264 research outputs found
Hyperons in neutron stars and supernova cores
The properties of compact stars and their formation processes depend on many
physical ingredients. The composition and the thermodynamics of the involved
matter is one of them. We will investigate here uniform strongly interacting
matter at densities and temperatures, where potentially other components than
free nucleons appear such as hyperons, mesons or even quarks. In this paper we
will put the emphasis on two aspects of stellar matter with non-nucleonic
degrees of freedom. First, we will study the phase diagram of baryonic matter
with strangeness, showing that the onset of hyperons, as that of quark matter,
could be related to a very rich phase structure with a large density domain
covered by phase coexistence. Second, we will investigate thermal effects on
the equation of state (EoS), showing that they favor the appearance of
non-nucleonic particles. We will finish by reviewing some recent results on the
impact of non-nucleonic degrees freedom in compact star mergers and
core-collapse events, where thermal effects cannot be neglected.Comment: 20 pages, 14 figures, contribution to the EPJA topical issue "Exotic
matter in neutron stars
Instanton picture of the spin tunneling in the Lipkin model
A consistent theory of the ground state energy and its splitting due to the
process of tunneling for the Lipkin model is presented. For the functional
integral in terms of the spin coherent states for the partition function of the
model we accurately calculate the trivial and the instanton saddle point
contributions. We show that such calculation has to be perfomed very accurately
taking into account the discrete nature of the functional integral. Such
accurate consideration leads to finite corrections to a naive continous
consideration. We present comparison with numerical calculation of the ground
state energy and the tunneling splitting and with the results obtained by the
quasiclassical method and get excellent agreement.Comment: REVTEX, 32 pages, 3 figure
Neutron star radii and crusts: uncertainties and unified equations of state
The uncertainties in neutron star (NS) radii and crust properties due to our
limited knowledge of the equation of state (EOS) are quantitatively analysed.
We first demonstrate the importance of a unified microscopic description for
the different baryonic densities of the star. If the pressure functional is
obtained matching a crust and a core EOS based on models with different
properties at nuclear matter saturation, the uncertainties can be as large as
for the crust thickness and for the radius. Necessary
conditions for causal and thermodynamically consistent matchings between the
core and the crust are formulated and their consequences examined. A large set
of unified EOS for purely nucleonic matter is obtained based on 24 Skyrme
interactions and 9 relativistic mean-field nuclear parametrizations. In
addition, for relativistic models 17 EOS including a transition to hyperonic
matter at high density are presented. All these EOS have in common the property
of describing a star and of being causal within stable NS. A span
of km and km is obtained for the radius of, respectively,
and star. Applying a set of nine further
constraints from experiment and ab-initio calculations the uncertainty is
reduced to km and km, respectively. These residual uncertainties
reflect lack of constraints at large densities and insufficient information on
the density dependence of the EOS near the nuclear matter saturation point. The
most important parameter to be constrained is shown to be the symmetry energy
slope which exhibits a linear correlation with the stellar radius,
particularly for masses . Potential constraints on , the
NS radius and the EOS from observations of thermal states of NS are also
discussed. [Abriged]Comment: Submitted to Phys. Rev. C. Supplemental material not include
Electronic health record-wide association study for atrial fibrillation in a British cohort
Background: Atrial fibrillation (AF) confers a major healthcare burden from hospitalisations and AF-related complications, such as stroke and heart failure. We performed an electronic health records-wide association study to identify the most frequent reasons for healthcare utilization, pre and post new-onset AF. Methods: Prospective cohort study with the linked electronic health records of 5.6 million patients in the United Kingdom Clinical Practice Research Datalink (1998–2016). A cohort study with AF patients and their age-and sex matched controls was implemented to compare the top 100 reasons of frequent hospitalisation and primary consultation. Results: Of the 199,433 patients who developed AF, we found the most frequent healthcare interactions to be cardiac, cerebrovascular and peripheral-vascular conditions, both prior to AF diagnosis (41/100 conditions in secondary care, such as cerebral infarction and valve diseases; and 33/100 conditions in primary care), and subsequently (47/100 conditions hospital care and 48 conditions in primary care). There was a high representation of repeated visits for cancer and infection affecting multiple organ systems. We identified 10 novel conditions which have not yet been associated with AF: folic acid deficiency, pancytopenia, idiopathic thrombocytopenic purpura, seborrheic dermatitis, lymphoedema, angioedema, laryngopharyngeal reflux, rib fracture, haemorrhagic gastritis, inflammatory polyneuropathies. Conclusion: Our nationwide data provide knowledge and better understanding of the clinical needs of AF patients suggesting: (i) groups at higher risk of AF, where screening may be more cost-effective, and (ii) potential complications developing following new-onset AF that can be prevented through implementation of comprehensive integrated care management and more personalised, tailored treatment. Clinical trial registration: NCT0478636
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