Adjuvancy and reactogenicity of N-acetylglycosaminyl-N-acetylmuramyl-dipeptide (GMDP) orally administered just prior to trivalent influenza subunit vaccine. A double-blind placebo-controlled study in nursing home residents.

One hundred and fifty-three nursing home residents received 0, 5, 25 or 50 mg N-acetylglucosaminyl-N-acetylmuramyl-dipeptide (GMDP) orally, and trivalent influenza subunit vaccine intramuscularly. One day after intervention, there was a strong increase of total leucocytes, monocytes and neutrophils in the groups receiving 25 or 50 mg GMDP. A GMDP dose dependent increase in systemic, but not in local, vaccine side-effects was observed. No significant differences in post-vaccination haemagglutination inhibiting serum antibody titres were observed between the four groups, indicating that oral administration of GMDP together with influenza vaccination, does not lead to a higher vaccine efficacy

Hybrid Meson Decay Phenomenology

The phenomenology of a newly developed model of hybrid meson decay is developed. The decay mechanism is based on the heavy quark expansion of QCD and the strong coupling flux tube picture of nonperturbative glue. A comprehensive list of partial decay widths of a wide variety of light, $s\bar s$, $c\bar c$, and $b \bar b$ hybrid mesons is presented. Results which appear approximately universal are highlighted along with those which distinguish different hybrid decay models. Finally, we examine several interesting hybrid candidates in detail.Comment: 37 pages, 2 figures, 6 tables, Revte

Mycobacteria counteract a TLR-mediated nitrosative defense mechanism in a zebrafish infection model.

Pulmonary tuberculosis (TB), caused by the intracellular bacterial pathogen Mycobacterium tuberculosis (Mtb), is a major world health problem. The production of reactive nitrogen species (RNS) is a potent cytostatic and cytotoxic defense mechanism against intracellular pathogens. Nevertheless, the protective role of RNS during Mtb infection remains controversial. Here we use an anti-nitrotyrosine antibody as a readout to study nitration output by the zebrafish host during early mycobacterial pathogenesis. We found that recognition of Mycobacterium marinum, a close relative of Mtb, was sufficient to induce a nitrosative defense mechanism in a manner dependent on MyD88, the central adaptor protein in Toll like receptor (TLR) mediated pathogen recognition. However, this host response was attenuated by mycobacteria via a virulence mechanism independent of the well-characterized RD1 virulence locus. Our results indicate a mechanism of pathogenic mycobacteria to circumvent host defense in vivo. Shifting the balance of host-pathogen interactions in favor of the host by targeting this virulence mechanism may help to alleviate the problem of infection with Mtb strains that are resistant to multiple drug treatments

Search for gravitational-lensing signatures in the full third observing run of the LIGO-Virgo network

Gravitational lensing by massive objects along the line of sight to the source causes distortions of gravitational wave-signals; such distortions may reveal information about fundamental physics, cosmology and astrophysics. In this work, we have extended the search for lensing signatures to all binary black hole events from the third observing run of the LIGO--Virgo network. We search for repeated signals from strong lensing by 1) performing targeted searches for subthreshold signals, 2) calculating the degree of overlap amongst the intrinsic parameters and sky location of pairs of signals, 3) comparing the similarities of the spectrograms amongst pairs of signals, and 4) performing dual-signal Bayesian analysis that takes into account selection effects and astrophysical knowledge. We also search for distortions to the gravitational waveform caused by 1) frequency-independent phase shifts in strongly lensed images, and 2) frequency-dependent modulation of the amplitude and phase due to point masses. None of these searches yields significant evidence for lensing. Finally, we use the non-detection of gravitational-wave lensing to constrain the lensing rate based on the latest merger-rate estimates and the fraction of dark matter composed of compact objects

Search for eccentric black hole coalescences during the third observing run of LIGO and Virgo

Despite the growing number of confident binary black hole coalescences observed through gravitational waves so far, the astrophysical origin of these binaries remains uncertain. Orbital eccentricity is one of the clearest tracers of binary formation channels. Identifying binary eccentricity, however, remains challenging due to the limited availability of gravitational waveforms that include effects of eccentricity. Here, we present observational results for a waveform-independent search sensitive to eccentric black hole coalescences, covering the third observing run (O3) of the LIGO and Virgo detectors. We identified no new high-significance candidates beyond those that were already identified with searches focusing on quasi-circular binaries. We determine the sensitivity of our search to high-mass (total mass M>70 M⊙) binaries covering eccentricities up to 0.3 at 15 Hz orbital frequency, and use this to compare model predictions to search results. Assuming all detections are indeed quasi-circular, for our fiducial population model, we place an upper limit for the merger rate density of high-mass binaries with eccentricities 0<e≤0.3 at 0.33 Gpc−3 yr−1 at 90\% confidence level

Ultralight vector dark matter search using data from the KAGRA O3GK run

Among the various candidates for dark matter (DM), ultralight vector DM can be probed by laser interferometric gravitational wave detectors through the measurement of oscillating length changes in the arm cavities. In this context, KAGRA has a unique feature due to differing compositions of its mirrors, enhancing the signal of vector DM in the length change in the auxiliary channels. Here we present the result of a search for U(1)B−L gauge boson DM using the KAGRA data from auxiliary length channels during the first joint observation run together with GEO600. By applying our search pipeline, which takes into account the stochastic nature of ultralight DM, upper bounds on the coupling strength between the U(1)B−L gauge boson and ordinary matter are obtained for a range of DM masses. While our constraints are less stringent than those derived from previous experiments, this study demonstrates the applicability of our method to the lower-mass vector DM search, which is made difficult in this measurement by the short observation time compared to the auto-correlation time scale of DM