Heavy fermions and two loop electroweak corrections to b→s+γb\rightarrow s+\gamma

Applying effective Lagrangian method and on-shell scheme, we analyze the electroweak corrections to the rare decay $b\rightarrow s+\gamma$ from some special two loop diagrams in which a closed heavy fermion loop is attached to the virtual charged gauge bosons or Higgs. At the decoupling limit where the virtual fermions in inner loop are much heavier than the electroweak scale, we verify the final results satisfying the decoupling theorem explicitly when the interactions among Higgs and heavy fermions do not contain the nondecoupling couplings. Adopting the universal assumptions on the relevant couplings and mass spectrum of new physics, we find that the relative corrections from those two loop diagrams to the SM theoretical prediction on the branching ratio of $B\rightarrow X_{_s}\gamma$ can reach 5% as the energy scale of new physics $\Lambda_{_{\rm NP}}=200$ GeV.Comment: 30 pages,4 figure

Intelligent management of on-street parking provision for the autonomous vehicles era

The increasing degree of connectivity between vehicles and infrastructure, and the impending deployment of autonomous vehicles (AV) in urban streets, presents unique opportunities and challenges regarding the on-street parking provision for AVs. This study develops a novel simulation-optimisation approach for intelligent curbside management, based on a metaheuristic technique. The hybrid method balances curb lanes for driving or parking, aiming to minimise the average traffic delay. The model is tested using an idealised grid layout with a range of flow rates and parking policies. Results demonstrate delay decreased by 9%-27% from the benchmark case. Additionally, the traffic delay distribution shows the trade-offs between expanding road capacity and minimising traffic demand through curb management, indicating the interplay between curb parking and traffic management in the AV era

Sample size calculations for cluster randomised controlled trials with a fixed number of clusters

Background\ud Cluster randomised controlled trials (CRCTs) are frequently used in health service evaluation. Assuming an average cluster size, required sample sizes are readily computed for both binary and continuous outcomes, by estimating a design effect or inflation factor. However, where the number of clusters are fixed in advance, but where it is possible to increase the number of individuals within each cluster, as is frequently the case in health service evaluation, sample size formulae have been less well studied. \ud \ud Methods\ud We systematically outline sample size formulae (including required number of randomisation units, detectable difference and power) for CRCTs with a fixed number of clusters, to provide a concise summary for both binary and continuous outcomes. Extensions to the case of unequal cluster sizes are provided. \ud \ud Results\ud For trials with a fixed number of equal sized clusters (k), the trial will be feasible provided the number of clusters is greater than the product of the number of individuals required under individual randomisation ($n_i$) and the estimated intra-cluster correlation ($\rho$). So, a simple rule is that the number of clusters ($\kappa$) will be sufficient provided: \ud \ud $\kappa$ > $n_i$ x $\rho$\ud \ud Where this is not the case, investigators can determine the maximum available power to detect the pre-specified difference, or the minimum detectable difference under the pre-specified value for power. \ud \ud Conclusions\ud Designing a CRCT with a fixed number of clusters might mean that the study will not be feasible, leading to the notion of a minimum detectable difference (or a maximum achievable power), irrespective of how many individuals are included within each cluster. \ud \u

Emotion-corpus guided lexicons for sentiment analysis on Twitter.

Research in Psychology have proposed frameworks that map emotion concepts with sentiment concepts. In this paper we study this mapping from a computational modelling perspective with a view to establish the role of an emotion-rich corpus for lexicon-based sentiment analysis. We propose two different methods which harness an emotion-labelled corpus of tweets to learn world-level numerical quantification of sentiment strengths over a positive to negative spectrum. The proposed methods model the emotion corpus using a generative unigram mixture model (UMM), combined with the emotion-sentiment mapping proposed in Psychology [6] for automated generation of sentiment lexicons. Sentiment analsysis experiments on benchmark Twitter data sets confirm the equality of our proposed lexicons. Further a comparative analysis with standard sentiment lexicons suggest that the proposed lexicons lead to a significantly better performance in both sentimentclassification and sentiment intensity prediction tasks

The economic burden of influenza-associated outpatient visits and hospitalizations in China: a retrospective survey

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Analysis of Score-Level Fusion Rules for Deepfake Detection

Deepfake detection is of fundamental importance to preserve the reliability of multimedia communications. Modern deepfake detection systems are often specialized on one or more types of manipulation but are not able to generalize. On the other hand, when properly designed, ensemble learning and fusion techniques can reduce this issue. In this paper, we exploit the complementarity of different individual classifiers and evaluate which fusion rules are best suited to increase the generalization capacity of modern deepfake detection systems. We also give some insights to designers for selecting the most appropriate approach

Asymmetric Origin for Gravitino Relic Density in the Hybrid Gravity-Gauge Mediated Supersymmetry Breaking

We propose the hybrid gravity-gauge mediated supersymmetry breaking where the gravitino mass is about several GeV. The strong constraints on supersymmetry viable parameter space from the CMS and ATLAS experiments at the LHC can be relaxed due to the heavy colored supersymmetric particles, and it is consistent with null results in the dark matter (DM) direct search experiments such as XENON100. In particular, the possible maximal flavor and CP violations from the relatively small gravity mediation may naturally account for the recent LHCb anomaly. In addition, because the gravitino mass is around the asymmetric DM mass, we propose the asymmetric origin of the gravitino relic density and solve the cosmological coincident problem on the DM and baryon densities \Omega_{\rm DM}:\Omega_{B}\approx 5:1. The gravitino relic density arises from asymmetric metastable particle (AMP) late decay. However, we show that there is no AMP candidate in the minimal supersymmetric Standard Model (SM) due to the robust gaugino/Higgsino mediated wash-out effects. Interestingly, AMP can be realized in the well motivated supersymmetric SMs with vector-like particles or continuous U(1)_R symmetry. Especially, the lightest CP-even Higgs boson mass can be lifted in the supersymmetric SMs with vector-like particles.Comment: RevTex4, 21 pages, 1 figure, minor corrections, JHEP versio

Gene variant effects across sodium channelopathies predict function and guide precision therapy

Pathogenic variants in the voltage-gated sodium channel gene family (SCNs) lead to early onset epilepsies, neurodevelopmental disorders, skeletal muscle channelopathies, peripheral neuropathies and cardiac arrhythmias. Disease-associated variants have diverse functional effects ranging from complete loss-of-function to marked gain-of-function. Therapeutic strategy is likely to depend on functional effect. Experimental studies offer important insights into channel function, but are resource intensive and only performed in a minority of cases. Given the evolutionarily conserved nature of the sodium channel genes we investigated whether similarities in biophysical properties between different voltage-gated sodium channels can predict function and inform precision treatment across sodium channelopathies. We performed a systematic literature search identifying functionally assessed variants in any of the nine voltage-gated sodium channel genes until 28 April 2021. We included missense variants that had been electrophysiologically characterised in mammalian cells in whole-cell patch-clamp recordings. We performed an alignment of linear protein sequences of all sodium channel genes and correlated variants by their overall functional effect on biophysical properties. Of 951 identified records, 437 sodium channel-variants met our inclusion criteria and were reviewed for functional properties. Of these, 141 variants were epilepsy-associated (SCN1/2/3/8A), 79 had a neuromuscular phenotype (SCN4/9/10/11A), 149 were associated with a cardiac phenotype (SCN5/10A) and 68 (16%) were considered benign. We detected 38 missense variant pairs with an identical disease-associated variant in a different sodium channel gene. 35 out of 38 of those pairs resulted in similar functional consequences indicating up to 92% biophysical agreement between corresponding sodium channel variants (odds ratio = 11.3; 95% CI = 2.8 to 66.9; P < 0.001). Pathogenic missense variants were clustered in specific functional domains, whereas population variants were significantly more frequent across non conserved domains (odds ratio = 18.6; 95% CI = 10.9 to 34.4; P < 0.001). Pore-loop regions were frequently associated with loss-of-function (LoF) variants, whereas inactivation sites were associated with gain-of-function (GoF; odds ratio = 42.1, 95% CI = 14.5 to 122.4; P < 0.001), whilst variants occurring in voltage-sensing regions comprised a range of gain- and loss-of-function effects. Our findings suggest that biophysical characterisation of variants in one SCN-gene can predict channel function across different SCN-genes where experimental data are not available. The collected data represent the first GoF versus LoF topological map of SCN proteins indicating shared patterns of biophysical effects aiding variant analysis and guiding precision therapy. We integrated our findings into a free online webtool to facilitate functional sodium channel gene variant interpretation (http://SCN-viewer.broadinstitute.org)

The Maximal U(1)LU(1)_L Inverse Seesaw from d=5d=5 Operator and Oscillating Asymmetric Sneutrino Dark Matter

The maximal $U(1)_L$ supersymmetric inverse seesaw mechanism (M$L$SIS) provides a natural way to relate asymmetric dark matter (ADM) with neutrino physics. In this paper we point out that, M$L$SIS is a natural outcome if one dynamically realizes the inverse seesaw mechanism in the next-to minimal supersymmetric standard model (NMSSM) via the dimension-five operator $(N)^2S^2/M_*$, with $S$ the NMSSM singlet developing TeV scale VEV; it slightly violates lepton number due to the suppression by the fundamental scale $M_*$, thus preserving $U(1)_L$ maximally. The resulting sneutrino is a distinguishable ADM candidate, oscillating and favored to have weak scale mass. A fairly large annihilating cross section of such a heavy ADM is available due to the presence of singlet.Comment: journal versio

Meteor-ablated Aluminum in the Mesosphere-Lower Thermosphere

The first global atmospheric model (WACCM-Al) of meteor-ablated aluminum was constructed from three components: The Whole Atmospheric Community Climate Model (WACCM6); a meteoric input function for Al derived by coupling an astronomical model of dust sources in the solar system with a chemical meteoric ablation model; and a comprehensive set of neutral, ion-molecule and photochemical reactions relevant to the chemistry of Al in the upper atmosphere. The reaction kinetics of two important reactions that control the rate at which Al+ ions are neutralized were first studied using a fast flow tube with pulsed laser ablation of an Al target, yielding k(AlO+ + CO) = (3.7 ± 1.1) × 10−10 and k(AlO+ + O) = (1.7 ± 0.7) × 10−10 cm3 molecule−1 s−1 at 294 K. The first attempt to observe AlO by lidar was made by probing the bandhead of the B2Σ+(v′ = 0) ← X2Σ+(v″ = 0) transition at λair = 484.23 nm. An upper limit for AlO of 60 cm−3 was determined, which is consistent with a night-time concentration of ∼5 cm−3 estimated from the decay of AlO following rocket-borne grenade releases. WACCM-Al predicts the following: AlO, AlOH and Al+ are the three major species above 80 km; the AlO layer at mid-latitudes peaks at 89 km with a half-width of ∼5 km, and a peak density which increases from a night-time minimum of ∼10 cm−3 to a daytime maximum of ∼60 cm−3; and that the best opportunity for observing AlO is at high latitudes during equinoctial twilight