Orbifold Duality Symmetries and Quantum Hall systems

We consider the possible role that chiral orbifold conformal field theories may play in describing the edge state theories of quantum Hall systems. This is a generalization of work that already exists in the literature, where it has been shown that 1+1 chiral bosons living on a n-dimensional torus, and which couple to a U_1 gauge field, give rise to anomalous electric currents, the anomaly being related to the Hall conductivity. The well known $O(n,n;Z)$ duality group associated with such toroidal conformal field theories transforms the edge states and Hall conductivities in a way which makes interesting connections between different theories, e.g. between systems exhibiting the integer and fractional quantum Hall effect. In this paper we try to explore the extension of these constructions to the case where such bosons live on a n-dimensional orbifold. We give a general formalism for discussing the relevant quantities like the Hall conductance and their transformation under the duality groups present in orbifold compactifications. We illustrate these ideas by presenting a detailed analysis of a toy model based on the two-dimensional Z_3 orbifold. In this model we obtain new classes of filling fractions, which generally the correspond to fermionic edge states carrying fractional electric charge. We also consider the relation between orbifold edge theories and Luttinger liquids (LL's), which in the past have provided important insights into the physics of quantum Hall systems.Comment: 35 pages, latex file. Factors corrected in some equations, typos corrected, references added. Also some clarifications of various points. Version to appear in Nuclear Physics

Cultural capital and smoking in young adults: applying new indicators to explore social inequalities in health behaviour

Background: Associations between social status and health behaviours are well documented, but the mechanisms involved are less understood. Cultural capital theory may contribute to a better understanding by expanding the scope of inequality indicators to include individuals' knowledge, skills, beliefs and material goods to examine how these indicators impact individuals' health lifestyles. We explore the structure and applicability of a set of cultural capital indicators in the empirical exploration of smoking behaviour among young male adults. Methods: We analysed data from the Swiss Federal Survey of Adolescents (CH-X) 2010-11 panel of young Swiss males (n = 10 736). A set of nine theoretically relevant variables (including incorporated, institutionalized and objectified cultural capital) were investigated using exploratory factor analysis. Regression models were run to observe the association between factor scores and smoking outcomes. Outcome measures consisted of daily smoking status and the number of cigarettes smoked by daily smokers. Results: Cultural capital indicators aggregated in a three-factor solution representing ‘health values', ‘education and knowledge' and ‘family resources'. Each factor score predicted the smoking outcomes. In young males, scoring low on health values, education and knowledge and family resources was associated with a higher risk of being a daily smoker and of smoking more cigarettes daily. Conclusion: Cultural capital measures that include, but go beyond, educational attainment can improve prediction models of smoking in young male adults. New measures of cultural capital may thus contribute to our understanding of the social status-based resources that individuals can use towards health behaviour

Social inequalities in health information seeking among young adults in Montreal

Over their lifecourse, young adults develop different skills and preferences in relationship to the information sources they seek when having questions about health. Health information seeking behaviour (HISB) includes multiple, unequally accessed sources; yet most studies have focused on single sources and did not examine HISB’s association with social inequalities. This study explores ‘multiple-source’ profiles and their association with socioeconomic characteristics. We analyzed cross-sectional data from the Interdisciplinary Study of Inequalities in Smoking involving 2093 young adults recruited in Montreal, Canada, in 2011–2012. We used latent class analysis to create profiles based on responses to questions regarding whether participants sought health professionals, family, friends or the Internet when having questions about health. Using multinomial logistic regression, we examined the associations between profiles and economic, social and cultural capital indicators: financial difficulties and transportation means, friend satisfaction and network size, and individual, mother’s, and father’s education. Five profiles were found: ‘all sources’ (42%), ‘health professional centred’ (29%), ‘family only’ (14%), ‘Internet centred’ (14%) and ‘no sources’ (2%). Participants with a larger social network and higher friend satisfaction were more likely to be in the ‘all sources’ group. Participants who experienced financial difficulties and completed college/university were less likely to be in the ‘family only’ group; those whose mother had completed college/university were more likely to be in this group. Our findings point to the importance of considering multiple sources to study HISB, especially when the capacity to seek multiple sources is unequally distributed. Scholars should acknowledge HISB’s implications for health inequalities

Identifying Gaps in Youth Employment Programs Capacity to Address Mental Health Needs

National Youth Employment Coalition (NYEC), in partnership with its member agencies, youth providers, academic institutions, and other partners, deployed a national survey in March 2022 to understand the readiness of youth programs across the US to respond to the youth mental health crisis; the processes and systems providers have in place to fight the crisis; and what supports they need to combat this ongoing, life-threatening challenge. This report identifies the many challenges practitioners face on micro and macro levels, insights into what young people are experiencing, and the types of interventions and support that are needed

Charge-transfer states in triazole linked donor-acceptor materials: Strong effects of chemical modification and solvation

© the Owner Societies 2017. A series of 1,2,3-triazole linked donor-acceptor chromophores are prepared by Click Chemistry from ene-yne starting materials. The effects of three distinct chemical variations are investigated: enhancing the acceptor strength through oxidation of the sulphur atom, alteration of the double bond configuration, and variation of the triazole substitution pattern. A detailed photophysical characterization shows that these alterations have a negligible effect on the absorption while dramatically altering the emission wavelengths. In addition, strong solvatochromism is found leading to significant red shifts in the case of polar solvents. The experimental findings are rationalized and related to the electronic structure properties of the chromophores by time-dependent density functional theory as well as the ab initio algebraic diagrammatic construction method for the polarization propagator in connection with a new formalism allowing to model the influence of solvation onto long-lived excited states and their emission energies. These calculations highlight the varying degree of intramolecular charge transfer character present for the different molecules and show that the amount of charge transfer is strongly modulated by the conducted chemical modifications, by the solvation of the chromophores, and by the structural relaxation in the excited state. It is, furthermore, shown that enhanced charge separation, as induced by chemical modification or solvation, reduces the singlet-triplet gaps and that two of the investigated molecules possess sufficiently low gaps to be considered as candidates for thermally activated delayed fluorescence

A proteomic analysis of an in vitro knock-out of miR-200c

Loss of miR-200c is correlated to advanced cancer-subtypes due to increased EMT and decreased treatment efficacy by chemotherapeutics. As miRNAs regulate a multitude of targets, the analysis of differentially expressed proteins upon a genomic knock-out (KO) is of interest. In this study, we generated a TALENs KO of miR-200c in MCF7 breast cancer cells, excluded its compensation by family-members and evaluated the impact on the proteome by analyzing three individual KO-clones. We identified 26 key proteins and a variety of enrichments in metabolic and cytoskeletal pathways. In six of these targets (AGR2, FLNA/B, ALDH7A1, SCIN, GSTM3) the differential expression was additionally detected at mRNA level. Together, these alterations in protein abundance accounted for the observed biological phenotypes, i.e. increased migration and chemoresistance and altered metabolism, found in the miR-200c-KO clones. These findings provide novel insights into miR-200c and pave the way for further studies

PREDICTORS OF HYPERTENSION

Peer Reviewedhttp://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/74570/1/j.1749-6632.1978.tb25565.x.pd