Study of instabilities and transition to turbulence in a linear hall accelerator

Magnetospheric instabilities and transition to plasma turbulence in Hall current accelerator

On the Use of Shor States for the [7,1,3] Quantum Error Correcting Code

We explore the effect of Shor state construction methods on logical state encoding and quantum error correction for the [[7,1,3]] Calderbank-Shor-Steane quantum error correction code in a nonequiprobable error environment. We determine the optimum number of verification steps to be used in Shor state construction and whether Shor states without verification are usable for practical quantum computation. These results are compared to the same processes of encoding and error correction where Shor states are not used. We demonstrate that the construction of logical zero states with no first order error terms may not require the complete edifice of quantum fault tolerance. With respect to error correction, we show for a particular initial state that error correction using a single qubit for syndrome measurement yields a similar output state accuracy to error correction using Shor states as syndrome qubits. In addition, we demonstrate that error correction with Shor states has an inherent sensitivity to bit-flip errors. Finally, we suggest that in this type of error correction scenario one should always repeat a syndrome measurement until attaining an all zero readout (twice in row).Comment: 7 pages, 1 figure, added section on non-zero syndrome measuremen

31st Annual Meeting and Associated Programs of the Society for Immunotherapy of Cancer (SITC 2016) : part two

Background The immunological escape of tumors represents one of the main ob- stacles to the treatment of malignancies. The blockade of PD-1 or CTLA-4 receptors represented a milestone in the history of immunotherapy. However, immune checkpoint inhibitors seem to be effective in specific cohorts of patients. It has been proposed that their efficacy relies on the presence of an immunological response. Thus, we hypothesized that disruption of the PD-L1/PD-1 axis would synergize with our oncolytic vaccine platform PeptiCRAd. Methods We used murine B16OVA in vivo tumor models and flow cytometry analysis to investigate the immunological background. Results First, we found that high-burden B16OVA tumors were refractory to combination immunotherapy. However, with a more aggressive schedule, tumors with a lower burden were more susceptible to the combination of PeptiCRAd and PD-L1 blockade. The therapy signifi- cantly increased the median survival of mice (Fig. 7). Interestingly, the reduced growth of contralaterally injected B16F10 cells sug- gested the presence of a long lasting immunological memory also against non-targeted antigens. Concerning the functional state of tumor infiltrating lymphocytes (TILs), we found that all the immune therapies would enhance the percentage of activated (PD-1pos TIM- 3neg) T lymphocytes and reduce the amount of exhausted (PD-1pos TIM-3pos) cells compared to placebo. As expected, we found that PeptiCRAd monotherapy could increase the number of antigen spe- cific CD8+ T cells compared to other treatments. However, only the combination with PD-L1 blockade could significantly increase the ra- tio between activated and exhausted pentamer positive cells (p= 0.0058), suggesting that by disrupting the PD-1/PD-L1 axis we could decrease the amount of dysfunctional antigen specific T cells. We ob- served that the anatomical location deeply influenced the state of CD4+ and CD8+ T lymphocytes. In fact, TIM-3 expression was in- creased by 2 fold on TILs compared to splenic and lymphoid T cells. In the CD8+ compartment, the expression of PD-1 on the surface seemed to be restricted to the tumor micro-environment, while CD4 + T cells had a high expression of PD-1 also in lymphoid organs. Interestingly, we found that the levels of PD-1 were significantly higher on CD8+ T cells than on CD4+ T cells into the tumor micro- environment (p < 0.0001). Conclusions In conclusion, we demonstrated that the efficacy of immune check- point inhibitors might be strongly enhanced by their combination with cancer vaccines. PeptiCRAd was able to increase the number of antigen-specific T cells and PD-L1 blockade prevented their exhaus- tion, resulting in long-lasting immunological memory and increased median survival

EFFECTS OF LOCAL ANESTHETICS ON TACTILE SENSITIVITY THRESHOLDS FOR CUTANEOUS AND MUCOUS MEMBRANES

New, reliable, and precise methods for measuring absolute pressure sensitivity in mucous membranes and on intact skin are described. Studies were conducted to determine how local anesthetics (phenol and sodium phenolate and Benzocaine) affect tactile sensitivity thresholds in the oropharynx and on the intact skin of the volar surface of the forearms, ankles, knees, elbows, and dorsum of the hands. Gargling and expectorating a solution containing phenol had a significantly greater anesthetic effect on the mucous membranes of the oropharynx than spraying and swallowing, which, in turn, had a greater effect than drinking the solution. Compared with ethanol and petroleum jelly (Vaseline), the topical application of Benzocaine (0, .5, 1, 3, and 5% solutions in 100% ethanol) significantly increased the tactile sensory thresholds on the volar surface of the forearm. A highly significant loss of tactual sensitivity of the oropharynx was demonstrated in smokers