On Tunnelling In Two-Throat Warped Reheating

We revisit the energy transfer necessary for the warped reheating scenario in a two-throat geometry. We study KK mode wavefunctions of the full two-throat system in the Randall--Sundrum (RS) approximation and find an interesting subtlety in the calculation of the KK mode tunnelling rate. While wavepacket tunnelling is suppressed unless the Standard Model throat is very long, wavefunctions of modes localized in different throats have a non-zero overlap and energy can be transferred between the throats by interactions between such KK modes. The corresponding decay rates are calculated and found to be faster than the tunnelling rates found in previously published works. However, it turns out that the imaginary parts of the mode frequencies, induced by the decay, slow the decay rates themselves down. The self-consistent decay rate turns out to be given by the plane wave tunnelling rate considered previously in the literature. We then discuss mechanisms that may enhance the energy transfer between the throats over the RS rates. In particular, we study models in which the warp factor changes in the UV region less abruptly than in the RS model, and find that it is easy to build phenomenological models in which the plane wave tunnelling rate, and hence the KK mode interaction rates, are enhanced compared to the standard RS setup.Comment: 27 pages + appendices, 5 figures, latex. v2: Discussion of decay in Section 4 changed: the most dangerous graviton amplitudes are zero, the results are now more positive for the warped reheating scenario; typos fixed, discussion cleaned up. v3:corrections in Section 5 (decay rates slowed down), mild changes of overall conclusion

Development and Testing of the Dysmenorrhea Symptom Interference (DSI) Scale

Dysmenorrhea affects most reproductive-age women and increases the risk of future pain. To evaluate dysmenorrhea interventions, validated outcome measures are needed. In this two-phase study, we developed and tested the dysmenorrhea symptom interference scale. During the scale-development phase (n = 30), we created a nine-item scale based on qualitative data from cognitive interviews. During the scale-testing phase (n = 686), we evaluated reliability, validity, and responsiveness to change. The scale measures how dysmenorrhea symptoms interfere with physical, mental, and social activities. Internal consistency was strong with Cronbach's α > 0.9. Test-retest reliability was acceptable (r = 0.8). The scale showed satisfactory content validity, construct validity (supported by confirmatory factor analysis), concurrent validity, and responsiveness to change. The minimally important difference was 0.3 points on a scale with a possible total score ranging from 1 to 5. This new psychometrically sound scale can be used in research and clinical practice to facilitate the measurement and management of dysmenorrhea

Existence of Ricci flows of incomplete surfaces

We prove a general existence result for instantaneously complete Ricci flows starting at an arbitrary Riemannian surface which may be incomplete and may have unbounded curvature. We give an explicit formula for the maximal existence time, and describe the asymptotic behaviour in most cases.Comment: 20 pages; updated to reflect galley proof correction