On viscous flow and azimuthal anisotropy of quark-gluon plasma in strong magnetic field

We calculate the viscous pressure tensor of the quark-gluon plasma in strong magnetic field. It is azimuthally anisotropic and is characterized by five shear viscosity coefficients, four of which vanish when the field strength eB is much larger than the plasma temperature squared. We argue, that the azimuthally anisotropic viscous pressure tensor generates the transverse flow with asymmetry as large as 1/3, even not taking into account the collision geometry. We conclude, that the magnitude of the shear viscosity extracted from the experimental data ignoring the magnetic field must be underestimated.Comment: 10 page

Photon decay in strong magnetic field in heavy-ion collisions

We calculate the photon pair production rate in strong magnetic field created in off-central heavy-ion collisions. Photon decay leads to depletion of the photon yield by a few percent at RHIC and by as much as 20% at the LHC. It also generates a substantial azimuthal asymmetry ("elliptic flow") of the final photon distribution. We estimate v_2~2% at RHIC and v_2~14% at LHC. Photon decay measurements is an important tool for studying the magnetic fields in early stages of heavy-ion collisions.Comment: 6 pages, 3 figure

An electrooptical muscle contraction sensor

An electrooptical sensor for the detection of muscle contraction is described. Infrared light is injected into the muscle, the backscattering is observed, and the contraction is detected by measuring the change, that occurs during muscle contraction, between the light scattered in the direction parallel and perpendicular to the muscle cells. With respect to electromyography and to optical absorption-based sensors, our device has the advantage of lower invasiveness, of lower sensitivity to electromagnetic noise and to movement artifacts, and of being able to distinguish between isometric and isotonic contractions

EHMTI-0266. Validation of a sham manipulative procedure: a new protocol for conducting placebo-control clinical trials in manual therapy

Background: Few manual therapy studies have attempted to conduct placebo-control clinical trials. Thus, quantification of alleged placebo effects consequently becomes difficult. Aim: To investigate and validate a new placebo intervention for spinal manipulative therapy clinical trials, i.e. sham manipulation, and investigate the feasibility of a short de-blinding questionnaire. Method: A single blinded, prospective randomized, placebo-controlled trial with 1 month baseline and 3 months treatment with 12 treatments. 104 participants diagnosed with migraine were equally randomized into 1 of 3 groups: (i) chiropractic spinal manipulative therapy (CSMT), (ii) placebo (sham manipulation), (iii) control group (continued usual management). The participants filled in questionnaire on de-blinding after each treatment session. Primary end-point was the rate of successful blinding through de-blinding questionnaires given after each treatment session. Results: 772 out of 840 individual cases were analyzed, only 8.1 % out of all cases missed their appointment. The unadjusted result shows that both the active and placebo group believed they received active treatment with odds ratio (OR) of ≥88.9 and ≥80.0 respectively. Due to strong cluster effect in our data, logistic regression model was used to adjust for repeated measures which showed a significant OR of >10 in both the active and the placebo group. Conclusion: This is the first study to successfully demonstrate a manipulative sham procedure over a full length treatment period, assessing the placebo group with de-blinding questionnaire after each session which thus, could be incorporated in future clinical trials.1 page(s

Beer-Lambert law along non-linear mean light pathways for the rational analysis of Photoplethysmography

Photoplethysmography (PPG) is a technique that uses light to noninvasively obtain a volumetric measurement of an organ with each cardiac cycle. A PPG-based system emits monochromatic light through the skin and measures the fraction of the light power which is transmitted through a vascular tissue and detected by a photodetector. Part of thereby transmitted light power is modulated by the vascular tissue volume changes due to the blood circulation induced by the heart beating. This modulated light power plotted against time is called the PPG signal. Pulse Oximetry is an empirical technique which allows the arterial blood oxygen saturation (SpO2 – molar fraction) evaluation from the PPG signals. There have been many reports in the literature suggesting that other arterial blood chemical components molar fractions and concentrations can be evaluated from the PPG signals. Most attempts to perform such evaluation on empirical bases have failed, especially for components concentrations. This paper introduces a non-empirical physical model which can be used to analytically investigate the phenomena of PPG signal. Such investigation would result in simplified engineering models, which can be used to design validating experiments and new types of spectroscopic devices with the potential to assess venous and arterial blood chemical composition in both molar fractions and concentrations non-invasively

Tsunamis, Viscosity and the HBT Puzzle

The equation of state and bulk and shear viscosities are shown to be able to affect the transverse dynamics of a central heavy ion collision. The net entropy, along with the femtoscopic radii are shown to be affected at the 10-20% level by both shear and bulk viscosity. The degree to which these effects help build a tsunami-like pulse is also discussed.Comment: Contribution to SQM 2007 in Levoca, Slovaki

Chemical composition of the decaying glasma

The the initial stage of a relativistic heavy ion collision can be described by a classical color field configuration known as the Glasma. The production of quark pairs from this background field is then computed nonperturbatively by numerically solving the Dirac equation in the classical background. The result seems to point towards an early chemical equilibration of the plasma.Comment: 8 pages, 5 figures, invited talk at Stangeness in Quark Matter 2006 (SQM06), UCLA, March 200

Hamiltonian Light-Front Field Theory: Recent Progress and Tantalizing Prospects

Fundamental theories, such as Quantum Electrodynamics (QED) and Quantum Chromodynamics (QCD) promise great predictive power addressing phenomena over vast scales from the microscopic to cosmic scales. However, new non-perturbative tools are required for physics to span from one scale to the next. I outline recent theoretical and computational progress to build these bridges and provide illustrative results for Hamiltonian Light Front Field Theory. One key area is our development of basis function approaches that cast the theory as a Hamiltonian matrix problem while preserving a maximal set of symmetries. Regulating the theory with an external field that can be removed to obtain the continuum limit offers additional possibilities as seen in an application to the anomalous magnetic moment of the electron. Recent progress capitalizes on algorithm and computer developments for setting up and solving very large sparse matrix eigenvalue problems. Matrices with dimensions of 20 billion basis states are now solved on leadership-class computers for their low-lying eigenstates and eigenfunctions.Comment: 8 pages with 2 figure

Recent Heavy-Flavor results at STAR

We present the recent results on non-photonic electron (NPE) yields from RHIC run8 p+p collisions. The $e/\pi$ ratio as a function of $p_T$ in run8 with a factor of 10 reduction of the inner detector material at STAR is found to be consistent with those results from run3 taking into account the NPE from charm leptonic decay and the difference of photonic electron yield from photon conversion in detector material. \Jpsi spectra in \pp and \cucu collisions at \sNN = 200 GeV with high sampled luminosity \Jpsi spectrum at high-\pT follows $x_T$ scaling, but the scaling is violated at low \pT. $J/\psi$-hadron correlations in \pp collisions are studied to understand the \Jpsi production mechanism at high $p_T$. We observed an absence of charged hadrons accompanying \Jpsi on the near-side, in contrast to the strong correlation peak in the di-hadron correlations. This constrains the $B$-meson contribution and jet fragmentation to inclusive \Jpsi to be ${}^{<}_{\sim}17$. Yields in minimum-bias \cucu collisions are consistent with those in \pp collisions scaled by the underlying binary nucleon-nucleon collisions in the measured \pT range. Other measurements and future projects related to heavy-flavors are discussed.Comment: 8 pages 4 figures, proceedings of the International Conference on Strangeness in Quark Matter 2008 - Beijing, China, Oct. 6-10, 200