Unveiling Neutrino Mixing and Leptonic CP Violation

We review the present understanding of neutrino masses and mixings, discussing what are the unknowns in the three family oscillation scenario. Despite the anticipated success coming from the planned long baseline neutrino experiments in unraveling the leptonic mixing sector, there are two important unknowns which may remain obscure: the mixing angle $\theta_{13}$ and the CP-phase $\delta$. The measurement of these two parameters has led us to consider the combination of superbeams and neutrino factories as the key to unveil the neutrino oscillation picture.Comment: Invited brief review, 18 pages, 6 figure

Improving Estimates of Gross Primary Productivity by Assimilating Solar-Induced Fluorescence Satellite Retrievals in a Terrestrial Biosphere Model Using a Process-Based SIF Model

Abstract Over the last few years, solar-induced chlorophyll fluorescence (SIF) observations from space have emerged as a promising resource for evaluating the spatio-temporal distribution of gross primary productivity (GPP) simulated by global terrestrial biosphere models. SIF can be used to improve GPP simulations by optimizing critical model parameters through statistical Bayesian data assimilation techniques. A prerequisite is the availability of a functional link between GPP and SIF in terrestrial biosphere models. Here we present the development of a mechanistic SIF observation operator in the ORCHIDEE (Organizing Carbon and Hydrology In Dynamic Ecosystems) terrestrial biosphere model. It simulates the regulation of photosystem II fluorescence quantum yield at the leaf level thanks to a novel parameterization of non-photochemical quenching as a function of temperature, photosynthetically active radiation, and normalized quantum yield of photochemistry. It emulates the radiative transfer of chlorophyll fluorescence to the top of the canopy using a parametric simplification of the SCOPE (Soil Canopy Observation Photosynthesis Energy) model. We assimilate two years of monthly OCO-2 (Orbiting Carbon Observatory-2) SIF product at 0.5° (2015?2016) to optimize ORCHIDEE photosynthesis and phenological parameters over an ensemble of grid points for all plant functional types. The impact on the simulated GPP is considerable with a large decrease of the global scale budget by 28 GtC/year over the period 1990?2009. The optimized GPP budget (134/136 GtC/year over 1990?2009/2001?2009) remarkably agrees with independent GPP estimates, FLUXSAT (137 GtC/year over 2001?2009) in particular and FLUXCOM (121 GtC/year over 1990?2009). Our results also suggest a biome dependency of the SIF-GPP relationship that needs to be improved for some plant functional types.Peer reviewe

Ablation de ZnO par laser UV (193 nm) : Nano-agregats en phase gazeuse

The condensation of zinc oxide nano clusters produced in gas phase has been evidenced in the ablation of a ZnO solid target by a pulsed ArF laser. We compare the spatio-temporal evolution of the shape of ZnO ablated plasma plume, both in vacuum and in controlled gas environments (Helium and/or Oxygen) from monitoring with CCD camera and from spectroscopic studies. The expansion of the plasma plume and the growth of the nanoclusters depend strongly upon the collisions between the ablated particles and surrounding gas molecules, as well as on the chemical reactions in the case of oxygen. The spectra of the observed plasma emittion are mainly due to atomic transitions in the neutral Zn. We have also observed the photoluminescence of the nanoclusters suspended in the gas and their decomposition in the beam of ArF laser.Comment: In Frenc

Clinical osteoarthritis of the hip and knee and fall risk: The role of low physical functioning and pain medication

Objective: Several studies have found an increased fall risk in persons with osteoarthritis (OA). However, most prospective studies did not use a clinical definition of OA. In addition, it is not clear which factors explain this risk. Our objectives were: (1) to confirm the prospective association between clinical OA of the hip and knee and falls; (2) to examine the modifying effect of sex; and (3) to examine whether low physical performance, low physical activity and use of pain medication are mediating these relationships. Methods: Baseline and 1-year follow-up data from the European Project on OSteoArthritis (EPOSA) were used involving pre-harmonized data from five European population-based cohort studies (ages 65 85, n = 2535). Clinical OA was defined according to American College of Rheumatology (ACR) criteria. Falls were assessed using self-report. Results: Over the follow-up period, 27.7% of the participants fell once or more (defined as faller), and 9.8% fell twice or more (recurrent faller). After adjustment for confounding, clinical knee OA was associated with the risk of becoming a recurrent faller (relative risk=1.55; 95% confidence interval: 1.10 2.18), but not with the risk of becoming a faller. No associations between clinical hip OA and (recurrent) falls were observed after adjustment for confounding. Use of opioids and analgesics mediated the associations between clinical OA and (recurrent) falls, while physical performance and physical activity did not. Conclusion: Individuals with clinical knee OA were at increased risk for recurrent falls. This relationship was mediated by pain medication, particularly opioids. The fall risk needs to be considered when discussing the risk benefit ratio of prescribing these medicationsSources of support: The Longitudinal Aging Study Amsterdam (LASA) is financially supported by the Dutch Ministry of Health, Welfare and Sports (grant no 311669, grant recipient D.J.H. Deeg). The Pe~nagrande study was partially supported by the National Fund for Health Research (Fondo de Investigaciones en Salud) of Spain (grant no FIS PI 05/1898; FIS RETICEF RD06/0013/1013 and FIS PS09/02143, grant recipients A. Otero, M.V. Castell). The Hertfordshire Cohort Study is supported by the Medical Research Council of Great Britain, Versus Arthritis, the British Heart Foundation and the International Osteoporosis Foundation (grant no MRC_MC_UP_A620_1014, grant recipients C. Cooper, E. Dennison). The Italian cohort was supported by the National Research Council of Italy (CNR), Research Project “Aging: molecular and technological innovations for improving the health of the elderly population" (Prot. MIUR 2867, grant recipient: S. Maggi). The Swedish Twin Registry is managed by Karolinska Institutet and receives funding through the Swedish Research Council (grant no 2017-00641, grant recipient Karolinska Institutet

Experimental trade-offs between different strategies for multihop communications evaluated over real deployments of wireless sensor network for environmental monitoring

Although much work has been done since wireless sensor networks appeared, there is not a great deal of information available on real deployments that incorporate basic features associated with these networks, in particular multihop routing and long lifetimes features. In this article, an environmental monitoring application (Internet of Things oriented) is described, where temperature and relative humidity samples are taken by each mote at a rate of 2 samples/min and sent to a sink using multihop routing. Our goal is to analyse the different strategies to gather the information from the different motes in this context. The trade-offs between 'sending always' and 'buffering locally' approaches were analysed and validated experimentally, taking into account power consumption, lifetime, efficiency and reliability. When buffering locally, different options were considered such as saving in either local RAM or FLASH memory, as well different alternatives to reduce overhead with different packet sizes. The conclusion is that in terms of energy and durability, the best option is to reduce the overhead. Nevertheless, sending larger packets is not worthy when the probability of retransmission is high. If real-time monitoring is required, then sending always is better than buffering locally

Oscillation enhanced search for new interaction with neutrinos

We discuss the measurement of new physics in long baseline neutrino oscillation experiments. Through the neutrino oscillation, the probability to detect the new physics effects such as flavor violation is enhanced by the interference with the weak interaction. We carefully explain the situations that the interference can take place. Assuming a neutrino factory and an upgraded conventional beam, we estimate the feasibility to observe new physics numerically and point out that we can search new interactions using some channels, for example $\nu_{\mu} \to \nu_{\mu}$, in these experiments. We also discuss several models which induce the effective interactions interfering with the weak interaction, and show that some new physics effects are large enough to be observed in the oscillation enhanced way.Comment: 25 pages, 20 figure

Intratumoral Hydrogen Peroxide With Radiation Therapy in Locally Advanced Breast Cancer: Results From a Phase 1 Clinical Trial.

Purpose Hydrogen peroxide (H2O2) plays a vital role in normal cellular processes but at supraphysiological concentrations causes oxidative stress and cytotoxicity, a property that is potentially exploitable for the treatment of cancer in combination with radiation therapy (RT). We report the first phase 1 trial testing the safety and tolerability of intratumoral H2O2 + external beam RT as a novel combination in patients with breast cancer and exploratory plasma marker analyses investigating possible mechanisms of action.Methods and materials Twelve patients with breast tumors ≥3 cm (surgically or medically inoperable) received intratumoral H2O2 with either 36 Gy in 6 twice-weekly fractions (n = 6) or 49.5 Gy in 18 daily fractions (n = 6) to the whole breast ± locoregional lymph nodes in a single-center, nonrandomized study. H2O2 was mixed in 1% sodium hyaluronate gel (final H2O2 concentration 0.5%) before administration to slow drug release and minimize local discomfort. The mixture was injected intratumorally under ultrasound guidance twice weekly 1 hour before RT. The primary endpoint was patient-reported maximum intratumoral pain intensity before and 24 hours postinjection. Secondary endpoints included grade ≥3 skin toxicity and tumor response by ultrasound. Blood samples were collected before, during, and at the end of treatment for cell-death and immune marker analysis.Results Compliance with H2O2 and RT was 100%. Five of 12 patients reported moderate pain after injection (grade 2 Common Terminology Criteria for Adverse Events v4.02) with median duration 60 minutes (interquartile range, 20-120 minutes). Skin toxicity was comparable to RT alone, with maintained partial/complete tumor response relative to baseline in 11 of 12 patients at last follow-up (median 12 months). Blood marker analysis highlighted significant associations of TRAIL, IL-1β, IL-4, and MIP-1α with tumor response.Conclusions Intratumoral H2O2 with RT is well tolerated with no additional toxicity compared with RT alone. If efficacy is confirmed in a randomized phase 2 trial, the approach has potential as a cost-effective radiation response enhancer in multiple cancer types in which locoregional control after RT alone remains poor

Comparison of large-angle production of charged pions with incident protons on cylindrical long and short targets

The HARP collaboration has presented measurements of the double-differential pi+/pi- production cross-section in the range of momentum 100 MeV/c <= p 800 MeV/c and angle 0.35 rad <= theta <= 2.15 rad with proton beams hitting thin nuclear targets. In many applications the extrapolation to long targets is necessary. In this paper the analysis of data taken with long (one interaction length) solid cylindrical targets made of carbon, tantalum and lead is presented. The data were taken with the large acceptance HARP detector in the T9 beam line of the CERN PS. The secondary pions were produced by beams of protons with momenta 5 GeV/c, 8 GeV/c and 12 GeV/c. The tracking and identification of the produced particles were performed using a small-radius cylindrical time projection chamber (TPC) placed inside a solenoidal magnet. Incident protons were identified by an elaborate system of beam detectors. Results are obtained for the double-differential yields per target nucleon d2 sigma / dp dtheta. The measurements are compared with predictions of the MARS and GEANT4 Monte Carlo simulations.Comment: 43 pages, 20 figure

Absolute Momentum Calibration of the HARP TPC

In the HARP experiment the large-angle spectrometer is using a cylindrical TPC as main tracking and particle identification detector. The momentum scale of reconstructed tracks in the TPC is the most important systematic error for the majority of kinematic bins used for the HARP measurements of the double-differential production cross-section of charged pions in proton interactions on nuclear targets at large angle. The HARP TPC operated with a number of hardware shortfalls and operational mistakes. Thus it was important to control and characterize its momentum calibration. While it was not possible to enter a direct particle beam into the sensitive volume of the TPC to calibrate the detector, a set of physical processes and detector properties were exploited to achieve a precise calibration of the apparatus. In the following we recall the main issues concerning the momentum measurement in the HARP TPC, and describe the cross-checks made to validate the momentum scale. As a conclusion, this analysis demonstrates that the measurement of momentum is correct within the published precision of 3%.Comment: To be published by JINS

Forward production of charged pions with incident π±\pi^{\pm} on nuclear targets measured at the CERN PS

Measurements of the double-differential $\pi^{\pm}$ production cross-section in the range of momentum 0.5 \GeVc \leq p \le 8.0 \GeVc and angle 0.025 \rad \leq \theta \le 0.25 \rad in interactions of charged pions on beryllium, carbon, aluminium, copper, tin, tantalum and lead are presented. These data represent the first experimental campaign to systematically measure forward pion hadroproduction. The data were taken with the large acceptance HARP detector in the T9 beam line of the CERN PS. Incident particles, impinging on a 5% nuclear interaction length target, were identified by an elaborate system of beam detectors. The tracking and identification of the produced particles was performed using the forward spectrometer of the HARP detector. Results are obtained for the double-differential cross-sections ${{\mathrm{d}^2 \sigma}}/{{\mathrm{d}p\mathrm{d}\Omega}}$ mainly at four incident pion beam momenta (3 \GeVc, 5 \GeVc, 8 \GeVc and 12 \GeVc). The measurements are compared with the GEANT4 and MARS Monte Carlo simulationComment: to be published on Nuclear Physics