1,036 research outputs found
GeV Majorana Neutrinos in Top-quark Decay at the LHC
We explore the \Delta L=2 same-sign dilepton signal from top-quark decay via
a Majorana neutrino at the LHC in the top anti-top pair production samples. The
signature is same-sign dilepton plus multi-jets with no significant missing
energy. The most optimistic region lies where the Majorana neutrino mass is
between 15-65 GeV. For 300 fb^-1 integrated luminosity, it is possible to probe
S_{ij}, the effective mixing parameter, to order of 10^-5.Comment: 15 pages, 8 figure
Identifying the cellular targets of drug action in the central nervous system following corticosteroid therapy
Corticosteroid (CS) therapy is used widely in the treatment of a range of pathologies, but can delay production of myelin, the insulating sheath around central nervous system nerve fibers. The cellular targets of CS action are not fully understood, that is, "direct" action on cells involved in myelin genesis [oligodendrocytes and their progenitors the oligodendrocyte precursor cells (OPCs)] versus "indirect" action on other neural cells. We evaluated the effects of the widely used CS dexamethasone (DEX) on purified OPCs and oligodendrocytes, employing complementary histological and transcriptional analyses. Histological assessments showed no DEX effects on OPC proliferation or oligodendrocyte genesis/maturation (key processes underpinning myelin genesis). Immunostaining and RT-PCR analyses show that both cell types express glucocorticoid receptor (GR; the target for DEX action), ruling out receptor expression as a causal factor in the lack of DEX-responsiveness. GRs function as ligand-activated transcription factors, so we simultaneously analyzed DEX-induced transcriptional responses using microarray analyses; these substantiated the histological findings, with limited gene expression changes in DEX-treated OPCs and oligodendrocytes. With identical treatment, microglial cells showed profound and global changes post-DEX addition; an unexpected finding was the identification of the transcription factor Olig1, a master regulator of myelination, as a DEX responsive gene in microglia. Our data indicate that CS-induced myelination delays are unlikely to be due to direct drug action on OPCs or oligodendrocytes, and may occur secondary to alterations in other neural cells, such as the immune component. To the best of our knowledge, this is the first comparative molecular and cellular analysis of CS effects in glial cells, to investigate the targets of this major class of anti-inflammatory drugs as a basis for myelination deficits
Linear Estimation of Location and Scale Parameters Using Partial Maxima
Consider an i.i.d. sample X^*_1,X^*_2,...,X^*_n from a location-scale family,
and assume that the only available observations consist of the partial maxima
(or minima)sequence, X^*_{1:1},X^*_{2:2},...,X^*_{n:n}, where
X^*_{j:j}=max{X^*_1,...,X^*_j}. This kind of truncation appears in several
circumstances, including best performances in athletics events. In the case of
partial maxima, the form of the BLUEs (best linear unbiased estimators) is
quite similar to the form of the well-known Lloyd's (1952, Least-squares
estimation of location and scale parameters using order statistics, Biometrika,
vol. 39, pp. 88-95) BLUEs, based on (the sufficient sample of) order
statistics, but, in contrast to the classical case, their consistency is no
longer obvious. The present paper is mainly concerned with the scale parameter,
showing that the variance of the partial maxima BLUE is at most of order
O(1/log n), for a wide class of distributions.Comment: This article is devoted to the memory of my six-years-old, little
daughter, Dionyssia, who leaved us on August 25, 2010, at Cephalonia isl. (26
pages, to appear in Metrika
Metal-Insulator Transition of Disordered Interacting Electrons
We calculate the corrections to the conductivity and compressibility of a
disordered metal when the mean free path is smaller than the screening length.
Such a condition is shown to be realized for low densities and large disorder.
Analysis of the stability of the metallic state reveals a transition to the
insulating state in two-dimensions.Comment: 11 pages, REVTEX, 1 figure included; Final versio
Theory of neutral and charged exciton scattering with electrons in semiconductor quantum wells
Electron scattering on both neutral () and charged () excitons in
quantum wells is studied theoretically. A microscopic model is presented,
taking into account both elastic and dissociating scattering. The model is
based on calculating the exciton-electron direct and exchange interaction
matrix elements, from which we derive the exciton scattering rates. We find
that for an electron density of in a GaAs QW at ,
the linewidth due to electron scattering is roughly twice as large as
that of the neutral exciton. This reflects both the larger interaction
matrix elements compared with those of , and their different dependence on
the transferred momentum. Calculated reflection spectra can then be obtained by
considering the three electronic excitations of the system, namely, the
heavy-hole and light-hole 1S neutral excitons, and the heavy-hole 1S charged
exciton, with the appropriate oscillator strengths.Comment: 18 pages, 12 figure
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