Exact Results for the Bipartite Entanglement Entropy of the AKLT spin-1 chain

We study the entanglement between two domains of a spin-1 AKLT chain subject to open boundary conditions. In this case the ground-state manifold is four-fold degenerate. We summarize known results and present additional exact analytical results for the von Neumann entanglement entropy, as a function of both the size of the domains and the total system size for {\it all} four degenerate ground-states. In the large $l,L$ limit the entanglement entropy approaches $\ln(2)$ and $2\ln(2)$ for the $S^z_T=\pm 1$ and $S^z_T=0$ states, respectively. In all cases, it is found that this constant is approached exponentially fast defining a length scale $\xi=1/\ln(3)$ equal to the known bulk correlation length.Comment: 11 pages, 3 figure

Vortex oscillations in confined Bose-Einstein condensate interacting with 1D optical lattice

We study Bose-Einstein condensate of atomic Boson gases trapped in a composite potential of a harmonic potential and an optical lattice potential. We found a series of collective excitations that induces localized vortex oscillations with a characteristic wavelength. The oscillations might be observed experimentally when radial confinement is tight. We present the excitation spectra of the vortex oscillation modes and propose a way to experimentally excite the modes.Comment: 5 pages, 7 figures. Title, abstract and references are update

Prognostic importance of left ventricular mechanical dyssynchrony in heart failure with preserved ejection fraction

Peer Reviewedhttps://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/138381/1/ejhf789.pdfhttps://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/138381/2/ejhf789_am.pd

Lifestyle travellers: Backpacking as a way of life

Scholarship on backpackers speculates some individuals may extend backpacking to a way of life. This article empirically explores this proposition using lifestyle consumption as its framing concept and conceptualises individuals who style their lives around the enduring practice of backpacking as ‘lifestyle travellers’. Ethnographic interviews with lifestyle travellers in India and Thailand offer an emic account of the practices, ideologies and social identity that characterise lifestyle travel as a distinctive subtype within backpacking. Departing from the drifter construct, which (re)constitutes this identity as socially deviant, the concept of lifestyle allows for a contemporary appraisal of these individuals’ patterns of meaningful consumption and wider insights into how ongoing mobility can lead to different ways of understanding identities and relating to place. Keywords: lifestyle consumption; backpacker; mobility; drifter; identit

Failure Processes in Elastic Fiber Bundles

The fiber bundle model describes a collection of elastic fibers under load. the fibers fail successively and for each failure, the load distribution among the surviving fibers change. Even though very simple, the model captures the essentials of failure processes in a large number of materials and settings. We present here a review of fiber bundle model with different load redistribution mechanism from the point of view of statistics and statistical physics rather than materials science, with a focus on concepts such as criticality, universality and fluctuations. We discuss the fiber bundle model as a tool for understanding phenomena such as creep, and fatigue, how it is used to describe the behavior of fiber reinforced composites as well as modelling e.g. network failure, traffic jams and earthquake dynamics.Comment: This article has been Editorially approved for publication in Reviews of Modern Physic

Candidate Genes Detected in Transcriptome Studies Are Strongly Dependent on Genetic Background

Whole genome transcriptomic studies can point to potential candidate genes for organismal traits. However, the importance of potential candidates is rarely followed up through functional studies and/or by comparing results across independent studies. We have analysed the overlap of candidate genes identified from studies of gene expression in Drosophila melanogaster using similar technical platforms. We found little overlap across studies between putative candidate genes for the same traits in the same sex. Instead there was a high degree of overlap between different traits and sexes within the same genetic backgrounds. Putative candidates found using transcriptomics therefore appear very sensitive to genetic background and this can mask or override effects of treatments. The functional importance of putative candidate genes emerging from transcriptome studies needs to be validated through additional experiments and in future studies we suggest a focus on the genes, networks and pathways affecting traits in a consistent manner across backgrounds

Flu Vaccine and Mortality in Hypertension:A Nationwide Cohort Study

BACKGROUND: Influenza infection may increase the risk of stroke and acute myocardial infarction (AMI). Whether influenza vaccination may reduce mortality in patients with hypertension is currently unknown. METHODS AND RESULTS: We performed a nationwide cohort study including all patients with hypertension in Denmark during 9 consecutive influenza seasons in the period 2007 to 2016 who were prescribed at least 2 different classes of antihypertensive medication (renin‐angiotensin system inhibitors, diuretics, calcium antagonists, or beta‐blockers). We excluded patients who were aged 100 years, had ischemic heart disease, heart failure, chronic obstructive lung disease, cancer, or cerebrovascular disease. The exposure to influenza vaccination was assessed before each influenza season. The end points were defined as death from all‐causes, from cardiovascular causes, or from stroke or AMI. For each influenza season, patients were followed from December 1 until April 1 the next year. We included a total of 608 452 patients. The median follow‐up was 5 seasons (interquartile range, 2–8 seasons) resulting in a total follow‐up time of 975 902 person‐years. Vaccine coverage ranged from 26% to 36% during the study seasons. During follow‐up 21 571 patients died of all‐causes (3.5%), 12 270 patients died of cardiovascular causes (2.0%), and 3846 patients died of AMI/stroke (0.6%). After adjusting for confounders, vaccination was significantly associated with reduced risks of all‐cause death (HR, 0.82; P<0.001), cardiovascular death (HR, 0.84; P<0.001), and death from AMI/stroke (HR, 0.90; P=0.017). CONCLUSIONS: Influenza vaccination was significantly associated with reduced risks of death from all‐causes, cardiovascular causes, and AMI/stroke in patients with hypertension. Influenza vaccination might improve outcome in hypertension

Back to the future of soil metagenomics

JN was funded by a fellowship from the French MENESR.Peer reviewedPeer Reviewe

Aggregation of measures to produce an overall assessment of animal welfare. Part 1: a review of existing methods

Several systems have been proposed for the overall assessment of animal welfare at the farm level for the purpose of advising farmers or assisting public decision-making. They are generally based on several measures compounded into a single evaluation, using different rules to assemble the information. Here we discuss the different methods used to aggregate welfare measures and their applicability to certification schemes involving welfare. Data obtained on a farm can be (i) analysed by an expert who draws an overall conclusion; (ii) compared with minimal requirements set for each measure; (iii) converted into ranks, which are then summed; or (iv) converted into values or scores compounded in a weighted sum (e.g. TGI35L) or using ad hoc rules. Existing methods used at present (at least when used exclusively) may be insufficiently sensitive or not routinely applicable, or may not reflect the multidimensional nature of welfare and the relative importance of various welfare measures. It is concluded that different methods may be used at different stages of the construction of an overall assessment of animal welfare, depending on the constraints imposed on the aggregation proces

Genetic risk and a primary role for cell-mediated immune mechanisms in multiple sclerosis.

Multiple sclerosis is a common disease of the central nervous system in which the interplay between inflammatory and neurodegenerative processes typically results in intermittent neurological disturbance followed by progressive accumulation of disability. Epidemiological studies have shown that genetic factors are primarily responsible for the substantially increased frequency of the disease seen in the relatives of affected individuals, and systematic attempts to identify linkage in multiplex families have confirmed that variation within the major histocompatibility complex (MHC) exerts the greatest individual effect on risk. Modestly powered genome-wide association studies (GWAS) have enabled more than 20 additional risk loci to be identified and have shown that multiple variants exerting modest individual effects have a key role in disease susceptibility. Most of the genetic architecture underlying susceptibility to the disease remains to be defined and is anticipated to require the analysis of sample sizes that are beyond the numbers currently available to individual research groups. In a collaborative GWAS involving 9,772 cases of European descent collected by 23 research groups working in 15 different countries, we have replicated almost all of the previously suggested associations and identified at least a further 29 novel susceptibility loci. Within the MHC we have refined the identity of the HLA-DRB1 risk alleles and confirmed that variation in the HLA-A gene underlies the independent protective effect attributable to the class I region. Immunologically relevant genes are significantly overrepresented among those mapping close to the identified loci and particularly implicate T-helper-cell differentiation in the pathogenesis of multiple sclerosis