Fermilab E791

Fermilab E791, a very high statistics charm particle experiment, recently completed its data taking at Fermilab's Tagged Photon Laboratory. Over 20 billion events were recorded through a loose transverse energy trigger and written to 8mm tape in the the 1991-92 fixed target run at Fermilab. This unprecedented data sample containing charm is being analysed on many-thousand MIP RISC computing farms set up at sites in the collaboration. A glimpse of the data taking and analysis effort is presented. We also show some preliminary results for common charm decay modes. Our present analysis indicates a very rich yield of over 200K reconstructed charm decays

The relationship between hypogammaglobulinemia, monoclonal gammopathy of undetermined significance and humoral immunodeficiency: a case series.

Hypogammaglobulinemia of the non-monoclonal immunoglobulin heavy chain classes has been reported in monoclonal gammopathy of undetermined significance (MGUS) patients. Whether low polyclonal immunoglobulin levels are associated with impaired specific antibody production and whether they represent a risk factor for the development of recurrent bacterial infections have not been established in this population. We determined the frequency of MGUS in patients referred to a tertiary care clinical immunology ambulatory care practice for evaluation of hypogammaglobulinemia, who were assessed for deficits in specific antibody production and the presence of recurrent infections. Of the 133 patients evaluated for hypogammaglobulinemia, 68 were screened for monoclonal gammopathy and 5 were found to have MGUS. Three had MGUS associated hypogammaglobulinemia in the absence of a defining primary immunodeficiency, one possibly had common variable immunodeficiency, and one had an uncertain diagnosis. Thus, MGUS may be uncovered in patients presenting with hypogammaglobulinemia even in those who lack an elevated serum level of IgG, IgM, or IgA

Charm physics at Fermilab E791

Experiment 791 at Fermilab`s Tagged Photon Laboratory has just accumulated a high statistics charm sample by recording 20 billion events on 24000 8mm tapes. A 500 GeV/c {pi}{sup {minus}} beam was used with a fixed target and a magnetic spectrometer which now includes 23 silicon microstrip planes for vertex reconstruction. A new data acquisition system read out 9000 events/sec during the part of the Tevatron cycle that delivered beam. Digitization and readout took 50 {mu}S per event. Data was buffered in eight large FIFO memories to allow continuous event building and continuous tape writing to a wall of 42 Exabytes at 9.6 MB/sec. The 50 terabytes of data buffered to tape is now being filtered on RISC CPUs. Preliminary results show D{sup 0} {yields} K{sup {minus}}{pi}{sup +} and D{sup +} {yields} K{sup {minus}}{pi}{pi}{sup +} decays. Rarer decays will be pursued