Tribological and material properties for cartilage of and throughout the bovine stifle: support for the altered joint kinematics hypothesis of osteoarthritis

SummaryObjectivePrior studies suggest that ligament and meniscus tears cause osteoarthritis (OA) when changes in joint kinematics bring underused and underprepared regions of cartilage into contact. This study aims to test the hypothesis that material and tribological properties vary throughout the joint according to the local mechanical environment.MethodThe local tribological and material properties of bovine stifle cartilage (N = 10 joints with 20 samples per joint) were characterized under physiologically consistent contact stress and fluid pressure conditions.ResultsOverall, cartilage from the bovine stifle had an equilibrium contact modulus of Ec0 = 0.62 ± 0.10 MPa, a tensile modulus of Et = 4.3 ± 0.7 MPa, and a permeability of k = 2.8 ± 0.9 × 10−3 mm4/Ns. During sliding, the cartilage had an effective friction coefficient of μeff = 0.024 ± 0.004, an effective contact modulus of Ec = 3.9 ± 0.7 MPa and a fluid load fraction of F′ = 0.81 ± 0.03. Tibial cartilage exhibited significantly poorer material and tribological properties than femoral cartilage. Statistically significant differences were also detected across the femoral condyle and tibial plateau. The central femoral condyle exhibited the most favorable properties while the uncovered tibial plateau exhibited the least favorable properties.ConclusionsOur findings support a previous hypothesis that altered loading patterns can cause OA by overloading underprepared regions. They also help explain why damage to the tibial plateau often precedes damage to the mating femoral condyle following joint injury in animal models. Because the variations are driven by fundamental biological processes, we anticipate similar variations in the human knee, which could explain the OA risk associated with ligament and meniscus tears

Markovian Behaviour and Constrained Maximization of the Entropy in Chaotic Quantum Systems

The separation of the Schr\"{o}dinger equation into a Markovian and an interference term provides a new insight in the quantum dynamics of classically chaotic systems. The competition between these two terms determines the localized or diffusive character of the dynamics. In the case of the Kicked Rotor, we show how the constrained maximization of the entropy implies exponential localization.Comment: 8 pages, 2 figure

The Australian Charter of Employment Rights: The missing dimensions

Just prior to the 2007 General Election, a group of labour lawyers and economists, broadly sympathetic to the Labor Party, produced a Charter of Employment Rights. This article examines the Charter's proposals and its underlying framework, and suggests significant aspects of work and labour have been omitted. It contends that the Charter would have been improved if it had not retained an artificially stretched definition of workers as employees, in which the only relationship worthy of inclusion in a Charter is that between the direct employer and employee. The framework and language of the Charter convey a paternalistic approach and an outdated focus on industrial labour, while ignoring aspects of the emerging global system of work linked to the concept of occupation

Quantum random walk on the line as a markovian process

We analyze in detail the discrete--time quantum walk on the line by separating the quantum evolution equation into Markovian and interference terms. As a result of this separation, it is possible to show analytically that the quadratic increase in the variance of the quantum walker's position with time is a direct consequence of the coherence of the quantum evolution. If the evolution is decoherent, as in the classical case, the variance is shown to increase linearly with time, as expected. Furthermore we show that this system has an evolution operator analogous to that of a resonant quantum kicked rotor. As this rotator may be described through a quantum computational algorithm, one may employ this algorithm to describe the time evolution of the quantum walker.Comment: few typos corrected, 13 pages, 2 figures, to appear in Physica

Two-point microrheology and the electrostatic analogy

The recent experiments of Crocker et al. suggest that microrheological measurements obtained from the correlated fluctuations of widely-separatedprobe particles determine the rheological properties of soft, complex materials more accurately than do the more traditional particle autocorrelations. This presents an interesting problem in viscoelastic dynamics. We develop an important, simplifing analogy between the present viscoelastic problem and classical electrostatics. Using this analogy and direct calculation we analyze both the one and two particle correlations in a viscoelastic medium in order to explain this observation

Magnetic monopoles from gauge theory phase transitions

Thermal fluctuations of the gauge field lead to monopole formation at the grand unified phase transition in the early Universe, even if the transition is merely a smooth crossover. The dependence of the produced monopole density on various parameters is qualitatively different from theories with global symmetries, and the monopoles have a positive correlation at short distances. The number density of monopoles may be suppressed if the grand unified symmetry is only restored for a short time by, for instance, nonthermal symmetry restoration after preheating.Comment: 5 pages, updated to match the version published in PRD (http://link.aps.org/abstract/PRD/v68/e021301) on 11 July 200

Spectrum of the Vortex Bound States of the Dirac and Schrodinger Hamiltonian in the presence of Superconducting Gaps

We investigate the vortex bound states both Schrodinger and Dirac Hamiltonian with the s-wave superconducting pairing gap by solving the mean-field Bogoliubov-de-Gennes equations. The exact vortex bound states spectrum is numerically determined by the integration method, and also accompanied by the quasi-classical analysis. It is found that the bound state energies is proportional to the vortex angular momentum when the chemical potential is large enough. By applying the external magnetic field, the vortex bound state energies of the Dirac Hamiltonian are almost unchanged; whereas the energy shift of the Schrodinger Hamiltonian is proportional to the magnetic field. These qualitative differences may serve as an indirect evidence of the existence of Majorana fermions in which the zero mode exists in the case of the Dirac Hamiltonian only.Comment: 8 pages, 9 figure

An intermittent hypercaloric diet alters gut microbiota, prefrontal cortical gene expression and social behaviours in rats.

Objectives: Excessive consumption of high fat and high sugar (HFHS) diets alters reward processing, behaviour, and changes gut microbiota profiles. Previous studies in gnotobiotic mice also provide evidence that these gut microorganisms may influence social behaviour. To further investigate these interactions, we examined the impact of the intermittent access to a HFHS diet on social behaviour, gene expression and microbiota composition in adolescent rats. Methods: Male rats were permitted intermittent daily access (2 h / day) to a palatable HFHS chow diet for 28 days across adolescence. Social interaction, social memory and novel object recognition were assessed during this period. Following testing, RT-PCR was conducted on hippocampal and prefrontal cortex (PFC) samples. 16S ribosomal RNA amplicon sequencing was used for identification and relative quantification of bacterial taxa in faecal samples. Results: We observed reduced social interaction behaviours, impaired social memory and novel object recognition in HFHS diet rats compared to chow controls. RT-PCR revealed reduced levels of monoamine oxidase A (Maoa), catechol-O-methyltransferase (Comt) and brain derived neurotrophic factor (Bdnf) mRNA in the PFC of HFHS diet rats. Faecal microbiota analysis demonstrated that the relative abundance of a number of specific bacterial taxa differed significantly between the two diet groups, in particular, Lachnospiraceae and Ruminoccoceae bacteria. Discussion: Intermittent HFHS diet consumption evoked physiological changes to the brain, particularly expression of mRNA associated with reward and neuroplasticity, and gut microbiome. These changes may underpin the observed alterations to social behaviours

An intermittent hypercaloric diet alters gut microbiota, prefrontal cortical gene expression and social behaviours in rats

Objectives: Excessive consumption of high fat and high sugar (HFHS) diets alters reward processing, behaviour, and changes gut microbiota profiles. Previous studies in gnotobiotic mice also provide evidence that these gut microorganisms may influence social behaviour. To further investigate these interactions, we examined the impact of the intermittent access to a HFHS diet on social behaviour, gene expression and microbiota composition in adolescent rats. Methods: Male rats were permitted intermittent daily access (2 h / day) to a palatable HFHS chow diet for 28 days across adolescence. Social interaction, social memory and novel object recognition were assessed during this period. Following testing, RT-PCR was conducted on hippocampal and prefrontal cortex (PFC) samples. 16S ribosomal RNA amplicon sequencing was used for identification and relative quantification of bacterial taxa in faecal samples. Results: We observed reduced social interaction behaviours, impaired social memory and novel object recognition in HFHS diet rats compared to chow controls. RT-PCR revealed reduced levels of monoamine oxidase A (Maoa), catechol-O-methyltransferase (Comt) and brain derived neurotrophic factor (Bdnf) mRNA in the PFC of HFHS diet rats. Faecal microbiota analysis demonstrated that the relative abundance of a number of specific bacterial taxa differed significantly between the two diet groups, in particular, Lachnospiraceae and Ruminoccoceae bacteria. Discussion: Intermittent HFHS diet consumption evoked physiological changes to the brain, particularly expression of mRNA associated with reward and neuroplasticity, and gut microbiome. These changes may underpin the observed alterations to social behaviours

Unbounded-error quantum computation with small space bounds

We prove the following facts about the language recognition power of quantum Turing machines (QTMs) in the unbounded error setting: QTMs are strictly more powerful than probabilistic Turing machines for any common space bound $s$ satisfying $s(n)=o(\log \log n)$. For "one-way" Turing machines, where the input tape head is not allowed to move left, the above result holds for $s(n)=o(\log n)$. We also give a characterization for the class of languages recognized with unbounded error by real-time quantum finite automata (QFAs) with restricted measurements. It turns out that these automata are equal in power to their probabilistic counterparts, and this fact does not change when the QFA model is augmented to allow general measurements and mixed states. Unlike the case with classical finite automata, when the QFA tape head is allowed to remain stationary in some steps, more languages become recognizable. We define and use a QTM model that generalizes the other variants introduced earlier in the study of quantum space complexity.Comment: A preliminary version of this paper appeared in the Proceedings of the Fourth International Computer Science Symposium in Russia, pages 356--367, 200