Towards portable muography with small-area, gas-tight glass Resistive Plate Chambers

Imaging techniques that use atmospheric muons, collectively named under the neologism "muography", have seen a tremendous growth in recent times, mainly due to their diverse range of applications. The most well-known ones include but are not limited to: volcanology, archaeology, civil engineering, nuclear reactor monitoring, nuclear waste characterization, underground mapping, etc. These methods are based on the attenuation or deviation of muons to image large and/or dense objects where conventional techniques cannot work or their use becomes challenging. In this context, we have constructed a muography telescope based on "mini glass-RPC planes" following a design similar to the glass-RPC detectors developed by the CALICE Collaboration and used by the TOMUVOL experiment in the context of volcano radiography, but with smaller active area (16 $\times$ 16 cm$^{2}$). The compact size makes it an attractive choice with respect to other detectors previously employed for imaging on similar scales. An important innovation in this design is that the detectors are sealed. This makes the detector more portable and solves the usual safety and logistic issues for gas detectors operated underground and/or inside small rooms. This paper provides an overview on our guiding principles, the detector development and our operational experiences. Drawing on the lessons learnt from the first prototype, we also discuss our future direction for an improved second prototype, focusing primarily on a recently adopted serigraphy technique for the resistive coating of the glass plates.Comment: 8 pages, 7 figures, XV Workshop on Resistive Plate Chambers and Related Detectors (RPC2020

The Comparative Analysis of Neutrons Properties of the Nuclear Fuel Produced by the Westinghouse and the TVEL for the Reactors VVER-1000 by Code SERPENT

In this paper, we analyze the impact on isotopic composition of spent nuclear fuel VVER-1000, due to various operational conditions, such as concentration of boric acid dissolved in water, the temperature of the fuel, and others. In addition, the impact that is caused by the technological allowances applied while manufacturing fuel assemblies that were analyzed by the mass fuel and its enrichment. The calculations were performed on models of the fuel assemblies of reactor VVER-1000. The basis was taken of a typical fuel Assembly of the Russian TVEL suppliers and the new fuel assemblies of the American company Westinghouse.

Vorkommen und Charakterisierung von Modulinen des Zellzyklus in Shiga Toxin-produzierenden Escherichia coli

Die zu den Zellzyklus-Modulinen gehörenden „cytolethal distending toxins“ (CDTs) verursachen eine Blockade des Zellzyklus in der G2-Phase, eine Zellvergrößerung und den Zelltod. Im ersten Teil der vorliegenden Arbeit konnten mittels PCR unter Verwendung spezifischer Primer die cdt-Gene in 12 von 181 Shiga Toxin-produzierenden E. coli (STEC) nachgewiesen werden. Die cdt-gentragenden Stämme wurden aus Stuhlproben von Patienten mit hämolytisch-urämischen Syndrom oder von Patienten mit Diarrhoe isoliert. Die Produktion eines biologisch aktiven CDT durch diese Stämme wurde mittels eines Zellkulturtests mit CHO (Chinese hamster ovary)-Zellen nachgewiesen. Im zweiten Teil der Arbeit wurden von vier STEC-Stämmen unterschiedlicher Serovare die kompletten cdt-V-Gene sequenziert. Hierbei zeigte sich in allen Fällen eine hohe Homologien (> 99%) zu dem cdt-V des E. coli O157:H-. Das Vorkommen von homologen cdt-Genen in phylogenetisch heterogenen STEC könnte darauf hindeuten, dass diese Virulenzgene erst in jüngster Zeit erworben wurden

DELPHES 3, A modular framework for fast simulation of a generic collider experiment

The version 3.0 of the DELPHES fast-simulation is presented. The goal of DELPHES is to allow the simulation of a multipurpose detector for phenomenological studies. The simulation includes a track propagation system embedded in a magnetic field, electromagnetic and hadron calorimeters, and a muon identification system. Physics objects that can be used for data analysis are then reconstructed from the simulated detector response. These include tracks and calorimeter deposits and high level objects such as isolated electrons, jets, taus, and missing energy. The new modular approach allows for greater flexibility in the design of the simulation and reconstruction sequence. New features such as the particle-flow reconstruction approach, crucial in the first years of the LHC, and pile-up simulation and mitigation, which is needed for the simulation of the LHC detectors in the near future, have also been implemented. The DELPHES framework is not meant to be used for advanced detector studies, for which more accurate tools are needed. Although some aspects of DELPHES are hadron collider specific, it is flexible enough to be adapted to the needs of electron-positron collider experiments.Comment: JHEP 1402 (2014

The B group vitamins and mineral elements in the selective removal of wheat kernel layers

The objective of this study was to investigate how selective removal of the surface layers of whole wheat grains by abrasive scouring affects the distribution of mineral elements (macronutrients, micronutrients and trace elements) and the B group vitamins (thiamin, riboflavin pyridoxine, pantothenic acid and niacin) in three soft winter wheat varieties (Partizanka, Novosadska rana and Lasta). Although representing technologically different quality classes of wheat, the varieties were not significantly different in the B group vitamin contents, except for pyridoxine. Whole grains of all varieties exhibited very similar scouring behavior in reduction of vitamins: the most intensive investigated regime only slightly, but not significantly reduced the concentration of the B group vitamins. The nutritive value of scoured wheat grains with regard to the B group vitamins was preserved. The investigated minerals were: Na, K, Ca, Mg, N4n, Fe, Cu, Zn, Ni, Cr, Se, Pb and Cd. The concentrations of minerals in scoured wheat grains were significantly reduced, dropping on average to 65% of the initial values for macro and 55% for microelements. The change of concentrations with the duration of applied treatment followed different patterns for different elements. Furthermore, a different pattern of the change for the same element in different wheat varieties was noticed. This might be due either to different mechanical properties of bran and bran layer interfaces or genotypic variability in distribution of elements in wheat grain. Severe reduction in Pb concentrations was achieved leading to improvement of whole-wheat food safety

Time to (finally) acknowledge that fish have emotionality and pain

The increasing work using fish as a model organism calls for a better understanding of their sentience. While growing evidence suggests that pain and emotionality exist in zebrafish, many deniers continue to ignore the evidence. Here we revisit the main conceptual breakthroughs in the field that argue clearly for pain and emotionality. We call for an end to denial and a focus on studying the mechanisms of fish pain and emotionality, and their translational relevance to human conditions

Frequency and Phase Synchronization in Neuromagnetic Cortical Responses to Flickering-Color Stimuli

In our earlier study dealing with the analysis of neuromagnetic responses (magnetoencephalograms - MEG) to flickering-color stimuli for a group of control human subjects (9 volunteers) and a patient with photosensitive epilepsy (a 12-year old girl), it was shown that Flicker-Noise Spectroscopy (FNS) was able to identify specific differences in the responses of each organism. The high specificity of individual MEG responses manifested itself in the values of FNS parameters for both chaotic and resonant components of the original signal. The present study applies the FNS cross-correlation function to the analysis of correlations between the MEG responses simultaneously measured at spatially separated points of the human cortex processing the red-blue flickering color stimulus. It is shown that the cross-correlations for control (healthy) subjects are characterized by frequency and phase synchronization at different points of the cortex, with the dynamics of neuromagnetic responses being determined by the low-frequency processes that correspond to normal physiological rhythms. But for the patient, the frequency and phase synchronization breaks down, which is associated with the suppression of cortical regulatory functions when the flickering-color stimulus is applied, and higher frequencies start playing the dominating role. This suggests that the disruption of correlations in the MEG responses is the indicator of pathological changes leading to photosensitive epilepsy, which can be used for developing a method of diagnosing the disease based on the analysis with the FNS cross-correlation function.Comment: 21 pages, 14 figures; submitted to "Laser Physics", 2010, 2

Proton-3^{3}He elastic scattering at low energies

We present new accurate measurements of the differential cross section $\sigma(\theta)$ and the proton analyzing power $A_{y}$ for proton-$^{3}$He elastic scattering at various energies. A supersonic gas jet target has been employed to obtain these low energy cross section measurements. The $\sigma(\theta)$ distributions have been measured at $E_{p}$ = 0.99, 1.59, 2.24, 3.11, and 4.02 MeV. Full angular distributions of $A_{y}$ have been measured at $E_{p}$ = 1.60, 2.25, 3.13, and 4.05 MeV. This set of high-precision data is compared to four-body variational calculations employing realistic nucleon-nucleon (NN) and three-nucleon (3N) interactions. For the unpolarized cross section the agreement between the theoretical calculation and data is good when a $3N$ potential is used. The comparison between the calculated and measured proton analyzing powers reveals discrepancies of approximately 50% at the maximum of each distribution. This is analogous to the existing ``$A_{y}$ Puzzle'' known for the past 20 years in nucleon-deuteron elastic scattering.Comment: 22 pages, 9 figures, to be published in Physical Review C, corrected reference 4