Study of J/Psi decays into eta Kstar Kstar-bar

We report the first observation of \mPJpsi \to \mPeta\mPKst\mAPKst decay in a \mPJpsi sample of 58 million events collected with the BESII detector. The branching fraction is determined to be $(1.15 \pm 0.13 \pm 0.22)\times 10^{-3}$. The selected signal event sample is further used to search for the \mPY resonance through \mPJpsi \to \mPeta \mPY, \mPY\to\mPKst\mAPKst. No evidence of a signal is seen. An upper limit of \mathrm{Br}(\mPJpsi \to \mPeta \mPY)\cdot\mathrm{Br}(\mPY\to\mPKst\mAPKst) < 2.52\times 10^{-4} is set at the 90% confidence level.Comment: 11 pages, 4 figure

Common variants in SOX-2 and congenital cataract genes contribute to age-related nuclear cataract

Nuclear cataract is the most common type of age-related cataract and a leading cause of blindness worldwide. Age-related nuclear cataract is heritable (h2 = 0.48), but little is known about specific genetic factors underlying this condition. Here we report findings from the largest to date multi-ethnic meta-analysis of genome-wide association studies (discovery cohort N = 14,151 and replication N = 5299) of the International Cataract Genetics Consortium. We confirmed the known genetic association of CRYAA (rs7278468, P = 2.8 × 10−16) with nuclear cataract and identified five new loci associated with this disease: SOX2-OT (rs9842371, P = 1.7 × 1

Effect of rolling ratios on the microstructural evolution and corrosion performance of an as-rolled Mg-8 wt.%Li alloy

In this work, the influence of rolling ratios on microstructural changes and corrosion behavior of an as-rolled Mg-8 wt.%Li alloy in 0.1 mol/L NaCl solution has been investigated. It revealed that with the rolling ratio being increased from 3 to 10, the α-Mg phases were elongated and fragmented, whilst the area fraction of exposed β-Li phases increased. Meanwhile, the corrosion performance of the alloy decreased with the increased rolling ratios. For all the samples, their corrosion processes were quite similar and can have two stages. At the initial stage with the samples being immersed for less than 6 h, the corrosion mainly occurred in β-Li phases. When the samples were immersed for longer than 6 h, the corrosion attack transferred to α-Mg phases and the hydrogen evolution rate was accelerated

A targeted complement-dependent strategy to improve the outcome of mAb therapy, and characterization in a murine model of metastatic cancer

Complement inhibitors expressed on tumor cells provide an evasion mechanism against mAb therapy and may modulate the development of an acquired antitumor immune response. Here we investigate a strategy to amplify mAb-targeted complement activation on a tumor cell, independent of a requirement to target and block complement inhibitor expression or function, which is difficult to achieve in vivo. We constructed a murine fusion protein, CR2Fc, and demonstrated that the protein targets to C3 activation products deposited on a tumor cell by a specific mAb, and amplifies mAb-dependent complement activation and tumor cell lysis in vitro. In syngeneic models of metastatic lymphoma (EL4) and melanoma (B16), CR2Fc significantly enhanced the outcome of mAb therapy. Subsequent studies using the EL4 model with various genetically modified mice and macrophage-depleted mice revealed that CR2Fc enhanced the therapeutic effect of mAb therapy via both macrophage-dependent FcγR-mediated antibody-dependent cellular cytotoxicity, and by direct complement-mediated lysis. Complement activation products can also modulate adaptive immunity, but we found no evidence that either mAb or CR2Fc treatment had any effect on an antitumor humoral or cellular immune response. CR2Fc represents a potential adjuvant treatment to increase the effectiveness of mAb therapy of cancer

Viscoelasticity of Cu- and La-based bulk metallic glasses: Interpretation based on the quasi-point defects theory

The dynamic mechanical relaxation of metallic glasses is closely associated with the physical and mechanical properties. In the current work, the dynamic mechanical relaxation behaviors of Cu46Zr45Al7Y2 and La65Al14(Cu5/6Ag1/6)11(Ni1/2Co1/2)10 bulk metallic glasses are investigated by mechanical spectroscopy. In general, metallic glasses display two relaxation modes: main () relaxation and the slow secondary () relaxation. The a relaxation is linked to the dynamic glass transition phenomenon and viscous flow while the slow relaxation is associated with many fundamental issues, such as diffusion and glass transition phenomenon. The experimental study shows La65Al14(Cu5/6Ag1/6)11(Ni1/2Co1/2)10 bulk metallic glass displays a noticeable slow relaxation. Contrarily, the Cu46Zr45Al7Y2 bulk metallic glass relaxation process takes the form of an “excess wing”. In the framework of quasi-point defects (QPD) theory, the dynamic mechanical response of the metallic glasses is discussed.Peer Reviewe