Refine
Year of publication
- 2021 (150) (remove)
Document Type
- Article (150) (remove)
Language
- English (150)
Has Fulltext
- yes (150)
Keywords
- Branching fraction (3)
- Cryoelectron microscopy (3)
- Particle decays (3)
- Quantum field theory (3)
- Relativistic heavy-ion collisions (3)
- AdS-CFT Correspondence (2)
- Atomic and molecular interactions with photons (2)
- Black holes (2)
- Finite temperature field theory (2)
- Functional renormalization group (2)
Institute
- Physik (150) (remove)
The rapid spread of the Coronavirus (COVID-19) confronts policy makers with the problem of measuring the effectiveness of containment strategies, balancing public health considerations with the economic costs of social distancing measures. We introduce a modified epidemic model that we name the controlled-SIR model, in which the disease reproduction rate evolves dynamically in response to political and societal reactions. An analytic solution is presented. The model reproduces official COVID-19 cases counts of a large number of regions and countries that surpassed the first peak of the outbreak. A single unbiased feedback parameter is extracted from field data and used to formulate an index that measures the efficiency of containment strategies (the CEI index). CEI values for a range of countries are given. For two variants of the controlled-SIR model, detailed estimates of the total medical and socio-economic costs are evaluated over the entire course of the epidemic. Costs comprise medical care cost, the economic cost of social distancing, as well as the economic value of lives saved. Under plausible parameters, strict measures fare better than a hands-off policy. Strategies based on current case numbers lead to substantially higher total costs than strategies based on the overall history of the epidemic.
The long-awaited detection of a gravitational wave from the merger of a binary neutron star in August 2017 (GW170817) marked the beginning of the new field of multi-messenger gravitational wave astronomy. By exploiting the extracted tidal deformations of the two neutron stars from the late inspiral phase of GW170817, it was possible to constrain several global properties of the equation of state of neutron star matter. By means of fully general-relativistic hydrodynamic simulations, it is possible to get an insight into the hydrodynamic evolution of matter and into the structure of the space–time deformation caused by the remnant of binary neutron star merger. Neutron star mergers represent an optimal astrophysical laboratory to investigate the phase transition from confined hadronic matter to deconfined quark matter. With future gravitational wave detectors, it will most likely be possible in the near future to investigate the hadron-quark phase transition by analyzing the spectrum of the post-merger gravitational wave of the differentially rotating hypermassive hybrid star. In contrast to hypermassive neutron stars, these highly differentially rotating objects contain deconfined strange quark matter in their slowly rotating inner region.
Based on recent perturbative and non-perturbative lattice calculations with almost quark flavors and the thermal contributions from photons, neutrinos, leptons, electroweak particles, and scalar Higgs bosons, various thermodynamic quantities, at vanishing net-baryon densities, such as pressure, energy density, bulk viscosity, relaxation time, and temperature have been calculated up to the TeV-scale, i.e., covering hadron, QGP, and electroweak (EW) phases in the early Universe. This remarkable progress motivated the present study to determine the possible influence of the bulk viscosity in the early Universe and to understand how this would vary from epoch to epoch. We have taken into consideration first- (Eckart) and second-order (Israel–Stewart) theories for the relativistic cosmic fluid and integrated viscous equations of state in Friedmann equations. Nonlinear nonhomogeneous differential equations are obtained as analytical solutions. For Israel–Stewart, the differential equations are very sophisticated to be solved. They are outlined here as road-maps for future studies. For Eckart theory, the only possible solution is the functionality, H(a(t)), where H(t) is the Hubble parameter and a(t) is the scale factor, but none of them so far could to be directly expressed in terms of either proper or cosmic time t. For Eckart-type viscous background, especially at finite cosmological constant, non-singular H(t) and a(t) are obtained, where H(t) diverges for QCD/EW and asymptotic EoS. For non-viscous background, the dependence of H(a(t)) is monotonic. The same conclusion can be drawn for an ideal EoS. We also conclude that the rate of decreasing H(a(t)) with increasing a(t) varies from epoch to epoch, at vanishing and finite cosmological constant. These results obviously help in improving our understanding of the nucleosynthesis and the cosmological large-scale structure.
Human societies are characterized by three constituent features, besides others. (A) Options, as for jobs and societal positions, differ with respect to their associated monetary and non-monetary payoffs. (B) Competition leads to reduced payoffs when individuals compete for the same option as others. (C) People care about how they are doing relatively to others. The latter trait –the propensity to compare one’s own success with that of others– expresses itself as envy. It is shown that the combination of (A)–(C) leads to spontaneous class stratification. Societies of agents split endogenously into two social classes, an upper and a lower class, when envy becomes relevant. A comprehensive analysis of the Nash equilibria characterizing a basic reference game is presented. Class separation is due to the condensation of the strategies of lower-class agents, which play an identical mixed strategy. Upper-class agents do not condense, following individualist pure strategies. The model and results are size-consistent, holding for arbitrary large numbers of agents and options. Analytic results are confirmed by extensive numerical simulations. An analogy to interacting confined classical particles is discussed.
Cysteine cross-linking in native membranes establishes the transmembrane architecture of Ire1
(2021)
The ER is a key organelle of membrane biogenesis and crucial for the folding of both membrane and secretory proteins. Sensors of the unfolded protein response (UPR) monitor the unfolded protein load in the ER and convey effector functions for maintaining ER homeostasis. Aberrant compositions of the ER membrane, referred to as lipid bilayer stress, are equally potent activators of the UPR. How the distinct signals from lipid bilayer stress and unfolded proteins are processed by the conserved UPR transducer Ire1 remains unknown. Here, we have generated a functional, cysteine-less variant of Ire1 and performed systematic cysteine cross-linking experiments in native membranes to establish its transmembrane architecture in signaling-active clusters. We show that the transmembrane helices of two neighboring Ire1 molecules adopt an X-shaped configuration independent of the primary cause for ER stress. This suggests that different forms of stress converge in a common, signaling-active transmembrane architecture of Ire1.
We report first results on elliptic flow of identified particles at midrapidity in Au+Au collisions at sqrt[sNN] = 130 GeV using the STAR TPC at RHIC. The elliptic flow as a function of transverse momentum and centrality differs significantly for particles of different masses. This dependence can be accounted for in hydrodynamic models, indicating that the system created shows a behavior consistent with collective hydrodynamical flow. The fit to the data with a simple model gives information on the temperature and flow velocities at freeze-out.
The vector U bosons, or so-called “dark photons,” are one of the possible candidates for the dark matter mediators. They are supposed to interact with the standard matter via a “vector portal” due to the Uð1Þ − Uð1Þ0 symmetry group mixing which might make them visible in particle and heavy-ion experiments. While there is no confirmed observation of dark photons, the detailed analysis of different experimental data allows to estimate the upper limit for the kinetic mixing parameter ϵ2 depending on the mass MU of U bosons which is also unknown. In this study we present theoretical constraints on the upper limit of ϵ2ðMUÞ in the mass range MU ≤ 0.6 GeV from the comparison of the calculated dilepton spectra with the experimental data from the HADES collaboration at SIS18 energies where the dark photons are not observed. Our analysis is based on the microscopic Parton-Hadron-String Dynamics (PHSD) transport
approach which reproduces well the measured dilepton spectra in p þ p, p þ A and A þ A collisions. Additionally to the different dilepton channels originating from interactions and decays of ordinary matter particles (mesons and baryons), we incorporate the decay of hypothetical U bosons to dileptons, U → eþe−, where the U bosons themselves are produced by the Dalitz decay of pions π0 → γU, η mesons η → γU and Delta resonances Δ → NU. Our analysis can help to estimate the requested accuracy for future experimental searches of “light” dark photons by dilepton experiments.
This study presents an ultra-wideband, elliptical slot, planar monopole antenna for early breast cancer microwave imaging. The on-body antenna's operation is optimised by direct contact with the patient's skin. With a compact size of 9 × 7 mm, the antenna covers a wide bandwidth from 16 to 24 GHz for reflection coefficients lower than –10 dB. Besides, it also features an electrode for electrical impedance tomography applications. Verification on a volunteer's breast gives an excellent agreement with the simulation for the defined bandwidth. Furthermore, as the first stage of the system's characterisation, pork fat is also used to demonstrate the possibility to enhance the transmission between the antennas within the high loss environment. Those results propose the feasibility of implementing a high-frequency radar system for breast cancer detection.
When a very strong light field is applied to a molecule an electron can be ejected by tunneling. In order to quantify the time-resolved dynamics of this ionization process, the concept of the Wigner time delay can be used. The properties of this process can depend on the tunneling direction relative to the molecular axis. Here, we show experimental and theoretical data on the Wigner time delay for tunnel ionization of H2 molecules and demonstrate its dependence on the emission direction of the electron with respect to the molecular axis. We find, that the observed changes in the Wigner time delay can be quantitatively explained by elongated/shortened travel paths of the emitted electrons, which occur due to spatial shifts of the electrons’ birth positions after tunneling. Our work provides therefore an intuitive perspective towards the Wigner time delay in strong-field ionization.
Cortical pyramidal neurons have a complex dendritic anatomy, whose function is an active research field. In particular, the segregation between its soma and the apical dendritic tree is believed to play an active role in processing feed-forward sensory information and top-down or feedback signals. In this work, we use a simple two-compartment model accounting for the nonlinear interactions between basal and apical input streams and show that standard unsupervised Hebbian learning rules in the basal compartment allow the neuron to align the feed-forward basal input with the top-down target signal received by the apical compartment. We show that this learning process, termed coincidence detection, is robust against strong distractions in the basal input space and demonstrate its effectiveness in a linear classification task.