315 research outputs found
SMW Wall for Seepage Control in Levee Reconstruction
An SMW wall was installed as a cutoff wall for seepage control during high floods in a narrow levee constructed in the early 1900\u27s using sandy soils. After part of the wall was installed, difficulties were encountered in evaluating the permeability of the as-built cutoff wall according to the project specifications. Methods used to evaluate the permeability of the cutoff wall included laboratory tests on bulk samples and core samples and in-situ permeability tests. Significant differences in test results were caused by various sample preparation and handling procedures, sampling disturbance, and different testing methods. The difficulties were resolved by performing a trial mix study and installing a full scale test section that resulted in changed installation, sampling, and testing procedures
Running coupling in Yang-Mills theory - a flow equation study -
The effective average action of Yang-Mills theory is analyzed in the
framework of exact renormalization group flow equations. Employing the
background-field method and using a cutoff that is adjusted to the spectral
flow, the running of the gauge coupling is obtained on all scales. In four
dimensions and for the gauge groups SU(2) and SU(3), the coupling approaches a
fixed point in the infrared.Comment: 35 pages, 3 figures, v2: References added, minor improvements,
version to appear in PR
Transport Properties of the Quark-Gluon Plasma -- A Lattice QCD Perspective
Transport properties of a thermal medium determine how its conserved charge
densities (for instance the electric charge, energy or momentum) evolve as a
function of time and eventually relax back to their equilibrium values. Here
the transport properties of the quark-gluon plasma are reviewed from a
theoretical perspective. The latter play a key role in the description of
heavy-ion collisions, and are an important ingredient in constraining particle
production processes in the early universe. We place particular emphasis on
lattice QCD calculations of conserved current correlators. These Euclidean
correlators are related by an integral transform to spectral functions, whose
small-frequency form determines the transport properties via Kubo formulae. The
universal hydrodynamic predictions for the small-frequency pole structure of
spectral functions are summarized. The viability of a quasiparticle description
implies the presence of additional characteristic features in the spectral
functions. These features are in stark contrast with the functional form that
is found in strongly coupled plasmas via the gauge/gravity duality. A central
goal is therefore to determine which of these dynamical regimes the quark-gluon
plasma is qualitatively closer to as a function of temperature. We review the
analysis of lattice correlators in relation to transport properties, and
tentatively estimate what computational effort is required to make decisive
progress in this field.Comment: 54 pages, 37 figures, review written for EPJA and APPN; one parag.
added end of section 3.4, and one at the end of section 3.2.2; some Refs.
added, and some other minor change
Theory of finite temperature crossovers near quantum critical points close to, or above, their upper-critical dimension
A systematic method for the computation of finite temperature () crossover
functions near quantum critical points close to, or above, their upper-critical
dimension is devised. We describe the physics of the various regions in the
and critical tuning parameter () plane. The quantum critical point is at
, , and in many cases there is a line of finite temperature
transitions at , with . For the relativistic,
-component continuum quantum field theory (which describes lattice
quantum rotor () and transverse field Ising () models) the upper
critical dimension is , and for , is the control
parameter over the entire phase diagram. In the region , we obtain an expansion for coupling constants which then are
input as arguments of known {\em classical, tricritical,} crossover functions.
In the high region of the continuum theory, an expansion in integer powers
of , modulo powers of , holds for all
thermodynamic observables, static correlators, and dynamic properties at all
Matsubara frequencies; for the imaginary part of correlators at real
frequencies (), the perturbative expansion describes
quantum relaxation at or larger, but fails for or smaller. An important principle,
underlying the whole calculation, is the analyticity of all observables as
functions of at , for ; indeed, analytic continuation in is
used to obtain results in a portion of the phase diagram. Our method also
applies to a large class of other quantum critical points and their associated
continuum quantum field theories.Comment: 36 pages, 4 eps figure
Do Instantons Like a Colorful Background?
We investigate chiral symmetry breaking and color symmetry breaking in QCD.
The effective potential of the corresponding scalar condensates is discussed in
the presence of non-perturbative contributions from the semiclassical
one-instanton sector. We concentrate on a color singlet scalar background which
can describe chiral condensation, as well as a color octet scalar background
which can generate mass for the gluons. Whereas a non-vanishing singlet chiral
field is favored by the instantons, we have found no indication for a
preference of color octet backgrounds.Comment: 25 pages, 7 figure
Myocarditis following COVID-19 vaccine: incidence, presentation, diagnosis, pathophysiology, therapy, and outcomes put into perspective. A clinical consensus document supported by the Heart Failure Association of the European Society of Cardiology (ESC) and the ESC Working Group on Myocardial and Pericardial Diseases
Over 10 million doses of COVID-19 vaccines based on RNA technology, viral vectors, recombinant protein, and inactivated virus have been administered worldwide. Although generally very safe, post-vaccine myocarditis can result from adaptive humoral and cellular, cardiac-specific inflammation within days and weeks of vaccination. Rates of vaccine-associated myocarditis vary by age and sex with the highest rates in males between 12 and 39 years. The clinical course is generally mild with rare cases of left ventricular dysfunction, heart failure and arrhythmias. Mild cases are likely underdiagnosed as cardiac magnetic resonance imaging (CMR) is not commonly performed even in suspected cases and not at all in asymptomatic and mildly symptomatic patients. Hospitalization of symptomatic patients with electrocardiographic changes and increased plasma troponin levels is considered necessary in the acute phase to monitor for arrhythmias and potential decline in left ventricular function. In addition to evaluation for symptoms, electrocardiographic changes and elevated troponin levels, CMR is the best non-invasive diagnostic tool with endomyocardial biopsy being restricted to severe cases with heart failure and/or arrhythmias. The management beyond. guideline-directed treatment of heart failure and arrhythmias includes non-specific measures to control pain. Anti-inflammatory drugs such as non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drugs, and corticosteroids have been used in more severe cases, with only anecdotal evidence for their effectiveness. In all age groups studied, the overall risks of SARS-CoV-2 infection-related hospitalization and death are hugely greater than the risks from post-vaccine myocarditis. This consensus statement serves as a practical resource for physicians in their clinical practice, to understand, diagnose, and manage affected patients. Furthermore, it is intended to stimulate research in this area
The Infrared Behaviour of the Pure Yang-Mills Green Functions
We review the infrared properties of the pure Yang-Mills correlators and
discuss recent results concerning the two classes of low-momentum solutions for
them reported in literature; i.e. decoupling and scaling solutions. We will
mainly focuss on the Landau gauge and pay special attention to the results
inferred from the analysis of the Dyson-Schwinger equations of the theory and
from "{\it quenched}" lattice QCD. The results obtained from properly
interplaying both approaches are strongly emphasized.Comment: Final version to be published in FBS (54 pgs., 11 figs., 4 tabs
Moments of Nucleon Light Cone Quark Distributions Calculated in Full Lattice QCD
Moments of the quark density, helicity, and transversity distributions are
calculated in unquenched lattice QCD. Calculations of proton matrix elements of
operators corresponding to these moments through the operator product expansion
have been performed on lattices for Wilson fermions at using configurations from the SESAM collaboration and at
using configurations from SCRI. One-loop perturbative renormalization
corrections are included. At quark masses accessible in present calculations,
there is no statistically significant difference between quenched and full QCD
results, indicating that the contributions of quark-antiquark excitations from
the Dirac Sea are small. Close agreement between calculations with cooled
configurations containing essentially only instantons and the full gluon
configurations indicates that quark zero modes associated with instantons play
a dominant role. Naive linear extrapolation of the full QCD calculation to the
physical pion mass yields results inconsistent with experiment. Extrapolation
to the chiral limit including the physics of the pion cloud can resolve this
discrepancy and the requirements for a definitive chiral extrapolation are
described.Comment: 53 Pages Revtex, 26 Figures, 9 Tables. Added additional reference and
updated referenced data in Table I
Genetic inhibition of neurotransmission reveals role of glutamatergic input to dopamine neurons in high-effort behavior
Midbrain dopamine neurons are crucial for many behavioral and cognitive functions. As the major excitatory input, glutamatergic afferents are important for control of the activity and plasticity of dopamine neurons. However, the role of glutamatergic input as a whole onto dopamine neurons remains unclear. Here we developed a mouse line in which glutamatergic inputs onto dopamine neurons are specifically impaired, and utilized this genetic model to directly test the role of glutamatergic inputs in dopamine-related functions. We found that while motor coordination and reward learning were largely unchanged, these animals showed prominent deficits in effort-related behavioral tasks. These results provide genetic evidence that glutamatergic transmission onto dopaminergic neurons underlies incentive motivation, a willingness to exert high levels of effort to obtain reinforcers, and have important implications for understanding the normal function of the midbrain dopamine system.Fil: Hutchison, M. A.. National Institutes of Health; Estados UnidosFil: Gu, X.. National Institutes of Health; Estados UnidosFil: Adrover, Martín Federico. National Institutes of Health; Estados Unidos. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas. Instituto de Investigaciones en Ingeniería Genética y Biología Molecular "Dr. Héctor N. Torres"; ArgentinaFil: Lee, M. R.. National Institutes of Health; Estados UnidosFil: Hnasko, T. S.. University of California at San Diego; Estados UnidosFil: Alvarez, V. A.. National Institutes of Health; Estados UnidosFil: Lu, W.. National Institutes of Health; Estados Unido
Low Energy Chiral Lagrangian in Curved Space-Time from the Spectral Quark Model
We analyze the recently proposed Spectral Quark Model in the light of Chiral
Perturbation Theory in curved space-time. In particular, we calculate the
chiral coefficients , as well as the coefficients ,
, and , appearing when the model is coupled to gravity. The
analysis is carried for the SU(3) case. We analyze the pattern of chiral
symmetry breaking as well as elaborate on the fulfillment of anomalies.
Matching the model results to resonance meson exchange yields the relation
between the masses of the scalar, tensor and vector mesons,
. Finally, the
large- limit suggests the dual relations in the vector and scalar
channels, and .Comment: 18 pages, no figure
- …