The recent observation of dipole-allowed P excitons up to principal quantum numbers of n=25 in cuprous oxide has given insight into exciton states with unprecedented spectral resolution. While so far ...the exciton description as a hydrogenlike complex has been fully adequate for cubic crystals, we demonstrate here distinct deviations: The breaking of rotational symmetry leads to mixing of high angular momentum F and H excitons with the P excitons so that they can be observed in absorption. The F excitons show a threefold splitting that depends systematically on n, in agreement with theoretical considerations. From detailed comparison of experiment and theory we determine the cubic anisotropy parameter of the Cu(2)O valence band.
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Plasmonics allows light to be localized on length scales much shorter than its wavelength, which makes it possible to integrate photonics and electronics on the nanoscale. Magneto-optical materials ...are appealing for applications in plasmonics because they open up the possibility of using external magnetic fields in plasmonic devices. Here, we fabricate a new magneto-optical material, a magnetoplasmonic crystal, that consists of a nanostructured noble-metal film on top of a ferromagnetic dielectric, and we demonstrate an enhanced Kerr effect with this material. Such magnetoplasmonic crystals could have applications in telecommunications, magnetic field sensing and all-optical magnetic data storage.
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MicroRNAs (miRNAs, miRs) are a class of small, non-coding RNA molecules with relevance as regulators of gene expression thereby affecting crucial processes in cancer development. MiRNAs offer great ...potential as biomarkers for cancer detection due to their remarkable stability in blood and their characteristic expression in many different diseases. We investigated whether microarray-based miRNA profiling on whole blood could discriminate between early stage breast cancer patients and healthy controls.
We performed microarray-based miRNA profiling on whole blood of 48 early stage breast cancer patients at diagnosis along with 57 healthy individuals as controls. This was followed by a real-time semi-quantitative Polymerase Chain Reaction (RT-qPCR) validation in a separate cohort of 24 early stage breast cancer patients from a breast cancer screening unit and 24 age matched controls using two differentially expressed miRNAs (miR-202, miR-718).
Using the significance level of p<0.05, we found that 59 miRNAs were differentially expressed in whole blood of early stage breast cancer patients compared to healthy controls. 13 significantly up-regulated miRNAs and 46 significantly down-regulated miRNAs in our microarray panel of 1100 miRNAs and miRNA star sequences could be detected. A set of 240 miRNAs that was evaluated by radial basis function kernel support vector machines and 10-fold cross validation yielded a specificity of 78.8%, and a sensitivity of 92.5%, as well as an accuracy of 85.6%. Two miRNAs were validated by RT-qPCR in an independent cohort. The relative fold changes of the RT-qPCR validation were in line with the microarray data for both miRNAs, and statistically significant differences in miRNA-expression were found for miR-202.
MiRNA profiling in whole blood has potential as a novel method for early stage breast cancer detection, but there are still challenges that need to be addressed to establish these new biomarkers in clinical use.
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An orthogonal approximation for the 8-point discrete cosine transform (DCT) is introduced. The proposed transformation matrix contains only zeros and ones; multiplications and bit-shift operations ...are absent. Close spectral behavior relative to the DCT was adopted as design criterion. The proposed algorithm is superior to the signed discrete cosine transform. It could also outperform state-of-the-art algorithms in low and high image compression scenarios, exhibiting at the same time a comparable computational complexity.
The Landé or g-factors of charge carriers are decisive for the spin-dependent phenomena in solids and provide also information about the underlying electronic band structure. We present a ...comprehensive set of experimental data for values and anisotropies of the electron and hole Landé factors in hybrid organic-inorganic (MAPbI
, MAPb(Br
Cl
)
, MAPb(Br
Cl
)
, FAPbBr
, FA
Cs
PbI
Br
, MA=methylammonium and FA=formamidinium) and all-inorganic (CsPbBr
) lead halide perovskites, determined by pump-probe Kerr rotation and spin-flip Raman scattering in magnetic fields up to 10 T at cryogenic temperatures. Further, we use first-principles density functional theory (DFT) calculations in combination with tight-binding and k ⋅ p approaches to calculate microscopically the Landé factors. The results demonstrate their universal dependence on the band gap energy across the different perovskite material classes, which can be summarized in a universal semi-phenomenological expression, in good agreement with experiment.
High-throughput genotyping arrays continue to be an attractive, cost-effective alternative to sequencing based approaches. We have developed a new 50k Illumina Infinium iSelect genotyping array for ...barley, a cereal crop species of major international importance. The majority of SNPs on the array have been extracted from variants called in exome capture data of a wide range of European barley germplasm. We used the recently published barley pseudomolecule assembly to map the exome capture data, which allowed us to generate markers with accurate physical positions and detailed gene annotation. Markers from an existing and widely used barley 9k Infinium iSelect array were carried over onto the 50k chip for backward compatibility. The array design featured 49,267 SNP markers that converted into 44,040 working assays, of which 43,461 were scorable in GenomeStudio. Of the working assays, 6,251 are from the 9k iSelect platform. We validated the SNPs by comparing the genotype calls from the new array to legacy datasets. Rates of agreement averaged 98.1 and 93.9% respectively for the legacy 9k iSelect SNP set (Comadran et al., 2012) and the exome capture SNPs. To test the utility of the 50k chip for genetic mapping, we genotyped a segregating population derived from a Golden Promise × Morex cross (Liu et al., 2014) and mapped over 14,000 SNPs to genetic positions which showed a near exact correspondence to their known physical positions. Manual adjustment of the cluster files used by the interpreting software for genotype scoring improved results substantially, but migration of cluster files between sites led to a deterioration of results, suggesting that local adjustment of cluster files is required on a site-per-site basis. Information relating to the markers on the chip is available online at https://ics.hutton.ac.uk/50k.
•Clinical depression affects economic decisions of individuals.•Individuals suffering from clinical depression are more likely to prefer current consumption over future consumption, compared to ...healthy individuals.•Individuals suffering from clinical depression tend to be less economically efficient than healthy individuals.•Individuals suffering from clinical depression tend to take more economic risks than healthy individuals.
Clinical depression has significant influence on an individual's behavior and decision making. This study examines how depression affects the economic decision making of individuals with clinical depression, looking specifically at time preference (subjective discount rate), attitude toward risk, and economic conduct. For this purpose, structured questionnaires were distributed to patients with clinical depression at the Be'er Sheva Mental Health Center and a control group of similar size, and with similar demographic characteristics. The questionnaire included questions for assessing the level of depression (processed by a physician), and questions on economic conduct, time preference, and risk preference. The study found that the participants’ level of depression correlated with their economic decisions, time preference and economic conduct, and that there is a significant gap in many aspects of economic decision making between individuals with different levels of depression, and healthy individuals. On one measure of risk preference, individuals with depression showed signs of taking more risks, but there was no uniform trend indicating a disparity between individuals with depression and healthy individuals in other measures of risk preference. Our main conclusion is that clinical depression has broad, significant impact on the economic decisions of those who suffer from it, and it may harm the short- and long-term economic situation of patients. In light of the above, it is important that individuals with depression, their relatives and therapists be aware of this tendency, and take it into consideration when recommending rehabilitation and social programs.
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GEOZS, IJS, IMTLJ, KILJ, KISLJ, NLZOH, NUK, OILJ, PNG, SAZU, SBCE, SBJE, UILJ, UL, UM, UPCLJ, UPUK, ZAGLJ, ZRSKP
We evaluate the accuracy of model selection and associated short-run forecasts using beta autoregressive moving average (βARMA) models, which are tailored for modeling and forecasting time series ...that assume values in the standard unit interval, (0,1), such as rates, proportions, and concentration indices. Different model selection strategies are considered, including one that uses data resampling. Simulation evidence on the frequency of correct model selection favors the bootstrap-based approach. Model selection based on information criteria outperforms that based on forecasting accuracy measures. A forecasting analysis of the proportion of stored hydroelectric energy in South Brazil is presented and discussed. The empirical evidence shows that model selection based on data resampling typically leads to more accurate out-of-sample forecasts.
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The pathological complete response (pCR) after neoadjuvant chemotherapy is a surrogate marker for a favorable prognosis in breast cancer patients. Factors capable of predicting a pCR, such as the ...proliferation marker Ki67, may therefore help improve our understanding of the drug response and its effect on the prognosis. This study investigated the predictive and prognostic value of Ki67 in patients with invasive breast cancer receiving neoadjuvant treatment for breast cancer.
Ki67 was stained routinely from core biopsies in 552 patients directly after the fixation and embedding process. HER2/neu, estrogen and progesterone receptors, and grading were also assessed before treatment. These data were used to construct univariate and multivariate models for predicting pCR and prognosis. The tumors were also classified by molecular phenotype to identify subgroups in which predicting pCR and prognosis with Ki67 might be feasible.
Using a cut-off value of > 13% positively stained cancer cells, Ki67 was found to be an independent predictor for pCR (OR 3.5; 95% CI, 1.4, 10.1) and for overall survival (HR 8.1; 95% CI, 3.3 to 20.4) and distant disease-free survival (HR 3.2; 95% CI, 1.8 to 5.9). The mean Ki67 value was 50.6 ± 23.4% in patients with pCR. Patients without a pCR had an average of 26.7 ± 22.9% positively stained cancer cells.
Ki67 has predictive and prognostic value and is a feasible marker for clinical practice. It independently improved the prediction of treatment response and prognosis in a group of breast cancer patients receiving neoadjuvant treatment. As mean Ki67 values in patients with a pCR were very high, cut-off values in a high range above which the prognosis may be better than in patients with lower Ki67 values may be hypothesized. Larger studies will be needed in order to investigate these findings further.
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We address the issue of model selection in beta regressions with varying dispersion. The model consists of two submodels, namely: for the mean and for the dispersion. Our focus is on the selection of ...the covariates for each submodel. Our Monte Carlo evidence reveals that the joint selection of covariates for the two submodels is not accurate in finite samples. We introduce two new model selection criteria that explicitly account for varying dispersion and propose a fast two step model selection scheme which is considerably more accurate and is computationally less costly than usual joint model selection. Monte Carlo evidence is presented and discussed. We also present the results of an empirical application.
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