Characterisation of a Thin Fully-Depleted SOI Pixel Sensor with Soft X-ray Radiation

This paper presents the results of the characterisation of a back-illuminated pixel sensor manufactured in Silicon-On-Insulator technology on a high-resistivity substrate with soft X-rays. The sensor is thinned and a thin Phosphor layer contact is implanted on the back-plane. The response to X-rays from 2.12 up to 8.6 keV is evaluated with fluorescence radiation at the LBNL Advanced Light Source.Comment: 9 pages, 5 figures, submitted to Nuclear Instruments and Methods

Assessing dysphagia via telerehabilitation: patient perceptions and satisfaction

To gain insight into factors which may infl uence future acceptance of dysphagia management via telerehabilitation, patients’ perceptions were examined before and after a telerehabilitation assessment session. Forty adult patients with dysphagia(M = 66 years, SD = 16.25) completed pre- and post-session questionnaires which consisted of 14 matched questions worded to suit pre- and post-conditions. Questions explored comfort with the use of telerehabilitation, satisfaction with audio and video quality, benefi ts of telerehabilitation assessments and patients’ preferred assessment modality. Questions were rated on a 5-point scale (1 = strongly disagree, 3 = unsure, 5 = strongly agree). Patients’ comfort with assessment via telerehabilitation was high in over 80% of the group both pre- and post-assessment. Pre-assessment, patients were unsure what to expect with the auditory and visual aspects of the videoconference, however there were signifi cant positive changes reported post-experience. In relation to perceived benefits of telerehabilitation services in general, most patients believed in the value of telerehabilitation and post-assessment this increased to 90 – 100% agreement. Although 92% felt they would be comfortable receiving services via telerehabilitation, 45% of patients indicated ultimate preference for a traditional faceto-face assessment. The data highlight that patients are interested in and willing to receive services via telerehabilitation; however, any concerns should be addressed pre-assessment

Process-evaluation of tropospheric humidity simulated by general circulation models using water vapor isotopic observations: 2. Using isotopic diagnostics to understand the mid and upper tropospheric moist bias in the tropics and subtropics

Evaluating the representation of processes controlling tropical and subtropical tropospheric relative humidity (RH) in atmospheric general circulation models (GCMs) is crucial to assess the credibility of predicted climate changes. GCMs have long exhibited a moist bias in the tropical and subtropical mid and upper troposphere, which could be due to the mis-representation of cloud processes or of the large-scale circulation, or to excessive diffusion during water vapor transport. The goal of this study is to use observations of the water vapor isotopic ratio to understand the cause of this bias. We compare the three-dimensional distribution of the water vapor isotopic ratio measured from space and ground to that simulated by several versions of the isotopic GCM LMDZ. We show that the combined evaluation of RH and of the water vapor isotopic composition makes it possible to discriminate the most likely cause of RH biases. Models characterized either by an excessive vertical diffusion, an excessive convective detrainment or an underestimated in situ cloud condensation will all produce a moist bias in the free troposphere. However, only an excessive vertical diffusion can lead to a reversed seasonality of the free tropospheric isotopic composition in the subtropics compared to observations. Comparing seven isotopic GCMs suggests that the moist bias found in many GCMs in the mid and upper troposphere most frequently results from an excessive diffusion during vertical water vapor transport. This study demonstrates the added value of water vapor isotopic measurements for interpreting shortcomings in the simulation of RH by climate models

Multiple novel prostate cancer susceptibility signals identified by fine-mapping of known risk loci among Europeans

Genome-wide association studies (GWAS) have identified numerous common prostate cancer (PrCa) susceptibility loci. We have fine-mapped 64 GWAS regions known at the conclusion of the iCOGS study using large-scale genotyping and imputation in 25 723 PrCa cases and 26 274 controls of European ancestry. We detected evidence for multiple independent signals at 16 regions, 12 of which contained additional newly identified significant associations. A single signal comprising a spectrum of correlated variation was observed at 39 regions; 35 of which are now described by a novel more significantly associated lead SNP, while the originally reported variant remained as the lead SNP only in 4 regions. We also confirmed two association signals in Europeans that had been previously reported only in East-Asian GWAS. Based on statistical evidence and linkage disequilibrium (LD) structure, we have curated and narrowed down the list of the most likely candidate causal variants for each region. Functional annotation using data from ENCODE filtered for PrCa cell lines and eQTL analysis demonstrated significant enrichment for overlap with bio-features within this set. By incorporating the novel risk variants identified here alongside the refined data for existing association signals, we estimate that these loci now explain ∼38.9% of the familial relative risk of PrCa, an 8.9% improvement over the previously reported GWAS tag SNPs. This suggests that a significant fraction of the heritability of PrCa may have been hidden during the discovery phase of GWAS, in particular due to the presence of multiple independent signals within the same regio

Effect of Surface Polarity on Gallium Adsorption on 6H-SiC(0001) Surfaces : An STM Study(STM-other surfaces)

We have performed the first STM study of gallium adsorption on both the Si and C terminated 6H-SiC(0001) surfaces. The development of surface structures was followed as a function Ga coverage. On both the Si-terminated √ x √ and C-terminated 2√ x 2√ surfaces, coverages of less than 1/2 ML resulted in a disordered phase. Increasing the coverage to greater than 1/2, but less than 1 ML produced ordered phases. On the Si-terminated side this consisted of parallel rows of Ga atoms arranged in three different domains, oriented at angles of 120 degrees with respect to each other. Thus the surface symmetry was reduced from three-fold to two-fold. On the C-terminated side, it consisted of interlocking rings of 12 atoms, which appear alternately bright and dark in the STM image. Thus the original threefold symmetry of the SiC surface was preserved. On both surfaces, full monolayer coverage led to the formation of the (1x1)Ga structure

Efficient synthesis of (E)-tributyl- and triphenyl(5-alkyl-5-hydroxybut-2-enyl)stannanes

Trialkyl and triaryl 5-alkyl-5-hydroxybut-2-enylstannanes (3) may be prepared by SH2' reaction of the corresponding stannanes with 2-tolylsulfonylbut-3-enols