Single-top <Emphasis Type="Italic">Wt</Emphasis>-channel production matched with parton showers using the POWHEG method

We present results for the next-to-leading order calculation of single-top Wt-channel production interfaced to Shower Monte Carlo programs, implemented according to the POWHEG method. A comparison with MC@NLO is carried out. Results obtained using the PYTHIA shower are also shown and the effect of typical cuts is briefly discussed.     

Combination of Heme Oxygenase-1 Inhibition and Sigma Receptor Modulation for Anticancer Activity

Cancer is a multifactorial disease that may be tackled by targeting different signaling pathways. Heme oxygenase-1 (HO-1) and sigma receptors (σRs) are both overexpressed in different human cancers, including prostate and brain, contributing to the cancer spreading. In the present study, we investigated whether HO-1 inhibitors and σR ligands, as well a combination of the two, may influence DU145 human prostate and U87MG human glioblastoma cancer cells proliferation. In addition, we synthesized, characterized, and tested a small series of novel hybrid compounds (HO-1/σRs) 1–4 containing the chemical features needed for HO-1 inhibition and σR modulation. Herein, we report for the first time that targeting simultaneously HO-1 and σR proteins may be a good strategy to achieve increased antiproliferative activity against DU145 and U87MG cells, with respect to the mono administration of the parent compounds. The obtained outcomes provide an initial proof of concept useful to further optimize the structure of HO-1/σRs hybrids to develop novel potential anticancer agents.     

Fixed points of endomorphisms of trace monoids

It is proved that the fixed point submonoid and the periodic point submonoid of a trace monoid endomorphism are always finitely generated. If the dependence alphabet is a transitive forest, it is proved that the set of regular fixed points of the (Scott) continuous extension of an endomorphism to real traces is Ω-rational for every endomorphism if and only if the monoid is a free product of free commutative monoids.     

Particle creation by loop black holes

We study the black hole particle production in a regular spacetime metric obtained in a minisuperspace approach to loop quantum gravity. In different previous papers the static solution was obtained and shown to be singularity-free and self-dual. In this paper expanding a previous study of the black hole dynamics we repeat the Hawking analysis which leads to a thermal flux of particles at the future infinity. The evaporation time is infinite and the unitarity is recovered due to the regularity of the spacetime and to the characteristic behavior of the surface gravity.     

Centroids, Centers, Medians: What is the Difference?

Consider a finite subset F of a real normed space. In this paper we try to evaluate the largest possible distance between pairs of points which are, for F, the centroid, a center, or a median. The results seem to show that only when X is a two-dimensional, strictly convex space, or when X is a Hilbert space, what the geometrical intuition indicates is more or less true. We give some examples showing some of the 'pathological' situations which can arise. Also, we indicate some open problems.     

ALMOST: An all atom molecular simulation toolkit for protein structure determination

Almost ( al l atom mo lecular s imulation t oolkit) is an open source computational package for structure determination and analysis of complex molecular systems including proteins, and nucleic acids. Almost has been designed with two primary goals: to provide tools for molecular structure determination using various types of experimental measurements as conformational restraints, and to provide methods for the analysis and assessment of structural and dynamical properties of complex molecular systems. The methods incorporated in Almost include the determination of structural and dynamical features of proteins using distance restraints derived from nuclear Overhauser effect measurements, orientational restraints obtained from residual dipolar couplings and the structural restraints from chemical shifts. Here, we present the first public release of Almost , highlight the key aspects of its computational design and discuss the main features currently implemented. Almost is available for the most common Unix‐based operating systems, including Linux and Mac OS X. Almost is distributed free of charge under the GNU Public License, and is available both as a source code and as a binary executable from the project web site at http://www.open‐almost.org . Interested users can follow and contribute to the further development of Almost on http://sourceforge.net/projects/almost . © 2014 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.     

Strange baryon signals of deconfinement in Pb−Pb collisions at 158 GeV/c per nucleon

The main results of the CERN WA97 heavy ion experiment are summarized. The evidence for the formation of a deconfined state of matter in Pb?Pb collisions at CERN SPS energies, provided by these results, is discussed. The ongoing experimental efforts, by the CERN NA57 experiment, to investigate the onset of deconfinement are briefly reviewed.     

Electroluminescence properties of light emitting devices based on silicon nanocrystals

We have fabricated MOS devices where the dielectric layer consists of a substoichiometric SiO_x (x<2) thin film, annealed at 1100°C for 1 h to induce the separation of the Si and SiO₂ phases, with the formation of silicon nanocrystals (nc) embedded in the insulating matrix. We have studied the electroluminescence (EL) properties of such devices as a function of the current density and of the temperature. We have evaluated the excitation cross section of Si nc under electrical pumping at room temperature and at low temperature (12 K). Moreover, we have used the experimental EL intensities and decay times to evaluate the radiative rate as a function of the temperature.