238 research outputs found
Towards Weyl fermions on the lattice without artefacts
In spite of the breakthrough in non-perturbative chiral gauge theories during
the last decade, the present formulation has stubborn artefacts. Independently
of the fermion representation one is confronted with unwanted CP violation and
infinitely many undetermined weight factors. Renormalization group identifies
the culprit. We demonstrate the procedure on Weyl fermions in a real
representation
Nanowire electron scattering spectroscopy
Methods and devices for spectroscopic identification of molecules using nanoscale wires are disclosed. According to one of the methods, nanoscale wires are provided, electrons are injected into the nanoscale wire; and inelastic electron scattering is measured via excitation of low-lying vibrational energy levels of molecules bound to the nanoscale wire
Effect of wetting layers on the strain and electronic structure of InAs self-assembled quantum dots
The effect of wetting layers on the strain and electronic structure of InAs
self-assembled quantum dots grown on GaAs is investigated with an atomistic
valence-force-field model and an empirical tight-binding model. By comparing a
dot with and without a wetting layer, we find that the inclusion of the wetting
layer weakens the strain inside the dot by only 1% relative change, while it
reduces the energy gap between a confined electron and hole level by as much as
10%. The small change in the strain distribution indicates that strain relaxes
only little through the thin wetting layer. The large reduction of the energy
gap is attributed to the increase of the confining-potential width rather than
the change of the potential height. First-order perturbation calculations or,
alternatively, the addition of an InAs disk below the quantum dot confirm this
conclusion. The effect of the wetting layer on the wave function is
qualitatively different for the weakly confined electron state and the strongly
confined hole state. The electron wave function shifts from the buffer to the
wetting layer, while the hole shifts from the dot to the wetting layer.Comment: 14 pages, 3 figures, and 3 table
Three-Dimensional Ultrasound Guidance of Autonomous Robotic Breast Biopsy: Feasibility Study
Feasibility studies of autonomous robot biopsies in tissue have been conducted using real time 3D ultrasound combined with simple thresholding algorithms. The robot first autonomously processed 3D image volumes received from the ultrasound scanner to locate a metal rod target embedded in turkey breast tissue simulating a calcification, and in a separate experiment, the center of a water-filled void in the breast tissue simulating a cyst. In both experiments the robot then directed a needle to the desired target, with no user input required. Separate needle-touch experiments performed by the image-guided robot in a water tank yielded an rms error of 1.15 mm
A comparison of machine learning classifiers for pediatric epilepsy using resting-state functional MRI latency data
Epilepsy affects 1 in 150 children under the age of 10 and is the most common chronic pediatric neurological condition; poor seizure control can irreversibly disrupt normal brain development. The present study compared the ability of different machine learning algorithms trained with resting-state functional MRI (rfMRI) latency data to detect epilepsy. Preoperative rfMRI and anatomical MRI scans were obtained for 63 patients with epilepsy and 259 healthy controls. The normal distribution of latency z-scores from the epilepsy and healthy control cohorts were analyzed for overlap in 36 seed regions. In these seed regions, overlap between the study cohorts ranged from 0.44-0.58. Machine learning features were extracted from latency z-score maps using principal component analysis. Extreme Gradient Boosting (XGBoost), Support Vector Machines (SVM), and Random Forest algorithms were trained with these features. Area under the receiver operating characteristics curve (AUC), accuracy, sensitivity, specificity and F1-scores were used to evaluate model performance. The XGBoost model outperformed all other models with a test AUC of 0.79, accuracy of 74%, specificity of 73%, and a sensitivity of 77%. The Random Forest model performed comparably to XGBoost across multiple metrics, but it had a test sensitivity of 31%. The SVM model did not perform \u3e70% in any of the test metrics. The XGBoost model had the highest sensitivity and accuracy for the detection of epilepsy. Development of machine learning algorithms trained with rfMRI latency data could provide an adjunctive method for the diagnosis and evaluation of epilepsy with the goal of enabling timely and appropriate care for patients
Kinetics of exciton photoluminescence in type-II semiconductor superlattices
The exciton decay rate at a rough interface in type-II semiconductor
superlattices is investigated. It is shown that the possibility of
recombination of indirect excitons at a plane interface essentially affects
kinetics of the exciton photoluminescence at a rough interface. This happens
because of strong correlation between the exciton recombination at the plane
interface and at the roughness. Expressions that relate the parameters of the
luminescence kinetics with statistical characteristics of the rough interface
are obtained. The mean height and length of roughnesses in GaAs/AlAs
superlattices are estimated from the experimental data.Comment: 3 PostScript figure
Infants with esophageal atresia and right aortic arch: Characteristics and outcomes from the Midwest Pediatric Surgery Consortium
Purpose
Right sided aortic arch (RAA) is a rare anatomic finding in infants with esophageal atresia with or without tracheoesophageal fistula (EA/TEF). In the presence of RAA, significant controversy exists regarding optimal side for thoracotomy in repair of the EA/TEF. The purpose of this study was to characterize the incidence, demographics, surgical approach, and outcomes of patients with RAA and EA/TEF.
Methods
A multi-institutional, IRB approved, retrospective cohort study of infants with EA/TEF treated at 11 children's hospitals in the United States over a 5-year period (2009 to 2014) was performed. All patients had a minimum of one-year follow-up.
Results
In a cohort of 396 infants with esophageal atresia, 20 (5%) had RAA, with 18 having EA with a distal TEF and 2 with pure EA. Compared to infants with left sided arch (LAA), RAA infants had a lower median birth weight, (1.96âŻkg (IQR 1.54â2.65) vs. 2.57âŻkg (2.00â3.03), pâŻ=âŻ0.01), earlier gestational age (34.5âŻweeks (IQR 32â37) vs. 37âŻweeks (35â39), pâŻ=âŻ0.01), and a higher incidence of congenital heart disease (90% vs. 32%, pâŻâŻ0.29).
Conclusion
RAA in infants with EA/TEF is rare with an incidence of 5%. Compared to infants with EA/TEF and LAA, infants with EA/TEF and RAA are more severely ill with lower birth weight and higher rates of prematurity and complex congenital heart disease. In neonates with RAA, surgical repair of the EA/TEF is technically feasible via thoracotomy from either chest. A higher incidence of anastomotic strictures may occur with a right-sided approach
Equal pay by gender and by nationality: a comparative analysis of Switzerland's unequal equal pay policy regimes across time
What explains the adoption of two different policies on equal pay by gender (EPG) and by nationality (EPN) in Switzerland? And why is the liberal, litigation-based, equal pay policy regime set up by the Gender Equality Act of 1996 much less effective than the neocorporatist âaccompanying measures' to the Bilateral European Union-Switzerland Agreement on Free Movement of Persons adopted in 1999 to ensure equal pay for workers of different national origins? The formation of two different policy regimes cannot be explained by different levels of political will. Equally, different âvarieties of capitalism' cannot explain the setup of the two different equal pay policy regimes within the very same country. Instead, our qualitative comparative analysis across time suggests that the differences can be best explained by a particular constellation of attributes, namely the use of different policy framesâi.e. âanti-discrimination' in the EPG and âunfair competition' in the EPN caseâand the different setting of interest politics epitomised by the opposite stances adopted by Switzerland's employer associations in the two case
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