4,671 research outputs found
Does the NJL chiral phase transition affect the elliptic flow of a fluid at fixed ?
We have derived and solved numerically the Boltzmann-Vlasov transport
equations that includes both two-body collisions and the chiral phase
transition by mean of NJL-field dynamics. The scope is to understand if the
field dynamics supply new genuine effects on the build-up of the elliptic flow
, a measure of the asymmetry in the momentum space, and in particular if
it can affect the relation between and the shear viscosity to entropy
ratio . Solving the transport equation with a constant cross section
for the condition of collisions at AGeV it is shown
a sizable suppression of due to the attractive nature of the field
dynamics that generates the constituent mass. However the key result is that if
of the system is kept fixed by an appropriate local renormalization of
the cross section the does not depend on the details of the collisional
and/or field dynamics and in particular it is not affected significantly by the
chiral phase transition.Comment: 5 pages, 5 figure
Imbalance of p75(NTR)/TrkB protein expression in Huntington's disease: Implication for neuroprotective therapies
Neuroprotective therapies based on brain-derived neurotrophic factor (BDNF) administration have been proposed for Huntington's disease (HD) treatment. However, our group has recently reported reduced levels of TrkB in HD mouse models and HD human brain suggesting that besides a decrease on BDNF levels a reduction of TrkB expression could also contribute to diminished neurotrophic support in HD. BDNF can also bind to p75 neurotrophin receptor (p75(NTR)) modulating TrkB signaling. Therefore, in this study we have analyzed the levels of p75(NTR) in several HD models, as well as in HD human brain. Our data demonstrates a p75(NTR)/TrkB imbalance in the striatum of two different HD mouse models, Hdh(Q111/111) homozygous knockin mice and R6/1 mice that was also manifested in the putamen of HD patients. The imbalance between TrkB and p75(NTR) levels in a HD cellular model did not affect BDNF-mediated TrkB activation of prosurvival pathways but induced activation of apoptotic cascades as demonstrated by increased JNK phosphorylation. Moreover, BDNF failed to protect mutant huntingtin striatal cells transfected with p75(NTR) against NMDA-mediated excitotoxicity, which was associated with decreased Akt phosphorylation. Interestingly, lack of Akt activation following BDNF and NMDA treatment correlated with increased PP1 levels. Accordingly, pharmacological inhibition of PP1 by okadaic acid (OA) prevented mutant huntingtin striatal cell death induced by NMDA and BDNF. Altogether, our findings demonstrate that the p75(NTR)/TrkB imbalance induced by mutant huntingtin in striatal cells associated with the aberrant activity of PP1 disturbs BDNF neuroprotection likely contributing to increasing striatal vulnerability in HD. On the basis of this data we hypothesize that normalization of p75(NTR) and/or TrkB expression or their signaling will improve BDNF neuroprotective therapies in HD. Cell Death and Disease (2013) 4, e595; doi:10.1038/cddis.2013.116; published online 18 April 201
Collective Flows in a Transport Approach
We introduce a transport approach at fixed shear viscosity to entropy ratio
\etas to study the generation of collective flows in ultra-relativistic
heavy-ion collisions. Transport theory supplies a covariant approach valid also
at large \etas and at intermediate transverse momentum , where
deviations from equilibrium is no longer negligible. Such an approach shows
that at RHIC energies a temperature dependent \etas enhances significantly
the respect to the case of constant \etas. Furthermore if NJL
chiral dynamics is self-consistently implemented we show that it does not
modify the relation between and \etas.Comment: 4 pages, 4 figures, Proceedings of Hot Quarks 2010, 21-26 June 2010
Las Londe Les Maures; to appear in Journal of Physics: Conference Serie
Asymmetry Effects on Nuclear Fragmentation
We show the possibility of extracting important information on the symmetry
term of the Equation of State () directly from multifragmentation
reactions using stable isotopes with different charge asymmetries. We study
n-rich and n-poor collisions at using a new stochastic
transport approach with all isospin effects suitably accounted for. For central
collisions a chemical component in the spinodal instabilities is clearly seen.
This effect is reduced in the neck fragmentation observed for semiperipheral
collisions, pointing to a different nature of the instability. In spite of the
low asymmetry tested with stable isotopes the results are showing an
interesting and promising dependence on the stiffness of the symmetry term,
with an indication towards an increase of the repulsion above normal density.Comment: 8 pages (Latex), 7 Postscript figures, CRIS2000 Conference,
Acicastello, Italy, May 22-26, (2000), Nucl. Phys. A (in press
Symmetry Energy Effects on the Mixed Hadron-Quark Phase at High Baryon Density
The phase transition of hadronic to quark matter at high baryon and isospin
density is analyzed. Relativistic mean field models are used to describe
hadronic matter, and the MIT bag model is adopted for quark matter. The
boundaries of the mixed phase and the related critical points for symmetric and
asymmetric matter are obtained. Due to the different symmetry term in the two
phases, isospin effects appear to be rather significant. With increasing
isospin asymmetry the binodal transition line of the (T,\rho_B) diagram is
lowered to a region accessible through heavy ion collisions in the energy range
of the new planned facilities, e.g. the FAIR/NICA projects. Some observable
effects are suggested, in particular an "Isospin Distillation" mechanism with a
more isospin asymmetric quark phase, to be seen in charged meson yield ratios,
and an onset of quark number scaling of the meson/baryon elliptic flows. The
presented isospin effects on the mixed phase appear to be robust with respect
to even large variations of the poorly known symmetry term at high baryon
density in the hadron phase. The dependence of the results on a suitable
treatment of isospin contributions in effective QCD Lagrangian approaches, at
the level of explicit isovector parts and/or quark condensates, is finally
discussed.Comment: 14 two column pages, 14 figures, new results with other hadron EoS.
Accepted for publication in Phys.Rev.
Hadron-quark phase transition in asymmetric matter with dynamical quark masses
The two-Equation of State (EoS) model is used to describe the hadron-quark
phase transition in asymmetric matter formed at high density in heavy-ion
collisions. For the quark phase, the three-flavor Nambu--Jona-Lasinio (NJL)
effective theory is used to investigate the influence of dynamical quark mass
effects on the phase transition. At variance to the MIT-Bag results, with fixed
current quark masses, the main important effect of the chiral dynamics is the
appearance of an End-Point for the coexistence zone. We show that a first order
hadron-quark phase transition may take place in the region T=(50-80)MeV and
\rho_B=(2-4)\rho_0, which is possible to be probed in the new planned
facilities, such as FAIR at GSI-Darmstadt and NICA at JINR-Dubna. From isospin
properties of the mixed phase somepossible signals are suggested. The
importance of chiral symmetry and dynamical quark mass on the hadron-quark
phase transition is stressed. The difficulty of an exact location of
Critical-End-Point comes from its appearance in a region of competition between
chiral symmetry breaking and confinement, where our knowledge of effective QCD
theories is still rather uncertain.Comment: 13 pages, 16 figures (revtex
Isospin Dynamics in Heavy Ion Collisions: from Coulomb Barrier to Quark Gluon Plasma
Heavy Ion Collisions (HIC) represent a unique tool to probe the in-medium
nuclear interaction in regions away from saturation. In this report we present
a selection of new reaction observables in dissipative collisions particularly
sensitive to the symmetry term of the nuclear Equation of State (Iso-EoS). We
will first discuss the Isospin Equilibration Dynamics. At low energies this
manifests via the recently observed Dynamical Dipole Radiation, due to a
collective neutron-proton oscillation with the symmetry term acting as a
restoring force. At higher beam energies Iso-EoS effects will be seen in
Imbalance Ratio Measurements, in particular from the correlations with the
total kinetic energy loss. For fragmentation reactions in central events we
suggest to look at the coupling between isospin distillation and radial flow.
In Neck Fragmentation reactions important information can be obtained
from the correlation between isospin content and alignement. The high density
symmetry term can be probed from isospin effects on heavy ion reactions at
relativistic energies (few AGeV range). Rather isospin sensitive observables
are proposed from nucleon/cluster emissions, collective flows and meson
production. The possibility to shed light on the controversial neutron/proton
effective mass splitting in asymmetric matter is also suggested. A large
symmetry repulsion at high baryon density will also lead to an "earlier"
hadron-deconfinement transition in n-rich matter. A suitable treatment of the
isovector interaction in the partonic EoS appears very relevant.Comment: 18 pages, 12 figures, lecture at the 2008 Erice School on Nuclear
Physics, to appear in Progress in Particle and Nuclear Physic
Phase transitions of hadronic to quark matter at finite T and \mu_B
The phase transition of hadronic to quark matter and the boundaries of the
mixed hadron-quark coexistence phase are studied within the two Equation of
State (EoS) model. The relativistic effective mean field approach with constant
and density dependent meson-nucleon couplings is used to describe hadronic
matter, and the MIT Bag model is adopted to describe quark matter. The
boundaries of the mixed phase for different Bag constants are obtained solving
the Gibbs equations.
We notice that the dependence on the Bag parameter of the critical
temperatures (at zero chemical potential) can be well reproduced by a fermion
ultrarelativistic quark gas model, without contribution from the hadron part.
At variance the critical chemical potentials (at zero temperature) are very
sensitive to the EoS of the hadron sector. Hence the study of the hadronic EoS
is much more relevant for the determination of the transition to the
quark-gluon-plasma at finite baryon density and low-T. Moreover in the low
temperature and finite chemical potential region no solutions of the Gibbs
conditions are existing for small Bag constant values, B < (135 MeV)^4. Isospin
effects in asymmetric matter appear relevant in the high chemical potential
regions at lower temperatures, of interest for the inner core properties of
neutron stars and for heavy ion collisions at intermediate energies.Comment: 24 pages and 16 figures (revtex4
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