Understanding the female judoka’s “coach – athlete” relationship: a British perspective

Background and Study Aim: The initial idea for the investigation came from Maki Tsukada’s two year observation of the British system, but also after reflection on the London 2012 Olympics and the “coach – athlete” interaction. The wider impact of the study will mean that coaches will have a greater understanding of how to build and work at their relationship with their athletes and understand what the important dynamics are within. The purpose of this study was the knowledge about the “coach – athlete” relationship, to gain a greater understanding into the relationship between female judo athletes and their coach. Material and Methods: The participants chosen were the Women’s Great Britain Judo Squad 2013, the athletes (n = 36) and the National coaches (n = 2). The study explores what is felt as important, the dynamics in the relationship and does the athlete’s opinion differ from that of the coach. The athletes participated in a specifically designed questionnaire and the coaches in semi-structured interview. Results: The findings demonstrate the importance of the relationship and the varying, yet often similar attributes expressed, from both the athletes and coaches. Conclusions: The significant and fundamental finding was the importance of the “coach – athlete” relationship being recognised by both the athletes and the coaches, with the athletes declaring that they definitely need a coach to develop and improve. In a direct comparison on what is important to the athlete and to the coach in the dynamic of the relationship, the points are very similar

Impurity-induced transition and impurity-enhanced thermopower in the thermoelectric oxide NaCo_{2-x}Cu_x$O_4

Various physical quantities are measured and analysed for the Cu-substituted thermoelectric oxide NaCo_{2-x}Cu_xO_4. As was previously known, the substituted Cu enhances the thermoelectric power, while it does not increase the resistivity significantly. The susceptibility and the electron specific-heat are substantially decreased with increasing x, which implies that the substituted Cu decreases the effective-mass enhancement. Through a quantitative comparison with the heavy fermion compounds and the valence fluctuation systems, we have found that the Cu substitution effectively increases the coupling between the conduction electron and the magnetic fluctuation. The Cu substitution induces a phase transition at 22 K that is very similar to a spin-density-wave transition.Comment: 8 pages, 7 figures, submitted to Phys. Rev.

Melting of a 2D Quantum Electron Solid in High Magnetic Field

The melting temperature ($T_m$) of a solid is generally determined by the pressure applied to it, or indirectly by its density ($n$) through the equation of state. This remains true even for helium solids\cite{wilk:67}, where quantum effects often lead to unusual properties\cite{ekim:04}. In this letter we present experimental evidence to show that for a two dimensional (2D) solid formed by electrons in a semiconductor sample under a strong perpendicular magnetic field\cite{shay:97} ($B$), the $T_m$ is not controlled by $n$, but effectively by the \textit{quantum correlation} between the electrons through the Landau level filling factor $\nu$=$nh/eB$. Such melting behavior, different from that of all other known solids (including a classical 2D electron solid at zero magnetic field\cite{grim:79}), attests to the quantum nature of the magnetic field induced electron solid. Moreover, we found the $T_m$ to increase with the strength of the sample-dependent disorder that pins the electron solid.Comment: Some typos corrected and 2 references added. Final version with minor editoriol revisions published in Nature Physic

Scanning tunneling spectroscopy of high-temperature superconductors

Tunneling spectroscopy played a central role in the experimental verification of the microscopic theory of superconductivity in the classical superconductors. Initial attempts to apply the same approach to high-temperature superconductors were hampered by various problems related to the complexity of these materials. The use of scanning tunneling microscopy/spectroscopy (STM/STS) on these compounds allowed to overcome the main difficulties. This success motivated a rapidly growing scientific community to apply this technique to high-temperature superconductors. This paper reviews the experimental highlights obtained over the last decade. We first recall the crucial efforts to gain control over the technique and to obtain reproducible results. We then discuss how the STM/STS technique has contributed to the study of some of the most unusual and remarkable properties of high-temperature superconductors: the unusual large gap values and the absence of scaling with the critical temperature; the pseudogap and its relation to superconductivity; the unprecedented small size of the vortex cores and its influence on vortex matter; the unexpected electronic properties of the vortex cores; the combination of atomic resolution and spectroscopy leading to the observation of periodic local density of states modulations in the superconducting and pseudogap states, and in the vortex cores.Comment: To appear in RMP; 65 pages, 62 figure

Incidence of cerebral metastases in patients treated with trastuzumab for metastatic breast cancer

Trastuzumab is an effective treatment for patients with metastatic breast cancer (MBC) that overexpresses HER-2. A high incidence of brain metastases (BM) has been noted in patients receiving trastuzumab. A retrospective chart review was conducted of 100 patients commencing trastuzumab for metastatic breast cancer from July 1999 to December 2002, at the Christie Hospital. Seven patients were excluded; five patients developed central nervous system metastases prior to starting trastuzumab, and inadequate data were available for two. Out of the remaining 93 patients, 23 (25%) have developed BM to date. In all, 46 patients have died, and of these 18 (39%) have been diagnosed with BM prior to death. Of the 23 patients developing BM, 18 (78%) were hormone receptor negative and 18 (78%) had visceral disease. Univariate analysis showed a significant association between the development of cerebral disease and both hormone receptor status and the presence of visceral disease. In conclusion, a high proportion of patients with MBC treated with trastuzumab develop symptomatic cerebral metastases. HER-2-positive breast cancer may have a predilection for the brain, or trastuzumab therapy may change the disease pattern by prolonging survival. New strategies to address this problem require investigation in this group of patients

Superconducting Fluctuation investigated by THz Conductivity of La2−x_{2-x}Srx_xCuO4_4 Thin Films

Frequency-dependent terahertz conductivities of La$_{2-x}$Sr$_x$CuO$_4$ thin films with various carrier concentrations were investigated. The imaginary part of the complex conductivity considerably increased from far above a zero-resistance superconducting transition temperature, $T_\text{c}^\text{zero}$, because of the existence of the fluctuating superfluid density with a short lifetime. The onset temperature of the superconducting fluctuation is at most $\sim 2T_\text{c}^\text{zero}$ for underdoped samples, which is consistent with the previously reported analysis of microwave conductivity. The superconducting fluctuation was not enhanced under a 0.5 T magnetic field. We also found that the temperature dependence of the superconducting fluctuation was sensitive to the carrier concentration of La$_{2-x}$Sr$_x$CuO$_4$, which reflects the difference in the nature of the critical dynamics near the superconducting transition temperature. Our results suggest that the onset temperature of the Nernst signal is not related to the superconducting fluctuation we argued in this paper.Comment: J. Phys. Soc. Jpn. in pres

Selective β-Arylation of Thiophenes with Aryl Iodides Catalyzed by Dinuclear Palladium Carboxylate Complexes

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Calmate: Communication support system for couples using a calm avatar

ABSTRACT Many people find that communication between men and women is difficult regardless of their efforts to understand their partners. Especially, negative feelings cause troubles on communication of couple members. In this paper, we proposed a novel communication support system for couples that helps couple members share their negative feelings and heal over them smoothly using a physical avatar