranor than among those who received placebo (1200-mg dose vs. placebo, 55% vs.33%, P = 0.007; 800-mg dose vs. placebo, 48% vs. 33%, P = 0.07). The results favored both the 1200-mg and 800-mg doses of lanifibranor over placebo for resolution of NASH without worsening of fibrosis (49% and 39%, respectively, vs. 22%), improvement in fibrosis stage of at least 1 without worsening of NASH (48% and 34%, respectively, vs. 29%), and resolution of NASH plus improvement in fibrosis stage of at least 1 (35% and 25%, respectively, vs. 9%). Liver enzyme levels decreased and the levels of the majority of lipid, inflammatory, and fibrosis biomarkers improved in the lanifibranor groups. The dropout rate for adverse events was less than 5% and was similar across the trial groups. Diarrhea, nausea, peripheral edema, anemia, and weight gain occurred more frequently with lanifibranor than with placebo. CONCLUSIONS In this phase 2b trial involving patients with active NASH, the percentage of patients who had a decrease of at least 2 points in the SAF-A score without worsening of fibrosis was significantly higher with the 1200-mg dose of lanifibranor than with placebo. These findings support further assessment of lanifibranor in phase 3 trials. (Funded by Inventiva Pharma; NATIVE ClinicalTrials.gov number, NCT0300807

Generalized Plasmonic Modelling of the Effect of Refractive Index on Laser-Induced Periodic Nanostructures

Laser-induced periodic surface structures (LIPSS) have been studied theoretically employing generalized plasmonic modelling on several dielectric materials such as SiO2, Al2O3, ZnO, AlAs and diamond exposed to 800 nm wavelength multi-pulse femtosecond laser irradiation. The study of the optical properties of the materials during laser irradiation reveals a formation of a metallic like pseudo-material on the irradiated layer during excitation. A study of the grating periodicity of the nanostructures shows that the materials having a high refraction index allow LIPSS formation with a wide range of grating periodicities. Results also show High Spatial Frequency LIPSS formation with periodicities 3 to 8 times lower than the laser wavelength

Parametric Representation of Noncommutative Field Theory

In this paper we investigate the Schwinger parametric representation for the Feynman amplitudes of the recently discovered renormalizable $\phi^4_4$ quantum field theory on the Moyal non commutative ${\mathbb R^4}$ space. This representation involves new {\it hyperbolic} polynomials which are the non-commutative analogs of the usual "Kirchoff" or "Symanzik" polynomials of commutative field theory, but contain richer topological information.Comment: 31 pages,10 figure

Bilateral redundancy gain and callosal integrity in a man with callosal lipoma: a diffusion-tensor imaging study

We investigated whether abnormalities in the structural organisation of the corpus callosum in the presence of curvilinear lipoma are associated with increased facilitation of response time to bilateral stimuli, an effect known as the redundancy gain. A patient (A.J.) with a curvilinear lipoma of the corpus callosum, his genetically-identical twin, and age-matched control participants made speeded responses to luminant stimuli. Structural organisation of callosal regions was assessed with diffusion-tensor imaging. A.J. was found to have reduced structural integrity in the splenium of the corpus callosum and produced a large redundancy gain suggestive of neural summation

Non-semisimple Lie algebras with Levi factor \frak{so}(3), \frak{sl}(2,R) and their invariants

We analyze the number N of functionally independent generalized Casimir invariants for non-semisimple Lie algebras \frak{s}\overrightarrow{% oplus}_{R}\frak{r} with Levi factors isomorphic to \frak{so}(3) and \frak{sl}(2,R) in dependence of the pair (R,\frak{r}) formed by a representation R of \frak{s} and a solvable Lie algebra \frak{r}. We show that for any dimension n >= 6 there exist Lie algebras \frak{s}\overrightarrow{\oplus}_{R}\frak{r} with non-trivial Levi decomposition such that N(\frak{s}% \overrightarrow{oplus}_{R}\frak{r}) = 0.Comment: 16 page

The role of the dominant versus the non-dominant hemisphere: an fMRI study of Aphasia recovery following stroke

Background: Speech production is one of the most frequently affected cognitive functions following stroke; however, the neural mechanisms underlying the recovery of speech function are still incompletely understood. Aims: The current study aims to address the differential contributions of the dominant and non-dominant hemispheres in recovery from aphasia following stroke by comparing data from four stroke patients and 12 control participants to assess the patterns of activation during speech production tasks during functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) scanning. Methods & Procedures: Four chronic stroke patients (three left-hemisphere lesion and one right-hemisphere lesion) diagnosed with Broca’s aphasia at the acute phase, but now recovered to near normal speech ability, were tested on speech production tasks (phonemic fluency, categorical fluency and picture naming) whilst undergoing fMRI. These patients were compared with 12 healthy controls undergoing the same procedure. Outcomes & Results: Individual subject analysis showed activation peaks in perilesional areas in three out of four patients. This included one patient with right-hemisphere lesion, who also showed predominant perilesional activation. Group analysis of control participants showed predominately left-hemisphere activation, but not exclusively so. Laterality indexes were calculated and showed predominant left-hemisphere lateralisation in the control group (LI = 0.4). Three out of the four patients showed speech lateralised to the same hemisphere as their lesion and the fourth patient showed speech lateralised to the opposite hemisphere to their lesion. Different speech production tasks resulted in varying lateralisation indices (LIs) within participants. Conclusions: The data suggest that perilesional areas support recovery of speech in the chronic phase post-stroke regardless of the site of the lesion. The study has implications for the understanding of functional recovery as well as for the paradigms used in fMRI to localise speech production areas. Specifically, a variety of speech tasks are required to elicit activation that is representative of the range of cortical involvement in speech in healthy adults and that also allows for accurate reporting of the extent of recovery experienced in patients

Casimir invariants for the complete family of quasi-simple orthogonal algebras

A complete choice of generators of the center of the enveloping algebras of real quasi-simple Lie algebras of orthogonal type, for arbitrary dimension, is obtained in a unified setting. The results simultaneously include the well known polynomial invariants of the pseudo-orthogonal algebras $so(p,q)$, as well as the Casimirs for many non-simple algebras such as the inhomogeneous $iso(p,q)$, the Newton-Hooke and Galilei type, etc., which are obtained by contraction(s) starting from the simple algebras $so(p,q)$. The dimension of the center of the enveloping algebra of a quasi-simple orthogonal algebra turns out to be the same as for the simple $so(p,q)$ algebras from which they come by contraction. The structure of the higher order invariants is given in a convenient "pyramidal" manner, in terms of certain sets of "Pauli-Lubanski" elements in the enveloping algebras. As an example showing this approach at work, the scheme is applied to recovering the Casimirs for the (3+1) kinematical algebras. Some prospects on the relevance of these results for the study of expansions are also given.Comment: 19 pages, LaTe