89 research outputs found
A Mathematical Model for Complete Morphological Regression in Primary Operable HER2-Positive Breast Cancer
Background. Breast cancer (BC) is distinguished with its biological tumour subtypes as luminal A, B, HER2-positive and triple-negative. The current clinical guidelines of the Russian Ministry of Health prescribe neoadjuvant targeted chemotherapy as combined treatment in the HER2-positive cancer subtype. An adequate model for treatment efficacy prediction in such patients had been missing to date.Aim. Development of a mathematical model and its computer realisation for complete morphological regression estimation in patients with primary operable HER2-positive breast cancer.Materials and methods. Statistically significant predictors were estimated with the treatment outcome data on 103 HER2- positive breast cancer cases with neoadjuvant targeted chemotherapy. A binary logistic regression model was developed to account for a dichotomous variable dependency on certain predictors.Results and discussion. Multivariate analysis laid out a mathematical model and software “Complete morphological regression estimation in primary operable EGFR-expressing breast cancer under neoadjuvant chemotherapy”. Our results attest that the program correctly automates a systematic estimation of complete morphological regression achieved prior to neoadjuvant targeted chemotherapy and is clinically justified for optimising treatment regimens in primary operable HER2-positive BC.Conclusion. The mathematical model and computer program developed estimate the rate of complete morphological regression achieved prior to neoadjuvant targeted chemotherapy with a high 92 % sensitivity, 97.33 % specificity and 93.21% accuracy
First atom lifetime and scattering length measurements
The results of a search for hydrogen-like atoms consisting of
mesons are presented. Evidence for atom production
by 24 GeV/c protons from CERN PS interacting with a nickel target has been seen
in terms of characteristic pairs from their breakup in the same target
() and from Coulomb final state interaction (). Using
these results the analysis yields a first value for the atom lifetime
of fs and a first model-independent measurement of
the S-wave isospin-odd scattering length
( for isospin ).Comment: 14 pages, 8 figure
Determination of scattering lengths from measurement of atom lifetime
The DIRAC experiment at CERN has achieved a sizeable production of
atoms and has significantly improved the precision on its lifetime
determination. From a sample of 21227 atomic pairs, a 4% measurement of the
S-wave scattering length difference
has been attained, providing an important test of Chiral Perturbation Theory.Comment: 6 pages, 6 figure
Investigation of pairs in the effective mass region near
The DIRAC experiment at CERN investigated in the reaction
the particle pairs and with relative momentum in the pair system less than 100 MeV/c.
Because of background influence studies, DIRAC explored three subsamples of
pairs, obtained by subtracting -- using time-of-flight (TOF) technique
-- background from initial distributions with sample fractions
more than 70\%, 50\% and 30\%. The corresponding pair distributions in and
in its longitudinal projection were analyzed first in a Coulomb model,
which takes into account only Coulomb final state interaction (FSI) and
assuming point-like pair production. This Coulomb model analysis leads to a
yield increase of about four at MeV/c compared to 100 MeV/c.
In order to study contributions from strong interaction, a second more
sophisticated model was applied, considering besides Coulomb FSI also strong
FSI via the resonances and and a variable distance
between the produced mesons. This analysis was based on three different
parameter sets for the pair production. For the 70\% subsample and with best
parameters, pairs was found to be compared to extracted by means of the Coulomb model. Knowing the efficiency
of the TOF cut for background suppression, the total number of detected
pairs was evaluated to be around , which agrees with
the result from the 30\% subsample. The pair number in the 50\%
subsample differs from the two other values by about three standard deviations,
confirming -- as discussed in the paper -- that experimental data in this
subsample is less reliable
Detection of atoms with the DIRAC spectrometer at CERN
The goal of the DIRAC experiment at CERN is to measure with high precision
the lifetime of the atom (), which is of order
s, and thus to determine the s-wave -scattering
lengths difference . atoms are detected through the
characteristic features of pairs from the atom break-up
(ionization) in the target. We report on a first high statistics atomic data
sample obtained from p Ni interactions at 24 GeV/ proton momentum and
present the methods to separate the signal from the background.Comment: 19 pages, 12 figures, 1 tabl
DIRAC: A High Resolution Spectrometer for Pionium Detection
The DIRAC spectrometer has been commissioned at CERN with the aim of
detecting atoms produced by a 24 GeV/ high intensity proton
beam in thin foil targets. A challenging apparatus is required to cope with the
high interaction rates involved, the triggering of pion pairs with very low
relative momentum, and the measurement of the latter with resolution around 0.6
MeV/. The general characteristics of the apparatus are explained and each
part is described in some detail. The main features of the trigger system,
data-acquisition, monitoring and setup performances are also given.Comment: 49 pages, 37 figures. Figures 1, 2, 5 and 28 are removed because of
size limitations imposed by hep-ex. They don't offer essential information.
Latex class file 'elsart.cls' also provide
First measurement of the atom lifetime
The goal of the DIRAC experiment at CERN (PS212) is to measure the
atom lifetime with 10% precision. Such a measurement would yield a
precision of 5% on the value of the -wave scattering lengths
combination . Based on part of the collected data we present a first
result on the lifetime, s, and
discuss the major systematic errors. This lifetime corresponds to
.Comment: 18 pages, 6 figure
Columnar Liquid Crystals in Cylindrical Nanoconfinement
Axial orientation of discotic columnar liquid crystals in nanopores of inorganic templates, with the columns parallel to the axis of the nanochannels, is considered desirable for applications such as production of molecular wires. Here, we evaluate experimentally the role of the rigidity of the LC columns in achieving such orientation in nanopores where the planar anchoring (i.e., columns parallel to wall surface) is enforced. We studied the columnar phase of several discotic compounds with increasing column rigidity in the following order: dendronized carbazole, hexakis(hexyloxy)triphenylene (HAT6), a 1:1 HAT6-trinitrofluorenone (TNF) complex, and a helicene derivative. Using 2-D X-ray diffraction, AFM, grazing incidence diffraction, and polarized microscopy, we observed that the orientation of the columns changes from circular concentric to axial with increasing column rigidity. Additionally, when the rigidity is borderline, increasing pore diameter can change the configuration from axial back to circular. We derive expressions for distortion free energy that suggest that the orientation is determined by the competition between, on the one hand, the distortion energy of the 2-d lattice and the mismatch of its crystallographic facets with the curved pore wall in the axial orientation and, on the other hand, the bend energy of the columns in the circular configuration. Furthermore, the highly detailed AFM images of the core of the disclinations of strength +1 and +1/2 in the center of the pore reveal that the columns spiral down to the very center of the disclination and that there is no amorphous or misaligned region at the core, as suggested previously
Evidence for -atoms with DIRAC
We present evidence for the first observation of electromagnetically bound
-pairs (-atoms) with the DIRAC experiment at the CERN-PS.
The -atoms are produced by the 24 GeV/c proton beam in a thin Pt-target
and the and -mesons from the atom dissociation are analyzed in
a two-arm magnetic spectrometer. The observed enhancement at low relative
momentum corresponds to the production of 173 54 -atoms. The mean
life of -atoms is related to the s-wave -scattering lengths, the
measurement of which is the goal of the experiment. From these first data we
derive a lower limit for the mean life of 0.8 fs at 90% confidence level.Comment: 15 pages, 9 figure
Improved siRNA/shRNA Functionality by Mismatched Duplex
siRNA (small interfering RNA) and shRNA (small hairpin RNA) are powerful and commonly used tools in biomedical research. Currently, siRNAs are generally designed as two 21 nt strands of RNA that include a 19 nt completely complementary part and a 2 nt overhang. However, since the si/shRNAs use the endogenous miRNA machinery for gene silencing and the miRNAs are generally 22 nt in length and contain multiple internal mismatches, we tested if the functionality can be increased by designing the si/shRNAs to mimic a miRNA structure. We systematically investigated the effect of single or multiple mismatches introduced in the passenger strand at different positions on siRNA functionality. Mismatches at certain positions could significantly increase the functionality of siRNAs and also, in some cases decreased the unwanted passenger strand functionality. The same strategy could also be used to design shRNAs. Finally, we showed that both si and miRNA structured oligos (siRNA with or without mismatches in the passenger strand) can repress targets in all individual Ago containing cells, suggesting that the Ago proteins do not differentiate between si/miRNA-based structure for silencing activity
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