Local ζ\zeta-functions, stress-energy tensor, field fluctuations, and all that, in curved static spacetime

This is a quick review on some technology concerning the local zeta function applied to Quantum Field Theory in curved static (thermal) spacetime to regularize the stress-energy tensor and the field fluctuations.Comment: LaTeX 10 Pages. Submitted to the volume "Cosmology, Quantum Vacuum, and Zeta Functions", in honour of Professor Emilio Elizalde on the occasion of his 60th birthda

Effects of jet algorithms from higher order QCD in W±W^\pm mass determinations at LEP2

We analyse the impact of systematic effects due to the scale dependence of QCD corrections in combination with the use of different jet clustering algorithms in the measurement of the $W^\pm$ mass in the fully hadronic decay mode of $W^+W^-$ pairs produced at LEP2. We consider higher order contributions induced by both virtual and real gluon radiation onto the electroweak CC03 and CC11 channels through ${\cal O}(\alpha_{s})$ at the parton level. We find that the associated uncertainties can be of order 100 MeV, thus competitive with those possibly arising in the non-perturbative regime and indeed above the current experimental estimates.Comment: 16 pages, latex, 4 figures, version to appear in EPJdirect

Androgens and Hypertension in Men and Women: a Unifying View.

This review was designed to revaluate the androgen role on the mechanisms of hypertension and cardiovascular risks in both men and women. Sex steroids are involved in the regulation of blood pressure, but pathophysiological mechanism is not well understood. Androgens have an important effect on metabolism, adipose and endothelial cell function, and cardiovascular risk in both men and women. A focal point in this contest is represented by the possible gender-specific regulation of different tissues and in particular of the adipose cell. Available data confirm that androgen deficiency is linked to increased prevalence of hypertension and cardiovascular diseases. Adipocyte dysfunction seems to be the main involved mechanism. Androgen replacement reduces inflammation state in man, protecting by metabolic syndrome progression. In women, androgen excess has been considered as promoting factor of cardiovascular risk. However, recent data suggest that excessive androgen production has little effect per se in inducing hypertension in young women of reproductive age. Also in postmenopausal women, data on relative androgen excess and hypertension are missing, while adrenal androgen deficiency has been associated to increased mortality. RECENT FINDINGS: Molecular mechanisms linking androgen dysregulation to hypertension are almost Unknown, but they seem to be related to increased visceral fat, promoting a chronic inflammatory state through different mechanisms. One of these may involve the recruitment and over-activation of NF-kB, a ubiquitous transcription factor also expressed in adipose cells, where it may cause the production of cytokines and other immune factors. The NF-kB signalling pathway may also influence brown adipogenesis leading to the preferential enlargement of visceral adipocytes. Chronic inflammation and adipocyte dysfunction may alter endothelial function leading to hypertension. Both in men and in women, particularly in the post-menopausal period, hypoandrogenism seems to be a major determinant of the increased prevalence of hypertension. The relationship between androgen signalling and NF-kB might explain the pathophysiological mechanism leading to the development of endothelium dysfunction and hypertension

The luminosity function of cluster galaxies. II. Data reduction procedures applied to the cluster Abell 496

We initiated a large project aimed to estimate the Luminosity Function of galaxies in clusters and to evaluate its relation to cluster morphology. With this paper we deem necessary to outline the general procedures of the data reduction and details of the data analysis. The cluster sample includes the brightest southern ROSAT all-sky survey clusters with z < 0.1. These have been observed in three colours g, r, i, and mapped up to a few core radii using a mosaic of CCD frames. E/S0 galaxies in the cluster core are singled out both by morphology (for the brightest galaxies), and by colour. The details of the data reduction procedure are illustrated via the analysis of the cluster Abell 496, which has been used as a pilot cluster for the whole program. The related photometric catalogue consists of 2355 objects. The limiting magnitudes (the reference Surface Brightness is given in parenthesis) in the various colours are respectively g(25.5) = 24.14, r(25.5) = 24.46, i(25.0) = 23.75$. These correspond to the limiting absolute magnitudes -12.28, -11.96 and -12.67 (H_0=50 km/sec/Mpc).Comment: 17 pages, 19 ps figures, aa.cl

Novel SM-like Higgs decay into displaced heavy neutrino pairs in U(1)' models

We examine the observability of heavy neutrino (nu_h) signatures of a U(1)' enlarged Standard Model (SM) encompassing three heavy Majorana neutrinos alongside the known light neutrino states at the the Large Hadron Collider (LHC). We show that heavy neutrinos can be rather long-lived particles producing distinctive displaced vertices that can be accessed in the CERN LHC detectors. We concentrate here on the gluon fusion production mechanism gg -> H_{1,2} -> nu_h nu_h, where H_1 is the discovered SM-like Higgs and H_2 is a heavier state, yielding displaced leptons following nu_h decays into weak gauge bosons. Using data collected by the end of the LHC Run 2, these signatures would prove to be accessible with negligibly small background.Comment: 30 pages, journal versio

Observations of GRBs with the Fermi Large Area Telescope

Fermi Gamma-ray Space Telescope successfully detected high-energy emission from 20 GRBs so far. Thanks to its unprecedented very wide energy coverage of Large Area Telescope (LAT: from 25MeV to > 300 GeV) and Gammaray Burst Monitor (GBM: from 8 keV to 40 MeV), Fermi provided new observational pictures of GRBs. Here we review some of the GRB properties seen by the LAT instrument such as the delayed onset and longer durations of high-energy emission compared with low-energy emission of the GBM. An extra spectral component in high and low energy is detected in some GRBs and moreover for the first time a cut-off in the spectral extra component is seen. These temporal and spectral distinct behaviors inspire many implications on the emission mechanism, including leptonic, hadronic and afterglow origin. Fermi also placed constraints both on the bulk Lorentz factor of the relativistic jet, larger than 1000 for bright LAT GRBs, and on outside-GRB topics such as quantum gravity

Charged di-boson production at the LHC in a 4-site model with a composite Higgs boson

We investigate the scope of the LHC in probing the parameter space of a 4-site model supplemented by one composite Higgs state, assuming all past, current and future energy and luminosity stages of the CERN machine. We concentrate on the yield of charged di-boson production giving two opposite-charge different-flavour leptons and missing (transverse) energy, i.e., events induced via the subprocess $q\bar q\to e^+\nu_e \mu^-\bar\nu_\mu$ + ${\rm{c.c.}}$, which enables the production in the intermediate step of all additional neutral and charged gauge bosons belonging to the spectrum of this model, some of which in resonant topologies. We find this channel accessible over the background at all LHC configurations after a dedicated cut-based analysis. We finally compare the yield of the di-boson mode to that of Drell-Yan processes and establish that they have complementary strengths, one covering regions of parameter space precluded to the others and vice versa.Comment: 36 pages, 13 figures, 13 table