333 research outputs found
Genomic organization and phylogenetic utility of deer mouse (Peromyscus maniculatus) lymphotoxin-alpha and lymphotoxin-beta
<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>Deer mice (<it>Peromyscus maniculatus</it>) are among the most common mammals in North America and are important reservoirs of several human pathogens, including Sin Nombre hantavirus (SNV). SNV can establish a life-long apathogenic infection in deer mice, which can shed virus in excrement for transmission to humans. Patients that die from hantavirus cardiopulmonary syndrome (HCPS) have been found to express several proinflammatory cytokines, including lymphotoxin (LT), in the lungs. It is thought that these cytokines contribute to the pathogenesis of HCPS. LT is not expressed by virus-specific CD4<sup>+ </sup>T cells from infected deer mice, suggesting a limited role for this pathway in reservoir responses to hantaviruses.</p> <p>Results</p> <p>We have cloned the genes encoding deer mouse LTα and LTβ and have found them to be highly similar to orthologous rodent sequences but with some differences in promoters elements. The phylogenetic analyses performed on the LTα, LTβ, and combined data sets yielded a strongly-supported sister-group relationship between the two murines (the house mouse and the rat). The deer mouse, a sigmodontine, appeared as the sister group to the murine clade in all of the analyses. High bootstrap values characterized the grouping of murids.</p> <p>Conclusion</p> <p>No conspicuous differences compared to other species are present in the predicted amino acid sequences of LTα or LTβ; however, some promoter differences were noted in LTβ. Although more extensive taxonomic sampling is required to confirm the results of our analyses, the preliminary findings indicate that both genes (analyzed both separately and in combination) hold potential for resolving relationships among rodents and other mammals at the subfamily level.</p
Periodic Orbits and Spectral Statistics of Pseudointegrable Billiards
We demonstrate for a generic pseudointegrable billiard that the number of
periodic orbit families with length less than increases as , where is a constant and is the average area occupied by these families. We also find that
increases with before saturating. Finally, we show
that periodic orbits provide a good estimate of spectral correlations in the
corresponding quantum spectrum and thus conclude that diffraction effects are
not as significant in such studies.Comment: 13 pages in RevTex including 5 figure
Classical Dynamics of Anyons and the Quantum Spectrum
In this paper we show that (a) all the known exact solutions of the problem
of N-anyons in oscillator potential precisely arise from the collective degrees
of freedom, (b) the system is pseudo-integrable ala Richens and Berry. We
conclude that the exact solutions are trivial thermodynamically as well as
dynamically.Comment: 19 pages, ReVTeX, IMSc/93/0
Semiclassical Inequivalence of Polygonalized Billiards
Polygonalization of any smooth billiard boundary can be carried out in
several ways. We show here that the semiclassical description depends on the
polygonalization process and the results can be inequivalent. We also establish
that generalized tangent-polygons are closest to the corresponding smooth
billiard and for de Broglie wavelengths larger than the average length of the
edges, the two are semiclassically equivalent.Comment: revtex, 4 ps figure
Periodic Orbits in Polygonal Billiards
We review some properties of periodic orbit families in polygonal billiards
and discuss in particular a sum rule that they obey. In addition, we provide
algorithms to determine periodic orbit families and present numerical results
that shed new light on the proliferation law and its variation with the genus
of the invariant surface. Finally, we deal with correlations in the length
spectrum and find that long orbits display Poisson fluctuations.Comment: 30 pages (Latex) including 11 figure
Semiclassical Quantisation Using Diffractive Orbits
Diffraction, in the context of semiclassical mechanics, describes the manner
in which quantum mechanics smooths over discontinuities in the classical
mechanics. An important example is a billiard with sharp corners; its
semiclassical quantisation requires the inclusion of diffractive periodic
orbits in addition to classical periodic orbits. In this paper we construct the
corresponding zeta function and apply it to a scattering problem which has only
diffractive periodic orbits. We find that the resonances are accurately given
by the zeros of the diffractive zeta function.Comment: Revtex document. Submitted to PRL. Figures available on reques
Scale Anomaly and Quantum Chaos in the Billiards with Pointlike Scatterers
We argue that the random-matrix like energy spectra found in pseudointegrable
billiards with pointlike scatterers are related to the quantum violation of
scale invariance of classical analogue system. It is shown that the behavior of
the running coupling constant explains the key characteristics of the level
statistics of pseudointegrable billiards.Comment: 10 pages, RevTex file, uuencode
Level spacing distribution of pseudointegrable billiard
In this paper, we examine the level spacing distribution of the
rectangular billiard with a single point-like scatterer, which is known as
pseudointegrable. It is shown that the observed is a new type, which is
quite different from the previous conclusion. Even in the strong coupling
limit, the Poisson-like behavior rather than Wigner-like is seen for ,
although the level repulsion still remains in the small region. The
difference from the previous works is analyzed in detail.Comment: 11 pages, REVTeX file, 3 PostScript Figure
Invariant varieties of periodic points for some higher dimensional integrable maps
By studying various rational integrable maps on with
invariants, we show that periodic points form an invariant variety of dimension
for each period, in contrast to the case of nonintegrable maps in which
they are isolated. We prove the theorem: {\it `If there is an invariant variety
of periodic points of some period, there is no set of isolated periodic points
of other period in the map.'}Comment: 24 page
Changes in paediatric respiratory infections at a UK teaching hospital 2016–2021; impact of the SARS-CoV-2 pandemic
Objective: To describe the impact of the SARS-CoV-2 pandemic on the incidence of paediatric viral respiratory tract infection in Oxfordshire, UK.
Methods: Data on paediatric Emergency Department (ED) attendances (0–15 years inclusive), respiratory virus testing, vital signs and mortality at Oxford University Hospitals were summarised using descriptive statistics.
Results: Between 1-March-2016 and 30-July-2021, 155,056 ED attendances occurred and 7,195 respiratory virus PCRs were performed. Detection of all pathogens was suppressed during the first national lockdown. Rhinovirus and adenovirus rates increased when schools reopened September-December 2020, then fell, before rising in March-May 2021. The usual winter RSV peak did not occur in 2020/21, with an inter-seasonal rise (32/1,000 attendances in 0–3 yr olds) in July 2021. Influenza remained suppressed throughout. A higher paediatric early warning score (PEWS) was seen for attendees with adenovirus during the pandemic compared to pre-pandemic (p = 0.04, Mann-Witney U test), no other differences in PEWS were seen.
Conclusions: SARS-CoV-2 caused major changes in the incidence of paediatric respiratory viral infection in Oxfordshire, with implications for clinical service demand, testing strategies, timing of palivizumab RSV prophylaxis, and highlighting the need to understand which public health interventions are most effective for preventing respiratory virus infections
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