Influence of infection on the distribution patterns of NIH-Chronic Prostatitis Symptom Index scores in patients with chronic prostatitis/chronic pelvic pain syndrome (CP/CPPS)

Chronic prostatitis/chronic pelvic pain syndrome (CP/CPPS) is a complex condition for which the etiological determinants are still poorly defined. To better characterize the diagnostic and therapeutic profile of patients, an algorithm known as UPOINT was created, addressing six major phenotypic domains of CP/CPPS, specifically the urinary (U), psycho-social (P), organ-specific (O), infection (I), neurological/systemic (N) and muscular tenderness (T) domains. An additional sexual dysfunction domain may be included in the UPOINT(S) system. The impact of the infection domain on the severity of CP/CPPS symptoms is a controversial issue, due to the contradictory results of different trials. The aim of the present retrospective study was to further analyze the extent to which a positive infection domain of UPOINTS may modify the pattern of CP/CPPS symptom scores, assessed with the National Institutes of Health-Chronic Prostatitis Symptom Index (NIH-CPSI). In a cohort of 935 patients that was divided on the basis of the presence or absence of prostatic infection, more severe clinical symptoms were shown by the patients with infection (median NIH total score: 24 versus 20 points in uninfected patients; P<0.001). Moreover, NIH-CPSI score distribution curves were shifted towards more severe symptoms in patients with a positive infection domain. Division of the patients into the six most prominent phenotypic clusters of UPOINTS revealed that the 'prostate infection-related sexual dysfunction' cluster, including the highest proportion of patients with evidence of infection (80%), scored the highest number of NIH-CPSI points among all the clusters. To assess the influence of the infection domain on the severity of patients' symptoms, all subjects with evidence of infection were withdrawn from the 'prostate infection-related sexual dysfunction' cluster. This modified cluster showed symptom scores significantly less severe than the original cluster, and the CPSI values became comparable to the scores of the five other clusters, which were virtually devoid of patients with evidence of infection. These results suggest that the presence of pathogens in the prostate gland may significantly affect the clinical presentation of patients affected by CP/CPPS, and that the infection domain may be a determinant of the severity of CP/CPPS symptoms in clusters of patients phenotyped with the UPOINTS system. This evidence may convey considerable therapeutic implications

Cooper pair formation in trapped atomic Fermi gases

We apply the closed time-path formalism to evaluate the dynamics of the BCS transition to the superfluid state in trapped atomic $^6$Li. We find that the Fokker-Planck equation for the probability distribution of the order parameter is, sufficiently close to the critical temperature, identical to the equation that describes the switching on of a single-mode laser.Comment: 4 pages revtex including 1 figur

Magnetic field control of elastic scattering in a cold gas of fermionic lithium atoms

We study elastic collisions in an optically trapped spin mixture of fermionic lithium atoms in the presence of magnetic fields up to 1.5kG by measuring evaporative loss. Our experiments confirm the expected magnetic tunability of the scattering length by showing the main features of elastic scattering according to recent calculations. We measure the zero crossing of the scattering length that is associated with a predicted Feshbach resonance at 530(3)G. Beyond the resonance we observe the expected large cross section in the triplet scattering regime

Inhibition of spontaneous emission in Fermi gases

Fermi inhibition is a quantum statistical analogue for the inhibition of spontaneous emission by an excited atom in a cavity. This is achieved when the relevant motional states are already occupied by a cloud of cold atoms in the internal ground state. We exhibit non-trivial effects at finite temperature and in anisotropic traps, and briefly consider a possible experimental realization.Comment: 4 pages with 3 figure

The Specific Heat of a Trapped Fermi Gas: an Analytical Approach

We find an analytical expression for the specific heat of a Fermi gas in a harmonic trap using a semi-classical approximation. Our approximation is valid for kT>hw and in this range it is shown to be highly accurate. We comment on the semi-classical approximation, presenting an explanation for this high accuracy.Comment: To be published in Physics Letters A. 7 pages (RevTex) and 2 figures (postscript

Effect of quantum group invariance on trapped Fermi gases

We study the properties of a thermodynamic system having the symmetry of a quantum group and interacting with a harmonic potential. We calculate the dependence of the chemical potential, heat capacity and spatial distribution of the gas on the quantum group parameter $q$ and the number of spatial dimensions $D$. In addition, we consider a fourth-order interaction in the quantum group fields $\Psi$, and calculate the ground state energy up to first order.Comment: LaTeX file, 20 pages, four figures, uses epsf.sty, packaged as a single tar.gz uuencoded fil

Elastic and inelastic collisions of 6Li in magnetic and optical traps

We use a full coupled channels method to calculate collisional properties of magnetically or optically trapped ultracold 6Li. The magnetic field dependence of the s-wave scattering lengths of several mixtures of hyperfine states are determined, as are the decay rates due to exchange collisions. In one case, we find Feshbach resonances at B=0.08 T and B=1.98 T. We show that the exact coupled channels calculation is well approximated over the entire range of magnetic fields by a simple analytical calculation.Comment: 4 pages revtex including 4 figures, submitted to PR

Degenerate fermion gas heating by hole creation

Loss processes that remove particles from an atom trap leave holes behind in the single particle distribution if the trapped gas is a degenerate fermion system. The appearance of holes increases the temperature and we show that the heating is (i) significant if the initial temperature is well below the Fermi temperature $T_{F}$, and (ii) increases the temperature to $T \geq T_{F}/4$ after half of the system's lifetime, regardless of the initial temperature. The hole heating has important consequences for the prospect of observing Cooper-pairing in atom traps.Comment: to be published in PR

Sympathetic cooling of an atomic Bose-Fermi gas mixture

Sympathetic cooling of an atomic Fermi gas by a Bose gas is studied by solution of the coupled quantum Boltzmann equations for the confined gas mixture. Results for equilibrium temperatures and relaxation dynamics are presented, and some simple models developed. Our study illustrate that a combination of sympathetic and forced evaporative cooling enables the Fermi gas to be cooled to the degenerate regime where quantum statistics, and mean field effects are important. The influence of mean field effects on the equilibrium spatial distributions is discussed qualitatively.Comment: 8 pages, 9 figures, accepted for publication in Phys.Rev.Let

Two-species mixture of quantum degenerate Bose and Fermi gases

We have produced a macroscopic quantum system in which a Li-6 Fermi sea coexists with a large and stable Na-23 Bose-Einstein condensate. This was accomplished using inter-species sympathetic cooling of fermionic Li-6 in a thermal bath of bosonic Na-23