283 research outputs found

    Dynamics of railway freight vehicles

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    This paper summarises the historical development of railway freight vehicles and how vehicle designers have tackled the difficult challenges of producing running gear which can accommodate the very high tare to laden mass of typical freight wagons whilst maintaining stable running at the maximum required speed and good curving performance. The most common current freight bogies are described in detail and recent improvements in techniques used to simulate the dynamic behaviour of railway vehicles are summarised and examples of how these have been used to improve freight vehicle dynamic behaviour are included. A number of recent developments and innovative components and sub systems are outlined and finally two new developments are presented in more detail: the LEILA bogie and the SUSTRAIL bogie

    Acceleration-Enlarged Symmetries in Nonrelativistic Space-Time with a Cosmological Constant

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    By considering the nonrelativistic limit of de-Sitter geometry one obtains the nonrelativistic space-time with a cosmological constant and Newton-Hooke (NH) symmetries. We show that the NH symmetry algebra can be enlarged by the addition of the constant acceleration generators and endowed with central extensions (one in any dimension (D) and three in D=(2+1)). We present a classical Lagrangian and Hamiltonian framework for constructing models quasi-invariant under enlarged NH symmetries which depend on three parameters described by three nonvanishing central charges. The Hamiltonian dynamics then splits into external and internal sectors with new non-commutative structures of external and internal phase spaces. We show that in the limit of vanishing cosmological constant the system reduces to the one presented in [1] which possesses accelaration-enlarged Galilean symmetries.Comment: 13 pages; small changes like a couple of footnotes et

    Jacobson generators, Fock representations and statistics of sl(n+1)

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    The properties of A-statistics, related to the class of simple Lie algebras sl(n+1) (Palev, T.D.: Preprint JINR E17-10550 (1977); hep-th/9705032), are further investigated. The description of each sl(n+1) is carried out via generators and their relations, first introduced by Jacobson. The related Fock spaces W_p (p=1,2,...) are finite-dimensional irreducible sl(n+1)-modules. The Pauli principle of the underlying statistics is formulated. In addition the paper contains the following new results: (a) The A-statistics are interpreted as exclusion statistics; (b) Within each W_p operators B(p)_1^\pm, ..., B(p)_n^\pm, proportional to the Jacobson generators, are introduced. It is proved that in an appropriate topology the limit of B(p)_i^\pm for p going to infinity is equal to B_i^\pm, where B_i^\pm are Bose creation and annihilation operators; (c) It is shown that the local statistics of the degenerated hard-core Bose models and of the related Heisenberg spin models is p=1 A-statistics.Comment: LaTeX-file, 33 page

    DNA methylation-based profiling of bone and soft tissue tumours: a validation study of the 'DKFZ Sarcoma Classifier'

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    Diagnosing bone and soft tissue neoplasms remains challenging because of the large number of subtypes, many of which lack diagnostic biomarkers. DNA methylation profiles have proven to be a reliable basis for the classification of brain tumours and, following this success, a DNA methylation-based sarcoma classification tool from the Deutsches Krebsforschungszentrum (DKFZ) in Heidelberg has been developed. In this study, we assessed the performance of their classifier on DNA methylation profiles of an independent data set of 986 bone and soft tissue tumours and controls. We found that the 'DKFZ Sarcoma Classifier' was able to produce a diagnostic prediction for 55% of the 986 samples, with 83% of these predictions concordant with the histological diagnosis. On limiting the validation to the 820 cases with histological diagnoses for which the DKFZ Classifier was trained, 61% of cases received a prediction, and the histological diagnosis was concordant with the predicted methylation class in 88% of these cases, findings comparable to those reported in the DKFZ Classifier paper. The classifier performed best when diagnosing mesenchymal chondrosarcomas (CHSs, 88% sensitivity), chordomas (85% sensitivity), and fibrous dysplasia (83% sensitivity). Amongst the subtypes least often classified correctly were clear cell CHSs (14% sensitivity), malignant peripheral nerve sheath tumours (27% sensitivity), and pleomorphic liposarcomas (29% sensitivity). The classifier predictions resulted in revision of the histological diagnosis in six of our cases. We observed that, although a higher tumour purity resulted in a greater likelihood of a prediction being made, it did not correlate with classifier accuracy. Our results show that the DKFZ Classifier represents a powerful research tool for exploring the pathogenesis of sarcoma; with refinement, it has the potential to be a valuable diagnostic tool

    Role of Alpha-Synuclein Protein Levels in Mitochondrial Morphology and Cell Survival in Cell Lines

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    α-Synuclein is highly associated with some neurodegeneration and malignancies. Overexpressing wild-type or mutant α-synuclein promotes neuronal death by mitochondrial dysfunction, the underlying mechanisms of which remain poorly defined. It was recently reported that α-synuclein expression could directly lead to mitochondrial fragmentation in vitro and in vivo, which may be due to α-synuclein localization on mitochondria. Here, we applied a double staining method to demonstrate mitochondrial morphogenetic changes in cells overexpressed with α-synuclein. We show that mitochondrial localization of α-synuclein was increased following its overexpression in three distinct cell lines, including HeLa, SH-SY5Y, and PC12 cells, but no alteration in mitochondrial morphology was detected. However, α-synuclein knockdown prevents MPP+-induced mitochondrial fragmentation in SH-SY5Y and PC12 cells. These data suggest that α-synuclein protein levels hardly affect mitochondrial morphology in normal cell lines, but may have some influence on that under certain environmental conditions

    Influence of the Amazon River on the Nd isotope composition of deep water in the western equatorial Atlantic during the Oligocene–Miocene transition

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    Dissolved and particulate neodymium (Nd) are mainly supplied to the oceans via rivers, dust, and release from marine sediments along continental margins. This process, together with the short oceanic residence time of Nd, gives rise to pronounced spatial gradients in oceanic 143Nd/144Nd ratios (εNd). However, we do not yet have a good understanding of the extent to which the influence of riverine point-source Nd supply can be distinguished from changes in mixing between different water masses in the marine geological record. This gap in knowledge is important to fill because there is growing awareness that major global climate transitions may be associated not only with changes in large-scale ocean water mass mixing, but also with important changes in continental hydroclimate and weathering. Here we present εNd data for fossilised fish teeth, planktonic foraminifera, and the Fe–Mn oxyhydroxide and detrital fractions of sediments recovered from Ocean Drilling Project (ODP) Site 926 on Ceara Rise, situated approximately 800 km from the mouth of the River Amazon. Our records span the Mi-1 glaciation event during the Oligocene–Miocene transition (OMT; ∼23 Ma). We compare our εNd records with data for ambient deep Atlantic northern and southern component waters to assess the influence of particulate input from the Amazon River on Nd in ancient deep waters at this site. εNd values for all of our fish teeth, foraminifera, and Fe–Mn oxyhydroxide samples are extremely unradiogenic (εNd ≈ −15); much lower than the εNd for deep waters of modern or Oligocene–Miocene age from the North Atlantic (εNd ≈ −10) and South Atlantic (εNd ≈ −8). This finding suggests that partial dissolution of detrital particulate material from the Amazon (εNd ≈ −18) strongly influences the εNd values of deep waters at Ceara Rise across the OMT. We conclude that terrestrially derived inputs of Nd can affect εNd values of deep water many hundreds of kilometres from source. Our results both underscore the need for care in reconstructing changes in large-scale oceanic water-mass mixing using sites proximal to major rivers, and highlight the potential of these marine archives for tracing changes in continental hydroclimate and weathering
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