Outpatient alcohol detoxification: Implementation efficacy and outcome effectiveness of a model project

Background: The aim of the study was to examine the practicability and implementation efficacy of an alcohol outpatient detoxification model and the concomitant `motivational' psychotherapeutic approach. Method: This was an open prospective study to examine the implementation efficacy, practicability and medical safety of a novel psychotherapy-based, integrated outpatient detoxification model in alcohol-dependent patients. Patients were carefully screened for relevant neuropsychiatric disorders and other exclusion criteria and then seen on a daily outpatient basis for 5 - 7 days. Patients received psychotropic or other medication, if necessary (CIWA-A score >16). Beside management of withdrawal symptoms, psychotherapeutic interventions were conducted to motivate the patient for further alcohol therapy. Results: Of 557 patients screened 331 entered the program. For medical reasons 226 patients had to be admitted for inpatient detoxification, 122 patients in a special alcohol unit, 101 patients in a general hospital. 198 (60%) of the outpatients received psychotropic medication during treatment. 312 (94%) of these patients successfully completed treatment. 301 (91% of the initial sample) patients entered a consecutive 3-month motivational phase of a two-phase alcohol treatment program. 139 (46%) patients successfully completed the 1-year consecutive outpatient treatment. Conclusions: Outpatient detoxification, at least in a highly structured frame, can be considered as a safe and efficient therapeutic approach. The data of this study also indicate that psychotherapeutic interventions and motivation for further abstinence and treatment may work in alcohol-dependent patients on an outpatient basis. Further controlled trials are necessary to compare the effects of outpatient versus inpatient withdrawal. Copyright (C) 2004 S. Karger AG, Basel

Of NBOs and kHz QPOs: a low-frequency modulation in resonant oscillations of relativistic accretion disks

The origin of quasi periodic modulations of flux in the kilohertz range (kHz QPOs), observed in low-mass X-ray binaries, is usually assumed to be physically distinct from that of the ``normal branch oscillations'' (NBOs) in the Z-sources. We show that a low-frequency modulation of the kHz QPOs is a natural consequence of the non-linear relativistic resonance suggested previously to explain the properties of the high-frequency twin peaks. The theoretical results discussed here are reminiscent of the 6 Hz variations of frequency and amplitude of the kHz QPOs reported by Yu, van der Klis and Jonker (2001).Comment: Accepted for publication in PASJ; 4 pages, 1 figur

Novel Fiber Design for Wideband Conversion and Amplification in Multimode Fibers

We propose an operating principle to achieve broadband and highly tunable mode conversion and amplification exploiting inter-modal four wave mixing in a multimode fiber. A bandwidth of 30 nanometers is demonstrated by properly designing a simple step-index silica fiber.Comment: Ecoc conference 201

Catalysis of Charcoal Emissions

This paper is about the development of a system to reduce the emissions of charcoal kilns with the catalyst from automotive catalytic converters. This device, called the charcoal kiln emissions oxidizer (CKEO), was designed and fabricated to meet the goal of a cost effective means to reduce the carbon monoxide and hydrocarbon emissions from charcoal kilns. Testing of the CKEO was never carried out as a test site could not be secured by this writing. The need for the CKEO, the theory behind it, and a procedure to test it are presented

Epicyclic oscillations of fluid bodies Paper II. Strong gravity

Fluids in external gravity may oscillate with frequencies characteristic of the epicyclic motions of test particles. We explicitly demonstrate that global oscillations of a slender, perfect fluid torus around a Kerr black hole admit incompressible vertical and radial epicyclic modes. Our results may be directly relevant to one of the most puzzling astrophysical phenomena -- high (hundreds of hertz) frequency quasiperiodic oscillations (QPOs) detected in X-ray fluxes from several black hole sources. Such QPOs are pairs of stable frequencies in the 3/2 ratio. It seems that they originate a few gravitational radii away from the black hole and thus observations of them have the potential to become an accurate probe of super-strong gravity.Comment: submitted to Classical and Quantum Gravit

Delocalization induced by low-frequency driving in disordered superlattices

We study the localization properties of disordered semiconductor superlattices driven by ac-fields. The localization length of the electrons in the superlattice increases when the frequency of the driving field is smaller than the miniband width. We show that there is an optimal value of the amplitude of the driving field for which the localization length of the system is maximal. This maximum localization length increases with the inverse of the driving frequency.Comment: 5 pages, 4 figure

Fast and broadband fiber dispersion measurement with dense wavelength sampling

We report on a method to obtain dispersion measurements from spectral-domain low-coherence interferograms which enables high accuracy (~ps/(nm·km)), broadband measurements and the determination of very dense (up to 20 points/nm over 500 nm) data sets for both dispersion and dispersion slope. The method exploits a novel phase extraction algorithm which allows the phase associated with each sampling point of the interferogram to be calculated and provides for very accurate results as well as a fast measurement capability, enabling close to real time measurements. The important issue of mitigating the measurement errors due to any residual dispersion of optical elements and to environmental fluctuations was also addressed. We performed systematic measurements on standard fibers which illustrate the accuracy and precision of the technique, and we demonstrated its general applicability to challenging problems by measuring a carefully selected set of microstructured fibers: a lead silicate W-type fiber with a flat, near-zero dispersion profile; a hollow core photonic bandgap fiber with strongly wavelength dependent dispersion and dispersion slope; a small core, highly birefringent index guiding microstructured fiber, for which polarization resolved measurements over an exceptionally wide (~1000 nm) wavelength interval were obtained