5 research outputs found
Dynamical and stationary critical behavior of the Ising ferromagnet in a thermal gradient
In this paper we present and discuss results of Monte Carlo numerical
simulations of the two-dimensional Ising ferromagnet in contact with a heat
bath that intrinsically has a thermal gradient. The extremes of the magnet are
at temperatures , where is the Onsager critical temperature.
In this way one can observe a phase transition between an ordered phase
() by means of a single simulation. By
starting the simulations with fully disordered initial configurations with
magnetization corresponding to , which are then suddenly
annealed to a preset thermal gradient, we study the short-time critical dynamic
behavior of the system. Also, by setting a small initial magnetization ,
we study the critical initial increase of the order parameter. Furthermore, by
starting the simulations from fully ordered configurations, which correspond to
the ground state at T=0 and are subsequently quenched to a preset gradient, we
study the critical relaxation dynamics of the system. Additionally, we perform
stationary measurements () that are discussed in terms of
the standard finite-size scaling theory. We conclude that our numerical
simulation results of the Ising magnet in a thermal gradient, which are
rationalized in terms of both dynamic and standard scaling arguments, are fully
consistent with well established results obtained under equilibrium conditions
X Chromosome Contribution to the Genetic Architecture of Primary Biliary Cholangitis.
BACKGROUND & AIMS: Genome-wide association studies in primary biliary cholangitis (PBC) have failed to find X chromosome (chrX) variants associated with the disease. Here, we specifically explore the chrX contribution to PBC, a sexually dimorphic complex autoimmune disease. METHODS: We performed a chrX-wide association study, including genotype data from 5 genome-wide association studies (from Italy, United Kingdom, Canada, China, and Japan; 5244 case patients and 11,875 control individuals). RESULTS: Single-marker association analyses found approximately 100 loci displaying P < 5 × 10(-4), with the most significant being a signal within the OTUD5 gene (rs3027490; P = 4.80 × 10(-6); odds ratio [OR], 1.39; 95% confidence interval [CI], 1.028-1.88; Japanese cohort). Although the transethnic meta-analysis evidenced only a suggestive signal (rs2239452, mapping within the PIM2 gene; OR, 1.17; 95% CI, 1.09-1.26; P = 9.93 × 10(-8)), the population-specific meta-analysis showed a genome-wide significant locus in East Asian individuals pointing to the same region (rs7059064, mapping within the GRIPAP1 gene; P = 6.2 × 10(-9); OR, 1.33; 95% CI, 1.21-1.46). Indeed, rs7059064 tags a unique linkage disequilibrium block including 7 genes: TIMM17B, PQBP1, PIM2, SLC35A2, OTUD5, KCND1, and GRIPAP1, as well as a superenhancer (GH0XJ048933 within OTUD5) targeting all these genes. GH0XJ048933 is also predicted to target FOXP3, the main T-regulatory cell lineage specification factor. Consistently, OTUD5 and FOXP3 RNA levels were up-regulated in PBC case patients (1.75- and 1.64-fold, respectively). CONCLUSIONS: This work represents the first comprehensive study, to our knowledge, of the chrX contribution to the genetics of an autoimmune liver disease and shows a novel PBC-related genome-wide significant locus.The article is available via Open Access. Click on the 'Additional link' above to access the full-text.Published version, accepted versio