Quantised inertia from relativity and the uncertainty principle

It is shown here that if we assume that what is conserved in nature is not simply mass-energy, but rather mass-energy plus the energy uncertainty of the uncertainty principle, and if we also assume that position uncertainty is reduced by the formation of relativistic horizons, then the resulting increase of energy uncertainty is close to that needed for a new model for inertial mass (MiHsC, quantised inertia) which has been shown to predict galaxy rotation without dark matter and cosmic acceleration without dark energy. The same principle can also be used to model the inverse square law of gravity, and predicts the mass of the electron

Testing quantised inertia on emdrives with dielectrics

Truncated-cone-shaped cavities with microwaves resonating within them (emdrives) move slightly towards their narrow ends, in contradiction to standard physics. This effect has been predicted by a model called quantised inertia (MiHsC) which assumes that the inertia of the microwaves is caused by Unruh radiation, more of which is allowed at the wide end. Therefore, photons going towards the wide end gain inertia, and to conserve momentum the cavity must move towards its narrow end, as observed. A previous analysis with quantised inertia predicted a controversial photon acceleration, which is shown here to be unnecessary. The previous analysis also mispredicted the thrust in those emdrives with dielectrics. It is shown here that having a dielectric at one end of the cavity is equivalent to widening the cavity at that end, and when dielectrics are considered, then quantised inertia predicts these results as well as the others, except for Shawyer's first test where the thrust is predicted to be the right size but in the wrong direction. As a further test, quantised inertia predicts that an emdrive's thrust can be enhanced by using a dielectric at the wide end

Use of buccal morphine in the management of pain in children with life-limiting conditions: Results of a laboratory study

BACKGROUND: Children and infants with impaired swallow or compromised enteral absorption require alternative routes for administration of analgesia. Recent clinical guidance and practice for paediatric palliative care teams, who often treat such children, supports buccal morphine sulphate as a fast acting, effective and easily administered agent for pain relief. However, a consideration of the physicochemical properties and potency of morphine would suggest that it is not a suitable candidate for delivery via the transmucosal route, raising questions about its use in children and infants. AIM: To explore the permeability of buccal morphine sulphate in an established ex vivo porcine buccal mucosa as a necessary step in examining efficacy for use in children with life-limiting conditions and life-threatening illnesses. DESIGN: A permeation study conducted with morphine sulphate in an ex vivo porcine buccal tissue model. Flux values and pharmacokinetic data were used to calculate the plasma values of morphine that would result following buccal administration in a 20kg child. RESULTS: Results show that the estimated steady state plasma values of morphine sulphate following buccal administration in this model do not achieve minimum therapeutic concentration. CONCLUSION: These data strongly suggest that morphine sulphate is not suitable for buccal administration and that further research is needed to establish its efficacy in relief of pain in children with life-limiting conditions and life-threatening illnesses

Upper-Ocean Eddy Transports of Heat, Potential Vorticity, and Volume in the Northeastern North Atlantic—“Vivaldi 1991”

Mesoscale eddies in the northeast North Atlantic were investigated using the SeaSoar towed CTD and ADCP data from the 1991 Vivaldi cruise. These data cover an area of 1700 km × 1500 km between 39° and 54°N and between 35° and 10°W. To maximize statistical significance, but retain the possibility of determining north-south gradients, statistics of eddy quantities were calculated separately for the northern and southern halves of the cruise area. The mean flow in the south is essentially zero: in the north the flow is dominated by the North Atlantic Current (NAC) with a mean speed of 6.5 cm s-1. The eddy kinetic energy in the south, 205 cm2 s-2, is, however, only slightly less than in the north, 272 cm2 s-2. The eddy momentum transports, or Reynolds stresses, u′v′, show a poleward decrease, corresponding to an acceleration of the mean eastward flow associated with the NAC of 0.03 cm s-1 day-1. The eddy heat transports, u′T′, are not significantly different from zero in the south but show a clear poleward transport in the north of 5.5 K cm s-1, or 0.1 PW for the 365-m layer 1500 km wide. The depth-averaged eddy potential vorticity fluxes, u′q′, show a convergence toward the source region of the low-potential-vorticity eastern North Atlantic Central Water west of Biscay. The residual or rectified eddy transport velocity implied by the eddy potential vorticity flux. u* = -u′q′/q, is 0.7 cm s-1 toward the southwest in the south, while in the north it is 0.9 cm s-1 toward the northwest crossing the property isolines. The directions correspond to a divergence from the formation region of the eastern North Atlantic Central Water. An assessment of the overall volume transport of the region suggests that the westward eddy volume transport (∼4 Sv; Sv ≡ 106 m3 s-1) is almost balanced by an eastward geostrophic flow (∼3 Sv) with the remainder being supplied by a smaller contribution leaving the northward-flowing eastern boundary current (∼1 Sv)

The domestic and gendered context for retirement

Against a global backdrop of population and workforce ageing, successive UK governments have encouraged people to work longer and delay retirement. Debates focus mainly on factors affecting individuals’ decisions on when and how to retire. We argue that a fuller understanding of retirement can be achieved by recognizing the ways in which individuals’ expectations and behaviours reflect a complicated, dynamic set of interactions between domestic environments and gender roles, often established over a long time period, and more temporally proximate factors. Using a qualitative data set, we explore how the timing, nature and meaning of retirement and retirement planning are played out in specific domestic contexts. We conclude that future research and policies surrounding retirement need to: focus on the household, not the individual; consider retirement as an often messy and disrupted process and not a discrete event; and understand that retirement may mean very different things for women and for men

Interactions among mitochondrial proteins altered in glioblastoma

Mitochondrial dysfunction is putatively central to glioblastoma (GBM) pathophysiology but there has been no systematic analysis in GBM of the proteins which are integral to mitochondrial function. Alterations in proteins in mitochondrial enriched fractions from patients with GBM were defined with label-free liquid chromatography mass spectrometry. 256 mitochondrially-associated proteins were identified in mitochondrial enriched fractions and 117 of these mitochondrial proteins were markedly (fold-change ≥2) and significantly altered in GBM (p ≤ 0.05). Proteins associated with oxidative damage (including catalase, superoxide dismutase 2, peroxiredoxin 1 and peroxiredoxin 4) were increased in GBM. Protein–protein interaction analysis highlighted a reduction in multiple proteins coupled to energy metabolism (in particular respiratory chain proteins, including 23 complex-I proteins). Qualitative ultrastructural analysis in GBM with electron microscopy showed a notably higher prevalence of mitochondria with cristolysis in GBM. This study highlights the complex mitochondrial proteomic adjustments which occur in GBM pathophysiology

Subanesthetic ketamine treatment promotes abnormal interactions between neural subsystems and alters the properties of functional brain networks

Acute treatment with subanesthetic ketamine, a non-competitive N-methyl-D-aspartic acid (NMDA) receptor antagonist, is widely utilized as a translational model for schizophrenia. However, how acute NMDA receptor blockade impacts on brain functioning at a systems level, to elicit translationally relevant symptomatology and behavioral deficits, has not yet been determined. Here, for the first time, we apply established and recently validated topological measures from network science to brain imaging data gained from ketamine-treated mice to elucidate how acute NMDA receptor blockade impacts on the properties of functional brain networks. We show that the effects of acute ketamine treatment on the global properties of these networks are divergent from those widely reported in schizophrenia. Where acute NMDA receptor blockade promotes hyperconnectivity in functional brain networks, pronounced dysconnectivity is found in schizophrenia. We also show that acute ketamine treatment increases the connectivity and importance of prefrontal and thalamic brain regions in brain networks, a finding also divergent to alterations seen in schizophrenia. In addition, we characterize how ketamine impacts on bipartite functional interactions between neural subsystems. A key feature includes the enhancement of prefrontal cortex (PFC)-neuromodulatory subsystem connectivity in ketamine-treated animals, a finding consistent with the known effects of ketamine on PFC neurotransmitter levels. Overall, our data suggest that, at a systems level, acute ketamine-induced alterations in brain network connectivity do not parallel those seen in chronic schizophrenia. Hence, the mechanisms through which acute ketamine treatment induces translationally relevant symptomatology may differ from those in chronic schizophrenia. Future effort should therefore be dedicated to resolve the conflicting observations between this putative translational model and schizophrenia

The Pioneer Anomaly

Radio-metric Doppler tracking data received from the Pioneer 10 and 11 spacecraft from heliocentric distances of 20-70 AU has consistently indicated the presence of a small, anomalous, blue-shifted frequency drift uniformly changing with a rate of ~6 x 10^{-9} Hz/s. Ultimately, the drift was interpreted as a constant sunward deceleration of each particular spacecraft at the level of a_P = (8.74 +/- 1.33) x 10^{-10} m/s^2. This apparent violation of the Newton's gravitational inverse-square law has become known as the Pioneer anomaly; the nature of this anomaly remains unexplained. In this review, we summarize the current knowledge of the physical properties of the anomaly and the conditions that led to its detection and characterization. We review various mechanisms proposed to explain the anomaly and discuss the current state of efforts to determine its nature. A comprehensive new investigation of the anomalous behavior of the two Pioneers has begun recently. The new efforts rely on the much-extended set of radio-metric Doppler data for both spacecraft in conjunction with the newly available complete record of their telemetry files and a large archive of original project documentation. As the new study is yet to report its findings, this review provides the necessary background for the new results to appear in the near future. In particular, we provide a significant amount of information on the design, operations and behavior of the two Pioneers during their entire missions, including descriptions of various data formats and techniques used for their navigation and radio-science data analysis. As most of this information was recovered relatively recently, it was not used in the previous studies of the Pioneer anomaly, but it is critical for the new investigation.Comment: 165 pages, 40 figures, 16 tables; accepted for publication in Living Reviews in Relativit