Osteocyte isolation and culture methods.

The aim of this paper is to present several popular methods for in vitro culture of osteocytes and osteocyte cell lines. Osteocytes are located extremely suitably within the calcified bone matrix to sense mechanical signals, and are equipped with a multitude of molecular features that allow mechanosensing. However, osteocytes are more than specialized mechanosensing cells. Several signaling molecules are preferentially produced by osteocytes, and osteocytes hold a tight reign over osteoblast and osteoclast formation and activity, but also have a role as endocrine cell, communicating with muscles or organs as remote as the kidneys. In order to facilitate further research into this fascinating cell type, three protocols will be provided in this paper. The first protocol will be on the culture of mouse (early) osteocyte cell lines, the second on the isolation and culture of primary mouse bone cells, and the third on the culture of fully embedded human osteocytes within their own three-dimensional bone matrix

Towards a lattice calculation of the coefficients of the QCD chiral Lagrangian

We discuss a general strategy to compute the coefficients of QCD chiral Lagrangian by using the lattice regularization of QCD with Wilson fermions. This procedure requires the introduction of an effective Lagrangian for lattice QCD as an intermediate step in the calculation. The continuum QCD chiral Lagrangian can be then obtained by expanding the lattice effective Lagrangian in increasing powers of the external momenta. A suitable renormalization procedure is required to account for the chiral symmetry breaking introduced by the Wilson term in the lattice action. In anticipation of a numerical simulation, the lattice effective Lagrangian is computed analytically and investigated in the strong coupling and large $N$ limitComment: Talk presented at LATTICE96(chirality in qcd) , 3 pages, no figures. Latex file with espcrc2 styl

The relative importance of electron-electron interactions compared to disorder in the two-dimensional "metallic" state

The effect of substrate bias and surface gate voltage on the low temperature resistivity of a Si-MOSFET is studied for electron concentrations where the resistivity increases with increasing temperature. This technique offers two degrees of freedom for controlling the electron concentration and the device mobility, thereby providing a means to evaluate the relative importance of electron-electron interactions and disorder in this so-called ``metallic'' regime. For temperatures well below the Fermi temperature, the data obey a scaling law where the disorder parameter ($k_{\rm{F}}l$), and not the concentration, appears explicitly. This suggests that interactions, although present, do not alter the Fermi-liquid properties of the system fundamentally. Furthermore, this experimental observation is reproduced in results of calculations based on temperature-dependent screening, in the context of Drude-Boltzmann theory.Comment: 5 pages, 6 figure

Temperature dependent resistivity of spin-split subbands in GaAs 2D hole system

We calculate the temperature dependent resistivity in spin-split subbands induced by the inversion asymmetry of the confining potential in GaAs 2D hole systems. By considering both temperature dependent multisubband screening of impurity disorder and hole-hole scattering we find that the strength of the metallic behavior depends on the symmetry of the confining potential (i.e., spin-splitting) over a large range of hole density. At low density above the metal-insulator transition we find that effective disorder reduces the enhancement of the metallic behavior induced by spin-splitting. Our theory is in good qualitative agreement with existing experiments

The Stern-Gerlach Experiment Revisited

The Stern-Gerlach-Experiment (SGE) of 1922 is a seminal benchmark experiment of quantum physics providing evidence for several fundamental properties of quantum systems. Based on today's knowledge we illustrate the different benchmark results of the SGE for the development of modern quantum physics and chemistry. The SGE provided the first direct experimental evidence for angular momentum quantization in the quantum world and thus also for the existence of directional quantization of all angular momenta in the process of measurement. It measured for the first time a ground state property of an atom, it produced for the first time a `spin-polarized' atomic beam, it almost revealed the electron spin. The SGE was the first fully successful molecular beam experiment with high momentum-resolution by beam measurements in vacuum. This technique provided a new kinematic microscope with which inner atomic or nuclear properties could be investigated. The original SGE is described together with early attempts by Einstein, Ehrenfest, Heisenberg, and others to understand directional quantization in the SGE. Heisenberg's and Einstein's proposals of an improved multi-stage SGE are presented. The first realization of these proposals by Stern, Phipps, Frisch and Segr\`e is described. The set-up suggested by Einstein can be considered an anticipation of a Rabi-apparatus. Recent theoretical work is mentioned in which the directional quantization process and possible interference effects of the two different spin states are investigated. In full agreement with the results of the new quantum theory directional quantization appears as a general and universal feature of quantum measurements. One experimental example for such directional quantization in scattering processes is shown. Last not least, the early history of the `almost' discovery of the electron spin in the SGE is revisited.Comment: 50pp, 17 fig

A tachyonic scalar field with mutually interacting components

We investigate the tachyonic cosmological potential $V(\phi)$ in two different cases of the quasi-exponential expansion of universe and discuss various forms of interaction between the two components---matter and the cosmological constant--- of the tachyonic scalar field, which leads to the viable solutions of their respective energy densities. The distinction among the interaction forms is shown to appear in the $O_{m}(x)$ diagnostic. Further, the role of the high- and low-redshift observations of the Hubble parameter is discussed to determine the proportionality constants and hence the correct form of matter--cosmological constant interaction.Comment: 14 page

Bias-voltage induced phase-transition in bilayer quantum Hall ferromagnets

We consider bilayer quantum Hall systems at total filling factor $\nu=1$ in presence of a bias voltage $\Delta_v$ which leads to different filling factors in each layer. We use auxiliary field functional integral approach to study mean-field solutions and collective excitations around them. We find that at large layer separation, the collective excitations soften at a finite wave vector leading to the collapse of quasiparticle gap. Our calculations predict that as the bias voltage is increased, bilayer systems undergo a phase transition from a compressible state to a $\nu=1$ phase-coherent state {\it with charge imbalance}. We present simple analytical expressions for bias-dependent renormalized charge imbalance and pseudospin stiffness which are sensitive to the softening of collective modes.Comment: 12 pages, 5 figures. Minor changes, one reference adde

Rms-flux relation of Cyg X-1 with RXTE: dipping and nondipping cases

The rms (root mean square) variability is the parameter for understanding the emission temporal properties of X-ray binaries (XRBs) and active galactic nuclei (AGN). The rms-flux relation with Rossi X-ray Timing Explorer (RXTE) data for the dips and nondip of black hole Cyg X-1 has been investigated in this paper. Our results show that there exist the linear rms-flux relations in the frequency range 0.1-10 Hz for the dipping light curve. Moreover, this linear relation still remains during the nondip regime, but with the steeper slope than that of the dipping case in the low energy band. For the high energy band, the slopes of the dipping and nondipping cases are hardly constant within errors. The explanations of the results have been made by means of the ``Propagating Perturbation'' model of Lyubarskii (1997).Comment: 15 pages, 12 figures, Accepted for publication in Astrophysics & Space Scienc