Apolipoprotein AIV gene variant S347 is associated with increased risk of coronary heart disease and lower plasma apolipoprotein AIV levels

The impact of common variants in the apolipoprotein gene cluster (APOC3-A4-A5) on prospective coronary heart disease (CHD) risk was examined in healthy UK men. Of the 2808 men followed over 9 years, 187 had a clinically defined CHD event. Examination of 9 single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) in this group revealed that homozygotes for APOA4 S347 had significantly increased risk of CHD [hazard ratio (HR) of 2.07 (95%CI 1.04 to 4.12)], whereas men homozygous for APOC3 1100T were protected [HR 0.28 (95%CI 0.09 to 0.87)]. In stepwise multiple regression analysis, after entering all the variants and adjusting for established risk factors APOA4 T347S alone remained in the model. Using all nine SNPs, the highest risk-estimate haplotypes carried APOA4 S347 and rare alleles of the two flanking intergenic markers. The protective effect of APOC3 1100T could be explained by negative linkage disequilibrium with these alleles. To determine the association of APOA4 T347S with apoAIV levels, the relationship was examined in 1600 healthy young European men and women. S347 homozygotes had significantly lower apoAIV plasma levels (13.64±0.59 mg/dL) compared with carriers of the T347 allele (14.90±0.12 mg/dL) (P=0.035). These results demonstrate that genetic variation in and around APOA4, independent of the effects of triglyceride, is associated with risk of CHD and apoAIV levels, supporting an antiatherogenic role for apoAIV

Vertical Confinement and Evolution of Reentrant Insulating Transition in the Fractional Quantum Hall Regime

We have observed an anomalous shift of the high field reentrant insulating phases in a two-dimensional electron system (2DES) tightly confined within a narrow GaAs/AlGaAs quantum well. Instead of the well-known transitions into the high field insulating states centered around $\nu = 1/5$, the 2DES confined within an 80\AA-wide quantum well exhibits the transition at $\nu = 1/3$. Comparably large quantum lifetime of the 2DES in narrow well discounts the effect of disorder and points to confinement as the primary driving force behind the evolution of the reentrant transition.Comment: 5 pages, 4 figure

Phase resolution limit in macroscopic interference between Bose-Einstein condensates

We study the competition between phase definition and quantum phase fluctuations in interference experiments between independently formed Bose condensates. While phase-sensitive detection of atoms makes the phase progressively better defined, interactions tend to randomize it faster as the uncertainty in the relative particle number grows. A steady state is reached when the two effects cancel each other. Then the phase resolution saturates to a value that grows with the ratio between the interaction strength and the atom detection rate, and the average phase and number begin to fluctuate classically. We discuss how our study applies to both recently performed and possible future experiments.Comment: 4 pages, 5 figure

Cosmological parameters from SDSS and WMAP

We measure cosmological parameters using the three-dimensional power spectrum P(k) from over 200,000 galaxies in the Sloan Digital Sky Survey (SDSS) in combination with WMAP and other data. Our results are consistent with a ``vanilla'' flat adiabatic Lambda-CDM model without tilt (n=1), running tilt, tensor modes or massive neutrinos. Adding SDSS information more than halves the WMAP-only error bars on some parameters, tightening 1 sigma constraints on the Hubble parameter from h~0.74+0.18-0.07 to h~0.70+0.04-0.03, on the matter density from Omega_m~0.25+/-0.10 to Omega_m~0.30+/-0.04 (1 sigma) and on neutrino masses from <11 eV to <0.6 eV (95%). SDSS helps even more when dropping prior assumptions about curvature, neutrinos, tensor modes and the equation of state. Our results are in substantial agreement with the joint analysis of WMAP and the 2dF Galaxy Redshift Survey, which is an impressive consistency check with independent redshift survey data and analysis techniques. In this paper, we place particular emphasis on clarifying the physical origin of the constraints, i.e., what we do and do not know when using different data sets and prior assumptions. For instance, dropping the assumption that space is perfectly flat, the WMAP-only constraint on the measured age of the Universe tightens from t0~16.3+2.3-1.8 Gyr to t0~14.1+1.0-0.9 Gyr by adding SDSS and SN Ia data. Including tensors, running tilt, neutrino mass and equation of state in the list of free parameters, many constraints are still quite weak, but future cosmological measurements from SDSS and other sources should allow these to be substantially tightened.Comment: Minor revisions to match accepted PRD version. SDSS data and ppt figures available at http://www.hep.upenn.edu/~max/sdsspars.htm

The chromatin accessibility landscape of primary human cancers

We present the genome-wide chromatin accessibility profiles of 410 tumor samples spanning 23 cancer types from The Cancer Genome Atlas (TCGA).We identify 562,709 transposase-accessible DNA elements that substantially extend the compendium of known cis-regulatory elements. Integration of ATAC-seq (the assay for transposase-accessible chromatin using sequencing) with TCGA multi-omic data identifies a large number of putative distal enhancers that distinguish molecular subtypes of cancers, uncovers specific driving transcription factors via protein-DNA footprints, and nominates long-range gene-regulatory interactions in cancer. These data reveal genetic risk loci of cancer predisposition as active DNA regulatory elements in cancer, identify gene-regulatory interactions underlying cancer immune evasion, and pinpoint noncoding mutations that drive enhancer activation and may affect patient survival. These results suggest a systematic approach to understanding the noncoding genome in cancer to advance diagnosis and therapy

Search for direct production of charginos and neutralinos in events with three leptons and missing transverse momentum in √s = 7 TeV pp collisions with the ATLAS detector

A search for the direct production of charginos and neutralinos in final states with three electrons or muons and missing transverse momentum is presented. The analysis is based on 4.7 fb−1 of proton–proton collision data delivered by the Large Hadron Collider and recorded with the ATLAS detector. Observations are consistent with Standard Model expectations in three signal regions that are either depleted or enriched in Z-boson decays. Upper limits at 95% confidence level are set in R-parity conserving phenomenological minimal supersymmetric models and in simplified models, significantly extending previous results

Technical summary

Human interference with the climate system is occurring. Climate change poses risks for human and natural systems. The assessment of impacts, adaptation, and vulnerability in the Working Group II contribution to the IPCC's Fifth Assessment Report (WGII AR5) evaluates how patterns of risks and potential benefits are shifting due to climate change and how risks can be reduced through mitigation and adaptation. It recognizes that risks of climate change will vary across regions and populations, through space and time, dependent on myriad factors including the extent of mitigation and adaptation

Jet size dependence of single jet suppression in lead-lead collisions at sqrt(s(NN)) = 2.76 TeV with the ATLAS detector at the LHC

Measurements of inclusive jet suppression in heavy ion collisions at the LHC provide direct sensitivity to the physics of jet quenching. In a sample of lead-lead collisions at sqrt(s) = 2.76 TeV corresponding to an integrated luminosity of approximately 7 inverse microbarns, ATLAS has measured jets with a calorimeter over the pseudorapidity interval |eta| < 2.1 and over the transverse momentum range 38 < pT < 210 GeV. Jets were reconstructed using the anti-kt algorithm with values for the distance parameter that determines the nominal jet radius of R = 0.2, 0.3, 0.4 and 0.5. The centrality dependence of the jet yield is characterized by the jet "central-to-peripheral ratio," Rcp. Jet production is found to be suppressed by approximately a factor of two in the 10% most central collisions relative to peripheral collisions. Rcp varies smoothly with centrality as characterized by the number of participating nucleons. The observed suppression is only weakly dependent on jet radius and transverse momentum. These results provide the first direct measurement of inclusive jet suppression in heavy ion collisions and complement previous measurements of dijet transverse energy imbalance at the LHC.Comment: 15 pages plus author list (30 pages total), 8 figures, 2 tables, submitted to Physics Letters B. All figures including auxiliary figures are available at http://atlas.web.cern.ch/Atlas/GROUPS/PHYSICS/PAPERS/HION-2011-02

Interferometry with independent Bose-Einstein ondensates: parity as an EPR/Bell quantum variable

When independent Bose-Einstein condensates (BEC), described quantum mechanically by Fock (number) states, are sent into interferometers, the measurement of the output port at which the particles are detected provides a binary measurement, with two possible results $\pm1$. With two interferometers and two BEC's, the parity (product of all results obtained at each interferometer) has all the features of an Einstein-Podolsky-Rosen quantity, with perfect correlations predicted by quantum mechanics when the settings (phase shifts of the interferometers) are the same. When they are different, significant violations of Bell inequalities are obtained. These violations do not tend to zero when the number $N$ of particles increases, and can therefore be obtained with arbitrarily large systems, but a condition is that all particles should be detected. We discuss the general experimental requirements for observing such effects, the necessary detection of all particles in correlation, the role of the pixels of the CCD detectors, and that of the alignments of the interferometers in terms of matching of the wave fronts of the sources in the detection regions. Another scheme involving three interferometers and three BEC's is discussed; it leads to Greenberger Horne Zeilinger (GHZ) sign contradictions, as in the usual GHZ case with three particles, but for an arbitrarily large number of them. Finally, generalizations of the Hardy impossibilities to an arbitrarily large number of particles are introduced. BEC's provide a large versality for observing violations of local realism in a variety of experimental arrangements.Comment: appendix adde