728 research outputs found
Coulomb screening in mesoscopic noise: a kinetic approach
Coulomb screening, together with degeneracy, is characteristic of the
metallic electron gas. While there is little trace of its effects in transport
and noise in the bulk, at mesoscopic scales the electronic fluctuations start
to show appreciable Coulomb correlations. Within a strictly standard Boltzmann
and Fermi-liquid framework, we analyze these phenomena and their relation to
the mesoscopic fluctuation-dissipation theorem, which we prove. We identify two
distinct screening mechanisms for mesoscopic fluctuations. One is the
self-consistent response of the contact potential in a non-uniform system. The
other couples to scattering, and is an exclusively non-equilibrium process.
Contact-potential effects renormalize all thermal fluctuations, at all scales.
Collisional effects are relatively short-ranged and modify non-equilibrium
noise. We discuss ways to detect these differences experimentally.Comment: Source: REVTEX. 16 pp.; 7 Postscript figs. Accepted for publication
in J. Phys.: Cond. Ma
Indications of Universal Excess Fluctuations in Nonequilibrium Systems
The fluctuation in electric current in nonequilibrium steady states is
investigated by molecular dynamics simulation of macroscopically uniform
conductors. At low frequencies, appropriate decomposition of the spectral
intensity of current into thermal and excess fluctuations provides a simple
picture of excess fluctuations behaving as shot noise. This indicates that the
fluctuation-dissipation relation may be violated in a universal manner by the
appearance of shot noise for a wide range of systems with particle or momentum
transport.Comment: 4 pages, 4 figures; title changed, major revision; to appear in J.
Phys. Soc. Jp
Diffusion of particles moving with constant speed
The propagation of light in a scattering medium is described as the motion of
a special kind of a Brownian particle on which the fluctuating forces act only
perpendicular to its velocity. This enforces strictly and dynamically the
constraint of constant speed of the photon in the medium. A Fokker-Planck
equation is derived for the probability distribution in the phase space
assuming the transverse fluctuating force to be a white noise. Analytic
expressions for the moments of the displacement along with an
approximate expression for the marginal probability distribution function
are obtained. Exact numerical solutions for the phase space
probability distribution for various geometries are presented. The results show
that the velocity distribution randomizes in a time of about eight times the
mean free time () only after which the diffusion approximation becomes
valid. This factor of eight is a well known experimental fact. A persistence
exponent of is calculated for this process in two dimensions
by studying the survival probability of the particle in a semi-infinite medium.
The case of a stochastic amplifying medium is also discussed.Comment: 9 pages, 9 figures(Submitted to Phys. Rev. E
High-field noise in metallic diffusive conductors
We analyze high-field current fluctuations in degenerate conductors by
mapping the electronic Fermi-liquid correlations at equilibrium to their
semiclassical non-equilibrium form. Our resulting Boltzmann description is
applicable to diffusive mesoscopic wires. We derive a non-equilibrium
connection between thermal fluctuations of the current and resistive
dissipation. In the weak-field limit this is the canonical fluctuation-
dissipation theorem. Away from equilibrium, the connection enables explicit
calculation of the excess ``hot-electron'' contribution to the thermal
spectrum. We show that excess thermal noise is strongly inhibited by Pauli
exclusion. This behaviour is generic to the semiclassical metallic regime.Comment: 13 pp, one fig. Companion paper to cond-mat/9911251. Final version,
to appear in J. Phys.: Cond. Ma
When the heart kills the liver: acute liver failure in congestive heart failure
Congestive heart failure as a cause of acute liver failure is rarely documented with only a few cases
Boundary conditions in the Unruh problem
We have analyzed the Unruh problem in the frame of quantum field theory and
have shown that the Unruh quantization scheme is valid in the double Rindler
wedge rather than in Minkowski spacetime. The double Rindler wedge is composed
of two disjoint regions (- and -wedges of Minkowski spacetime) which are
causally separated from each other. Moreover the Unruh construction implies
existence of boundary condition at the common edge of - and -wedges in
Minkowski spacetime. Such boundary condition may be interpreted as a
topological obstacle which gives rise to a superselection rule prohibiting any
correlations between - and - Unruh particles. Thus the part of the field
from the -wedge in no way can influence a Rindler observer living in the
-wedge and therefore elimination of the invisible "left" degrees of freedom
will take no effect for him. Hence averaging over states of the field in one
wedge can not lead to thermalization of the state in the other. This result is
proved both in the standard and algebraic formulations of quantum field theory
and we conclude that principles of quantum field theory does not give any
grounds for existence of the "Unruh effect".Comment: 31 pages,1 figur
G-protein inwardly rectifying potassium channel 1 (GIRK 1) gene expression correlates with tumor progression in non-small cell lung cancer
BACKGROUND: G-protein inwardly rectifying potassium channel 1 (GIRK1) is thought to play a role in cell proliferation in cancer, and GIRK1 gene expression level may define a more aggressive phenotype. We detected GIRK1 expression in tissue specimens from patients with non-small cell lung cancers (NSCLCs) and assessed their clinical characteristics. METHODS: Using reverse transcription-polymerase chain reaction (RT-PCR) analyses, we quantified the expression of GIRK1 in 72 patients with NSCLCs to investigate the relationship between GIRK1 expression and clinicopathologic factors and prognosis. RESULTS: In 72 NSCLC patients, 50 (69%) samples were evaluated as having high GIRK1 gene expression, and 22 (31%) were evaluated as having low GIRK1 gene expression. GIRK1 gene expression was significantly associated with lymph node metastasis, stage (p = 0.0194 for lymph node metastasis; p = 0.0207 for stage). The overall and stage I survival rates for patients with high GIRK1 gene expressed tumors was significantly worse than for those individuals whose tumors had low GIRK1 expression (p = 0.0004 for the overall group; p = 0.0376 for stage I). CONCLUSIONS: These data indicate that GIRK1 may contribute to tumor progression and GIRK1 gene expression can serve as a useful prognostic marker in the overall and stage I NSCLCs
Common Variants in a Novel Gene, FONG on Chromosome 2q33.1 Confer Risk of Osteoporosis in Japanese
Osteoporosis is a common disease characterized by low bone mass, decreased bone quality and increased predisposition to fracture. Genetic factors have been implicated in its etiology; however, the specific genes related to susceptibility to osteoporosis are not entirely known. To detect susceptibility genes for osteoporosis, we conducted a genome-wide association study in Japanese using ∼270,000 SNPs in 1,747 subjects (190 cases and 1,557 controls) followed by multiple levels of replication of the association using a total of ∼5,000 subjects (2,092 cases and 3,114 controls). Through these staged association studies followed by resequencing and linkage disequilibrium mapping, we identified a single nucleotide polymorphism (SNP), rs7605378 associated with osteoporosis. (combined P = 1.51×10−8, odds ratio = 1.25). This SNP is in a previously unknown gene on chromosome 2q33.1, FONG. FONG is predicted to encode a 147 amino-acid protein with a formiminotransferase domain in its N-terminal (FTCD_N domain) and is ubiquitously expressed in various tissues including bone. Our findings would give a new insight into osteoporosis etiology and pathogenesis
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