512 research outputs found
Carotid baroreceptor reflexes in humans during orthostatic stress
Orthostatic stress, including standing, head-up tilting and lower body suction, results in increases in peripheral vascular resistance but little or no change in mean arterial pressure. This study was undertaken to determine whether the sensitivity of the carotid baroreceptor reflex was enhanced during conditions of decreased venous return. We studied eight healthy subjects and determined responses of pulse interval (ECG) and forearm vascular resistance (mean finger blood pressure divided by Doppler estimate of brachial artery blood velocity) to graded increases and decreases in carotid transmural pressure, effected by a neck suction/pressure device.
Responses were determined with and without the application of lower body negative pressure (LBNP) at -40 mmHg. Stimulus-response curves were determined as the responses to graded neck pressure changes and the differential of this provided estimates of reflex sensitivity. Changes in carotid transmural pressure caused graded changes in R-R interval and vascular resistance. The cardiac responses were unaffected by LBNP. Vascular resistance responses, however, were significantly enhanced during LBNP and the peak gain of the reflex was increased from 1.2 ± 0.3 (mean ± S.E.M.) to 2.2 ± 0.3 units (P < 0.05). The increased baroreflex gain may contribute to maintenance of blood pressure during orthostatic stress and limit the pressure decreases during prolonged periods of such stress. Experimental Physiology (2001) 86.5, 677-681
An Estimate of the Vibrational Frequencies of Spherical Virus Particles
The possible normal modes of vibration of a nearly spherical virus particle
are discussed. Two simple models for the particle are treated, a liquid drop
model and an elastic sphere model. Some estimates for the lowest vibrational
frequency are given for each model. It is concluded that this frequency is
likely to be of the order of a few GHz for particles with a radius of the order
of 50 nm.Comment: 6 pages, 1 figur
Spinor Bose-Einstein Condensates with Many Vortices
Vortex-lattice structures of antiferromagnetic spinor Bose-Einstein
condensates with hyperfine spin F=1 are investigated theoretically based on the
Ginzburg-Pitaevskii equations near . The Abrikosov lattice with clear
core regions are found {\em never stable} at any rotation drive .
Instead, each component prefers to shift the core
locations from the others to realize almost uniform order-parameter amplitude
with complicated magnetic-moment configurations. This system is characterized
by many competing metastable structures so that quite a variety of vortices may
be realized with a small change in external parameters.Comment: 4 page
Bi-directional association between depression and HF: An electronic health records-based cohort study.
To determine whether a bi-directional relationship exists between depression and HF within a single population of individuals receiving primary care services, using longitudinal electronic health records (EHRs).
This retrospective cohort study utilized EHRs for adults who received primary care services within a large healthcare system in 2006. Validated EHR-based algorithms identified 10,649 people with depression (depression cohort) and 5,911 people with HF (HF cohort) between January 1, 2006 and December 31, 2018. Each person with depression or HF was matched 1:1 with an unaffected referent on age, sex, and outpatient service use. Each cohort (with their matched referents) was followed up electronically to identify newly diagnosed HF (in the depression cohort) and depression (in the HF cohort) that occurred after the index diagnosis of depression or HF, respectively. The risks of these outcomes were compared (vs. referents) using marginal Cox proportional hazard models adjusted for 16 comorbid chronic conditions.
2,024 occurrences of newly diagnosed HF were observed in the depression cohort and 944 occurrences of newly diagnosed depression were observed in the HF cohort over approximately 4-6 years of follow-up. People with depression had significantly increased risk for developing newly diagnosed HF (HR 2.08, 95% CI 1.89-2.28) and people with HF had a significantly increased risk of newly diagnosed depression (HR 1.34, 95% CI 1.17-1.54) after adjusting for all 16 comorbid chronic conditions.
These results provide evidence of a bi-directional relationship between depression and HF independently of age, sex, and multimorbidity from chronic illnesses
Onset of magnetism in B2 transition metals aluminides
Ab initio calculation results for the electronic structure of disordered bcc
Fe(x)Al(1-x) (0.4<x<0.75), Co(x)Al(1-x) and Ni(x)Al(1-x) (x=0.4; 0.5; 0.6)
alloys near the 1:1 stoichiometry, as well as of the ordered B2 (FeAl, CoAl,
NiAl) phases with point defects are presented. The calculations were performed
using the coherent potential approximation within the Korringa-Kohn-Rostoker
method (KKR-CPA) for the disordered case and the tight-binding linear
muffin-tin orbital (TB-LMTO) method for the intermetallic compounds. We studied
in particular the onset of magnetism in Fe-Al and Co-Al systems as a function
of the defect structure. We found the appearance of large local magnetic
moments associated with the transition metal (TM) antisite defect in FeAl and
CoAl compounds, in agreement with the experimental findings. Moreover, we found
that any vacancies on both sublattices enhance the magnetic moments via
reducing the charge transfer to a TM atom. Disordered Fe-Al alloys are
ferromagnetically ordered for the whole range of composition studied, whereas
Co-Al becomes magnetic only for Co concentration >0.5.Comment: 11 pages with 9 embedded postscript figures, to be published in
Phys.Rev.
Strong interactions in air showers
We study the role new gauge interactions in extensions of the standard model
play in air showers initiated by ultrahigh-energy cosmic rays. Hadron-hadron
events remain dominated by quantum chromodynamics, while projectiles and/or
targets from beyond the standard model permit us to see qualitative differences
arising due to the new interactions.Comment: 35 pages, 12 figures. Accepted for publication in JCA
Simultaneous and independent detection of C9ORF72 alleles with low and high number of GGGGCC repeats using an optimised protocol of Southern blot hybridisation
Background
Sizing of GGGGCC hexanucleotide repeat expansions within the C9ORF72 locus, which account for approximately 10% of all amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS) cases, is urgently required to answer fundamental questions about mechanisms of pathogenesis in this important genetic variant. Currently employed PCR protocols are limited to discrimination between the presence and absence of a modified allele with more than 30 copies of the repeat, while Southern hybridisation-based methods are confounded by the somatic heterogeneity commonly present in blood samples, which might cause false-negative or ambiguous results.
Results
We describe an optimised Southern hybridisation-based protocol that allows confident detection of the presence of a C9ORF72 repeat expansion alongside independent assessment of its heterogeneity and the number of repeat units. The protocol can be used with either a radiolabeled or non-radiolabeled probe. Using this method we have successfully sized the C9ORF72 repeat expansion in lymphoblastoid cells, peripheral blood, and post-mortem central nervous system (CNS) tissue from ALS patients. It was also possible to confidently demonstrate the presence of repeat expansion, although of different magnitude, in both C9ORF72 alleles of the genome of one patient.
Conclusions
The suggested protocol has sufficient advantages to warrant adoption as a standard for Southern blot hybridisation analysis of GGGGCC repeat expansions in the C9ORF72 locu
Density Waves in Layered Systems with Fermionic Polar Molecules
A layered system of two-dimensional planes containing fermionic polar
molecules can potentially realize a number of exotic quantum many-body states.
Among the predictions, are density-wave instabilities driven by the anisotropic
part of the dipole-dipole interaction in a single layer. However, in typical
multilayer setups it is reasonable to expect that the onset and properties of a
density-wave are modified by adjacent layers. Here we show that this is indeed
the case. For multiple layers the critical strength for the density-wave
instability decreases with the number of layers. The effect depends on density
and is more pronounced in the low density regime. The lowest solution of the
instability corresponds to the density waves in the different layers being
in-phase, whereas higher solutions have one or several adjancet layers that are
out of phase. The parameter regime needed to explore this instability is within
reach of current experiments.Comment: 7 pages, 4 figures. Final version in EPJD, EuroQUAM special issue
"Cold Quantum Matter - Achievements and Prospects
Observing many body effects on lepton pair production from low mass enhancement and flow at RHIC and LHC energies
The spectral function at finite temperature calculated using the
real-time formalism of thermal field theory is used to evaluate the low mass
dilepton spectra. The analytic structure of the propagator is studied
and contributions to the dilepton yield in the region below the bare
peak from the different cuts in the spectral function are discussed. The
space-time integrated yield shows significant enhancement in the region below
the bare peak in the invariant mass spectra. It is argued that the
variation of the inverse slope of the transverse mass () distribution can
be used as an efficient tool to predict the presence of two different phases of
the matter during the evolution of the system. Sensitivity of the effective
temperature obtained from the slopes of the spectra to the medium effects
are studied
Dimers, Effective Interactions, and Pauli Blocking Effects in a Bilayer of Cold Fermionic Polar Molecules
We consider a bilayer setup with two parallel planes of cold fermionic polar
molecules when the dipole moments are oriented perpendicular to the planes. The
binding energy of two-body states with one polar molecule in each layer is
determined and compared to various analytic approximation schemes in both
coordinate- and momentum-space. The effective interaction of two bound dimers
is obtained by integrating out the internal dimer bound state wave function and
its robustness under analytical approximations is studied. Furthermore, we
consider the effect of the background of other fermions on the dimer state
through Pauli blocking, and discuss implications for the zero-temperature
many-body phase diagram of this experimentally realizable system.Comment: 18 pages, 10 figures, accepted versio
- …