Fundamental and clinical evaluation of "SCC RIABEAD" kit for immuno radiometric assay of squamous cell carcinoma related antigen.

Classic vector control strategies target mosquitoes indoors as the main transmitters of malaria are indoor-biting and –resting mosquitoes. However, the intensive use of insecticide-treated bed-nets (ITNs) and indoor residual spraying have put selective pressure on mosquitoes to adapt in order to obtain human blood meals. Thus, early-evening and outdoor vector activity is becoming an increasing concern. This study assessed the effect of a deltamethrin-treated net (100 mg/m2) attached to a one-meter high fence around outdoor cattle enclosures on the number of mosquitoes landing on humans. Mosquitoes were collected from four cattle enclosures: Pen A – with cattle and no net; B – with cattle and protected by an untreated net; C – with cattle and protected by a deltamethrin-treated net; D – no cattle and no net. A total of 3217 culicines and 1017 anophelines were collected, of which 388 were Anopheles gambiae and 629 An. ziemanni. In the absence of cattle nearly 3 times more An. gambiae (p<0.0001) landed on humans. The deltamethrin-treated net significantly reduced (nearly three-fold, p<0.0001) culicine landings inside enclosures. The sporozoite rate of the zoophilic An. ziemanni, known to be a secondary malaria vector, was as high as that of the most competent vector An. gambiae; raising the potential of zoophilic species as secondary malaria vectors. After deployment of the ITNs a deltamethrin persistence of 9 months was observed despite exposure to African weather conditions. The outdoor use of ITNs resulted in a significant reduction of host-seeking culicines inside enclosures. Further studies investigating the effectiveness and spatial repellence of ITNs around other outdoor sites, such as bars and cooking areas, as well as their direct effect on vector-borne disease transmission are needed to evaluate its potential as an appropriate outdoor vector control tool for rural Africa

Bottom-Up Approach to Moduli Dynamics in Heavy Gravitino Scenario : Superpotential, Soft Terms and Sparticle Mass Spectrum

The physics of moduli fields is examined in the scenario where the gravitino is relatively heavy with mass of order 10 TeV, which is favored in view of the severe gravitino problem. The form of the moduli superpotential is shown to be determined, if one imposes a phenomenological requirement that no physical CP phase arise in gaugino masses from conformal anomaly mediation. This bottom-up approach allows only two types of superpotential, each of which can have its origins in a fundamental underlying theory such as superstring. One superpotential is the sum of an exponential and a constant, which is identical to that obtained by Kachru et al (KKLT), and the other is the racetrack superpotential with two exponentials. The general form of soft supersymmetry breaking masses is derived, and the pattern of the superparticle mass spectrum in the minimal supersymmetric standard model is discussed with the KKLT-type superpotential. It is shown that the moduli mediation and the anomaly mediation make comparable contributions to the soft masses. At the weak scale, the gaugino masses are rather degenerate compared to the minimal supergravity, which bring characteristic features on the superparticle masses. In particular, the lightest neutralino, which often constitutes the lightest superparticle and thus a dark matter candidate, is a considerable admixture of gauginos and higgsinos. We also find a small mass hierarchy among the moduli, gravitino, and superpartners of the standard-model fields. Cosmological implications of the scenario are briefly described.Comment: 45 pages, 10 figures, typos correcte

Commensurability oscillations in the rf conductivity of unidirectional lateral superlattices: measurement of anisotropic conductivity by coplanar waveguide

We have measured the rf magnetoconductivity of unidirectional lateral superlattices (ULSLs) by detecting the attenuation of microwave through a coplanar waveguide placed on the surface. ULSL samples with the principal axis of the modulation perpendicular (S_perp) and parallel (S_||) to the microwave electric field are examined. For low microwave power, we observe expected anisotropic behavior of the commensurability oscillations (CO), with CO in samples S_perp and S_|| dominated by the diffusion and the collisional contributions, respectively. Amplitude modulation of the Shubnikov-de Haas oscillations is observed to be more prominent in sample S_||. The difference between the two samples is washed out with the increase of the microwave power, letting the diffusion contribution govern the CO in both samples. The failure of the intended directional selectivity in the conductivity measured with high microwave power is interpreted in terms of large-angle electron-phonon scattering.Comment: 8 pages, 5 figure

Effect of Oscillating Landau Bandwidth on the Integer Quantum Hall Effect in a Unidirectional Lateral Superlattice

We have measured activation gaps for odd-integer quantum Hall states in a unidirectional lateral superlattice (ULSL) -- a two-dimensional electron gas (2DEG) subjected to a unidirectional periodic modulation of the electrostatic potential. By comparing the activation gaps with those simultaneously measured in the adjacent section of the same 2DEG sample without modulation, we find that the gaps are reduced in the ULSL by an amount corresponding to the width acquired by the Landau levels through the introduction of the modulation. The decrement of the activation gap varies with the magnetic field following the variation of the Landau bandwidth due to the commensurability effect. Notably, the decrement vanishes at the flat band conditions.Comment: 7 pages, 6 figures, minor revisio

Pre-meeting support views based on SISCO model

This report presents and compares three different approaches on the implementation of a pre-meeting support sstem. The prototypes described here were developed by three independent teams, two from Brazil and one from Chile. SISCO-Recife and SISCO-Rio are the Brazilian prototypes and USISCO is Chilean. The development of the three prototypes was based on the same SISCO discussion model. SISCO has as its main goal the enhancemnt of meetings productivity through previous discussion. The developed prototypes support asynchronous collaboration, as a preparation for a face-to-face meeting

Excitonic Correlations in the Intermetallic Fe2VAl

The intermetallic compound Fe2VAl looks non-metallic in transport and strongly metallic in thermodynamic and photoemission data. It has in its band structure a highly differentiated set of valence and conduction bands leading to a semimetallic system with a very low density of carriers. The pseudogap itself is due to interaction of Al states with the d orbitals of Fe and V, but the resulting carriers have little Al character. The effects of generalized gradient corrections to the local density band structure as well spin-orbit coupling are shown to be significant, reducing the carrier density by a factor of three. Doping of this nonmagnetic compound by 0.5 electrons per cell in a virtual crystal fashion results in a moment of 0.5 bohr magnetons and destroys the pseudogap. We assess the tendencies toward formation of an excitonic condensate and toward an excitonic Wigner crystal, and find both to be unlikely. We propose a model is which the observed properties result from excitonic correlations arising from two interpenetrating lattices of distinctive electrons (e_g on V) and holes (t_2g on Fe) of low density (one carrier of each sign per 350 formula units).Comment: 8 2-column pages, 8 postscript figure

Modulation Induced Phase Transition from Fractional Quantum Hall to Stripe State at nu=5/3

We have investigated the effect of unidirectional periodic potential modulation on the fractional quantum Hall (FQH) state at filling factors nu=5/3 and 4/3. For large enough modulation amplitude, we find that the resistivity minimum at nu=5/3 gives way to a peak that grows with decreasing temperature. Density matrix renormalization group calculation reveals that phase transition from FQH state to unidirectional striped state having a period sim 4 l (with l the magnetic length) takes place at nu=1/3 (equivalent to nu=5/3 by the particle-hole symmetry) with the increase of the modulation amplitude, suggesting that the observed peak is the manifestation of the stripe phase.Comment: 4 pages, 6 figures; minor revisio

Fabrication of aligned carbon nanotube-filled rubber composite

ArticleScripta Materialia. 54(1):31-35 (2006)journal articl

Timing and spectral studies of the transient X-ray pulsar EXO 053109-6609.2 with ASCA and Beppo-SAX

We report timing and spectral properties of the transient Be X-ray pulsar EXO 053109--6609.2 studied using observations made with the ASCA and BeppoSAX observatories. Though there must have been at least one spin-down episode of the pulsar since its discovery, the new pulse period measurements show a monotonic spin-up trend since 1996. The pulse profile is found to have marginal energy dependence. There is also evidence for strong luminosity dependence of the pulse profile, a single peaked profile at low luminosity that changes to a double peaked profile at high luminosity. This suggests a change in the accretion pattern at certain luminosity level. The X-ray spectrum is found to consist of a simple power-law with photon index in the range of 0.4--0.8. At high intensity level the spectrum also shows presence of weak iron emission line.Comment: 12 pages, 8 figures, Accepted for publication in Ap

Efficient and highly selective boron-doped carbon materials-catalyzed reduction of nitroarenes

Exploring the potential catalytic applications of boron-doped carbon materials is a fascinating challenge. Here we describe that boron-doped onion-like carbon and carbon nanotubes as metal-free catalysts exhibit excellent catalytic activity and stability in nitroarene reduction under a stoichiometric amount of reductant