Vascular risk factors and diabetic neuropathy

Background: Other than glycemic control, there are no treatments for diabetic neuropathy. Thus, identifying potentially modifiable risk factors for neuropathy is crucial. We studied risk factors for the development of distal symmetric neuropathy in 1172 patients with type 1 diabetes mellitus from 31 centers participating in the European Diabetes (EURODIAB) Prospective Complications Study. Methods: Neuropathy was assessed at baseline (1989 to 1991) and at follow-up (1997 to 1999), with a mean (±SD) follow-up of 7.3±0.6 years. A standardized protocol included clinical evaluation, quantitative sensory testing, and autonomic-function tests. Serum lipids and lipoproteins, glycosylated hemoglobin, and the urinary albumin excretion rate were measured in a central laboratory. Results: At follow-up, neuropathy had developed in 276 of 1172 patients without neuropathy at baseline (23.5 percent). The cumulative incidence of neuropathy was related to the glycosylated hemoglobin value and the duration of diabetes. After adjustment for these factors, we found that higher levels of total and low-density lipoprotein cholesterol and triglycerides, a higher body-mass index, higher von Willebrand factor levels and urinary albumin excretion rate, hypertension, and smoking were all significantly associated with the cumulative incidence of neuropathy. After adjustment for other risk factors and diabetic complications, we found that duration of diabetes, current glycosylated hemoglobin value, change in glycosylated hemoglobin value during the follow-up period, body-mass index, and smoking remained independently associated with the incidence of neuropathy. Cardiovascular disease at baseline was associated with double the risk of neuropathy, independent of cardiovascular risk factors. Conclusions: This prospective study indicates that, apart from glycemic control, the incidence of neuropathy is associated with potentially modifiable cardiovascular risk factors, including a raised triglyceride level, body-mass index, smoking, and hypertension

Vascular risk factors and diabetic neuropathy

Background: Other than glycemic control, there are no treatments for diabetic neuropathy. Thus, identifying potentially modifiable risk factors for neuropathy is crucial. We studied risk factors for the development of distal symmetric neuropathy in 1172 patients with type 1 diabetes mellitus from 31 centers participating in the European Diabetes (EURODIAB) Prospective Complications Study. Methods: Neuropathy was assessed at baseline (1989 to 1991) and at follow-up (1997 to 1999), with a mean (±SD) follow-up of 7.3±0.6 years. A standardized protocol included clinical evaluation, quantitative sensory testing, and autonomic-function tests. Serum lipids and lipoproteins, glycosylated hemoglobin, and the urinary albumin excretion rate were measured in a central laboratory. Results: At follow-up, neuropathy had developed in 276 of 1172 patients without neuropathy at baseline (23.5 percent). The cumulative incidence of neuropathy was related to the glycosylated hemoglobin value and the duration of diabetes. After adjustment for these factors, we found that higher levels of total and low-density lipoprotein cholesterol and triglycerides, a higher body-mass index, higher von Willebrand factor levels and urinary albumin excretion rate, hypertension, and smoking were all significantly associated with the cumulative incidence of neuropathy. After adjustment for other risk factors and diabetic complications, we found that duration of diabetes, current glycosylated hemoglobin value, change in glycosylated hemoglobin value during the follow-up period, body-mass index, and smoking remained independently associated with the incidence of neuropathy. Cardiovascular disease at baseline was associated with double the risk of neuropathy, independent of cardiovascular risk factors. Conclusions: This prospective study indicates that, apart from glycemic control, the incidence of neuropathy is associated with potentially modifiable cardiovascular risk factors, including a raised triglyceride level, body-mass index, smoking, and hypertension

Out-of-equilibrium singlet-triplet Kondo effect in a single C_60 quantum dot

We have used an electromigration technique to fabricate a $\rm{C_{{60}}}$ single-molecule transistor (SMT). Besides describing our electromigration procedure, we focus and present an experimental study of a single molecule quantum dot containing an even number of electrons, revealing, for two different samples, a clear out-of-equilibrium Kondo effect. Low temperature magneto-transport studies are provided, which demonstrates a Zeeman splitting of the finite bias anomaly.Comment: 6 pages, 4 figure

A computationally and cognitively plausible model of supervised and unsupervised learning

Author version made available in accordance with the publisher's policy. "The final publication is available at link.springer.com”The issue of chance correction has been discussed for many decades in the context of statistics, psychology and machine learning, with multiple measures being shown to have desirable properties, including various definitions of Kappa or Correlation, and the psychologically validated ΔP measures. In this paper, we discuss the relationships between these measures, showing that they form part of a single family of measures, and that using an appropriate measure can positively impact learning

Emission spectra and intrinsic optical bistability in a two-level medium

Scattering of resonant radiation in a dense two-level medium is studied theoretically with account for local field effects and renormalization of the resonance frequency. Intrinsic optical bistability is viewed as switching between different spectral patterns of fluorescent light controlled by the incident field strength. Response spectra are calculated analytically for the entire hysteresis loop of atomic excitation. The equations to describe the non-linear interaction of an atomic ensemble with light are derived from the Bogolubov-Born-Green-Kirkwood-Yvon hierarchy for reduced single particle density matrices of atoms and quantized field modes and their correlation operators. The spectral power of scattered light with separated coherent and incoherent constituents is obtained straightforwardly within the hierarchy. The formula obtained for emission spectra can be used to distinguish between possible mechanisms suggested to produce intrinsic bistability.Comment: 18 pages, 5 figure

Golgi cell mediated inhibition in the cerebellar granule cell layer

The cerebellar cortex integrates multimodal information from mossy fibre (MF) and climbing fibre inputs to perform a variety of computations relating to movement, motor learning and balance. Before MF information can be combined with climbing fibre input in Purkinje cells (PCs) it must pass through the granule cell (GrC) layer wherein it is transformed by the anatomical connectivity and local inhibitory circuit. GrCs receive both tonic and phasic inhibition, the latter arising from the release of gamma aminobutyric acid (GABA) from Golgi cell (GoC) axons. However, the properties of GoC mediated inhibition and its computational significance are not well understood. I have characterised the GoC–GrC synaptic connection using paired whole-cell patch-clamp recordings. My results show that unitary GoC inputs are smaller than previously realised and are frequently mediated purely by spillover from synapses onto adjacent GrCs. I have used the dynamic clamp method to investigate how changes in the frequency and synchrony of spiking in the GoC network can affect GrC computation. I found that changes in GoC firing rate strongly modulate the gain of the GrC input–output (I–O) function, while GoC synchrony can create permissive and non-permissive windows resulting in a patternation of GrC firing that may convey a temporal signal to downstream PCs. GoCs are subject to regulation through the activation of metabotropic glutamate receptors (mGluRs) and nicotinic acetylcholine receptors (nAChRs). I have investigated how these modulatory inputs to GoCs might affect their inhibitory output and show that mGluR activation dramatically reduces GABA release while nAChR activation dramatically increases GABA release from GoCs. My results show that GoCs can exert potent inhibitory control over GrCs that could be relevant to the processing of both temporally coded and rate coded information

Preliminary results on electrophoretic and immunoelectrophoretic fractionation of bovine muscle extract

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Evidence for the Jacobi shape transition in hot 46Ti

The gamma-rays from the decay of the GDR in 46Ti compound nucleus formed in the 18O+28Si reaction at bombarding energy 105 MeV have been measured in an experiment using a setup consisting of the combined EUROBALL IV, HECTOR and EUCLIDES arrays. A comparison of the extracted GDR lineshape data with the predictions of the thermal shape fluctuation model shows evidence for the Jacobi shape transition in hot 46Ti. In addition to the previously found broad structure in the GDR lineshape region at 18-27 MeV caused by large deformations, the presence of a low energy component (around 10 MeV), due to the Coriolis splitting in prolate well deformed shape, has been identified for the first time.Comment: 8 pages, 4 figures, proceedings of the COMEX1 conference, June 2003, Paris; to be published in Nucl. Phys.

Strangeness Enhancement in p+Ap+A and S+AS+A Interactions at SPS Energies

The systematics of strangeness enhancement is calculated using the HIJING and VENUS models and compared to recent data on $\,pp\,$, $\,pA\,$ and $\,AA\,$ collisions at CERN/SPS energies ($200A\,\, GeV\,$). The HIJING model is used to perform a {\em linear} extrapolation from $pp$ to $AA$. VENUS is used to estimate the effects of final state cascading and possible non-conventional production mechanisms. This comparison shows that the large enhancement of strangeness observed in $S+Au$ collisions, interpreted previously as possible evidence for quark-gluon plasma formation, has its origins in non-equilibrium dynamics of few nucleon systems. % Strangeness enhancement %is therefore traced back to the change in the production dynamics %from $pp$ to minimum bias $pS$ and central $SS$ collisions. A factor of two enhancement of $\Lambda^{0}$ at mid-rapidity is indicated by recent $pS$ data, where on the average {\em one} projectile nucleon interacts with only {\em two} target nucleons. There appears to be another factor of two enhancement in the light ion reaction $SS$ relative to $pS$, when on the average only two projectile nucleons interact with two target ones.Comment: 29 pages, 8 figures in uuencoded postscript fil

A measurement of the tau mass and the first CPT test with tau leptons

We measure the mass of the tau lepton to be 1775.1+-1.6(stat)+-1.0(syst.) MeV using tau pairs from Z0 decays. To test CPT invariance we compare the masses of the positively and negatively charged tau leptons. The relative mass difference is found to be smaller than 3.0 10^-3 at the 90% confidence level.Comment: 10 pages, 4 figures, Submitted to Phys. Letts.