1,987 research outputs found
Anogenital distance in human male and female newborns: a descriptive, cross-sectional study
BACKGROUND: In animal studies of the effects of hormonally active agents, measurement of anogenital distance (AGD) is now routine, and serves as a bioassay of fetal androgen action. Although measurement of AGD in humans has been discussed in the literature, to our knowledge it has been measured formally in only two descriptive studies of females. Because AGD has been an easy-to-measure, sensitive outcome in animals studies, we developed and implemented an anthropometric protocol for measurement of AGD in human males as well as females. METHODS: We first evaluated the reliability of the AGD measures in 20 subjects. Then measurements were taken on an additional 87 newborns (42 females, 45 males). All subjects were from Morelos, Mexico. RESULTS: The reliability (Pearson r) of the AGD measure was, for females 0.50, and for males, 0.64. The between-subject variation in AGD, however, was much greater than the variation due to measurement error. The AGD measure was about two-fold greater in males (mean, 22 mm) than in females (mean, 11 mm), and there was little overlap in the distributions for males and females. CONCLUSION: The sexual dimorphism of AGD in humans comprises prima facie evidence that this outcome may respond to in utero exposure to hormonally active agents
Measurement of the cosmic ray spectrum above eV using inclined events detected with the Pierre Auger Observatory
A measurement of the cosmic-ray spectrum for energies exceeding
eV is presented, which is based on the analysis of showers
with zenith angles greater than detected with the Pierre Auger
Observatory between 1 January 2004 and 31 December 2013. The measured spectrum
confirms a flux suppression at the highest energies. Above
eV, the "ankle", the flux can be described by a power law with
index followed by
a smooth suppression region. For the energy () at which the
spectral flux has fallen to one-half of its extrapolated value in the absence
of suppression, we find
eV.Comment: Replaced with published version. Added journal reference and DO
Energy Estimation of Cosmic Rays with the Engineering Radio Array of the Pierre Auger Observatory
The Auger Engineering Radio Array (AERA) is part of the Pierre Auger
Observatory and is used to detect the radio emission of cosmic-ray air showers.
These observations are compared to the data of the surface detector stations of
the Observatory, which provide well-calibrated information on the cosmic-ray
energies and arrival directions. The response of the radio stations in the 30
to 80 MHz regime has been thoroughly calibrated to enable the reconstruction of
the incoming electric field. For the latter, the energy deposit per area is
determined from the radio pulses at each observer position and is interpolated
using a two-dimensional function that takes into account signal asymmetries due
to interference between the geomagnetic and charge-excess emission components.
The spatial integral over the signal distribution gives a direct measurement of
the energy transferred from the primary cosmic ray into radio emission in the
AERA frequency range. We measure 15.8 MeV of radiation energy for a 1 EeV air
shower arriving perpendicularly to the geomagnetic field. This radiation energy
-- corrected for geometrical effects -- is used as a cosmic-ray energy
estimator. Performing an absolute energy calibration against the
surface-detector information, we observe that this radio-energy estimator
scales quadratically with the cosmic-ray energy as expected for coherent
emission. We find an energy resolution of the radio reconstruction of 22% for
the data set and 17% for a high-quality subset containing only events with at
least five radio stations with signal.Comment: Replaced with published version. Added journal reference and DO
Measurement of the Radiation Energy in the Radio Signal of Extensive Air Showers as a Universal Estimator of Cosmic-Ray Energy
We measure the energy emitted by extensive air showers in the form of radio
emission in the frequency range from 30 to 80 MHz. Exploiting the accurate
energy scale of the Pierre Auger Observatory, we obtain a radiation energy of
15.8 \pm 0.7 (stat) \pm 6.7 (sys) MeV for cosmic rays with an energy of 1 EeV
arriving perpendicularly to a geomagnetic field of 0.24 G, scaling
quadratically with the cosmic-ray energy. A comparison with predictions from
state-of-the-art first-principle calculations shows agreement with our
measurement. The radiation energy provides direct access to the calorimetric
energy in the electromagnetic cascade of extensive air showers. Comparison with
our result thus allows the direct calibration of any cosmic-ray radio detector
against the well-established energy scale of the Pierre Auger Observatory.Comment: Replaced with published version. Added journal reference and DOI.
Supplemental material in the ancillary file
Descriptive epidemiology of somatising tendency: findings from the CUPID study.
Somatising tendency, defined as a predisposition to worry about common somatic symptoms, is importantly associated with various aspects of health and health-related behaviour, including musculoskeletal pain and associated disability. To explore its epidemiological characteristics, and how it can be specified most efficiently, we analysed data from an international longitudinal study. A baseline questionnaire, which included questions from the Brief Symptom Inventory about seven common symptoms, was completed by 12,072 participants aged 20-59 from 46 occupational groups in 18 countries (response rate 70%). The seven symptoms were all mutually associated (odds ratios for pairwise associations 3.4 to 9.3), and each contributed to a measure of somatising tendency that exhibited an exposure-response relationship both with multi-site pain (prevalence rate ratios up to six), and also with sickness absence for non-musculoskeletal reasons. In most participants, the level of somatising tendency was little changed when reassessed after a mean interval of 14 months (75% having a change of 0 or 1 in their symptom count), although the specific symptoms reported at follow-up often differed from those at baseline. Somatising tendency was more common in women than men, especially at older ages, and varied markedly across the 46 occupational groups studied, with higher rates in South and Central America. It was weakly associated with smoking, but not with level of education. Our study supports the use of questions from the Brief Symptom Inventory as a method for measuring somatising tendency, and suggests that in adults of working age, it is a fairly stable trait
A Contribution of the HAWC Observatory to the TeV era in the High Energy Gamma-Ray Astrophysics: The case of the TeV-Halos
We present a short overview of the TeV-Halos objects as a discovery and a
relevant contribution of the High Altitude Water \v{C}erenkov (HAWC)
observatory to TeV astrophysics. We discuss history, discovery, knowledge, and
the next step through a new and more detailed analysis than the original study
in 2017. TeV-Halos will contribute to resolving the problem of the local
positron excess observed on the Earth. To clarify the latter, understanding the
diffusion process is mandatory.Comment: Work presented in the 21st International Symposium on Very High
Energy Cosmic Ray Interactions(ISVHECRI 2022) as part of the Ph. D. Thesis of
Ramiro Torres-Escobedo (SJTU, Shanghai, China). Accepted for publication in
SciPost Physics Proceedings (ISSN 2666-4003). 11 pages, 3 Figures. Short
overview of HAWC and TeV Halos objects until 202
The 13th Data Release of the Sloan Digital Sky Survey: First Spectroscopic Data from the SDSS-IV Survey Mapping Nearby Galaxies at Apache Point Observatory
The fourth generation of the Sloan Digital Sky Survey (SDSS-IV) began observations in July 2014. It pursues three core programs: APOGEE-2,MaNGA, and eBOSS. In addition, eBOSS contains two major subprograms: TDSS and SPIDERS. This paper describes the first data release from SDSS-IV, Data Release 13 (DR13), which contains new data, reanalysis of existing data sets and, like all SDSS data releases, is inclusive of previously released data. DR13 makes publicly available 1390 spatially resolved integral field unit observations of nearby galaxies from MaNGA,the first data released from this survey. It includes new observations from eBOSS, completing SEQUELS. In addition to targeting galaxies and quasars, SEQUELS also targeted variability-selected objects from TDSS and X-ray selected objects from SPIDERS. DR13 includes new reductions ofthe SDSS-III BOSS data, improving the spectrophotometric calibration and redshift classification. DR13 releases new reductions of the APOGEE-1data from SDSS-III, with abundances of elements not previously included and improved stellar parameters for dwarf stars and cooler stars. For the SDSS imaging data, DR13 provides new, more robust and precise photometric calibrations. Several value-added catalogs are being released in tandem with DR13, in particular target catalogs relevant for eBOSS, TDSS, and SPIDERS, and an updated red-clump catalog for APOGEE.This paper describes the location and format of the data now publicly available, as well as providing references to the important technical papers that describe the targeting, observing, and data reduction. The SDSS website, http://www.sdss.org, provides links to the data, tutorials and examples of data access, and extensive documentation of the reduction and analysis procedures. DR13 is the first of a scheduled set that will contain new data and analyses from the planned ~6-year operations of SDSS-IV.PostprintPeer reviewe
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