Approximate treatment of electron Coulomb distortion in quasielastic (e,e') reactions

In this paper we address the adequacy of various approximate methods of including Coulomb distortion effects in (e,e') reactions by comparing to an exact treatment using Dirac-Coulomb distorted waves. In particular, we examine approximate methods and analyses of (e,e') reactions developed by Traini et al. using a high energy approximation of the distorted waves and phase shifts due to Lenz and Rosenfelder. This approximation has been used in the separation of longitudinal and transverse structure functions in a number of (e,e') experiments including the newly published 208Pb(e,e') data from Saclay. We find that the assumptions used by Traini and others are not valid for typical (e,e') experiments on medium and heavy nuclei, and hence the extracted structure functions based on this formalism are not reliable. We describe an improved approximation which is also based on the high energy approximation of Lenz and Rosenfelder and the analyses of Knoll and compare our results to the Saclay data. At each step of our analyses we compare our approximate results to the exact distorted wave results and can therefore quantify the errors made by our approximations. We find that for light nuclei, we can get an excellent treatment of Coulomb distortion effects on (e,e') reactions just by using a good approximation to the distorted waves, but for medium and heavy nuclei simple additional ad hoc factors need to be included. We describe an explicit procedure for using our approximate analyses to extract so-called longitudinal and transverse structure functions from (e,e') reactions in the quasielastic region.Comment: 30 pages, 8 figures, 16 reference

The Fornax Spectroscopic Survey I. Survey Strategy and Preliminary Results on the Redshift Distribution of a Complete Sample of Stars and Galaxies

The Fornax Spectroscopic Survey will use the Two degree Field spectrograph (2dF) of the Anglo-Australian Telescope to obtain spectra for a complete sample of all 14000 objects with 16.5<=Bj<=19.7 in a 12 square degree area centred on the Fornax Cluster. By selecting all objects---both stars and galaxies---independent of morphology, we cover a much larger range of surface brightness and scale size than previous surveys. In this paper we present results from the first 2dF field. Redshift distributions and velocity structures are shown for all observed objects in the direction of Fornax, including Galactic stars, galaxies in and around the Fornax Cluster, and for the background galaxy population. The velocity data for the stars show the contributions from the different Galactic components, plus a small tail to high velocities. We find no galaxies in the foreground to the cluster in our 2dF field. The Fornax Cluster is clearly defined kinematically. The mean velocity from the 26 cluster members having reliable redshifts is 1560+/-80 km/s. They show a velocity dispersion of 380+/-50 km/s. Large-scale structure can be traced behind the cluster to a redshift beyond z=0.3. Background compact galaxies and low surface brightness galaxies are found to follow the general galaxy distribution.Comment: LaTeX format; uses aa.cls (included). Accepted for publication in Astronomy and Astrophysic

Preliminary effectiveness of a smartphone app to reduce depressive symptoms in the workplace: feasibility and acceptability study

© Mark Deady, David Johnston, David Milne, Nick Glozier, Dorian Peters, Rafael Calvo, Samuel Harvey. Background: The workplace represents a unique setting for mental health interventions. Due to range of job-related factors, employees in male-dominated industries are at an elevated risk. However, these at-risk groups are often overlooked. HeadGear is a smartphone app–based intervention designed to reduce depressive symptoms and increase well-being in these populations. Objective: This paper presents the development and pilot testing of the app’s usability, acceptability, feasibility, and preliminary effectiveness. Methods: The development process took place from January 2016 to August 2017. Participants for prototype testing (n=21; stage 1) were recruited from industry partner organizations to assess acceptability and utility. A 5-week effectiveness and feasibility pilot study (n=84; stage 2) was then undertaken, utilizing social media recruitment. Demographic data, acceptability and utility questionnaires, depression (Patient Health Questionnaire-9), and other mental health measures were collected. Results: The majority of respondents felt HeadGear was easy to use (92%), easily understood (92%), were satisfied with the app (67%), and would recommend it to a friend (75%; stage 1). Stage 2 found that compared with baseline, depression and anxiety symptoms were significantly lower at follow-up (t30=2.53; P=.02 and t30=2.18; P=.04, respectively), days of sick leave in past month (t28=2.38; P=.02), and higher self-reported job performance (t28=−2.09; P=.046; stage 2). Over 90% of respondents claimed it helped improve their mental fitness, and user feedback was again positive. Attrition was high across the stages. Conclusions: Overall, HeadGear was well received, and preliminary findings indicate it may provide an innovative new platform for improving mental health outcomes. Unfortunately, attrition was a significant issue, and findings should be interpreted with caution. The next stage of evaluation will be a randomized controlled trial. If found to be efficacious, the app has the potential to reduce disease burden and improve health in this at-risk group

Inelastic nucleon contributions in (e,e′)(e,e^\prime) nuclear response functions

We estimate the contribution of inelastic nucleon excitations to the $(e,e^\prime)$ inclusive cross section in the CEBAF kinematic range. Calculations are based upon parameterizations of the nucleon structure functions measured at SLAC. Nuclear binding effects are included in a vector-scalar field theory, and are assumed have a minimal effect on the nucleon excitation spectrum. We find that for q\lsim 1 GeV the elastic and inelastic nucleon contributions to the nuclear response functions are comparable, and can be separated, but with roughly a factor of two uncertainty in the latter from the extrapolation from data. In contrast, for q\rsim 2 GeV this uncertainty is greatly reduced but the elastic nucleon contribution is heavily dominated by the inelastic nucleon background.Comment: 20 pages, 7 figures available from the authors at Department of Physics and Astronomy, University of Rochester, Rochester NY 1462

Eikonal analysis of Coulomb distortion in quasi-elastic electron scattering

An eikonal expansion is used to provide systematic corrections to the eikonal approximation through order $1/k^2$, where $k$ is the wave number. Electron wave functions are obtained for the Dirac equation with a Coulomb potential. They are used to investigate distorted-wave matrix elements for quasi-elastic electron scattering from a nucleus. A form of effective-momentum approximation is obtained using trajectory-dependent eikonal phases and focusing factors. Fixing the Coulomb distortion effects at the center of the nucleus, the often-used ema approximation is recovered. Comparisons of these approximations are made with full calculations using the electron eikonal wave functions. The ema results are found to agree well with the full calculations.Comment: 12 pages, 6 Postscript figure

The magnitude and characteristics of the population of cancer survivors: Using populationbased estimates of cancer prevalence to inform service planning for survivorship care

© 2014 Sharp et al. Background: Rising cancer incidence and survival mean that the number of cancer survivors is growing. Accumulating evidence suggests many survivors have long-term medical and supportive care needs, and that these needs vary by survivors' socio-demographic and clinical characteristics. To illustrate how cancer registry data may be useful in survivorship care service planning, we generated population-based estimates of cancer prevalence in Ireland and described socio-demographic and clinical characteristics of the survivor population. Methods: Details of people diagnosed with invasive cancer (ICD10 C00-C96) during 1994-2011, and who were still alive on 31/12/2011, were abstracted from the National Cancer Registry, and tabulated by cancer site, sex, current age, marital status, initial treatment, and time since diagnosis. Associations were investigated using chi-square tests. Results: After excluding non-melanoma skin cancers, 17-year cancer prevalence in Ireland was 112,610 (females: 58,054 (52%) males: 54,556 (48%)). The four most prevalent cancers among females were breast (26,066), colorectum (6,598), melanoma (4,593) and uterus (3,505) and among males were prostate (23,966), colorectum (8,207), lymphoma (3,236) and melanoma (2,774). At the end of 2011, 39% of female survivors were aged <60 and 35% were ≥70 compared to 25% and 46% of males (p < 0.001). More than half of survivors of bladder, colorectal and prostate cancer were ≥70. Cancers with the highest percentages of younger (<40) survivors were: testis (50%); leukaemia (females: 28%; males: 22%); cervix (20%); and lymphoma (females: 19%; males: 20%). Fewer female (57%) than male (64%) survivors were married but the percentage single was similar (17-18%). More female (25%) than male survivors (18%; p < 0.001) were ≥10 years from diagnosis. Overall, 69% of survivors had undergone cancer-directed surgery, and 39%, 32% and 18% had received radiotherapy, chemotherapy and hormone therapy, respectively. These frequencies were higher among females than males (surgery: 82%, 54%; radiotherapy: 42%, 35%; chemotherapy: 40%, 22%; hormone therapy: 23%, 13%). Conclusions: These results reveal the socio-demographic and clinical heterogeneity of the survivor population, and highlight groups which may have specific medical and supportive care needs. These types of population-based estimates may help decision-makers, planners and service providers to develop follow-up and after-care services to effectively meet survivors' needs

Extended Superscaling of Electron Scattering from Nuclei

An extended study of scaling of the first and second kinds for inclusive electron scattering from nuclei is presented. Emphasis is placed on the transverse response in the kinematic region lying above the quasielastic peak. In particular, for the region in which electroproduction of resonances is expected to be important, approximate scaling of the second kind is observed and the modest breaking of it is shown probably to be due to the role played by an inelastic version of the usual scaling variable.Comment: LaTeX, 36 pages including 5 color postscript figures and 4 postscript figure

2MASS Galaxies in the Fornax Cluster Spectroscopic Survey

The Fornax Cluster Spectroscopic Survey (FCSS) is an all-object survey of a region around the Fornax Cluster of galaxies undertaken using the 2dF multi-object spectrograph on the Anglo-Australian Telescope. Its aim was to obtain spectra for a complete sample of all objects with 16.5 < b_j < 19.7 irrespective of their morphology (i.e. including `stars', `galaxies' and `merged' images). We explore the extent to which (nearby) cluster galaxies are present in 2MASS. We consider the reasons for the omission of 2MASS galaxies from the FCSS and vice versa. We consider the intersection (2.9 square degrees on the sky) of our data set with the infra-red 2 Micron All-Sky Survey (2MASS), using both the 2MASS Extended Source Catalogue (XSC) and the Point Source Catalogue (PSC). We match all the XSC objects to FCSS counterparts by position and also extract a sample of galaxies, selected by their FCSS redshifts, from the PSC. We confirm that all 114 XSC objects in the overlap sample are galaxies, on the basis of their FCSS velocities. A total of 23 Fornax Cluster galaxies appear in the matched data, while, as expected, the remainder of the sample lie at redshifts out to z = 0.2 (the spectra show that 61% are early type galaxies, 18% are intermediate types and 21% are strongly star forming).The PSC sample turns out to contain twice as many galaxies as does the XSC. However, only one of these 225 galaxies is a (dwarf) cluster member. On the other hand, galaxies which are unresolved in the 2MASS data (though almost all are resolved in the optical) amount to 71% of the non-cluster galaxies with 2MASS detections and have redshifts out to z=0.32.Comment: 5 pages, accepted by A&A, resubmitted due to missing reference

Sex-Role Orientation in Men Is Related to Salivary Testosterone Levels

Previous research has implicated the involvement of androgens in sex-role orientation in males, from studies of 2 nd to 4 th digit ratio (a purported marker of prenatal testosterone). The present pilot study investigates the relationship between salivary testosterone levels and sex-role orientation using Bem Sex Role Inventory (BSRI) scores in adult males. Twenty-one males (aged 18 -24) completed the BSRI and provided saliva samples for assay. BSRI Femininity scores were significantly negatively correlated with testosterone levels; the higher the Femininity scores, the lower the testos-terone levels. There was no relation of BSRI Masculinity scores with testosterone levels. Our preliminary results add to the research suggesting that sex-role orientation in males may be partially related to underlying hormone levels