Multiquark Hadrons

A number of candidate multiquark hadrons, i.e., particle resonances with substructures that are more complex than the quark-antiquark mesons and three-quark baryons that are prescribed in the textbooks, have recently been observed. In this talk I present: some recent preliminary BESIII results on the near-threshold behavior of sigma(e+e- --> Lambda Lambda-bar) that may or may not be related to multiquark mesons in the light- and strange-quark sectors; results from Belle and LHCb on the electrically charged, charmoniumlike Z(4430)^+ --> pi^+ psi ' resonance that necessarily has a four-quark substructure; and the recent LHCb discovery of the P_c(4380) and P_c(4450) hidden-charm resonances seen as a complex structure in the J/psi p invariant mass distribution for Lambda_b --> K^-J/psi p decays and necessarily have a five-quark substructure and are, therefore, prominent candidates for pentaquark baryons.Comment: 12 pages, 9 figures, summary of a talk presented at the 12th Conference on Hypernuclear and Strange Particle Physics (HYP2015), September 7-12, 2015 Sendai, JAPAN. To appear in the JPS Conference proceeding

The Color-Octet intrinsic charm in η′\eta^\prime and B→η′XB\to \eta^\prime X decays

Color-octet mechanism for the decay B\to \eta^\prime X is proposed to explain the large branching ratio of Br(B\to \eta^\prime X)\sim 1\times 10^{-3} recently announced by CLEO. We argue that the inclusive \eta^\prime production in B decays may dominantly come from the Cabbibo favored b\to (\bar c c)_8s process where \bar c c pair is in a color-octet configuration, and followed by the nonperturbative transition (\bar c c)_8\to \eta^\prime X. The color-octet intrinsic charm component in the higher Fock states of \eta^\prime is crucial and is induced by the strong coupling of \eta^\prime to gluons via QCD axial anomaly.Comment: 9 pages, RevTex, 1 PS figur

Tacrolimus analysis: A comparison of different methods and matrices

We determined the trough blood and plasma concentrations of tacrolimus from the day of transplantation through 30 days posttransplantation in four liver and four kidney transplant patients by three different methods. The first method involved a solid phase extraction of the blood or plasma using Sep-Pak columns (SPs) followed by quantitation of tacrolimus using an enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay (ELISA); the second method involved a liquid-liquid extraction using methylene chloride (MC) followed by quantitation of tacrolimus using the ELISA, and the third method involved a high-performance liquid chromatography (HPLC) fractionation of the extract obtained from the solid-phase extraction and quantitation of tacrolimus in the fractions by ELISA. The trough plasma tacrolimus concentrations ranged from 0.1 to 5.2 ng/ml. While the trough plasma concentrations of tacrolimus were similar and independent of the method of analysis in kidney transplant patients and in liver transplant patients with normal biochemical profile, in patients with liver dysfunction, tacrolimus plasma concentrations were higher when measured by SP-ELISA and MC-ELISA methods as compared to the HPLC-ELISA method. In plasma samples obtained from liver transplant patients with liver dysfunction, the presence of some metabolites that cross-reacted with the antibody used in the ELISA could be documented in the HPLC fraction corresponding to the metabolites. This indicates that while tacrolimus metabolites that cross-react significantly with the antibody used in the ELISA do not accumulate in kidney transplant patients, they can appear in the plasma of patients with liver dysfunction. The trough blood tacrolimus concentrations in patients were significantly higher than the corresponding plasma concentrations and ranged from 1.4 to 107 ng/ml. The trough blood tacrolimus concentrations were similar and independent of the method of analysis in kidney and liver transplant patients, suggesting unchanged tacrolimus to be the major component in the blood. The HPLC fractions corresponding to the metabolites of tacrolimus did not contain any components that cross-reacted with the antibody used. This study documents that the methods used in this study for the analysis of blood concentrations of tacrolimus appear to be specific for the parent tacrolimus and can be used in future pharmacokinetic and clinical studies. © 1995 Raven Press, Ltd., New York

The meson BcB_c annihilation to leptons and inclusive light hadrons

The annihilation of the $B_c$ meson to leptons and inclusive light hadrons is analyzed in the framework of nonrelativistic QCD (NRQCD) factorization. We find that the decay mode, which escapes from the helicity suppression, contributes a sizable fraction width. According to the analysis, the branching ratio due to the contribution from the color-singlet component of the meson $B_c$ can be of order (10^{-2}). We also estimate the contributions from the color-octet components. With the velocity scaling rule of NRQCD, we find that the color-octet contributions are sizable too, especially, in certain phase space of the annihilation they are greater than (or comparative to) the color-singlet component. A few observables relevant to the spectrum of charged lepton are suggested, that may be used as measurements on the color-octet and color-singlet components in the future $B_c$ experiments. A typical long distance contribution in the annihilation is estimated too.Comment: 26 pages, 5 figures (6 eps-files), submitted to Phys. Rev.

Exploring the Atmosphere of Neoproterozoic Earth: The Effect of O2_{2} on Haze Formation and Composition

Previous studies of haze formation in the atmosphere of the Early Earth have focused on N$_{2}$/CO$_{2}$/CH$_{4}$ atmospheres. Here, we experimentally investigate the effect of O$_{2}$ on the formation and composition of aerosols to improve our understanding of haze formation on the Neoproterozoic Earth. We obtained in situ size, particle density, and composition measurements of aerosol particles produced from N$_{2}$/CO$_{2}$/CH$_{4}$/O$_{2}$ gas mixtures subjected to FUV radiation (115-400 nm) for a range of initial CO$_{2}$/CH$_{4}$/O$_{2}$ mixing ratios (O$_{2}$ ranging from 2 ppm to 0.2\%). At the lowest O$_{2}$ concentration (2 ppm), the addition increased particle production for all but one gas mixture. At higher oxygen concentrations (20 ppm and greater) particles are still produced, but the addition of O$_{2}$ decreases the production rate. Both the particle size and number density decrease with increasing O$_{2}$, indicating that O$_{2}$ affects particle nucleation and growth. The particle density increases with increasing O$_{2}$. The addition of CO$_{2}$ and O$_{2}$ not only increases the amount of oxygen in the aerosol, but it also increases the degree of nitrogen incorporation. In particular, the addition of O$_{2}$ results in the formation of nitrate bearing molecules. The fact that the presence of oxygen bearing molecules increases the efficiency of nitrogen fixation has implications for the role of haze as a source of molecules required for the origin and evolution of life. The composition changes also likely affect the absorption and scattering behavior of these particles but optical properties measurements are required to fully understand the implications for the effect on the planetary radiative energy balance and climate.Comment: 15 pages, 3 tables, 8 figures, accepted in Astrophysical Journa

Neutrino Masses and A TeV Scale Seesaw Mechanism

A simple extension of the Standard Model providing TeV scale seesaw mechanism is presented. Beside the Standard Model particles and right-handed Majorana neutrinos, the model contains a singly charged scalar, an extra Higgs doublet and three vector like singly charged fermions. In our model, Dirac neutrino mass matrix raises only at the loop level. Small but non-zero Majorana neutrino masses come from integrating out heavy Majorana neutrinos, which can be at the TeV scale. The phenomenologies of the model are investigated, including scalar mass spectrum, neutrino masses and mixings, lepton flavor violations, heavy neutrino magnetic moments as well as possible collider signatures of the model at the LHC.Comment: 13 pages, 4 figures. references adde

The Electric Dipole Moment and CP Violation in B→Xsl+l−B \to X_s l^+ l^- in SUGRA Models with Nonuniversal Gaugino Masses

The constraints of electric dipole moments (EDMs) of electron and neutron on the parameter space in supergravity (SUGRA) models with nonuniversal gaugino masses are analyzed. It is shown that with a light sparticle spectrum, the sufficient cancellations in the calculation of EDMs can happen for all phases being order of one in the small tan$\beta$ case and all phases but $\phi_{\mu}$ ($|\phi_{\mu}| <\sim \pi/6$) order of one in the large tan$\beta$ case. This is in contrast to the case of mSUGRA in which in the parameter space where cancellations among various SUSY contributions to EDMs happen $|\phi_{\mu}|$ must be less than $\pi/10$ for small $tan\beta$ and ${\cal{O}}(10^{-2})$ for large $tan\beta$. Direct CP asymmetries and the T-odd polarization of lepton in $B\to X_s l^+l^-$ are investigated in the models. In the large tan$\beta$ case, $A_{CP}^2$ and $P_N$ for l=$\mu$ ($\tau$) can be enhanced by about a factor of ten (ten) and ten (three) respectively compared to those of mSUGRA.Comment: 12 pages, latex, 4 figures, a few change

Structure Space of Model Proteins --A Principle Component Analysis

We study the space of all compact structures on a two-dimensional square lattice of size $N=6\times6$. Each structure is mapped onto a vector in $N$-dimensions according to a hydrophobic model. Previous work has shown that the designabilities of structures are closely related to the distribution of the structure vectors in the $N$-dimensional space, with highly designable structures predominantly found in low density regions. We use principal component analysis to probe and characterize the distribution of structure vectors, and find a non-uniform density with a single peak. Interestingly, the principal axes of this peak are almost aligned with Fourier eigenvectors, and the corresponding Fourier eigenvalues go to zero continuously at the wave-number for alternating patterns ($q=\pi$). These observations provide a stepping stone for an analytic description of the distribution of structural points, and open the possibility of estimating designabilities of realistic structures by simply Fourier transforming the hydrophobicities of the corresponding sequences.Comment: 14 pages, 12 figures, Conclusion has been modifie