5,789 research outputs found
Hamiltonian formalism and the Garrett-Munk spectrum of internal waves in the ocean
Wave turbulence formalism for long internal waves in a stratified fluid is
developed, based on a natural Hamiltonian description. A kinetic equation
appropriate for the description of spectral energy transfer is derived, and its
self-similar stationary solution corresponding to a direct cascade of energy
toward the short scales is found. This solution is very close to the high
wavenumber limit of the Garrett-Munk spectrum of long internal waves in the
ocean. In fact, a small modification of the Garrett-Munk formalism includes a
spectrum consistent with the one predicted by wave turbulence.Comment: 4 pages latex fil
Bound states of magnons in the S=1/2 quantum spin ladder
We study the excitation spectrum of the two-leg antiferromagnetic S=1/2
Heisenberg ladder. Our approach is based on the description of the excitations
as triplets above a strong-coupling singlet ground state. The quasiparticle
spectrum is calculated by treating the excitations as a dilute Bose gas with
infinite on-site repulsion. We find singlet (S=0) and triplet (S=1)
two-particle bound states of the elementary triplets. We argue that bound
states generally exist in any dimerized quantum spin model.Comment: 4 REVTeX pages, 4 Postscript figure
Constraints on extragalactic transmitters via Breakthrough Listen
The Breakthrough Listen Initiative has embarked on a comprehensive SETI
survey of nearby stars in the Milky Way that is vastly superior to previous
efforts as measured by a wide range of different metrics. SETI surveys
traditionally ignore the fact that they are sensitive to many background
objects, in addition to the foreground target star. In order to better
appreciate and exploit the presence of extragalactic objects in the field of
view, the Aladin sky atlas and NED were employed to make a rudimentary census
of extragalactic objects that were serendipitously observed with the 100-m
Greenbank telescope observing at 1.1-1.9 GHz. For 469 target fields (assuming a
FWHM radial field-of-view of 4.2 arcminutes), NED identified a grand total of
143024 extragalactic objects, including various astrophysical exotica e.g. AGN
of various types, radio galaxies, interacting galaxies, and one confirmed
gravitational lens system. Several nearby galaxies, galaxy groups and galaxy
clusters are identified, permitting the parameter space probed by SETI surveys
to be significantly extended. Constraints are placed on the luminosity function
of potential extraterrestrial transmitters assuming it follows a simple power
law and limits on the prevalence of very powerful extraterrestrial transmitters
associated with these vast stellar systems are also determined. It is
demonstrated that the recent Breakthrough Listen Initiative, and indeed many
previous SETI radio surveys, place stronger limits on the prevalence of
extraterrestrial intelligence in the distant Universe than is often fully
appreciated.Comment: 9 Pages, 5 figures, accepted by MNRA
A new B-dot probe-based diagnostic for amplitude, polarization, and wavenumber measurements of ion cyclotron range-of frequency fields on ASDEX Upgrade
A new B-dot probe-based diagnostic has been installed on an ASDEX Upgrade tokamak to characterize ion cyclotron range-of frequency (ICRF) wave generation and interaction with magnetized plasma. The diagnostic consists of a field-aligned array of B-dot probes, oriented to measure fast and slow ICRF wave fields and their field-aligned wavenumber (k(//)) spectrum on the low field side of ASDEX Upgrade. A thorough description of the diagnostic and the supporting electronics is provided. In order to compare the measured dominant wavenumber of the local ICRF fields with the expected spectrum of the launched ICRF waves, in-air near-field measurements were performed on the newly installed 3-strap ICRF antenna to reconstruct the dominant launched toroidal wavenumbers (k(tor)). Measurements during a strap current phasing scan in tokamak discharges reveal an upshift in k(//) as strap phasing is moved away from the dipole configuration. This result is the opposite of the k(tor) trend expected from in-air near-field measurements; however, the near-field based reconstruction routine does not account for the effect of induced radiofrequency (RF) currents in the passive antenna structures. The measured exponential increase in the local ICRF wave field amplitude is in agreement with the upshifted k(//), as strap phasing moves away from the dipole configuration. An examination of discharges heated with two ICRF antennas simultaneously reveals the existence of beat waves at 1 kHz, as expected from the difference of the two antennas' operating frequencies. Beats are observed on both the fast and the slow wave probes suggesting that the two waves are coupled outside the active antennas. Although the new diagnostic shows consistent trends between the amplitude and the phase measurements in response to changes applied by the ICRF antennas, the disagreement with the in-air near-field measurements remains. An electromagnetic model is currently under development to address this issue. (C) 2015 AIP Publishing LLC
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APOBEC-related mutagenesis and neo-peptide hydrophobicity: implications for response to immunotherapy.
Tumor-associated neo-antigens are mutated peptides that allow the immune system to recognize the affected cell as foreign. Cells carrying excessive mutation load often develop mechanisms of tolerance. PD-L1/PD-1 checkpoint immunotherapy is a highly promising approach to overcome these protective signals and induce tumor shrinkage. Yet, the nature of the neo-antigens driving those beneficial responses remains unclear. Here, we show that APOBEC-related mutagenesis - a mechanism at the crossroads between anti-viral immunity and endogenous nucleic acid editing - increases neo-peptide hydrophobicity (a feature of immunogenicity), as demonstrated by in silico computation and in the TCGA pan-cancer cohort, where APOBEC-related mutagenesis was also strongly associated with immune marker expression. Moreover, APOBEC-related mutagenesis correlated with immunotherapy response in a cohort of 99 patients with diverse cancers, and this correlation was independent of the tumor mutation burden (TMB). Combining APOBEC-related mutagenesis estimate and TMB resulted in greater predictive ability than either parameter alone. Based on these results, further investigation of APOBEC-related mutagenesis as a marker of response to anti-cancer checkpoint blockade is warranted
Background Contamination of the Project Hephaistos Dyson Spheres Candidates
Project Hephaistos recently identified seven M-dwarfs as possible Dyson Spheres (DS) candidates. We have cross-matched three of these candidates (A, B and G) with radio sources detected in various all-sky surveys. The radio sources are offset from the Gaia stellar positions by ∼4.9, ∼0.4 and ∼5.″0 for candidates A, B, and G respectively. We propose that Dust obscured galaxies (DOGs) lying close to the line-of-sight of these M-dwarf stars significantly contribute to the measured WISE mid-IR flux densities in the WISE W3 and W4 wave bands. These three stars have therefore been misidentified as DS candidates. We also note that with an areal sky density of 9 × 10−6 per square arcsecond, Hot DOGs can probably account for the contamination of all 7 DS candidates drawn from an original sample of 5 million stars
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