849 research outputs found
Beam Test of Silicon Strip Sensors for the ZEUS Micro Vertex Detector
For the HERA upgrade, the ZEUS experiment has designed and installed a high
precision Micro Vertex Detector (MVD) using single sided micro-strip sensors
with capacitive charge division. The sensors have a readout pitch of 120
microns, with five intermediate strips (20 micron strip pitch). An extensive
test program has been carried out at the DESY-II testbeam facility. In this
paper we describe the setup developed to test the ZEUS MVD sensors and the
results obtained on both irradiated and non-irradiated single sided micro-strip
detectors with rectangular and trapezoidal geometries. The performances of the
sensors coupled to the readout electronics (HELIX chip, version 2.2) have been
studied in detail, achieving a good description by a Monte Carlo simulation.
Measurements of the position resolution as a function of the angle of incidence
are presented, focusing in particular on the comparison between standard and
newly developed reconstruction algorithms.Comment: 41 pages, 21 figures, 2 tables, accepted for publication in NIM
Guidelines for incorporating scientific knowledge and practice on rare diseases into higher education: neuronal ceroid lipofuscinoses as a model disorder model disorder.
This article addresses the educational issues associated with rare diseases (RD) and in particular the Neuronal
Ceroid Lipofuscinoses (NCLs, or CLN diseases) in the curricula of Health Sciences and Professional's Training
Programs. Our aim is to develop guidelines for improving scientific knowledge and practice in higher education
and continuous learning programs.
Rare diseases (RD) are collectively common in the general populationwith 1 in 17 people affected by a RDin their
lifetime. Inherited defects in genes involved in metabolism are the commonest group of RD with over 8000
known inborn errors of metabolism. The majority of these diseases are neurodegenerative including the NCLs.
Any professional training program on NCL must take into account the medical, social and economic burdens
related to RDs. To address these challenges and find solutions to themit is necessary that individuals in the government
and administrative authorities, academia, teaching hospitals and medical schools, the pharmaceutical
industry, investment community and patient advocacy groups all work together to achieve these goals.
The logistical issues of including RD lectures in university curricula and in continuing medical education should
reflect its complex nature. To evaluate the state of education in the RD field, a summary should be periodically up
dated in order to assess the progress achieved in each country that signed up to the international conventions
addressing RD issues in society. It is anticipated that auditing current practice will lead to higher standards and
provide a framework for those educators involved in establishing RD teaching programs world-wide.publishedVersio
First Experimental Characterization of Microwave Emission from Cosmic Ray Air Showers
We report the first direct measurement of the overall characteristics of
microwave radio emission from extensive air showers. Using a trigger provided
by the KASCADE-Grande air shower array, the signals of the microwave antennas
of the CROME (Cosmic-Ray Observation via Microwave Emission) experiment have
been read out and searched for signatures of radio emission by high-energy air
showers in the GHz frequency range. Microwave signals have been detected for
more than 30 showers with energies above 3*10^16 eV. The observations presented
in this Letter are consistent with a mainly forward-directed and polarised
emission process in the GHz frequency range. The measurements show that
microwave radiation offers a new means of studying air showers at energies
above 10^17 eV.Comment: Accepted for publication in PR
The wavefront of the radio signal emitted by cosmic ray air showers
Analyzing measurements of the LOPES antenna array together with corresponding
CoREAS simulations for more than 300 measured events with energy above
eV and zenith angles smaller than , we find that the radio
wavefront of cosmic-ray air showers is of approximately hyperbolic shape. The
simulations predict a slightly steeper wavefront towards East than towards
West, but this asymmetry is negligible against the measurement uncertainties of
LOPES. At axis distances m, the wavefront can be approximated by
a simple cone. According to the simulations, the cone angle is clearly
correlated with the shower maximum. Thus, we confirm earlier predictions that
arrival time measurements can be used to study the longitudinal shower
development, but now using a realistic wavefront. Moreover, we show that the
hyperbolic wavefront is compatible with our measurement, and we present several
experimental indications that the cone angle is indeed sensitive to the shower
development. Consequently, the wavefront can be used to statistically study the
primary composition of ultra-high energy cosmic rays. At LOPES, the
experimentally achieved precision for the shower maximum is limited by
measurement uncertainties to approximately g/cm. But the simulations
indicate that under better conditions this method might yield an accuracy for
the atmospheric depth of the shower maximum, , better than
g/cm. This would be competitive with the established air-fluorescence
and air-Cherenkov techniques, where the radio technique offers the advantage of
a significantly higher duty-cycle. Finally, the hyperbolic wavefront can be
used to reconstruct the shower geometry more accurately, which potentially
allows a better reconstruction of all other shower parameters, too.Comment: accepted by JCA
Multijet production in neutral current deep inelastic scattering at HERA and determination of α_{s}
Multijet production rates in neutral current deep inelastic scattering have been measured in the range of exchanged boson virtualities 10 5 GeV and –1 < η_{LAB}^{jet} < 2.5. Next-to-leading-order QCD calculations describe the data well. The value of the strong coupling constant α_{s} (M_{z}), determined from the ratio of the trijet to dijet cross sections, is α_{s} (M_{z}) = 0.1179 ± 0.0013 (stat.)_{-0.0046}^{+0.0028}(exp.)_{-0.0046}^{+0.0028}(th.)
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