3,140 research outputs found
Optimization of micromachined relex klystrons for operation at terahertz frequencies
New micromachining techniques now provide us
with the technology to fabricate reflex klystron oscillators with dimensions suitable for operation in the terahertz region of the electromagnetic spectrum. For the success of these devices, accurate designs are required since the optimization of certain parameters is critical to obtaining useful amounts of ac power. Classical models for device design have long been in existence,
but these are no longer valid at terahertz frequencies. For this reason, we have developed a simulation tool, specifically aimed at the design of terahertz frequency reflex klystrons. The tool, based on the Monte Carlo algorithm, includes loss mechanisms and takes into account the main peculiarities expected for device
operation at terahertz frequencies. In this study, the tool is used to study the influence of the electron beam aperture angle and cavity dimensions (particularly the grid spacing) on ac power generation. The results demonstrate that aperture angles of less than 10 are necessary for the optimization of output power. It is
also found that the power output is highly sensitive to the distance between the grids
Efficient Retrieval and Ranking of Undesired Package Cycles in Large Software Systems
International audienceMany design guidelines state that a software system architecture should avoid cycles between its packages. Yet such cycles appear again and again in many programs. We believe that the existing approaches for cycle detection are too coarse to assist the developers to remove cycles from their programs. In this paper, we describe an efficient algorithm that performs a fine-grained analysis of the cycles among the packages of an application. In addition, we define a metric to rank cycles by their level of undesirability, prioritizing the cycles that seems the more undesired by the developers. Our approach is validated on two large and mature software systems in Java and Smalltalk
Controlling anomalous stresses in soft field-responsive systems
We report a new phenomenon occurring in field-responsive suspensions:
shear-induced anomalous stresses. Competition between a rotating field and a
shear flow originates a multiplicity of anomalous stress behaviors in
suspensions of bounded dimers constituted by induced dipoles. The great variety
of stress regimes includes non-monotonous behaviors, multi-resonances, negative
viscosity effect and blockades. The reversibility of the transitions between
the different regimes and the self-similarity of the stresses make this
phenomenon controllable and therefore applicable to modify macroscopic
properties of soft condensed matter phasesComment: 5 pages, 6 figures, submitted to PR
NMR and molecular dynamics studies of the interaction of melatonin with calmodulin
Pineal hormone melatonin (N-acetyl-5-methoxytryptamine) is thought to modulate the calcium/calmodulin signaling pathway either by changing intracellular Ca2+ concentration via activation of its G-protein-coupled membrane receptors, or through a direct interaction with calmodulin (CaM). The present work studies the direct interaction of melatonin with intact calcium-saturated CaM both experimentally, by fluorescence and nuclear magnetic resonance spectroscopies, and theoretically, by molecular dynamics simulations. The analysis of the experimental data shows that the interaction is calcium-dependent. The affinity, as obtained from monitoring 15N and 1H chemical shift changes for a melatonin titration, is weak (in the millimolar range) and comparable for the N- and C-terminal domains. Partial replacement of diamagnetic Ca2+ by paramagnetic Tb3+ allowed the measurement of interdomain NMR pseudocontact shifts and residual dipolar couplings, indicating that each domain movement in the complex is not correlated with the other one. Molecular dynamics simulations allow us to follow the dynamics of melatonin in the binding pocket of CaM. Overall, this study provides an example of how a combination of experimental and theoretical approaches can shed light on a weakly interacting system of biological and pharmacological significance.Fil:Turjanski, A.G. Universidad de Buenos Aires. Facultad de Ciencias Exactas y Naturales; Argentina.Fil:Estrin, D.A. Universidad de Buenos Aires. Facultad de Ciencias Exactas y Naturales; Argentina.Fil:Rosenstein, R.E. Universidad de Buenos Aires. Facultad de Ciencias Exactas y Naturales; Argentina.Fil:Biekofsky, R.R. Universidad de Buenos Aires. Facultad de Ciencias Exactas y Naturales; Argentina
Structural Connectivity of the Developing Human Amygdala
<div><p>A large corpus of research suggests that there are changes in the manner and degree to which the amygdala supports cognitive and emotional function across development. One possible basis for these developmental differences could be the maturation of amygdalar connections with the rest of the brain. Recent functional connectivity studies support this conclusion, but the structural connectivity of the developing amygdala and its different nuclei remains largely unstudied. We examined age related changes in the DWI connectivity fingerprints of the amygdala to the rest of the brain in 166 individuals of ages 5-30. We also developed a model to predict age based on individual-subject amygdala connectivity, and identified the connections that were most predictive of age. Finally, we segmented the amygdala into its four main nucleus groups, and examined the developmental changes in connectivity for each nucleus. We observed that with age, amygdalar connectivity becomes increasingly sparse and localized. Age related changes were largely localized to the subregions of the amygdala that are implicated in social inference and contextual memory (the basal and lateral nuclei). The central nucleus’ connectivity also showed differences with age but these differences affected fewer target regions than the basal and lateral nuclei. The medial nucleus did not exhibit any age related changes. These findings demonstrate increasing specificity in the connectivity patterns of amygdalar nuclei across age.</p></div
Anomalies in Noncommutative Dipole Field Theories
We study chiral symmetries of fermionic non commutative dipole theories. By
using Fujikawa's approach we obtain explicit expressions of the anomalies for
Dirac and chiral fermions in 2 and 4 dimensions.Comment: 11pages, latex file. Comments adde
Results from the 4PI Effective Action in 2- and 3-dimensions
We consider a symmetric scalar theory with quartic coupling and solve the
equations of motion from the 4PI effective action in 2- and 3-dimensions using
an iterative numerical lattice method. For coupling less than 10 (in
dimensionless units) good convergence is obtained in less than 10 iterations.
We use lattice size up to 16 in 2-dimensions and 10 in 3-dimensions and
demonstrate the convergence of the results with increasing lattice size. The
self-consistent solutions for the 2-point and 4-point functions agree well with
the perturbative ones when the coupling is small and deviate when the coupling
is large.Comment: 14 pages, 11 figures; v5: added numerical calculations in 3D; version
accepted for publication in EPJ
Properties of the BFKL equation and structure function predictions for HERA
The general properties of the Lipatov or BFKL equation are reviewed.
Modifications to the infrared region are proposed. Numerical predictions for
the deep-inelastic electron-proton structure functions at small are
presented and confronted with recent HERA measurements.Comment: 21 pages, 11 figures, Latex file, Durham preprint DTP 92/2
Inflationary Perturbations: the Cosmological Schwinger Effect
This pedagogical review aims at presenting the fundamental aspects of the
theory of inflationary cosmological perturbations of quantum-mechanical origin.
The analogy with the well-known Schwinger effect is discussed in detail and a
systematic comparison of the two physical phenomena is carried out. In
particular, it is demonstrated that the two underlying formalisms differ only
up to an irrelevant canonical transformation. Hence, the basic physical
mechanisms at play are similar in both cases and can be reduced to the
quantization of a parametric oscillator leading to particle creation due to the
interaction with a classical source: pair production in vacuum is therefore
equivalent to the appearance of a growing mode for the cosmological
fluctuations. The only difference lies in the nature of the source: an electric
field in the case of the Schwinger effect and the gravitational field in the
case of inflationary perturbations. Although, in the laboratory, it is
notoriously difficult to produce an electric field such that pairs extracted
from the vacuum can be detected, the gravitational field in the early universe
can be strong enough to lead to observable effects that ultimately reveal
themselves as temperature fluctuations in the Cosmic Microwave Background.
Finally, the question of how quantum cosmological perturbations can be
considered as classical is discussed at the end of the article.Comment: 49 pages, 6 figures, to appear in a LNP volume "Inflationary
Cosmology
Neural signals predict information sharing across cultures
Information sharing influences which messages spread and shape beliefs, behavior, and culture. In a preregistered neuroimaging study conducted in the United States and the Netherlands, we demonstrate replicability, predictive validity, and generalizability of a brain-based prediction model of information sharing. Replicating findings in Scholz et al., Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. U.S.A. 114, 2881–2886 (2017), self-, social-, and value-related neural signals in a group of individuals tracked the population sharing of US news articles. Preregistered brain-based prediction models trained on Scholz et al. (2017) data proved generalizable to the new data, explaining more variance in population sharing than self-report ratings alone. Neural signals (versus self-reports) more reliably predicted sharing cross-culturally, suggesting that they capture more universal psychological mechanisms underlying sharing behavior. These findings highlight key neurocognitive foundations of sharing, suggest potential target mechanisms for interventions to increase message effectiveness, and advance brain-as-predictor research
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