65 research outputs found
Emergency TeleOrthoPaedics m-health system for wireless communication links
For the first time, a complete wireless and mobile emergency TeleOrthoPaedics system with field trials and expert opinion is presented. The system enables doctors in a remote area to obtain a second opinion from doctors in the hospital using secured wireless telecommunication networks. Doctors can exchange securely medical images and video as well as other important data, and thus perform remote consultations, fast and accurately using a user friendly interface, via a reliable and secure telemedicine system of low cost. The quality of the transmitted compressed (JPEG2000) images was measured using different metrics and doctors opinions. The results have shown that all metrics were within acceptable limits. The performance of the system was evaluated successfully under different wireless communication links based on real data
Coulomb suppression of NMR coherence peak in fullerene superconductors
The suppressed NMR coherence peak in the fullerene superconductors is
explained in terms of the dampings in the superconducting state induced by the
Coulomb interaction between conduction electrons. The Coulomb interaction,
modelled in terms of the onsite Hubbard repulsion, is incorporated into the
Eliashberg theory of superconductivity with its frequency dependence considered
self-consistently at all temperatures. The vertex correction is also included
via the method of Nambu. The frequency dependent Coulomb interaction induces
the substantial dampings in the superconducting state and, consequently,
suppresses the anticipated NMR coherence peak of fullerene superconductors as
found experimentally.Comment: 4 pages, Revtex, and 2 figures. Revised and final version to appear
in Phys. Rev. Lett. (1998
Conductance of Open Quantum Billiards and Classical Trajectories
We analyse the transport phenomena of 2D quantum billiards with convex
boundary of different shape. The quantum mechanical analysis is performed by
means of the poles of the S-matrix while the classical analysis is based on the
motion of a free particle inside the cavity along trajectories with a different
number of bounces at the boundary. The value of the conductance depends on the
manner the leads are attached to the cavity. The Fourier transform of the
transmission amplitudes is compared with the length of the classical paths.
There is good agreement between classical and quantum mechanical results when
the conductance is achieved mainly by special short-lived states such as
whispering gallery modes (WGM) and bouncing ball modes (BBM). In these cases,
also the localization of the wave functions agrees with the picture of the
classical paths. The S-matrix is calculated classically and compared with the
transmission coefficients of the quantum mechanical calculations for five modes
in each lead. The number of modes coupled to the special states is effectively
reduced.Comment: 19 pages, 6 figures (jpg), 2 table
Fermi Liquid Damping and NMR Relaxation in Superconductors
Electron collisions for a two dimensional Fermi liquid (FL) are shown to give
a quasiparticle damping with interesting frequency and temperature variations
in the BCS superconducting state. The spin susceptibility which determines the
structure of the damping is analyzed in the normal state for a Hubbard model
with a constant on--site Coulomb repulsion. This is then generalized to the
superconducting state by including coherence factors and self energy and vertex
corrections. Calculations of the NMR relaxation rate reveal that the FL damping
structure can reduce the Hebel--Slichter peak, in agreement with data on the
organic superconductor (MDT-TTF)AuI. However, the strongly suppressed
FL damping in the superconducting state does not eliminate the Hebel-Slichter
peak, and thus suggests that other mechanisms are needed to explain the NMR
data on (TMTSF)ClO, the BEDT organic compounds, and cuprate
superconductors. Predictions of the temperature variation of the damping and
the spin response are given over a wide frequency range as a guide to
experimental probes of the symmetry of the superconducting pairs.Comment: 10 pages, RevTeX 3.0, 9 figures in uuencoded postscrip
Extreme sensitivity of the spin-splitting and 0.7 anomaly to confining potential in one-dimensional nanoelectronic devices
Quantum point contacts (QPCs) have shown promise as nanoscale spin-selective
components for spintronic applications and are of fundamental interest in the
study of electron many-body effects such as the 0.7 x 2e^2/h anomaly. We report
on the dependence of the 1D Lande g-factor g* and 0.7 anomaly on electron
density and confinement in QPCs with two different top-gate architectures. We
obtain g* values up to 2.8 for the lowest 1D subband, significantly exceeding
previous in-plane g-factor values in AlGaAs/GaAs QPCs, and approaching that in
InGaAs/InP QPCs. We show that g* is highly sensitive to confinement potential,
particularly for the lowest 1D subband. This suggests careful management of the
QPC's confinement potential may enable the high g* desirable for spintronic
applications without resorting to narrow-gap materials such as InAs or InSb.
The 0.7 anomaly and zero-bias peak are also highly sensitive to confining
potential, explaining the conflicting density dependencies of the 0.7 anomaly
in the literature.Comment: 23 pages, 7 figure
The association between sleeping time and metabolic syndrome features among older adults living in Mediterranean region. The MEDIS study.
Background: Metabolic Syndrome (MetS) as a combination of features has been known to significantly increase Cardiovascular Disease (CVD) risk, whilst MetS presence is linked to lifestyle parameters including physical activity and dietary habits; recently, the potential impact of sleeping habits has also become an issue under consideration. The aim of this study was to investigate the role of sleep quantity in several MetS components. Methods: Design:Cross-sectional observational study. Setting: 26 Mediterranean islands and the rural Mani region (Peloponnesus) of Greece. Participants: during 2005-2017, 3130 older (aged 65-100 years) Mediterranean residents were voluntarily enrolled. Measurements: Dietary habits (including MedDietScore assessment), physical activity status, socio-demographic characteristics, lifestyle parameters (sleeping and smoking habits) and clinical profile aspects including Metabolic Syndrome (MetS) components (i.e., waist circumference, systolic and diastolic blood pressure, fasting glucose, triglycerides, LDL and HDL-cholesterol) were derived through standard procedures. Results: The number of daily hours of sleep was independently associated with greater waist circumference (b coefficient per 1 hour=0.91, 95% Confidence Interval (CI); 0.34, 1.49), higher LDL-cholesterol levels (b per 1 hour=3.84, 95%CI; 0.63, 7.05) and lower diastolic blood pressure levels (b per 1 hour=-0.98, 95%CI; - 1.57, -0.39) after adjusting for participants’ age, gender, body mass index, daily walking time, level of adherence to Mediterranean diet and smoking status. No association was revealed between hours of sleep per day and fasting glucose, triglycerides, HDL-cholesterol and systolic blood pressure. Conclusions: Increased hours of sleep is an indicator of metabolic disorders among elderly inviduals, and further research is needed to identify the paths through which sleep quantity is linked to MetS features in different age-groups
New Mediterranean biodiversity records (March 2016)
In this Collective Article on “New Mediterranean Biodiversity Records”, we present additional records of species found
in the Mediterranean Sea. These records refer to eight different countries mainly throughout the northern part of the basin, and
include 28 species, belonging to five Phyla. The findings per country include the following species: Spain: Callinectes sapidus
and Chelidonura fulvipunctata; Monaco: Aplysia dactylomela; Italy: Charybdis (Charybdis) feriata, Carcharodon carcharias,
Seriola fasciata, and Siganus rivulatus; Malta: Pomacanthus asfur; Croatia: Lagocephalus sceleratus and Pomadasys incisus;
Montenegro: Lagocephalus sceleratus; Greece: Amathia (Zoobotryon) verticillata, Atys macandrewii, Cerithium scabridum,
Chama pacifica, Dendostrea cf. folium, Ergalatax junionae, Septifer cumingii, Syphonota geographica, Syrnola fasciata, Oxyu-
richthys petersi, Scarus ghobban, Scorpaena maderensis, Solea aegyptiaca and Upeneus pori; Turkey: Lobotes surinamensis,
Ruvettus pretiosus and Ophiocten abyssicolum. In the current article, the presence of Taractes rubescens (Jordan & Evermann,
1887) is recorded for the first time in the Mediterranean from Italy. The great contribution of citizen scientists in monitoring
biodiversity records is reflected herein, as 10% of the authors are citizen scientists, and contributed 37.5% of the new findings.peer-reviewe
The Volatile Anesthetic Isoflurane Increases Endothelial Adenosine Generation via Microparticle Ecto-5′-Nucleotidase (CD73) Release
Endothelial dysfunction is common in acute and chronic organ injury. Isoflurane is a widely used halogenated volatile anesthetic during the perioperative period and protects against endothelial cell death and inflammation. In this study, we tested whether isoflurane induces endothelial ecto-5′-nucleotidase (CD73) and cytoprotective adenosine generation to protect against endothelial cell injury. Clinically relevant concentrations of isoflurane induced CD73 activity and increased adenosine generation in cultured human umbilical vein or mouse glomerular endothelial cells. Surprisingly, isoflurane-mediated induction of endothelial CD73 activity occurred within 1 hr and without synthesizing new CD73. We determined that isoflurane rapidly increased CD73 containing endothelial microparticles into the cell culture media. Indeed, microparticles isolated from isoflurane-treated endothelial cells had significantly higher CD73 activity as well as increased CD73 protein. In vivo, plasma from mice anesthetized with isoflurane had significantly higher endothelial cell-derived CD144+ CD73+ microparticles and had increased microparticle CD73 activity compared to plasma from pentobarbital-anesthetized mice. Supporting a critical role of CD73 in isoflurane-mediated endothelial protection, a selective CD73 inhibitor (APCP) prevented isoflurane-induced protection against human endothelial cell inflammation and apoptosis. In addition, isoflurane activated endothelial cells Rho kinase evidenced by myosin phosphatase target subunit-1 and myosin light chain phosphorylation. Furthermore, isoflurane-induced release of CD73 containing microparticles was significantly attenuated by a selective Rho kinase inhibitor (Y27632). Taken together, we conclude that the volatile anesthetic isoflurane causes Rho kinase-mediated release of endothelial microparticles containing preformed CD73 and increase adenosine generation to protect against endothelial apoptosis and inflammation
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