9,759 research outputs found
Assessment of the Potential Impact and Cost-effectiveness of Self-Testing for HIV in Low-Income Countries.
Studies have demonstrated that self-testing for human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) is highly acceptable among individuals and could allow cost savings, compared with provider-delivered HIV testing and counseling (PHTC), although the longer-term population-level effects are uncertain. We evaluated the cost-effectiveness of introducing self-testing in 2015 over a 20-year time frame in a country such as Zimbabwe
Filling dependence of a new type of charge ordered liquid on a triangular lattice system
We study the recently reported characteristic gapless charge ordered state in
a spinless fermion system on a triangular lattice under strong inter-site
Coulomb interactions. In this state the charges are spontaneously divided into
solid and liquid component, and the former solid part aligns in a Wigner
crystal manner while the latter moves among them like a pinball. We show that
such charge ordered liquid is stable over a wide range of filling, ,
and examine its filling dependent nature.Comment: 3 pages 3 figure
Continuous Avalanche Segregation of Granular Mixtures in Thin Rotating Drums
We study segregation of granular mixtures in the continuous avalanche regime
(for frequencies above ~ 1 rpm) in thin rotating drums using a continuum theory
for surface flows of grains. The theory predicts profiles in agreement with
experiments only when we consider a flux dependent velocity of flowing grains.
We find the segregation of species of different size and surface properties,
with the smallest and roughest grains being found preferentially at the center
of the drum. For a wide difference between the species we find a complete
segregation in agreement with experiments. In addition, we predict a transition
to a smooth segregation regime - with an power-law decay of the concentrations
as a function of radial coordinate - as the size ratio between the grains is
decreased towards one.Comment: 4 pages, 4 figures, http://polymer.bu.edu/~hmaks
Mutations in shaking-B prevent electrical synapse formation in the Drosophila giant fiber system
The giant fiber system (GFS) is a simple network of neurons that mediates visually elicited escape behavior in Drosophila. The giant fiber (GF), the major component of the system, is a large, descending interneuron that relays visual stimuli to the motoneurons that innervate the tergotrochanteral jump muscle (TTM) and dorsal longitudinal flight muscles (DLMs). Mutations in the neural transcript from the shaking-B locus abolish the behavioral response by disrupting transmission at some electrical synapses in the GFS. This study focuses on the role of the gene in the development of the synaptic connections. Using an enhancer-trap line that expresses lacZ in the GFs, we show that the neurons develop during the first 30 hr of metamorphosis. Within the next 15 hr, they begin to form electrical synapses, as indicated by the transfer of intracellularly injected Lucifer yellow. The GFs dye-couple to the TTM motoneuron between 30 and 45 hr of metamorphosis, to the peripherally synapsing interneuron that drives the DLM motoneurons at approximately 48 hr, and to giant commissural interneurons in the brain at approximately 55 hr. Immunocytochemistry with shaking-B peptide antisera demonstrates that the expression of shaking-B protein in the region of GFS synapses coincides temporally with the onset of synaptogenesis; expression persists thereafter. The mutation shak-B2, which eliminates protein expression, prevents the establishment of dye coupling shaking-B, therefore, is essential for the assembly and/or maintenance of functional gap junctions at electrical synapses in the GFS
Internal thermal noise in the LIGO test masses : a direct approach
The internal thermal noise in LIGO's test masses is analyzed by a new
technique, a direct application of the Fluctuation-Dissipation Theorem to
LIGO's readout observable, (longitudinal position of test-mass face,
weighted by laser beam's Gaussian profile). Previous analyses, which relied on
a normal-mode decomposition of the test-mass motion, were valid only if the
dissipation is uniformally distributed over the test-mass interior, and they
converged reliably to a final answer only when the beam size was a
non-negligible fraction of the test-mass cross section. This paper's direct
analysis, by contrast, can handle inhomogeneous dissipation and arbitrary beam
sizes. In the domain of validity of the previous analysis, the two methods give
the same answer for , the spectral density of thermal noise, to within
expected accuracy. The new analysis predicts that thermal noise due to
dissipation concentrated in the test mass's front face (e.g. due to mirror
coating) scales as , by contrast with homogeneous dissipation, which
scales as ( is the beam radius); so surface dissipation could
become significant for small beam sizes.Comment: 6 pages, RevTex, 1 figur
The Quantum Nature of a Nuclear Phase Transition
In their ground states, atomic nuclei are quantum Fermi liquids. At finite
temperatures and low densities, these nuclei may undergo a phase change similar
to, but substantially different from, a classical liquid gas phase transition.
As in the classical case, temperature is the control parameter while density
and pressure are the conjugate variables. At variance with the classical case,
in the nucleus the difference between the proton and neutron concentrations
acts as an additional order parameter, for which the symmetry potential is the
conjugate variable. Different ratios of the neutron to proton concentrations
lead to different critical points for the phase transition. This is analogous
to the phase transitions occurring in He-He liquid mixtures. We
present experimental results which reveal the N/Z dependence of the phase
transition and discuss possible implications of these observations in terms of
the Landau Free Energy description of critical phenomena.Comment: 5 pages, 4 figure
Electronic structure and magnetism of equiatomic FeN
In order to investigate the phase stability of equiatomic FeN compounds and
the structure-dependent magnetic properties, the electronic structure and total
energy of FeN with NaCl, ZnS and CsCl structures and various magnetic
configurations are calculated using the first-principles TB-LMTO-ASA method.
Among all the FeN phases considered, the antiferromagnetic NaCl structure with
q=(00pi) is found to have the lowest energy at the theoretical equilibrium
volume. However, the FM NaCl phase lies only 1mRyd higher. The estimated
equilibrium lattice constant for nonmagnetic ZnS-type FeN agrees quite well
with the experimental value, but for the AFM NaCl phase the estimated value is
6.7% smaller than that observed experimentally. For ZnS-type FeN, metastable
magnetic states are found for volumes larger than the equilibrium value. On the
basis of an analysis of the atom- and orbital-projected density of states and
orbital-projected Crystal Orbital Hamilton Population, the iron-nitrogen
interactions in NM ZnS, AFM NaCl and FM CsCl structures are discussed. The
leading Fe-N interactions is due to the d-p iron-nitrogen hybridization, while
considerable s-p and p-p hybridizations are also observed in all three phases.
The iron magnetic moment in FeN is found to be highly sensitive to the
nearest-neighboring Fe-N distance. In particular, the magnetic moment shows an
abrupt drop from a value of about 2 muB to zero with the reduction of the Fe-N
distance for the ZnS and CsCl structures.Comment: 12 pages, 6 figure
Gravity-driven Dense Granular Flows
We report and analyze the results of numerical studies of dense granular
flows in two and three dimensions, using both linear damped springs and
Hertzian force laws between particles. Chute flow generically produces a
constant density profile that satisfies scaling relations suggestive of a
Bagnold grain inertia regime. The type of force law has little impact on the
behavior of the system. Bulk and surface flows differ in their failure criteria
and flow rheology, as evidenced by the change in principal stress directions
near the surface. Surface-only flows are not observed in this geometry.Comment: 4 pages, RevTeX 3.0, 4 PostScript figures (5 files) embedded with
eps
Thermal noise in interferometric gravitational wave detectors due to dielectric optical coatings
We report on thermal noise from the internal friction of dielectric coatings
made from alternating layers of Ta2O5 and SiO2 deposited on fused silica
substrates. We present calculations of the thermal noise in gravitational wave
interferometers due to optical coatings, when the material properties of the
coating are different from those of the substrate and the mechanical loss angle
in the coating is anisotropic. The loss angle in the coatings for strains
parallel to the substrate surface was determined from ringdown experiments. We
measured the mechanical quality factor of three fused silica samples with
coatings deposited on them. The loss angle of the coating material for strains
parallel to the coated surface was found to be (4.2 +- 0.3)*10^(-4) for
coatings deposited on commercially polished slides and (1.0 +- 0.3)*10^{-4} for
a coating deposited on a superpolished disk. Using these numbers, we estimate
the effect of coatings on thermal noise in the initial LIGO and advanced LIGO
interferometers. We also find that the corresponding prediction for thermal
noise in the 40 m LIGO prototype at Caltech is consistent with the noise data.
These results are complemented by results for a different type of coating,
presented in a companion paper.Comment: Submitted to LSC (internal) review Sept. 20, 2001. To be submitted to
Phys. Lett.
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