875 research outputs found
Dissipative Dynamics of a Josephson Junction In the Bose-Gases
The dissipative dynamics of a Josephson junction in the Bose-gases is
considered within the framework of the model of a tunneling Hamiltonian. The
effective action which describes the dynamics of the phase difference across
the junction is derived using functional integration method. The dynamic
equation obtained for the phase difference across the junction is analyzed for
the finite temperatures in the low frequency limit involving the radiation
terms. The asymmetric case of the Bose-gases with the different order
parameters is calculated as well
Monte Carlo simulation of ice models
We propose a number of Monte Carlo algorithms for the simulation of ice
models and compare their efficiency. One of them, a cluster algorithm for the
equivalent three colour model, appears to have a dynamic exponent close to
zero, making it particularly useful for simulations of critical ice models. We
have performed extensive simulations using our algorithms to determine a number
of critical exponents for the square ice and F models.Comment: 32 pages including 15 postscript figures, typeset in LaTeX2e using
the Elsevier macro package elsart.cl
STIRAP transport of Bose-Einstein condensate in triple-well trap
The irreversible transport of multi-component Bose-Einstein condensate (BEC)
is investigated within the Stimulated Adiabatic Raman Passage (STIRAP) scheme.
A general formalism for a single BEC in M-well trap is derived and analogy
between multi-photon and tunneling processes is demonstrated. STIRAP transport
of BEC in a cyclic triple-well trap is explored for various values of detuning
and interaction between BEC atoms. It is shown that STIRAP provides a complete
population transfer at zero detuning and interaction and persists at their
modest values. The detuning is found not to be obligatory. The possibility of
non-adiabatic transport with intuitive order of couplings is demonstrated.
Evolution of the condensate phases and generation of dynamical and geometric
phases are inspected. It is shown that STIRAP allows to generate the
unconventional geometrical phase which is now of a keen interest in quantum
computing.Comment: 9 pages, 6 figures. To be published in Laser Physics (v. 19, n.4,
2009
The (extended) achondroplasia foramen magnum score has good observer reliability
Background
Achondroplasia is the most common skeletal dysplasia. A significant complication is foramen magnum stenosis. When severe, compression of the spinal cord may result in sleep apnea, sudden respiratory arrest and death. To avoid complications, surgical decompression of the craniocervical junction is offered in at-risk cases. However, practice varies among centres. To standardize magnetic resonance (MR) reporting, the achondroplasia foramen magnum score was recently developed. The reliability of the score has not been assessed.
Objective
To assess the interobserver reliability of the achondroplasia foramen magnum score.
Materials and methods
Base of skull imaging of children with achondroplasia under the care of Sheffield Children’s Hospital was retrospectively and independently reviewed by four observers using the achondroplasia foramen magnum score. Two-way random-effects intraclass coefficient (ICC) was used to assess inter- and intra-observer reliability.
Results
Forty-nine eligible cases and five controls were included. Of these, 10 were scored normal, 17 had a median score of 1 (mild narrowing), 11 had a median score of 2 (effacement of cerebral spinal fluid), 10 had a score of 3 (compression of cord) and 6 had a median score of 4 (cord myelopathic change). Interobserver ICC was 0.72 (95% confidence interval = 0.62–0.81). Intra-observer ICC ranged from 0.60 to 0.86. Reasons for reader disagreement included flow void artefact, subtle T2 cord signal and myelopathic T2 cord change disproportionate to canal narrowing.
Conclusion
The achondroplasia foramen magnum score has good interobserver reliability. Imaging features leading to interobserver disagreement have been identified. Further research is required to prospectively validate the score against clinical outcomes
Working Group Report: Neutrino and Astroparticle Physics
This is the report of neutrino and astroparticle physics working group at
WHEPP-8. We present the discussions carried out during the workshop on selected
topics in the above fields and also indicate progress made subsequently. The
neutrino physics subgroup studied the possibilites of constraining neutrino
masses, mixing and CPT violation in lepton sector from future experiments.
Neutrino mass models in the context of abelian horizontal symmetries, warped
extra dimensions and in presence of triplet Higgs were studied. Effect of
threshold corrections on radiative magnification of mixing angles was
investigated. The astroparticle physics subgroup focused on how various
particle physics inputs affect the CMBR fluctuation spectrum, and on brane
cosmology. This report also contains an introduction on how to use the publicly
available code CMBFAST to calculate the CMBR fluctuations.Comment: Prepared for the 8th Workshop on High-Energy Physics Phenomenology
(WHEPP-8), IIT Mumbai, India, 5-16 Jan 200
Chemical-potential standard for atomic Bose-Einstein condensates
When subject to an external time periodic perturbation of frequency , a
Josephson-coupled two-state Bose-Einstein condensate responds with a constant
chemical potential difference , where is Planck's constant
and is an integer. We propose an experimental procedure to produce
ac-driven atomic Josephson devices that may be used to define a standard of
chemical potential. We investigate how to circumvent some of the specific
problems derived from the present lack of advanced atom circuit technology. We
include the effect of dissipation due to quasiparticles, which is essential to
help the system relax towards the exact Shapiro resonance, and set limits to
the range of values which the various physical quantities must have in order to
achieve a stable and accurate chemical potential difference between the
macroscopic condensates.Comment: 13 pages, 4 figure
Leptogenesis with Heavy Majorana Neutrinos Reexamined
The mass term for Majorana neutrinos explicitly violates lepton number.
Several authors have used this fact to create a lepton asymmetry in the
universe by considering CP violating effects in the one loop self-energy
correction for the decaying heavy Majorana neutrino. We compare and comment on
the different approaches used to calculate the lepton asymmetry including those
using an effective Hamiltonian and resummed propagators. We also recalculate
the asymmetry in the small mass difference limit.Comment: 16 pages, LaTex, 1 figure included. 2 footnotes and 1 reference adde
Hysteresis, Avalanches, and Disorder Induced Critical Scaling: A Renormalization Group Approach
We study the zero temperature random field Ising model as a model for noise
and avalanches in hysteretic systems. Tuning the amount of disorder in the
system, we find an ordinary critical point with avalanches on all length
scales. Using a mapping to the pure Ising model, we Borel sum the
expansion to for the correlation length exponent. We sketch a
new method for directly calculating avalanche exponents, which we perform to
. Numerical exponents in 3, 4, and 5 dimensions are in good
agreement with the analytical predictions.Comment: 134 pages in REVTEX, plus 21 figures. The first two figures can be
obtained from the references quoted in their respective figure captions, the
remaining 19 figures are supplied separately in uuencoded forma
Robust Detection of Hierarchical Communities from Escherichia coli Gene Expression Data
Determining the functional structure of biological networks is a central goal
of systems biology. One approach is to analyze gene expression data to infer a
network of gene interactions on the basis of their correlated responses to
environmental and genetic perturbations. The inferred network can then be
analyzed to identify functional communities. However, commonly used algorithms
can yield unreliable results due to experimental noise, algorithmic
stochasticity, and the influence of arbitrarily chosen parameter values.
Furthermore, the results obtained typically provide only a simplistic view of
the network partitioned into disjoint communities and provide no information of
the relationship between communities. Here, we present methods to robustly
detect coregulated and functionally enriched gene communities and demonstrate
their application and validity for Escherichia coli gene expression data.
Applying a recently developed community detection algorithm to the network of
interactions identified with the context likelihood of relatedness (CLR)
method, we show that a hierarchy of network communities can be identified.
These communities significantly enrich for gene ontology (GO) terms, consistent
with them representing biologically meaningful groups. Further, analysis of the
most significantly enriched communities identified several candidate new
regulatory interactions. The robustness of our methods is demonstrated by
showing that a core set of functional communities is reliably found when
artificial noise, modeling experimental noise, is added to the data. We find
that noise mainly acts conservatively, increasing the relatedness required for
a network link to be reliably assigned and decreasing the size of the core
communities, rather than causing association of genes into new communities.Comment: Due to appear in PLoS Computational Biology. Supplementary Figure S1
was not uploaded but is available by contacting the author. 27 pages, 5
figures, 15 supplementary file
Effects of Atrazine exposure on human bone marrow-derived mesenchymal stromal cells assessed by combinatorial assay matrix
IntroductionMesenchymal Stromal/Stem cells (MSCs) are an essential component of the regenerative and immunoregulatory stem cell compartment of the human body and thus of major importance in human physiology. The MSCs elicit their beneficial properties through a multitude of complementary mechanisms, which makes it challenging to assess their phenotype and function in environmental toxicity screening. We here employed the novel combinatorial assays matrix approach/technology to profile the MSC response to the herbicide Atrazine, which is a common environmental xenobiotic, that is in widespread agricultural use in the US and other countries, but banned in the EU. Our here presented approach is representative for screening the impact of environmental xenobiotics and toxins on MSCs as an essential representative component of human physiology and well-being.MethodsWe here employed the combinatorial assay matrix approach, including a panel of well standardized assays, such as flow cytometry, multiplex secretome analysis, and metabolic assays, to define the phenotype and functionality of human-donor-derived primary MSCs exposed to the representative xenobiotic Atrazine. This assay matrix approach is now also endorsed for characterization of cell therapies by leading regulatory agencies, such as FDA and EMA.ResultsOur results show that the exposure to Atrazine modulates the metabolic activity, size, and granularity of MSCs in a dose and time dependent manner. Intriguingly, Atrazine exposure leads to a broad modulation of the MSCs secretome (both upregulation and downmodulation of certain factors) with the identification of Interleukin-8 as the topmost upregulated representative secretory molecule. Interestingly, Atrazine attenuates IFNγ-induced upregulation of MHC-class-II, but not MHC-class-I, and early phosphorylation signals on MSCs. Furthermore, Atrazine exposure attenuates IFNγ responsive secretome of MSCs. Mechanistic knockdown analysis identified that the Atrazine-induced effector molecule Interleukin-8 affects only certain but not all the related angiogenic secretome of MSCs.DiscussionThe here described Combinatorial Assay Matrix Technology identified that Atrazine affects both the innate/resting and cytokine-induced/stimulated assay matrix functionality of human MSCs, as identified through the modulation of selective, but not all effector molecules, thus vouching for the great usefulness of this approach to study the impact of xenobiotics on this important human cellular subset involved in the regenerative healing responses in humans
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