877 research outputs found
Hint of Lepton Flavour Non-Universality in Meson Decays
The LHCb collaboration has recently presented their result on R_K = BR(B+ ->
K+ mu+ mu-)/ BR(B+ -> K+ e+ e-) for the dilepton invariant mass bin m_{ll}^2 =
1-6 GeV^2 (l = mu, e). The measurement shows an intriguing 2.6 sigma deviation
from the Standard Model (SM) prediction. In view of this, we study model
independent New Physics (NP) explanations of R_K consistent with other
measurements involving b -> s l l transition, relaxing the assumption of lepton
universality. We perform a Bayesian statistical fit to the NP Wilson
Coefficients and compare the Bayes Factors of the different hypotheses in order
to quantify their goodness-of-fit. We show that the data slightly favours NP in
the muon sector over NP in the electron sector.Comment: Final version, to appear in JHE
Linear flavour violation and anomalies in B physics
We propose renormalizable models of new physics that can explain various
anomalies observed in decays of B-mesons to electron and muon pairs. The new
physics states couple to linear combinations of Standard Model fermions,
yielding a pattern of flavour violation that gives a consistent fit to the
gamut of flavour data. Accidental symmetries prevent contributions to baryon-
and lepton-number-violating processes, as well as enforcing a loop suppression
of new physics contributions to flavour violating processes. Data require that
the new flavour-breaking couplings are largely aligned with the Yukawa
couplings of the SM and so we also explore patterns of flavour symmetry
breaking giving rise to this structure.Comment: v2: 28 pages, 10 figures. Added two appendices to make the SU(2)
structure of the model clearer, and to discuss Z/photon penguin
contributions. Updated a bound on Bs mixing, and added references.
Conclusions unchanged. Version to appear in JHE
Current, Projected Performance and Costs of Thermal Energy Storage
The technology for storing thermal energy as sensible heat, latent heat, or thermochemical energy has greatly evolved in recent years, and it is expected to grow up to about 10.1 billion US dollars by 2027. A thermal energy storage (TES) system can significantly improve industrial energy efficiency and eliminate the need for additional energy supply in commercial and residential applications. This study is a first-of-its-kind specific review of the current projected performance and costs of thermal energy storage. This paper presents an overview of the main typologies of sensible heat (SH-TES), latent heat (LH-TES), and thermochemical energy (TCS) as well as their application in European countries. With regard to future challenges, the installation of TES systems in buildings is being implemented at a rate of 5%; cogeneration application with TES is attested to 10.2%; TES installation in the industry sector accounts for 5% of the final energy consumption. From the market perspective, the share of TES is expected to be dominated by SH-TES technologies due to their residential and industrial applications. With regard to the cost, the SH-TES system is typically more affordable than the LH-TES system or the TCS system because it consists of a simple tank containing the medium and the charging/discharging equipment
Bullous lung disease and neurofibromatosis type-1.
Lung interstitial diseases and bullae are described as possible complications of neurofibromatosis type-1 (NF-1), a genetic disorder inherited as a autosomal-dominant trait. We report the case of a 16-year-old male non-smoker with NF-1, who presented with pneumothorax caused by ruptured lung bullae. The case of this young patient, successfully treated by video-assisted thoracoscopic resection of bullae, supports the concept that pulmonary alterations may be part of the NF-1 syndrome, rather than as an unrelated complication
Bullous lung disease and neurofibromatosis type-1
Lung interstitial diseases and bullae are described as possible complications of neurofibromatosis type-1 (NF-1), a genetic disorder inherited as a autosomal-dominant trait. We report the case of a 16-year-old male non-smoker with NF-1, who presented with pneumothorax caused by ruptured lung bullae. The case of this young patient, successfully treated by video-assisted thoracoscopic resection of bullae, supports the concept that pulmonary alterations may be part of the NF-1 syndrome, rather than as an unrelated complication
Extended Tree-Level Gauge Mediation
Tree-level gauge mediation (TGM) is a scenario of SUSY breaking in which the
tree-level exchange of heavy (possibly GUT) vector fields generates
flavor-universal sfermion masses. In this work we extend this framework to the
case of E_6 that is the natural extension of the minimal case studied so far.
Despite the number of possible E_6 subgroups containing G_SM is large (we list
all rank 6 subgroups), there are only three different cases corresponding to
the number of vector messengers. As a robust prediction we find that sfermion
masses are SU(5) invariant at the GUT scale, even if the gauge group does not
contain SU(5). If SUSY breaking is mediated purely by the U(1) generator that
commutes with SO(10) we obtain universal sfermion masses and thus can derive
the CMSSM boundary conditions in a novel scenario.Comment: 22 pages, 2 figures, 3 table
Gravitino Dark Matter in Tree Level Gauge Mediation with and without R-parity
We investigate the cosmological aspects of Tree Level Gauge Mediation, a
recently proposed mechanism in which the breaking of supersymmetry is
communicated to the soft scalar masses by extra gauge interactions at the tree
level. Embedding the mechanism in a Grand Unified Theory and requiring the
observability of sfermion masses at the Large Hadron Collider, it follows that
the Lightest Supersymmetric Particle is a gravitino with a mass of the order of
10 GeV. The analysis in the presence of R-parity shows that a typical Tree
Level Gauge Mediation spectrum leads to an overabundance of the Dark Matter
relic density and a tension with the constraints from Big Bang Nucleosynthesis.
This suggests to relax the exact conservation of the R-parity. The underlying
SO(10) Grand Unified Theory together with the bounds from proton decay provide
a rationale for considering only bilinear R-parity violating operators. We
finally analyze the cosmological implications of this setup by identifying the
phenomenologically viable regions of the parameter space.Comment: 28 pages, 5 figures. References added. To appear in JHE
Missense PDSS1 mutations in CoenzymeQ10 synthesis cause optic atrophy and sensorineural deafness
CoenzymeQ10 is one of the main cellular antioxidants and an essential lipid involved in numerous cell reactions, such as energy production and apoptosis modulation. A large number of enzymes are involved in CoQ10 biosynthesis. Mutations in the genes encoding for these enzymes cause a CoQ10 deficiency, characterized by neurological and systemic symptoms. Here we describe two young sisters with sensorineural deafness followed by optic atrophy, due to a novel homozygous pathogenic variant in PDSS1. The visual system seems to be mainly involved when the first steps of CoQ10 synthesis are impaired (PDSS1, PDSS2, and COQ2 deficiency)
Comparison of multiple techniques for endobronchial ultrasound-transbronchial needle aspiration specimen preparation in a single institution experience.
The optimal method for specimen preparation of endobronchial ultrasound-transbronchial needle aspiration (EBUS-TBNA) is still controversial. This study aims to compare several techniques available for EBUS-TBNA specimen acquisition and processing, in order to identify the best performing technique.
We retrospectively reviewed the data of 199 consecutive patients [male, 73%; median age, 64 years (IQR: 52-74 years)] undergoing EBUS-TBNA at our institution from 2012 through 2014 for diagnosis of hilar-mediastinal lymph node enlargement suspect of neoplastic (n=139) or granulomatous (n=60) disease. All procedures were performed by two experienced bronchoscopists, under conscious sedation and local anaesthesia, using 21/22-Gauge (G) needle, without rapid on-site evaluation (ROSE). Five specimen-processing techniques were used: cytology slides in 42 cases (21%); cell-block in 25 (13%); core-tissue in 60 (30%); combination of cytology slides and core-tissue in 51 (26%); combination of cytology slides and cell-block in 21 (10%). To assess the diagnostic accuracy of each tissue-processing technique we compared the EBUS-TBNA results to those obtained with surgical lymphadenectomy, or 1-year follow-up in non-operated patients.
Diagnostic yield, accuracy and area under the curve (AUC) were as follows. Cytology slides: 81%, 80%, 0.90; cell-block: 48%, 33%, 0.67; core-tissue: 87%, 99%, 0.96; cytology slides + core-tissue: 80%, 100%, 1.00; cytology slides + cell-block: 86%, 100%, 1.00. Cytology slides and core-tissue method showed non-significantly different diagnostic yield (P=0.435) and AUC (P=0.152).
In our single-institution experience, cytology slides and core-tissue preparations demonstrated high and similar diagnostic performance. Cytology slides combination with core-tissue or cell-block showed the highest performance, however these combination methods were more resource-consuming
- …