Period Integrals of CY and General Type Complete Intersections

We develop a global Poincar\'e residue formula to study period integrals of families of complex manifolds. For any compact complex manifold $X$ equipped with a linear system $V^*$ of generically smooth CY hypersurfaces, the formula expresses period integrals in terms of a canonical global meromorphic top form on $X$. Two important ingredients of our construction are the notion of a CY principal bundle, and a classification of such rank one bundles. We also generalize our construction to CY and general type complete intersections. When $X$ is an algebraic manifold having a sufficiently large automorphism group $G$ and $V^*$ is a linear representation of $G$, we construct a holonomic D-module that governs the period integrals. The construction is based in part on the theory of tautological systems we have developed in the paper \cite{LSY1}, joint with R. Song. The approach allows us to explicitly describe a Picard-Fuchs type system for complete intersection varieties of general types, as well as CY, in any Fano variety, and in a homogeneous space in particular. In addition, the approach provides a new perspective of old examples such as CY complete intersections in a toric variety or partial flag variety.Comment: An erratum is included to correct Theorem 3.12 (Uniqueness of CY structure

Trust as a mediator in the relationship between childhood sexual abuse and IL-6 level in adulthood

Childhood sexual abuse (CSA) has been shown to predict the coupling of depression and inflammation in adulthood. Trust within intimate relationships, a core element in marital relations, has been shown to predict positive physical and mental health outcomes, but the mediating role of trust in partners in the association between CSA and inflammation in adulthood requires further study. The present study aimed to examine the impact of CSA on inflammatory biomarkers (IL-6 and IL-1β) in adults with depression and the mediating role of trust. A cross-sectional survey data set of adults presenting with mood and sleep disturbance was used in the analysis. CSA demonstrated a significant negative correlation with IL-6 level (r = -0.28, p<0. 01) in adults with clinically significant depression, while trust showed a significant positive correlation with IL-6 level (r = 0.36, p < .01). Sobel test and bootstrapping revealed a significant mediating role for trust between CSA and IL-6 level. CSA and trust in partners were revealed to have significant associations with IL-6 level in adulthood. Counterintuitively, the directions of association were not those expected. Trust played a mediating role between CSA and adulthood levels of IL-6. Plausible explanations for these counterintuitive findings are discussed

Local Heterotic Torsional Models

We present a class of smooth supersymmetric heterotic solutions with a non-compact Eguchi-Hanson space. The non-compact geometry is embedded as the base of a six-dimensional non-Kahler manifold with a non-trivial torus fiber. We solve the non-linear anomaly equation in this background exactly. We also define a new charge that detects the non-Kahlerity of our solutions.Comment: 24 pages, harvmac; v2: published version, reference adde

Nanoantennas for visible and infrared radiation

Nanoantennas for visible and infrared radiation can strongly enhance the interaction of light with nanoscale matter by their ability to efficiently link propagating and spatially localized optical fields. This ability unlocks an enormous potential for applications ranging from nanoscale optical microscopy and spectroscopy over solar energy conversion, integrated optical nanocircuitry, opto-electronics and density-ofstates engineering to ultra-sensing as well as enhancement of optical nonlinearities. Here we review the current understanding of optical antennas based on the background of both well-developed radiowave antenna engineering and the emerging field of plasmonics. In particular, we address the plasmonic behavior that emerges due to the very high optical frequencies involved and the limitations in the choice of antenna materials and geometrical parameters imposed by nanofabrication. Finally, we give a brief account of the current status of the field and the major established and emerging lines of investigation in this vivid area of research.Comment: Review article with 76 pages, 21 figure

Phase-field modeling of microstructural pattern formation during directional solidification of peritectic alloys without morphological instability

During the directional solidification of peritectic alloys, two stable solid phases (parent and peritectic) grow competitively into a metastable liquid phase of larger impurity content than either solid phase. When the parent or both solid phases are morphologically unstable, i.e., for a small temperature gradient/growth rate ratio ($G/v_p$), one solid phase usually outgrows and covers the other phase, leading to a cellular-dendritic array structure closely analogous to the one formed during monophase solidification of a dilute binary alloy. In contrast, when $G/v_p$ is large enough for both phases to be morphologically stable, the formation of the microstructurebecomes controlled by a subtle interplay between the nucleation and growth of the two solid phases. The structures that have been observed in this regime (in small samples where convection effect are suppressed) include alternate layers (bands) of the parent and peritectic phases perpendicular to the growth direction, which are formed by alternate nucleation and lateral spreading of one phase onto the other as proposed in a recent model [R. Trivedi, Metall. Mater. Trans. A 26, 1 (1995)], as well as partially filled bands (islands), where the peritectic phase does not fully cover the parent phase which grows continuously. We develop a phase-field model of peritectic solidification that incorporates nucleation processes in order to explore the formation of these structures. Simulations of this model shed light on the morphology transition from islands to bands, the dynamics of spreading of the peritectic phase on the parent phase following nucleation, which turns out to be characterized by a remarkably constant acceleration, and the types of growth morphology that one might expect to observe in large samples under purely diffusive growth conditions.Comment: Final version, minor revisions, 16 pages, 14 EPS figures, RevTe

Obstructions to the Existence of Sasaki-Einstein Metrics

We describe two simple obstructions to the existence of Ricci-flat Kahler cone metrics on isolated Gorenstein singularities or, equivalently, to the existence of Sasaki-Einstein metrics on the links of these singularities. In particular, this also leads to new obstructions for Kahler-Einstein metrics on Fano orbifolds. We present several families of hypersurface singularities that are obstructed, including 3-fold and 4-fold singularities of ADE type that have been studied previously in the physics literature. We show that the AdS/CFT dual of one obstruction is that the R-charge of a gauge invariant chiral primary operator violates the unitarity bound.Comment: 35 pages, 1 figure; references and a footnote adde

Magnetism, Critical Fluctuations and Susceptibility Renormalization in Pd

Some of the most popular ways to treat quantum critical materials, that is, materials close to a magnetic instability, are based on the Landau functional. The central quantity of such approaches is the average magnitude of spin fluctuations, which is very difficult to measure experimentally or compute directly from the first principles. We calculate the parameters of the Landau functional for Pd and use these to connect the critical fluctuations beyond the local-density approximation and the band structure.Comment: Replaced with the revised version accepted for publication. References updated, errors corrected, other change

An Integrated TCGA Pan-Cancer Clinical Data Resource to Drive High-Quality Survival Outcome Analytics

For a decade, The Cancer Genome Atlas (TCGA) program collected clinicopathologic annotation data along with multi-platform molecular profiles of more than 11,000 human tumors across 33 different cancer types. TCGA clinical data contain key features representing the democratized nature of the data collection process. To ensure proper use of this large clinical dataset associated with genomic features, we developed a standardized dataset named the TCGA Pan-Cancer Clinical Data Resource (TCGA-CDR), which includes four major clinical outcome endpoints. In addition to detailing major challenges and statistical limitations encountered during the effort of integrating the acquired clinical data, we present a summary that includes endpoint usage recommendations for each cancer type. These TCGA-CDR findings appear to be consistent with cancer genomics studies independent of the TCGA effort and provide opportunities for investigating cancer biology using clinical correlates at an unprecedented scale. Analysis of clinicopathologic annotations for over 11,000 cancer patients in the TCGA program leads to the generation of TCGA Clinical Data Resource, which provides recommendations of clinical outcome endpoint usage for 33 cancer types

Mapping gene associations in human mitochondria using clinical disease phenotypes

Nuclear genes encode most mitochondrial proteins, and their mutations cause diverse and debilitating clinical disorders. To date, 1,200 of these mitochondrial genes have been recorded, while no standardized catalog exists of the associated clinical phenotypes. Such a catalog would be useful to develop methods to analyze human phenotypic data, to determine genotype-phenotype relations among many genes and diseases, and to support the clinical diagnosis of mitochondrial disorders. Here we establish a clinical phenotype catalog of 174 mitochondrial disease genes and study associations of diseases and genes. Phenotypic features such as clinical signs and symptoms were manually annotated from full-text medical articles and classified based on the hierarchical MeSH ontology. This classification of phenotypic features of each gene allowed for the comparison of diseases between different genes. In turn, we were then able to measure the phenotypic associations of disease genes for which we calculated a quantitative value that is based on their shared phenotypic features. The results showed that genes sharing more similar phenotypes have a stronger tendency for functional interactions, proving the usefulness of phenotype similarity values in disease gene network analysis. We then constructed a functional network of mitochondrial genes and discovered a higher connectivity for non-disease than for disease genes, and a tendency of disease genes to interact with each other. Utilizing these differences, we propose 168 candidate genes that resemble the characteristic interaction patterns of mitochondrial disease genes. Through their network associations, the candidates are further prioritized for the study of specific disorders such as optic neuropathies and Parkinson disease. Most mitochondrial disease phenotypes involve several clinical categories including neurologic, metabolic, and gastrointestinal disorders, which might indicate the effects of gene defects within the mitochondrial system. The accompanying knowledgebase (http://www.mitophenome.org/) supports the study of clinical diseases and associated genes