Neutrino mass from higher than d=5 effective operators in SUSY, and its test at the LHC

We discuss neutrino masses from higher than d=5 effective operators in a supersymmetric framework, where we explicitly demonstrate which operators could be the leading contribution to neutrino mass in the MSSM and NMSSM. As an example, we focus on the d=7 operator L L H_u H_u H_d H_u, for which we systematically derive all tree-level decompositions. We argue that many of these lead to a linear or inverse see-saw scenario with two extra neutral fermions, where the lepton number violating term is naturally suppressed by a heavy mass scale when the extra mediators are integrated out. We choose one example, for which we discuss possible implementations of the neutrino flavor structure. In addition, we show that the heavy mediators, in this case SU(2) doublet fermions, may indeed be observable at the LHC, since they can be produced by Drell-Yan processes and lead to displaced vertices when they decay. However, the direct observation of lepton number violating processes is on the edge at LHC.Comment: 24 pages, 5 figures, 6 table

Plasmonic Brownian ratchet

Here we present a Brownian ratchet based on plasmonic interactions. By periodically turning on and off a laser beam that illuminates a periodic array of plasmonic nanostructures with broken spatial symmetry, the random thermal motion of a subwavelength dielectric bead is rectified into one direction. By means of the Molecular Dynamics technique we show a statistical directed drift in particle flow

On the spectroscopy of quantum dots in microcavities

At the occasion of the OECS conference in Madrid, we give a succinct account of some recent predictions in the spectroscopy of a quantum dot in a microcavity that remain to be observed experimentally, sometimes within the reach of the current state of the art.Comment: OECS11 Conference proceedings, in editor style. 4 pages, 1 figure. Animations provided separatel

Voltage-controlled Group Velocity of Edge Magnetoplasmon in the Quantum Hall Regime

We investigate the group velocity of edge magnetoplasmons (EMPs) in the quantum Hall regime by means of time-of-flight measurement. The EMPs are injected from an Ohmic contact by applying a voltage pulse, and detected at a quantum point contact by applying another voltage pulse to its gate. We find that the group velocity of the EMPs traveling along the edge channel defined by a metallic gate electrode strongly depends on the voltage applied to the gate. The observed variation of the velocity can be understood to reflect the degree of screening caused by the metallic gate, which damps the in-plane electric field and hence reduces the velocity. The degree of screening can be controlled by changing the distance between the gate and the edge channel with the gate voltage.Comment: 5 pages, 6 figures, to be published in Physical Review

IRE1 phosphatase PP2Ce regulates adaptive ER stress response in the postpartum mammary gland.

We recently reported that the PPM1l gene encodes an endoplasmic reticulum (ER) membrane targeted protein phosphatase (named PP2Ce) with highly specific activity towards Inositol-requiring protein-1 (IRE1) and regulates the functional outcome of ER stress. In the present report, we found that the PP2Ce protein is highly expressed in lactating epithelium of the mammary gland. Loss of PP2Ce in vivo impairs physiological unfolded protein response (UPR) and induces stress kinase activation, resulting in loss of milk production and induction of epithelial apoptosis in the lactating mammary gland. This study provides the first in vivo evidence that PP2Ce is an essential regulator of normal lactation, possibly involving IRE1 signaling and ER stress regulation in mammary epithelium

Possibility of valence-fluctuation mediated superconductivity in Cd-doped CeIrIn5_5 probed by In-NQR

We report on a pressure-induced evolution of exotic superconductivity and spin correlations in CeIr(In$_{1-x}$Cd$_{x}$)$_5$ by means of In-Nuclear-Quadrupole-Resonance (NQR) studies. Measurements of an NQR spectrum and nuclear-spin-lattice-relaxation rate $1/T_1$ have revealed that antiferromagnetism induced by the Cd-doping emerges locally around Cd dopants, but superconductivity is suddenly induced at $T_c$ = 0.7 and 0.9 K at 2.34 and 2.75 GPa, respectively. The unique superconducting characteristics with a large fraction of the residual density of state at the Fermi level that increases with $T_c$ differ from those for anisotropic superconductivity mediated by antiferromagnetic correlations. By incorporating the pressure dependence of the NQR frequency pointing to the valence change of Ce, we suggest that unconventional superconductivity in the CeIr(In$_{1-x}$Cd$_{x}$)$_5$ system may be mediated by valence fluctuations.Comment: Accepted for publication in Physical Review Letter

PhyloCSF: a comparative genomics method to distinguish protein-coding and non-coding regions

As high-throughput transcriptome sequencing provides evidence for novel transcripts in many species, there is a renewed need for accurate methods to classify small genomic regions as protein-coding or non-coding. We present PhyloCSF, a novel comparative genomics method that analyzes a multi-species nucleotide sequence alignment to determine whether it is likely to represent a conserved protein-coding region, based on a formal statistical comparison of phylogenetic codon models. We show that PhyloCSF's classification performance in 12-species _Drosophila_ genome alignments exceeds all other methods we compared in a previous study, and we provide a software implementation for use by the community. We anticipate that this method will be widely applicable as the transcriptomes of many additional species, tissues, and subcellular compartments are sequenced, particularly in the context of ENCODE and modENCODE

Anomalous Higgs Couplings at the LHC

We discuss the impact and potential discovery of physics beyond the Standard Model, coupling to the Higgs sector, at the LHC. Using a model-independent effective Lagrangian approach, pure Higgs and Higgs-gauge operators are analyzed, and their origin in terms of tree-level exchange of unknown heavy messengers is systematically derived. It is demonstrated that early signals at the LHC may result from a simultaneous modification of Higgs-fermion and Higgs-gauge boson couplings induced by those operators, pointing towards singlet scalar or a triplet vector -- barring fine-tuned options. Of course, the Higgs discovery itself will also be affected by such new couplings. With increasing statistics, the remaining options can be discriminated from each other. On the other hand, the discovery of a new scalar doublet may require technology beyond the LHC, since the Higgs self-couplings have to be measured. Our conclusions are based on the complete set of tree-level decompositions of the effective operators unbiased by a specific model.Comment: 31 pages, 6 figures, version to appear in Phys.Rev.

Morphological Diversity between Culture Strains of a Chlorarachniophyte, Lotharella globosa

Chlorarachniophytes are marine unicellular algae that possess secondary plastids of green algal origin. Although chlorarachniophytes are a small group (the phylum of Chlorarachniophyta contains 14 species in 8 genera), they have variable and complex life cycles that include amoeboid, coccoid, and/or flagellate cells. The majority of chlorarachniophytes possess two or more cell types in their life cycles, and which cell types are found is one of the principle morphological criteria used for species descriptions. Here we describe an unidentified chlorarachniophyte that was isolated from an artificial coral reef that calls this criterion into question. The life cycle of the new strain includes all three major cell types, but DNA barcoding based on the established nucleomorph ITS sequences showed it to share 100% sequence identity with Lotharella globosa. The type strain of L. globosa was also isolated from a coral reef, but is defined as completely lacking an amoeboid stage throughout its life cycle. We conclude that L. globosa possesses morphological diversity between culture strains, and that the new strain is a variety of L. globosa, which we describe as Lotharella globosa var. fortis var. nov. to include the amoeboid stage in the formal description of L. globosa. This intraspecies variation suggest that gross morphological stages maybe lost rather rapidly, and specifically that the type strain of L. globosa has lost the ability to form the amoeboid stage, perhaps recently. This in turn suggests that even major morphological characters used for taxonomy of this group may be variable in natural populations, and therefore misleading