Primary Particle Type of the Most Energetic Fly's Eye Air Shower

The longitudinal profile of the most energetic cosmic-ray air shower measured so far, the event recorded by the Fly's Eye detector with a reconstructed primary energy of about 320 EeV, is compared to simulated shower profiles. The calculations are performed with the CORSIKA code and include primary photons and different hadron primaries. For primary photons, preshower formation in the geomagnetic field is additionally treated in detail. For primary hadrons, the hadronic interaction models QGSJET01 and SIBYLL2.1 have been employed. The predicted longitudinal profiles are compared to the observation. A method for testing the hypothesis of a specific primary particle type against the measured profile is described which naturally takes shower fluctuations into account. The Fly's Eye event is compatible with any assumption of a hadron primary between proton and iron nuclei in both interaction models, although differences between QGSJET01 and SIBYLL2.1 in the predicted profiles of lighter nuclei exist. The primary photon profiles differ from the data on a level of ~1.5 sigma. Although not favoured by the observation, the primary photon hypothesis can not be rejected for this particular event.Comment: 20 pages, 8 figures; v2 matches version accepted by Astroparticle Physic

The Tsim Tsoum Approaches for Prevention of Cardiovascular Disease

The Tsim Tsoum Concept means that humans evolved on a diet in which nature recommends to ingest fatty acids in a balanced ratio (polyunsaturated(P) : saturated(S) =w-6 : w-3 = 1 : 1)as part of dietary lipid pattern where monounsaturated fatty acids(MUFA) is the major fatty acid(P : M : S = 1 : 6 : 1) in the background of other dietary factors; antioxidants, vitamins, minerals and fiber as well as physical activity and low mental stress. Several hundred years ago, our diet included natural foods; fruits, vegetables, green vegetables, seeds, eggs and honey. Fish, and wild meat were also available to pre-agricultural humans which shaped modern human genetic nutritional requirement. Cereal grains (refined), and vegetable oils that are rich in w-6 fatty acids are relatively recent addition to the human diet that represent dramatic departure from those foods to which we are adapted. Excess of linoleic acid, trans fatty acids (TFA), saturated and total fat as well as refined starches and sugar are proinflammatory. Low dietary MUFA and n-3 fatty acids and other long chain polyunsarurated fatty acids (LCPUFA) are important in the pathogenesis of metabolic syndrome. Increased sympathetic activity with greater secretion of neurotransmitters in conjunction of underlying long chain PUFA deficiency, and excess of proinflammatory nutrients, may damage the neurons via proinflammatory cytokines, in the ventromedial hypothalamus and insulin receptors in the brain.Since, 30–50% of the fatty acids in the brain are LCPUFA, especially omega-3 fatty acids, which are incorporated in the cell membrane phospholipids, it is possible that their supplementation may be protective.Blood lipid composition does reflect one's health status: (a) circulating serum lipoproteins and their ratio provide information on their atherogenicity to blood vessels and (b) circulating plasma fatty acids, such as w-6/w-3 fatty acid ratio, give indication on proinflammatory status of blood vessels, cardiomyocytes, liver cells and neurones; (a) and (b) are phenotype-related and depend on genetic, environmental and developmental factors. As such, they appear as universal markers for holistic health and these may be important in the pathogenesis of cardiovascular diseases and cancer, which is the main consideration of Tsim Tsoum concept

Atmospheric Profiles at the Southern Pierre Auger Observatory and their Relevance to Air Shower Measurement

The dependence of atmospheric conditions on altitude and time have to be known at the site of an air shower experiment for accurate reconstruction of extensive air showers and their simulations. The height-profile of atmospheric depth is of particular interest as it enters directly into the reconstruction of longitudinal shower development and of the primary energy and mass of cosmic rays. For the southern part of the Auger Observatory, the atmosphere has been investigated in a number of campaigns with meteorological radio soundings and with continuous measurements of ground-based weather stations. Focussing on atmospheric depth and temperature profiles, temporal variations are described and monthly profiles are developed. Uncertainties of the monthly atmospheres that are currently applied in the Auger reconstruction are discussed.Comment: To be published in Proceedings of 29th International Cosmic Ray Conference (ICRC) 2005, Pune, Indi

Automated track recognition and event reconstruction in nuclear emulsion

The major advantages of nuclear emulsion for detecting charged particles are its submicron position resolution and sensitivity to minimum ionizing particles. These must be balanced, however, against the difficult manual microscope measurement by skilled observers required for the analysis. We have developed an automated system to acquire and analyze the microscope images from emulsion chambers. Each emulsion plate is analyzed independently, allowing coincidence techniques to be used in order to reject background and estimate error rates. The system has been used to analyze a sample of high-multiplicity Pb-Pb interactions (charged particle multiplicities ∼1100) produced by the 158 GeV/c per nucleon 208Pb beam at CERN. Automatically measured events agree with our best manual measurements on 97% of all the tracks. We describe the image analysis and track reconstruction techniques, and discuss the measurement and reconstruction uncertainties

Depth concentrations of deuterium ions implanted into some pure metals and alloys

Pure metals (Cu, Ti, Zr, V, Pd) and diluted Pd-alloys (Pd-Ag, Pd-Pt, Pd-Ru, Pd-Rh) were implanted by 25 keV deuterium ions at fluences in the range (1.2{\div}2.3)x1022 D+/m2. The post-treatment depth distributions of deuterium ions were measured 10 days and three months after the implantation using Elastic Recoil Detection Analysis (ERDA) and Rutherford Backscattering (RBS). Comparison of the obtained results allowed to make conclusions about relative stability of deuterium and hydrogen gases in pure metals and diluted Pd alloys. Very high diffusion rates of implanted deuterium ions from V and Pd pure metals and Pd alloys were observed. Small-angle X-ray scattering revealed formation of nanosized defects in implanted corundum and titanium.Comment: 12 pages, 9 figure