An epidemiological and economic framework for evaluating the tangible and intangible impacts of emergency animal disease outbreaks

The economics of emergency animal disease outbreak response is impacted by a range of factors, such as the likelihood of an event occurring, species affected, frequency and distribution of disease incursions, transmission cycles, host interactions and climatic anomalies. Whilst empirically focussed economic evaluation tools for analysis and evaluation of control and prevention options are in frequent use, insights can be gained from an expanded framework that incorporates value-drivers used to justify decisions. The framework is build around an extrapolated cost-benefit analysis (CBA) that incorporates tangible and intangible elements. Primary steps involve risk analysis to ascertain the magnitude, priority and impact of the potential emergency situation. The framework also allows the operator to value-add to the CBA by incorporating non-commercial intangibles (such as environment, human health and animal welfare) using a series of value multipliers. These are essentially an averaged preference for a nominated approach or intervention along a scale of potential value placements using an axiological methodology. The outcome of the framework represents a holistically adjusted parametric. Potential uses of these outcomes could include (but are not limited to): (1) development of new policy for emergency animal diseases in peace time (Preparedness phase); (2) during consultative processes where multiple perspectives and values must be identified and considered: (1) for economic (tangible and intangible) justification of adjustments to response policy during an exotic animal disease (control phase); (2) for comparing and contrasting the economic (tangible and intangible) consequences of a particular control or prevention policy A case study using Hendra Virus will be given

Suppression of human papillomavirus gene expression in vitro and in vivo by herpes simplex virus type 2 infection

AbstractRecent epidemiological studies have found that women infected with both herpes simplex virus type 2 (HSV-2) and human papillomavirus (HPV) type 16 or HPV-18 are at greater risk of developing cervical carcinoma compared to women infected with only one virus. However, it remains unclear if HSV-2 is a cofactor for cervical cancer or if HPV and HSV-2 interact in any way. We have studied the effect of HSV-2 infection on HPV-11 gene expression in an in vitro double-infection assay. HPV transcripts were down-regulated in response to HSV-2 infection. Two HSV-2 vhs mutants failed to reduce HPV-16 E1^E4 transcripts. We also studied the effect of HSV-2 infection on preexisting experimental papillomas in a vaginal epithelial xenograft model. Doubly infected grafts demonstrated papillomatous transformation and the classical cytopathic effect from HSV-2 infection. HPV and HSV DNA signals were mutually exclusive. These studies may have therapeutic applications for HPV infections and related neoplasms

Quantisation of twistor theory by cocycle twist

We present the main ingredients of twistor theory leading up to and including the Penrose-Ward transform in a coordinate algebra form which we can then `quantise' by means of a functorial cocycle twist. The quantum algebras for the conformal group, twistor space CP^3, compactified Minkowski space CMh and the twistor correspondence space are obtained along with their canonical quantum differential calculi, both in a local form and in a global *-algebra formulation which even in the classical commutative case provides a useful alternative to the formulation in terms of projective varieties. We outline how the Penrose-Ward transform then quantises. As an example, we show that the pull-back of the tautological bundle on CMh pulls back to the basic instanton on S^4\subset CMh and that this observation quantises to obtain the Connes-Landi instanton on \theta-deformed S^4 as the pull-back of the tautological bundle on our \theta-deformed CMh. We likewise quantise the fibration CP^3--> S^4 and use it to construct the bundle on \theta-deformed CP^3 that maps over under the transform to the \theta-deformed instanton.Comment: 68 pages 0 figures. Significant revision now has detailed formulae for classical and quantum CP^

Hidden Symmetries and Integrable Hierarchy of the N=4 Supersymmetric Yang-Mills Equations

We describe an infinite-dimensional algebra of hidden symmetries of N=4 supersymmetric Yang-Mills (SYM) theory. Our derivation is based on a generalization of the supertwistor correspondence. Using the latter, we construct an infinite sequence of flows on the solution space of the N=4 SYM equations. The dependence of the SYM fields on the parameters along the flows can be recovered by solving the equations of the hierarchy. We embed the N=4 SYM equations in the infinite system of the hierarchy equations and show that this SYM hierarchy is associated with an infinite set of graded symmetries recursively generated from supertranslations. Presumably, the existence of such nonlocal symmetries underlies the observed integrable structures in quantum N=4 SYM theory.Comment: 24 page

Multibeam Maser Survey of methanol and excited OH in the Magellanic clouds: new detections and maser abundance estimates

‘The definitive version is available at www.blackwell-synergy.com.’ Copyright Blackwell Publishing DOI: 10.1111/j.1365-2966.2008.12888.xPeer reviewe

Resonance fluorescence from a telecom-wavelength quantum dot

© 2016 Author(s).We report on resonance fluorescence from a single quantum dot emitting at telecom wavelengths. We perform high-resolution spectroscopy and observe the Mollow triplet in the Rabi regime - a hallmark of resonance fluorescence. The measured resonance-fluorescence spectra allow us to rule out pure dephasing as a significant decoherence mechanism in these quantum dots. Combined with numerical simulations, the experimental results provide robust characterisation of charge noise in the environment of the quantum dot. Resonant control of the quantum dot opens up new possibilities for the on-demand generation of indistinguishable single photons at telecom wavelengths as well as quantum optics experiments and direct manipulation of solid-state qubits in telecom-wavelength quantum dots

Emission spectra and intrinsic optical bistability in a two-level medium

Scattering of resonant radiation in a dense two-level medium is studied theoretically with account for local field effects and renormalization of the resonance frequency. Intrinsic optical bistability is viewed as switching between different spectral patterns of fluorescent light controlled by the incident field strength. Response spectra are calculated analytically for the entire hysteresis loop of atomic excitation. The equations to describe the non-linear interaction of an atomic ensemble with light are derived from the Bogolubov-Born-Green-Kirkwood-Yvon hierarchy for reduced single particle density matrices of atoms and quantized field modes and their correlation operators. The spectral power of scattered light with separated coherent and incoherent constituents is obtained straightforwardly within the hierarchy. The formula obtained for emission spectra can be used to distinguish between possible mechanisms suggested to produce intrinsic bistability.Comment: 18 pages, 5 figure

Measurement of the scintillation time spectra and pulse-shape discrimination of low-energy beta and nuclear recoils in liquid argon with DEAP-1

The DEAP-1 low-background liquid argon detector was used to measure scintillation pulse shapes of electron and nuclear recoil events and to demonstrate the feasibility of pulse-shape discrimination (PSD) down to an electron-equivalent energy of 20 keV. In the surface dataset using a triple-coincidence tag we found the fraction of beta events that are misidentified as nuclear recoils to be $<1.4\times 10^{-7}$ (90% C.L.) for energies between 43-86 keVee and for a nuclear recoil acceptance of at least 90%, with 4% systematic uncertainty on the absolute energy scale. The discrimination measurement on surface was limited by nuclear recoils induced by cosmic-ray generated neutrons. This was improved by moving the detector to the SNOLAB underground laboratory, where the reduced background rate allowed the same measurement with only a double-coincidence tag. The combined data set contains $1.23\times10^8$ events. One of those, in the underground data set, is in the nuclear-recoil region of interest. Taking into account the expected background of 0.48 events coming from random pileup, the resulting upper limit on the electronic recoil contamination is $<2.7\times10^{-8}$ (90% C.L.) between 44-89 keVee and for a nuclear recoil acceptance of at least 90%, with 6% systematic uncertainty on the absolute energy scale. We developed a general mathematical framework to describe PSD parameter distributions and used it to build an analytical model of the distributions observed in DEAP-1. Using this model, we project a misidentification fraction of approx. $10^{-10}$ for an electron-equivalent energy threshold of 15 keV for a detector with 8 PE/keVee light yield. This reduction enables a search for spin-independent scattering of WIMPs from 1000 kg of liquid argon with a WIMP-nucleon cross-section sensitivity of $10^{-46}$ cm$^2$, assuming negligible contribution from nuclear recoil backgrounds.Comment: Accepted for publication in Astroparticle Physic