Novel handheld magnetometer probe based on magnetic tunnelling junction sensors for intraoperative sentinel lymph node identification

Using magnetic tunnelling junction sensors, a novel magnetometer probe for the identification of the sentinel lymph node using magnetic tracers was developed. Probe performance was characterised in vitro and validated in a preclinical swine model. Compared to conventional gamma probes, the magnetometer probe showed excellent spatial resolution of 4.0 mm, and the potential to detect as few as 5 μg of magnetic tracer. Due to the high sensitivity of the magnetometer, all first-tier nodes were identified in the preclinical experiments, and there were no instances of false positive or false negative detection. Furthermore, these preliminary data encourage the application of the magnetometer probe for use in more complex lymphatic environments, such as in gastrointestinal cancers, where the sentinel node is often in close proximity to other non-sentinel nodes, and high spatial resolution detection is required.A Cousins, G.L. Balalis, S.K. Thompson, D. Forero Morales, A. Mohtar, A.B. Wedding, B. Thierr

Analysis of the impact of broad absorption lines on quasar redshift measurements with synthetic observations

Accurate quasar classifications and redshift measurements are increasingly important to precision cosmology experiments. Broad absorption line (BAL) features are present in 15-20 per cent of all quasars, and these features can introduce systematic redshift errors, and in extreme cases produce misclassifications. We quantitatively investigate the impact of BAL features on quasar classifications and redshift measurements with synthetic spectra that were designed to match observations by the Dark Energy Spectroscopic Instrument (DESI) survey. Over the course of 5 yr, DESI aims to measure spectra for 40 million galaxies and quasars, including nearly three million quasars. Our synthetic quasar spectra match the signal-to-noise ratio and redshift distributions of the first year of DESI observations, and include the same synthetic quasar spectra both with and without BAL features. We demonstrate that masking the locations of the BAL features decreases the redshift errors by about 1 per cent and reduces the number of catastrophic redshift errors by about 80 per cent. We conclude that identifying and masking BAL troughs should be a standard part of the redshift determination step for DESI and other large-scale spectroscopic surveys of quasars

Sp1-regulated expression of p11 contributes to motor neuron degeneration by membrane insertion of TASK1

Disruption in membrane excitability contributes to malfunction and differential vulnerability of specific neuronal subpopulations in a number of neurological diseases. The adaptor protein p11, and background potassium channel TASK1, have overlapping distributions in the CNS. Here, we report that the transcription factor Sp1 controls p11 expression, which impacts on excitability by hampering functional expression of TASK1. In the SOD1-G93A mouse model of ALS, Sp1-p11-TASK1 dysregulation contributes to increased excitability and vulnerability of motor neurons. Interference with either Sp1 or p11 is neuroprotective, delaying neuron loss and prolonging lifespan in this model. Nitrosative stress, a potential factor in human neurodegeneration, stimulated Sp1 expression and human p11 promoter activity, at least in part, through a Sp1-binding site. Disruption of Sp1 or p11 also has neuroprotective effects in a traumatic model of motor neuron degeneration. Together our work suggests the Sp1-p11- TASK1 pathway is a potential target for treatment of degeneration of motor neurons

The Target-selection Pipeline for the Dark Energy Spectroscopic Instrument

In 2021 May, the Dark Energy Spectroscopic Instrument (DESI) began a 5 yr survey of approximately 50 million total extragalactic and Galactic targets. The primary DESI dark-time targets are emission line galaxies, luminous red galaxies, and quasars. In bright time, DESI will focus on two surveys known as the Bright Galaxy Survey and the Milky Way Survey. DESI also observes a selection of “secondary” targets for bespoke science goals. This paper gives an overview of the publicly available pipeline (desitarget) used to process targets for DESI observations. Highlights include details of the different DESI survey targeting phases, the targeting ID (TARGETID) used to define unique targets, the bitmasks used to indicate a particular type of target, the data model and structure of DESI targeting files, and examples of how to access and use the desitarget code base. This paper will also describe “supporting” DESI target classes, such as standard stars, sky locations, and random catalogs that mimic the angular selection function of DESI targets. The DESI target-selection pipeline is complex and sizable; this paper attempts to summarize the most salient information required to understand and work with DESI targeting data

Mock data sets for the Eboss and DESI Lyman-α\alpha forest surveys

{We present a publicly-available code to generate mock Lyman-$\alpha$ (\lya) forest data sets. The code is based on the Fluctuating Gunn-Peterson Approximation (FGPA) applied to Gaussian random fields and on the use of fast Fourier transforms (FFT). The output includes spectra of lya transmitted flux fraction, $F$, a quasar catalog, and a catalog of high-column-density systems. While these three elements have realistic correlations, additional code is then used to generate realistic quasar spectra, to add absorption by high-column-density systems and metals, and to simulate instrumental effects. Redshift space distortions (RSD) are implemented by including the large-scale velocity-gradient field in the FGPA resulting in a correlation function of $F$ that can be accurately predicted. One hundred realizations have been produced over the 14,000 deg$^2$ Dark Energy Spectroscopy Instrument (DESI) survey footprint with 100 quasars per deg$^{2}$, and they are being used for the Extended Baryon Oscillation Survey (eBOSS) and DESI surveys. The analysis of these realizations shows that the correlation of $F$ follows the prediction within the accuracy of eBOSS survey. The most time-consuming part of the production occurs before application of the FGPA, and the existing pre-FGPA forests can be used to easily produce new mock sets with modified redshift-dependent bias parameters or observational conditions.Comment: to be submitted ot JCA

Dendritic Cells Take up and Present Antigens from Viable and Apoptotic Polymorphonuclear Leukocytes

Dendritic cells (DC) are endowed with the ability to cross-present antigens from other cell types to cognate T cells. DC are poised to meet polymorphonuclear leukocytes (PMNs) as a result of being co-attracted by interleukin-8 (IL-8), for instance as produced by tumor cells or infected tissue. Human monocyte-derived and mouse bone marrow-derived DC can readily internalize viable or UV-irradiated PMNs. Such internalization was abrogated at 4°C and partly inhibited by anti-CD18 mAb. In mice, DC which had internalized PMNs containing electroporated ovalbumin (OVA) protein, were able to cross-present the antigen to CD8 (OT-1) and CD4 (OT-2) TCR-transgenic T cells. Moreover, in humans, tumor cell debris is internalized by PMNs and the tumor-cell material can be subsequently taken up from the immunomagnetically re-isolated PMNs by DC. Importantly, if human neutrophils had endocytosed bacteria, they were able to trigger the maturation program of the DC. Moreover, when mouse PMNs with E. coli in their interior are co-injected in the foot pad with DC, many DC loaded with fluorescent material from the PMNs reach draining lymph nodes. Using CT26 (H-2d) mouse tumor cells, it was observed that if tumor cells are intracellularly loaded with OVA protein and UV-irradiated, they become phagocytic prey of H-2d PMNs. If such PMNs, that cannot present antigens to OT-1 T cells, are immunomagnetically re-isolated and phagocytosed by H-2b DC, such DC productively cross-present OVA antigen determinants to OT-1 T cells. Cross-presentation to adoptively transferred OT-1 lymphocytes at draining lymph nodes also take place when OVA-loaded PMNs (H-2d) are coinjected in the footpad of mice with autologous DC (H-2b). In summary, our results indicate that antigens phagocytosed by short-lived PMNs can be in turn internalized and productively cross-presented by DC

3D Correlations in the Lyman-α\alpha Forest from Early DESI Data

We present the first measurements of Lyman-$\alpha$ (Ly$\alpha$) forest correlations using early data from the Dark Energy Spectroscopic Instrument (DESI). We measure the auto-correlation of Ly$\alpha$ absorption using 88,509 quasars at $z>2$, and its cross-correlation with quasars using a further 147,899 tracer quasars at $z\gtrsim1.77$. Then, we fit these correlations using a 13-parameter model based on linear perturbation theory and find that it provides a good description of the data across a broad range of scales. We detect the BAO peak with a signal-to-noise ratio of $3.8\sigma$, and show that our measurements of the auto- and cross-correlations are fully-consistent with previous measurements by the Extended Baryon Oscillation Spectroscopic Survey (eBOSS). Even though we only use here a small fraction of the final DESI dataset, our uncertainties are only a factor of 1.7 larger than those from the final eBOSS measurement. We validate the existing analysis methods of Ly$\alpha$ correlations in preparation for making a robust measurement of the BAO scale with the first year of DESI data

The Dark Energy Spectroscopic Instrument: one-dimensional power spectrum from first Ly α forest samples with Fast Fourier Transform

We present the one-dimensional Ly α forest power spectrum measurement using the first data provided by the Dark Energy Spectroscopic Instrument (DESI). The data sample comprises 26 330 quasar spectra, at redshift z > 2.1, contained in the DESI Early Data Release and the first 2 months of the main survey. We employ a Fast Fourier Transform (FFT) estimator and compare the resulting power spectrum to an alternative likelihood-based method in a companion paper. We investigate methodological and instrumental contaminants associated with the new DESI instrument, applying techniques similar to previous Sloan Digital Sky Survey (SDSS) measurements. We use synthetic data based on lognormal approximation to validate and correct our measurement. We compare our resulting power spectrum with previous SDSS and high-resolution measurements. With relatively small number statistics, we successfully perform the FFT measurement, which is already competitive in terms of the scale range. At the end of the DESI survey, we expect a five times larger Ly α forest sample than SDSS, providing an unprecedented precise one-dimensional power spectrum measurement

The Lyman-α\alpha forest catalog from the Dark Energy Spectroscopic Instrument Early Data Release

We present and validate the catalog of Lyman-$\alpha$ forest fluctuations for 3D analyses using the Early Data Release (EDR) from the Dark Energy Spectroscopic Instrument (DESI) survey. We used 96,317 quasars collected from DESI Survey Validation (SV) data and the first two months of the main survey (M2). We present several improvements to the method used to extract the Lyman-$\alpha$ absorption fluctuations performed in previous analyses from the Sloan Digital Sky Survey (SDSS). In particular, we modify the weighting scheme and show that it can improve the precision of the correlation function measurement by more than 20%. This catalog can be downloaded from https://data.desi.lbl.gov/public/edr/vac/edr/lya/fuji/v0.3 and it will be used in the near future for the first DESI measurements of the 3D correlations in the Lyman-$\alpha$ forest

Low exposure long-baseline neutrino oscillation sensitivity of the DUNE experiment

The Deep Underground Neutrino Experiment (DUNE) will produce world-leading neutrino oscillation measurements over the lifetime of the experiment. In this work, we explore DUNE's sensitivity to observe charge-parity violation (CPV) in the neutrino sector, and to resolve the mass ordering, for exposures of up to 100 kiloton-megawatt-years (kt-MW-yr). The analysis includes detailed uncertainties on the flux prediction, the neutrino interaction model, and detector effects. We demonstrate that DUNE will be able to unambiguously resolve the neutrino mass ordering at a 3$\sigma$ (5$\sigma$) level, with a 66 (100) kt-MW-yr far detector exposure, and has the ability to make strong statements at significantly shorter exposures depending on the true value of other oscillation parameters. We also show that DUNE has the potential to make a robust measurement of CPV at a 3$\sigma$ level with a 100 kt-MW-yr exposure for the maximally CP-violating values \delta_{\rm CP}} = \pm\pi/2. Additionally, the dependence of DUNE's sensitivity on the exposure taken in neutrino-enhanced and antineutrino-enhanced running is discussed. An equal fraction of exposure taken in each beam mode is found to be close to optimal when considered over the entire space of interest