Cyber-pseudepigraphy: A New Challenge for Higher Education Policy and Management

There is no lack of critical literature dealing with cyber-plagiarism and the implications for assessment in higher education. The practice of the selling of academic papers through the Internet is generally included under the category of plagiarism, although it is suggested that this ought to be considered under the separate category of cyber-pseudepigraphy. Pseudepigraphy is defined in this essay as the deliberate ascription of false authorship to a piece of writing, and cyber-pseudepigraphy is defined as using the Internet to have another person write an academic essay or paper, without this authorship being acknowledged. It is suggested that cyber-pseudepigraphy has widespread implications, and five critical issues are discussed. The essay finally raises the prospect of a return to some form of unseen examination as a method of student assessment as a way of dealing with this problem

Degenerate Stars and Gravitational Collapse in AdS/CFT

We construct composite CFT operators from a large number of fermionic primary fields corresponding to states that are holographically dual to a zero temperature Fermi gas in AdS space. We identify a large N regime in which the fermions behave as free particles. In the hydrodynamic limit the Fermi gas forms a degenerate star with a radius determined by the Fermi level, and a mass and angular momentum that exactly matches the boundary calculations. Next we consider an interacting regime, and calculate the effect of the gravitational back-reaction on the radius and the mass of the star using the Tolman-Oppenheimer-Volkoff equations. Ignoring other interactions, we determine the "Chandrasekhar limit" beyond which the degenerate star (presumably) undergoes gravitational collapse towards a black hole. This is interpreted on the boundary as a high density phase transition from a cold baryonic phase to a hot deconfined phase.Comment: 75 page

Discovery of mating in the major African livestock pathogen Trypanosoma congolense

The protozoan parasite, Trypanosoma congolense, is one of the most economically important pathogens of livestock in Africa and, through its impact on cattle health and productivity, has a significant effect on human health and well being. Despite the importance of this parasite our knowledge of some of the fundamental biological processes is limited. For example, it is unknown whether mating takes place. In this paper we have taken a population genetics based approach to address this question. The availability of genome sequence of the parasite allowed us to identify polymorphic microsatellite markers, which were used to genotype T. congolense isolates from livestock in a discrete geographical area of The Gambia. The data showed a high level of diversity with a large number of distinct genotypes, but a deficit in heterozygotes. Further analysis identified cryptic genetic subdivision into four sub-populations. In one of these, parasite genotypic diversity could only be explained by the occurrence of frequent mating in T. congolense. These data are completely inconsistent with previous suggestions that the parasite expands asexually in the absence of mating. The discovery of mating in this species of trypanosome has significant consequences for the spread of critical traits, such as drug resistance, as well as for fundamental aspects of the biology and epidemiology of this neglected but economically important pathogen

GLAST: Understanding the High Energy Gamma-Ray Sky

We discuss the ability of the GLAST Large Area Telescope (LAT) to identify, resolve, and study the high energy gamma-ray sky. Compared to previous instruments the telescope will have greatly improved sensitivity and ability to localize gamma-ray point sources. The ability to resolve the location and identity of EGRET unidentified sources is described. We summarize the current knowledge of the high energy gamma-ray sky and discuss the astrophysics of known and some prospective classes of gamma-ray emitters. In addition, we also describe the potential of GLAST to resolve old puzzles and to discover new classes of sources.Comment: To appear in Cosmic Gamma Ray Sources, Kluwer ASSL Series, Edited by K.S. Cheng and G.E. Romer

The Pioneer Anomaly

Radio-metric Doppler tracking data received from the Pioneer 10 and 11 spacecraft from heliocentric distances of 20-70 AU has consistently indicated the presence of a small, anomalous, blue-shifted frequency drift uniformly changing with a rate of ~6 x 10^{-9} Hz/s. Ultimately, the drift was interpreted as a constant sunward deceleration of each particular spacecraft at the level of a_P = (8.74 +/- 1.33) x 10^{-10} m/s^2. This apparent violation of the Newton's gravitational inverse-square law has become known as the Pioneer anomaly; the nature of this anomaly remains unexplained. In this review, we summarize the current knowledge of the physical properties of the anomaly and the conditions that led to its detection and characterization. We review various mechanisms proposed to explain the anomaly and discuss the current state of efforts to determine its nature. A comprehensive new investigation of the anomalous behavior of the two Pioneers has begun recently. The new efforts rely on the much-extended set of radio-metric Doppler data for both spacecraft in conjunction with the newly available complete record of their telemetry files and a large archive of original project documentation. As the new study is yet to report its findings, this review provides the necessary background for the new results to appear in the near future. In particular, we provide a significant amount of information on the design, operations and behavior of the two Pioneers during their entire missions, including descriptions of various data formats and techniques used for their navigation and radio-science data analysis. As most of this information was recovered relatively recently, it was not used in the previous studies of the Pioneer anomaly, but it is critical for the new investigation.Comment: 165 pages, 40 figures, 16 tables; accepted for publication in Living Reviews in Relativit

Dynamical Boson Stars

The idea of stable, localized bundles of energy has strong appeal as a model for particles. In the 1950s John Wheeler envisioned such bundles as smooth configurations of electromagnetic energy that he called {\em geons}, but none were found. Instead, particle-like solutions were found in the late 1960s with the addition of a scalar field, and these were given the name {\em boson stars}. Since then, boson stars find use in a wide variety of models as sources of dark matter, as black hole mimickers, in simple models of binary systems, and as a tool in finding black holes in higher dimensions with only a single killing vector. We discuss important varieties of boson stars, their dynamic properties, and some of their uses, concentrating on recent efforts.Comment: 79 pages, 25 figures, invited review for Living Reviews in Relativity; major revision in 201

Physics of Neutron Star Crusts

The physics of neutron star crusts is vast, involving many different research fields, from nuclear and condensed matter physics to general relativity. This review summarizes the progress, which has been achieved over the last few years, in modeling neutron star crusts, both at the microscopic and macroscopic levels. The confrontation of these theoretical models with observations is also briefly discussed.Comment: 182 pages, published version available at <http://www.livingreviews.org/lrr-2008-10

Hawking Radiation from Higher-Dimensional Black Holes

We review the quantum field theory description of Hawking radiation from evaporating black holes and summarize what is known about Hawking radiation from black holes in more than four space-time dimensions. In the context of the Large Extra Dimensions scenario, we present the theoretical formalism for all types of emitted fields and a selection of results on the radiation spectra. A detailed analysis of the Hawking fluxes in this case is essential for modelling the evaporation of higher-dimensional black holes at the LHC, whose creation is predicted by low-energy models of quantum gravity. We discuss the status of the quest for black-hole solutions in the context of the Randall-Sundrum brane-world model and, in the absence of an exact metric, we review what is known about Hawking radiation from such black holes

Current and prospective pharmacological targets in relation to antimigraine action

Migraine is a recurrent incapacitating neurovascular disorder characterized by unilateral and throbbing headaches associated with photophobia, phonophobia, nausea, and vomiting. Current specific drugs used in the acute treatment of migraine interact with vascular receptors, a fact that has raised concerns about their cardiovascular safety. In the past, α-adrenoceptor agonists (ergotamine, dihydroergotamine, isometheptene) were used. The last two decades have witnessed the advent of 5-HT1B/1D receptor agonists (sumatriptan and second-generation triptans), which have a well-established efficacy in the acute treatment of migraine. Moreover, current prophylactic treatments of migraine include 5-HT2 receptor antagonists, Ca2+ channel blockers, and β-adrenoceptor antagonists. Despite the progress in migraine research and in view of its complex etiology, this disease still remains underdiagnosed, and available therapies are underused. In this review, we have discussed pharmacological targets in migraine, with special emphasis on compounds acting on 5-HT (5-HT1-7), adrenergic (α1, α2, and β), calcitonin gene-related peptide (CGRP 1 and CGRP2), adenosine (A1, A2, and A3), glutamate (NMDA, AMPA, kainate, and metabotropic), dopamine, endothelin, and female hormone (estrogen and progesterone) receptors. In addition, we have considered some other targets, including gamma-aminobutyric acid, angiotensin, bradykinin, histamine, and ionotropic receptors, in relation to antimigraine therapy. Finally, the cardiovascular safety of current and prospective antimigraine therapies is touched upon

Multi-messenger observations of a binary neutron star merger

On 2017 August 17 a binary neutron star coalescence candidate (later designated GW170817) with merger time 12:41:04 UTC was observed through gravitational waves by the Advanced LIGO and Advanced Virgo detectors. The Fermi Gamma-ray Burst Monitor independently detected a gamma-ray burst (GRB 170817A) with a time delay of ~1.7 s with respect to the merger time. From the gravitational-wave signal, the source was initially localized to a sky region of 31 deg2 at a luminosity distance of 40+8-8 Mpc and with component masses consistent with neutron stars. The component masses were later measured to be in the range 0.86 to 2.26 Mo. An extensive observing campaign was launched across the electromagnetic spectrum leading to the discovery of a bright optical transient (SSS17a, now with the IAU identification of AT 2017gfo) in NGC 4993 (at ~40 Mpc) less than 11 hours after the merger by the One- Meter, Two Hemisphere (1M2H) team using the 1 m Swope Telescope. The optical transient was independently detected by multiple teams within an hour. Subsequent observations targeted the object and its environment. Early ultraviolet observations revealed a blue transient that faded within 48 hours. Optical and infrared observations showed a redward evolution over ~10 days. Following early non-detections, X-ray and radio emission were discovered at the transient’s position ~9 and ~16 days, respectively, after the merger. Both the X-ray and radio emission likely arise from a physical process that is distinct from the one that generates the UV/optical/near-infrared emission. No ultra-high-energy gamma-rays and no neutrino candidates consistent with the source were found in follow-up searches. These observations support the hypothesis that GW170817 was produced by the merger of two neutron stars in NGC4993 followed by a short gamma-ray burst (GRB 170817A) and a kilonova/macronova powered by the radioactive decay of r-process nuclei synthesized in the ejecta