Study of strange quark density fluctuations in Au+Au Collisions at sNN\sqrt{s_{NN}} = 7.7-200 GeV from AMPT Model

The strangeness production is an important observable to study the QCD phase diagram. The yield ratios of strange quark can be helpful to search for the QCD critical point and/or first order phase transition. In this work, we studied the production of $K^{\pm}$, $\Xi^-(\bar{\Xi}^{+})$, $\phi$ and $\Lambda (\bar \Lambda)$ in Au+Au collisions at $\sqrt{s_{NN}}$ = 7.7, 11.5, 14.5, 19.6, 27, 39, 54.4, 62.4 and 200 GeV from A Multi-Phase Transport model with string melting version (AMPT-SM). We calculated the invariant yield of these strange hadrons using a different set of parameters reported in earlier studies and also by varying the hadronic cascade time ($t_{max}$) in the AMPT-SM model. We also calculated the yield ratios, $\mathcal{O}_{K^{\pm}-\Xi^{-}(\bar \Xi^{+})-\phi-\Lambda (\bar \Lambda)}$ which are sensitive to the strange quark density fluctuations and found that the AMPT-SM model fails to describe the non-monotonic trend observed by the STAR experiment. The negative particle ratio are found to be higher than the ratio of positive particles which is consistent with the experimental data. A significant effect is also seen on these ratios by varying the $t_{max}$. This study based on the transport model can be helpful to provide possible constraints as well as reference for the search of CEP in future heavy-ion experiments. Our findings suggest that the ongoing Beam Energy Scan program at RHIC and the future heavy-ion experiments will be able to find/locate the possible CEP in the QCD phase diagram which results large quark density fluctuations.Comment: 7 pages, 2 figure

Cognitive and physical impairment and the risk of stroke - A prospective cohort study

The manifestation of cognitive and physical impairment in stroke patients before the acute event suggests accumulating subclinical vascular pathology in the brain. We investigated whether impairments in cognitive and physical functioning were associated with an increased stroke risk. Between 2002 and 2008, 8,519 stroke-free non-demented participants from the population-based Rotterdam Study underwent cognition and physical assessments including Mini-Mental State Examination, 15-word learning test, Stroop test, letter-digit substitution test, verbal fluency test, Purdue pegboard test and questionnaires on basic and instrumental activities of daily living (BADL; IADL). Principal component analysis was used to derive global cognition (G-factor). Incident stroke was assessed through continuous monitoring of medical records until 2016. Among 8,519 persons (mean age 66.0 years; 57.8% wome

Detection of Four Novel Polymorphisms in PrP gene of Pakistani sheep (Damani and Hashtnagri) and goats (Kamori and Local Hairy) breeds

Scrapie is a fatal neurodegenerative disorder of sheep and goats caused by post-translational conformational change in the host-encoded prion protein (PrPC). Susceptibility or resistance to scrapie has been associated with the presence of polymorphisms in the prion protein (PrP) gene. In the present study, we analyzed the PrP gene sequence to determine the frequency of polymorphisms in 56 sheep (28 each from Damani and Hashtnagri breeds) and 56 goats (28 each from Kamori and Local Hairy breeds). A total of 7 amino acid polymorphisms were detected in the PrP gene for sheep and 4 for goats. These amino acid polymorphisms were combined in 13 alleles and 15 genotypes in sheep and 5 alleles and 6 genotypes in goats. The overall frequency of the most sheep scrapie-resistant polymorphism (Q171R) was calculated to be 0.107. The most scrapie-susceptible polymorphism (A136V) was not detected in any of the studied sheep. The overall frequency of scrapie-associated polymorphism (H143R) in goats was found to be 0.152. Along with already known amino acid polymorphisms, two novel polymorphisms were also detected for each of sheep (Q171N and T191I) and goats (G22C and P63L). However, the overall frequency of these polymorphisms was extremely low

The retinal microcirculation in migraine: The Rotterdam Study

Background: To explore the role of microvascular pathology in migraine, we investigated the association between migraine and retinal microvascular damage. Methods: We included 3270 participants (age ≥ 45 years, 63% women) from the population-based Rotterdam Study (2006–2009). Participants with migraine were identified using a validated questionnaire based on ICHD-II criteria (n = 562). Retinopathy signs were graded on fundus photographs. Retinal arteriolar and venular caliber were measured by semi-automatic assessment of fundus photographs. Associations of migraine with retinopathy and retinal microvascular calibers were examined using logistic and linear regression models, respectively, adjusting for age, sex, and cardiovascular risk factors. Results: Migraine was not associated with the presence of retinopathy (odds ratio (OR): 1.09, 95% confidence interval (CI) 0.62; 1.92). In the fully adjusted model, adjusting for the companion vessel, persons with migraine did not differ in retina

Effect of hadronic cascade time on freeze-out properties of Identified Hadrons in Au+Au Collisions at sNN\sqrt{s_{NN}} = 7.7-39 GeV from AMPT Model

We report the transverse momentum $p_T$ spectra of identified hadrons ($\pi^\pm$, $K^\pm$ and $p(\bar p)$) in Au+Au collisions at $\sqrt{s_{NN}}$ = 7.7 - 39 GeV from A Multi Phase Transport Model with string melting effect (AMPT-SM). During this study, a new set of parameters are explored to study the effect of hadronic cascade by varying hadronic cascade time $t_{max}$ = 30 $f$m/$c$ and 0.4 $f$m/$c$. No significant effect of this change is observed in the $p_T$ spectra of light hadrons and the AMPT-SM model reasonably reproduces the experimental data. To investigate the kinetic freeze-out properties the blast wave fit is performed to the $p_T$ spectra and it is found that the blast wave model describes the AMPT-SM simulations well. We additionally observe that the kinetic freeze-out temperature ($T_{kin}$) increases from central to peripheral collisions, which is consistent with the argument of short-lived fireball in peripheral collisions. Whereas the transverse flow velocity, shows a decreasing trend from central to peripheral collisions indicating a more rapid expansion in the central collisions. Both, $T_{kin}$ and show a weak dependence on the collision energy at most energies. We also observe a strong anti-correlation between $T_{kin}$ and $$. The extracted freeze-out parameters from the AMPT-SM simulations agree with the experimental data as opposed to earlier studies that reported some discrepancies. Whereas, no significant effect is found on the freeze-out parameters by varying the $t_{max}$. We also report the $p_T$ spectra of light hadrons and their freeze-out parameters by AMPT-SM simulations at $\sqrt{s_{NN}}$ = 14.5 GeV, where no experimental data is available for comparison. Overall, the set of parameters used in this study well describes the experimental data at BES energies.Comment: 12 pages, 7 figures, 2 table

Study of Baryon number transport using model simulations in pppp collisions at LHC Energies

We report on the excitation function of anti-baryon to baryon ratios ($\overline{p}/p$, {\alam /\lam} and {\axi / \xim}) in $pp$ collisions at {\sqrts} = 0.9, 2.76, 7 TeV from DPMJET-III, Pythia~8, EPOS~1.99, and EPOS-LHC model simulations. To study the predictions of these models at {\sqrts} = 13.6 TeV. The anti-baryon to baryon ratios are extremely important for the study of baryon number transport mechanisms. These ratios help determine the carriers of the baryon number and in the extraction of baryon structure information. Even though all models show a good agreement between model simulations and data, the ratios extracted from DPMJET-III model closely describes data at all energies. It is observed that these ratios converge to unity for various model predictions. This convergence also indicates that the anti-baryon to baryon ratios follow the mass hierarchy, such that the hyperon specie containing more strange quarks ({\alam /\lam} and {\axi / \xim}) approaches unity faster than specie containing fewer strange quarks ($\overline{p}/p$). It is also observed that the $\overline{B}/B$ ratio approaches unity more rapidly with the increase in {\sqrts} energy. At lower energies we observe an excess production of baryons over anti-baryons. However, this effect vanishes at higher energies due to the baryon-anti-baryon pair production and the baryon-anti-baryon yield becomes equal. Using model simulations, we additionally compute the asymmetry, (A\equiv\frac{N_{p}-N_{\bar{p}}}N_{p}+N_{\bar{p}}}) for protons. The asymmetry shows a decreasing trend with increase in energy from 0.9 to 7 TeV for all energies. This asymmetry trend is confirmed by model predictions at {\sqrts} = 13.6 TeV which will help to put possible constraints on model calculations at {\sqrts} = 13.6 TeV once the Run-III data for LHC becomes available.Comment: 14 pages, 8 figures, 2 table

Unspecified Strokes: Time Trends, Determinants, and Long-Term Prognosis in the General Population

Introduction: In the absence of neuroimaging, a stroke is typically labelled as unspecified. While the majority of clinic-based stroke research focuses on hemorrhagic or ischemic stroke, in the general population, a substantial proportion of strokes remains unspecified. Objective: To investigate time trends in the occurrence and determinants of unspecified strokes and differences in patient characteristics and survival compared to ischemic or hemorrhagic stroke. Methods: We included 1,546 participants from the population-based Rotterdam Study who suffered a first-ever stroke during follow-up (1990-2016). We calculated the proportion of unspecified strokes per year and compared their characteristics between 3 time periods (1990-1999, 2000-2009, and 2010-2016) using a chi-square test, and furthermore investigated differences between unspecified, ischemic, and hemorrhagic stroke in patient characteristics and survival using age- and sex-adjusted survival curves. Results: The occurrence of unspecified stroke among all strokes decreased from 75% in 1990 to 16% in 2016. Compared to the first time period (1991-1999), diagnosis of unspecified strokes was more often done by nursing home physicians (13 vs. 40%) and unspecified stroke patients had more often dementia (30 vs. 43%) in the last time period (2010-2016). Compared to patients with ischemic or hemorrhagic stroke, patients with unspecified stroke were on average older (84.3 vs. 78.5 years) and had more often physical impairments and dementia. Furthermore, patients with unspecified stroke had a lower survival probability up to 10 years after stroke than those with ischemic stroke. Conclusions: The proportion of unspecified strokes decreased drastically from 75 to 16% in the last decades. Patients who do not undergo neuroimaging and therefore are classified as unspecified stroke represent an older, more frail patient group that suffers more often from multimorbidities and poor long-term prognosis than those who do undergo neuroimaging and are thus classified as ischemic or hemorrhagic stroke

Multilayer perceptron neural network-based QoS-aware, content-aware and device-aware QoE prediction model : a proposed prediction model for medical ultrasound streaming over small cell networks

This paper presents a QoS-aware, content-aware and device-aware non-intrusive medical QoE (m-QoE) prediction model over small cell networks. The proposed prediction model utilises a Multilayer Perceptron (MLP) neural network to predict m-QoE. It also acts as a platform to maintain and optimise the acceptable diagnostic quality through a device-aware adaptive video streaming mechanism. The proposed model is trained for an unseen dataset of input variables such as QoS, content features, and display device characteristics, to produce an output value in the form of m-QoE (i.e. MOS). The efficiency of the proposed model is validated through subjective tests carried by medical experts. The prediction accuracy obtained via the correlation coefficient and Root Mean-Square-Error (RMSE) indicates that the proposed model succeeds in measuring m-QoE closer to the visual perception of the medical experts. Furthermore, we have addressed the following two main research questions: (1) How significant is ultrasound video content type in determining m-QoE? and (2) How much of a role does the screen size and device resolution play in medical experts’ diagnostic experience? The former is answered through the content classification of ultrasound video sequences based on their spatio-temporal features, by including these features in the proposed prediction model, and validating their significance through medical experts’ subjective ratings. The latter is answered by conducting a novel subjective experiment of the ultrasound video sequences across multiple devices

Intracranial arteriosclerosis and the risk of dementia:A population-based cohort study

BACKGROUNDThe impact of intracranial arteriosclerosis on dementia remains largely unclear.METHODSIn 2339 stroke-free and dementia-free participants (52.2% women, mean age 69.5 years) from the general population, we assessed intracranial carotid artery calcification (ICAC) and vertebrobasilar artery calcification (VBAC) as proxy for arteriosclerosis. Associations with dementia were assessed using Cox models. In addition, indirect effects through cerebral small vessel disease (cSVD) and subcortical brain structure volumes were assessed using causal mediation analyses.RESULTSDuring a median of 13.4 years (25th–75th percentiles 9.9–14.5) of follow-up, 282 participants developed dementia. Both ICAC presence (hazard ratio [HR]: 1.53, 95% confidence interval [CI]: 1.00–2.32]) and volume (HR per standard deviation: 1.19, 95% CI: 1.01–1.40) increased dementia risk. For VBAC, severe calcifications increased dementia risk (HR for third vs first volume tertile: 1.89, 95% CI: 1.00–3.59). These effects were mediated partly through increased cSVD (percentage mediated for ICAC: 13% and VBAC: 24%).DISCUSSIONIntracranial arteriosclerosis increases the risk of dementia