Comparison of different mathematical models of diffusion-weighted prostate MR imaging

Purpose

To evaluate which mathematical model (monoexponential, biexponential, statistical, kurtosis) fits best to the diffusion-weighted signal in prostate magnetic resonance imaging (MRI).

Materials and Methods

24 prostate 3-T MRI examinations of young volunteers (YV, n= 8), patients with biopsy proven prostate cancer (PC, n= 8) and an aged matched control group (AC, n= 8) were included. Diffusion-weighted imaging was performed using 11 b-values ranging from 0 to 800 s/mm².

Results

Monoexponential apparent diffusion coefficient (ADC) values were significantly (P<.001) lower in the peripheral (PZ) zone (1.18±0.16 mm²/s) and the central (CZ) zone (0.73±0.13 mm²/s) of YV compared to AC (PZ 1.92±0.17 mm²/s; CZ 1.35±0.21 mm²/s). In PC ADC_mono values (0.61±0.06 mm²/s) were significantly (P<.001) lower than in the peripheral of central zone of AC. Using the statistical analysis (Akaike information criteria) in YV most pixels were best described by the biexponential model (82%), the statistical model, respectively kurtosis (93%) each compared to the monoexponential model. In PC the majority of pixels was best described by the monoexponential model (57%) compared to the biexponential model.

Conclusion

Although a more complex model might provide a better fitting when multiple b-values are used, the monoexponential analyses for ADC calculation in prostate MRI is sufficient to discriminate prostate cancer from normal tissue using b-values ranging from 0 to 800 s/mm².     

Neutrino and antineutrino charged-current inclusive scattering in iron in the energy range 20<E v <300 GeV

Inclusive charged-current interactions of high-energy neutrinos and antineutrinos have been studied with high statistics in a counter experiment at the CERN Super Proton Synchrotron. The energy dependence of the total cross-sections, the longitudinal structure function, and the nucleon structure functionsF ₂,xF ₃, and \(\bar q^{\bar v} \) are determined from these data. The analysis of theQ ²-dependence of the structure functions is used to test quantum chromodynamics, to determine the scale parameter Λ and the gluon distribution in the nucleon.     

The TV in Your Pocket: Development of Liquid‐Crystal Materials for the New Millennium

New liquid crystals with very low viscosity, good mesophase behavior, and high reliability are necessary to achieve the breakthrough from flat computer monitors to large displays for television. Fluorine plays a decisive role not only because of the polarity it induces in organic molecules but also because of its low polarizability and weak propensity for ion solvation. In addition, subtle stereoelectronic effects in fluorine‐containing liquid crystals influence material properties and allow these to be tuned to some extent to achieve the desired outcome. Some fairly sophisticated chemistry is required that is normally ruled out in the specialty chemicals industry because of cost. The television display market is now entering a phase of saturation. The broad availability of the internet has led to an ever increasing tendency for mobile products. Tablet PCs and smartphones require touch‐panel functionality and low power consumption. New LCD modes with high‐performance liquid crystals and additional components, such as polymerizable materials, can be used in such products.     

Associated production of charged Higgs bosons and top quarks with POWHEG

The associated production of charged Higgs bosons and top quarks at hadron colliders is an important discovery channel to establish the existence of a non-minimal Higgs sector. Here, we present details of a next-to-leading order (NLO) calculation of this process using the Catani–Seymour dipole formalism and describe its implementation in POWHEG, which allows to match NLO calculations to parton showers. Numerical predictions are presented using the PYTHIA parton shower and are compared to those obtained previously at fixed order, to a leading order calculation matched to the PYTHIA parton shower, and to a different NLO calculation matched to the HERWIG parton shower with MC@NLO. We also present numerical predictions and theoretical uncertainties for various Two Higgs Doublet Models at the Tevatron and LHC.     

Factorization breaking in dijet photoproduction with a leading neutron

The production of dijets with a leading neutron in ep interactions at HERA is calculated in leading order and next-to-leading order of perturbative QCD using a pion-exchange model. Differential cross sections for deep-inelastic scattering and photoproduction are presented as a function of several kinematic variables. By comparing the theoretical predictions for DIS dijets to recent H1 data, the pion flux factor together with the parton distribution functions of the pion is determined. The dijet cross sections in photoproduction show factorization breaking if compared to the H1 photoproduction data. The suppression factor is S=0.48 (0.64) for resolved (global) suppression. PACS 12.38.Bx; 13.60.-r     

Threshold resummation for gaugino pair production at hadron colliders

We present a complete analysis of threshold resummation effects on direct light and heavy gaugino pair production at the Tevatron and the LHC. Based on a new perturbative calculation at next-to-leading order of SUSY-QCD, which includes also squark mixing effects, we resum soft gluon radiation in the threshold region at leading and next-to-leading logarithmic accuracy, retaining at the same time the full SUSY-QCD corrections in the finite coefficient function. This allows us to correctly match the resummed to the perturbative cross section. Universal subleading logarithms are resummed in full matrix form. We find that threshold resummation slightly increases and considerably stabilizes the invariant mass spectra and total cross sections with respect to the next-to-leading order calculation. For future reference, we present total cross sections and their theoretical errors in tabular form for several commonly used SUSY benchmark points, gaugino pairs, and hadron collider energies.     

NLO+NLL collider bounds,Dirac fermion and scalar dark matter in the B–L model

Baryon and lepton numbers being accidental global symmetries of the Standard Model (SM), it is natural to promote them to local symmetries. However, to preserve anomaly-freedom, only combinations of B–L are viable. In this spirit, we investigate possible dark matter realizations in the context of the \(U(1)_\mathrm{B{-}L}\) model: (i) Dirac fermion with unbroken B–L; (ii) Dirac fermion with broken B–L; (iii) scalar dark matter; (iv) two-component dark matter. We compute the relic abundance, direct and indirect detection observables and confront them with recent results from Planck, LUX-2016, and Fermi-LAT and prospects from XENON1T. In addition to the well-known LEP bound \(M_{Z^{\prime }}/g_\mathrm{BL} \gtrsim 7\) TeV, we include often ignored LHC bounds using 13 TeV dilepton (dimuon + dielectron) data at next-to-leading order plus next-to-leading logarithmic accuracy. We show that, for gauge couplings smaller than 0.4, the LHC gives rise to the strongest collider limit. In particular, we find \(M_{Z^{\prime }}/g_\mathrm{BL} > 8.7\) TeV for \(g_\mathrm{BL}=0.3\). We conclude that the NLO+NLL corrections improve the dilepton bounds on the \(Z^{\prime }\) mass and that both dark matter candidates are only viable in the \(Z^{\prime }\) resonance region, with the parameter space for scalar dark matter being fully probed by XENON1T. Lastly, we show that one can successfully have a minimal two-component dark matter model.     

Diffusion-weighted imaging (DWI) of the spleen in patients with liver cirrhosis and portal hypertension

Objective

The purpose of this study was to assess the influence of liver cirrhosis and portal hypertension on diffusion coefficients of the spleen.

Material and Methods

We retrospectively evaluated 50 patients with liver cirrhosis and 50 patients without any history of liver disease who underwent magnetic resonance imaging of the upper abdomen, including echo planar diffusion-weighted imaging using b values of 50, 300 and 600 mm²/s. Spleen apparent diffusion coefficient (ADC), liver ADC, muscle ADC and normalized spleen ADC (defined as the ratio of spleen ADC to muscle ADC) were compared between cirrhotic patients and patients in the control group and correlated with Child–Pugh stages. Reproducibility was assessed by measuring interclass correlation coefficient (n = 11). Additionally, in eight patients, ADC measurements were performed 1 day before and 3 days after transjugular intrahepatic portosystemic shunt (TIPSS) implantation.

Results

Compared with control subjects, patients with cirrhosis and portal hypertension had significantly higher spleen ADCs (P = .0001). There was a statistically significant correlation between Child–Pugh grade and spleen ADC (Pearson correlation coefficient, observer 1 r = 0.6, P = .0001; observer 2 r = 0.5, P = .0001). After TIPSS implantation, we observed a reduction in spleen ADC values. Spleen ADC measurements showed a high reproducibility (interclass correlation coefficient 0.75, P = .001).

Conclusion

Our data suggest that different stages of liver cirrhosis and portal hypertension correlate with ADC values of the spleen. Furthermore, ADC values of the spleen decrease after TIPSS implantation. Further studies are required to understand the potential clinical values of these observations.