Single transverse-spin asymmetry in Drell-Yan lepton angular distribution

We calculate a single transverse-spin asymmetry for the Drell-Yan lepton-pair's angular distribution in perturbative QCD. At leading order in the strong coupling constant, the asymmetry is expressed in terms of a twist-3 quark-gluon correlation function T_F^{(V)}(x_1,x_2). In our calculation, the same result was obtained in both light-cone and covariant gauge in QCD, while keeping explicit electromagnetic current conservation for the virtual photon that decays into the lepton pair. We also present a numerical estimate of the asymmetry and compare the result to an existing other prediction.Comment: 15 pages, Revtex, 5 Postscript figures, uses aps.sty, epsfig.st

Dilatation of Lateral Ventricles with Brain Volumes in Infants with 3D Transfontanelle US

Ultrasound (US) can be used to assess brain development in newborns, as MRI is challenging due to immobilization issues, and may require sedation. Dilatation of the lateral ventricles in the brain is a risk factor for poorer neurodevelopment outcomes in infants. Hence, 3D US has the ability to assess the volume of the lateral ventricles similar to clinically standard MRI, but manual segmentation is time consuming. The objective of this study is to develop an approach quantifying the ratio of lateral ventricular dilatation with respect to total brain volume using 3D US, which can assess the severity of macrocephaly. Automatic segmentation of the lateral ventricles is achieved with a multi-atlas deformable registration approach using locally linear correlation metrics for US-MRI fusion, followed by a refinement step using deformable mesh models. Total brain volume is estimated using a 3D ellipsoid modeling approach. Validation was performed on a cohort of 12 infants, ranging from 2 to 8.5 months old, where 3D US and MRI were used to compare brain volumes and segmented lateral ventricles. Automatically extracted volumes from 3D US show a high correlation and no statistically significant difference when compared to ground truth measurements. Differences in volume ratios was 6.0 +/- 4.8% compared to MRI, while lateral ventricular segmentation yielded a mean Dice coefficient of 70.8 +/- 3.6% and a mean absolute distance (MAD) of 0.88 +/- 0.2mm, demonstrating the clinical benefit of this tool in paediatric ultrasound

Open charm tomography of cold nuclear matter

We study the relative contribution of partonic sub-processes to D meson production and D meson-triggered inclusive di-hadrons to lowest order in perturbative QCD. While gluon fusion dominates the creation of large angle DD-bar pairs, charm on light parton scattering determines the yield of single inclusive D mesons. The distinctly different non-perturbative fragmentation of c quarks into D mesons versus the fragmentation of quarks and gluons into light hadrons results in a strong transverse momentum dependence of anticharm content of the away-side charm-triggered jet. In p+A reactions, we calculate and resum the coherent nuclear-enhanced power corrections from the final state partonic scattering in the medium. We find that single and double inclusive open charm production can be suppressed as much as the yield of neutral pions from dynamical high-twist shadowing. Effects of energy loss in p+A collisions are also investigated phenomenologically and may lead to significantly weaker transverse momentum dependence of the nuclear attenuation.Comment: 24 pages, 21 figure

Crossover from Kramers to phase-diffusion switching in hysteretic DC-SQUIDs

We have measured and propose a model for switching rates in hysteretic DC-SQUID in the regime where phase diffusion processes start to occur. We show that the switching rates in this regime are smaller than the rates given by Kramers' formula due to retrapping of Josephson phase. The retrapping process, which is affected by the frequency dependent impedance of the environment of the DC-SQUID, leads to a peaked second moment of the switching distribution as a function of temperature. The temperature where the peaks occur are proportional to the critical current of the DC- SQUID.Comment: 4 pages, 4 figure

Small atom diffusion and breakdown of the Stokes–Einstein relation in the supercooled liquid state of the Zr46.7Ti8.3Cu7.5Ni10Be27.5 alloy

Be diffusivity data in the bulk metallic glass forming alloy Zr46.7Ti8.3Cu7.5Ni10Be27.5 are reported for temperatures between 530 and 710 K, extending 85 K into the supercooled liquid state of the alloy. At the glass transition temperature Tg, a change in temperature dependence of the data is observed, and above Tg the diffusivity increases more quickly with temperature than below. The data in the supercooled liquid can be described by a modified Arrhenius expression based on a diffusion mechanism suggested earlier. The comparison with viscosity data in the supercooled liquid state of Zr46.7Ti8.3Cu7.5Ni10Be27.5 reveals a breakdown of the Stokes–Einstein relation, indicating a cooperative diffusion mechanism in the supercooled liquid state of Zr46.7Ti8.3Cu7.5Ni10Be27.5