Energy criterion to select the behavior of dynamical masses in technicolor models

We propose a quite general ansatz for the dynamical mass in technicolor models. We impose on this ansatz the condition that it should lead to the deepest minimum of energy. This criterion selects a particular form of the technifermion self energy. © 2002 Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserved.

Probing the LSND mass scale and four neutrino scenarios with a neutrino telescope

We show in this Letter that the observation of the angular distribution of upward-going muons and cascade events induced by atmospheric neutrinos at the TeV energy scale which can be performed by a kilometer-scale neutrino telescope, such as the IceCube detector, can be used to probe a large neutrino mass splitting, |Δm 2| ∼ (0.5-2.0) eV 2, implied by the LSND experiment and discriminate among four neutrino mass schemes. This is due to the fact that such a large mass scale can promote non-negligible v μ → v e, v τ/v μ → v e, v τ conversions at these energies by the MSW effect as well as vacuum oscillation, unlike what is expected if all the neutrino mass splittings are small. © 2003 Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserved.

Search for scalar neutrino superpartners in e+mu final states in p(p)over-bar collisions at root s=1.96 TeV

We report a search for R-parity-violating production and decay of sneutrino particles in the eμ final state with 1.04±0.06fb-1 of data collected with the D0 detector at the Fermilab Tevatron Collider in 2002-2006. Good agreement between the data and the standard model prediction is observed. With no evidence for new physics, we set limits on the R-parity-violating couplings λ311′ and λ312 as a function of the sneutrino mass. © 2008 The American Physical Society.

Absolute neutrino mass from helicity measurements

The possibility to access the absolute neutrino mass scale through the measurement of the wrong helicity contribution of charged leptons is investigated in pion decay. Through this method, one may have access to the same effective mass m 2β extractable from the tritium beta decay experiments for electron neutrinos as well as the analogous effective mass $(m 2nuμ}){eff} for muon neutrinos. In the channel π-→ ē-v̄, the relative probability of producing an antineutrino with left helicity is enhanced if compared with the naive expectation (m ν/2E ν) 2. The possibility to constrain new interactions in the context of two-Higgs-Doublet models is also investigated. © 2009 World Scientific Publishing Company.

Effects of dynamical masses of gluons and quarks on hadronic B decays

We study hadronic annihilation decays of B mesons within the perturbative QCD at collinear approximation. The regulation of endpoint divergences is performed with the help of an infrared finite gluon propagator characterized by a non-perturbative dynamical gluon mass. The divergences at twist-3 are regulated by a dynamical quark mass. Our results fit quite well the existent data of B 0→D s-K + and B 0→ D s-*K + for the expected range of dynamical gluon masses. We also make predictions for the rare decays B 0→K -K +, B s0→π -π +, π 0π 0, B +→D s(*) +K̄ 0, B 0→D s±(*)K ± and B s0 →D±(*) π ±, D 0π 0. © 2010 American Institute of Physics.

Ultra-high energy extragalactic neutrinos interacting with ultra-light dark matter

We show the results and discussions of the study of a possible suppression of the extragalactic neutrino flux during its propagation due to a nonstandard interaction with a candidate field to dark matter. In particular, we show the study of neutrino interaction with an ultra-light scalar field. It is shown that the extragalactic neutrino flux may be suppressed by such an interaction, leading to a mechanism to reduce the ultra-high energy neutrino flux. We calculate both the cases of non-self-conjugate as well as self-conjugate ultra-light dark matter. In the first case, the suppression is independent of the neutrino and dark matter masses. We conclude that care must be taken when explaining limits on the neutrino flux through source acceleration mechanisms only, since there could be other mechanisms, as absorption during propagation, for the reduction of the neutrino flux [1], © Published under licence by IOP Publishing Ltd.

Search for third-generation leptoquarks and scalar bottom quarks in pp collisions at √s=7Tev

Results are presented from a search for third-generation leptoquarks and scalar bottom quarks in a sample of proton-proton collisions at √s=7Tev collected by the CMS experiment at the LHC, corresponding to an integrated luminosity of 4.7 fb-1. A scenario where the new particles are pair produced and each decays to a b quark plus a tau neutrino or neutralino is considered. The number of observed events is found to be in agreement with the standard model prediction. Upper limits are set at 95% confidence level on the production cross sections. Leptoquarks with masses below ~450 GeV are excluded. Upper limits in the mass plane of the scalar quark and neutralino are set such that scalar bottom quark masses up to 410 GeV are excluded for neutralino masses of 50 GeV. © 2012 CERN for the benefit of CMS collaboration.

Review of the efficacy and safety of cryoablation for the treatment of small renal masses

Purpose: Small renal masses are increasingly being discovered incidentally on imaging for another reason. The standard of care of these masses involves excision by open or laparoscopic techniques. Recently, ablative techniques, such as radiofrequency ablation (RFA) and cryoablation, have taken a more prominent role in the treatment algorithm of these masses. We evaluate the effectiveness and safety of cryoablation to treat renal tumours. Methods: A review of the literature was conducted. There was no language restriction. Studies were obtained from the following sources: the Cochrane Library, PUBMED, EMBASE and LILACS. Results: There was no clinical trial identified in the literature. Thus, we described the results from 23 case series and retrospective studies with a reasonable sample size (number of reported patients in each study ≥30), with a total of 2104 analyzed tumours from 2038 patients. There was wide variability in the outcomes reported, but success rates were generally good. Follow-up was generally short, but some series reported outcomes at 5 years. The most common complications reported were hemorrhage (some of the patients requiring transfusion), perinephric hematoma and urine leaks. Conclusion: Cryoablation presents a feasible treatment for patients with small renal masses. Only short-term data are available and, as such, meaningful conclusions regarding long-term cancer control cannot be made. More rigorous studies are needed. © 2013 Canadian Urological Association.

Search for new physics in final states with a lepton and missing transverse energy in pp collisions at the LHC

This Letter describes the search for an enhanced production rate of events with a charged lepton and a neutrino in high-energy pp collisions at the LHC. The analysis uses data collected with the CMS detector, with an integrated luminosity of 5.0 fb-1 at √s=7 TeV, and a further 3.7 fb -1 at √s=8 TeV. No evidence is found for an excess. The results are interpreted in terms of limits on a heavy charged gauge boson (W ′) in the sequential standard model, a split universal extra dimension model, and contact interactions in the helicity-nonconserving model. For the last, values of the binding energy below 10.5 (8.8) TeV in the electron (muon) channel are excluded at a 95% confidence level. Interpreting the ℓν final state in terms of a heavy W′ with standard model couplings, masses below 2.90 TeV are excluded. © 2013 CERN.

Classification of masses in mammographic image using wavelet domain features and polynomial classifier

Breast cancer is the most common cancer among women. In CAD systems, several studies have investigated the use of wavelet transform as a multiresolution analysis tool for texture analysis and could be interpreted as inputs to a classifier. In classification, polynomial classifier has been used due to the advantages of providing only one model for optimal separation of classes and to consider this as the solution of the problem. In this paper, a system is proposed for texture analysis and classification of lesions in mammographic images. Multiresolution analysis features were extracted from the region of interest of a given image. These features were computed based on three different wavelet functions, Daubechies 8, Symlet 8 and bi-orthogonal 3.7. For classification, we used the polynomial classification algorithm to define the mammogram images as normal or abnormal. We also made a comparison with other artificial intelligence algorithms (Decision Tree, SVM, K-NN). A Receiver Operating Characteristics (ROC) curve is used to evaluate the performance of the proposed system. Our system is evaluated using 360 digitized mammograms from DDSM database and the result shows that the algorithm has an area under the ROC curve Az of 0.98 ± 0.03. The performance of the polynomial classifier has proved to be better in comparison to other classification algorithms. © 2013 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Spodoptera frugiperda (J. E. Smith) (Lepidoptera: Noctuidae) in cotton: vertical distribution of egg masses, effects of adult density and plant age on oviposition behavior

O trabalho teve por objetivo determinar, em casa-de-vegetação, a densidade adequada de adultos, a idade ideal das plantas e a distribuição vertical de ovos nas diferentes partes da planta, visando à realização de estudos de resistência e à melhoria das práticas de manejo de Spodoptera frugiperda em algodoeiro. Os experimentos de oviposição de S. frugiperda em relação à densidade de adultos, relação entre plantas de algodoeiro e oviposição de S. frugiperda e não preferência para oviposição de S. frugiperda em variedades de algodoeiro foram realizados com plantas da variedade de algodoeiro BRS Ita 90. A não preferência (antixenose) para oviposição foi acompanhada nas variedades FiberMax 966, FiberMax 977, DeltaOpal, DeltaPenta, Acala 90, Coodetec 408, Coodetec 409, Coodetec 410, BRS Cedro, BRS Ipê, BRS Aroeira, IPR 96, IPR 20, BRS Araçá, IAC 24 e BRS Ita 90. Concluiu-se que S. frugiperda prefere ovipositar em plantas com cerca de 60 dias de idade, na superfície inferior das folhas situadas no terço superior dos testes de plantas sob condições de estufa. Uma densidade de, pelo menos, três pares de adultos S. frugiperda por planta foi suficiente para realizar testes de não preferência para oviposição em casa de vegetação. As variedades Coodetec 408, BRS Aroeira, BRS Araçá, BRS Ita 90 e DeltaPenta apresentaram resistência do tipo não preferência para oviposição de S. frugiperda. Em regiões com altas infestações de S. frugiperda, seria prudente para o cultivo utilizar a variedade de algodão BRS Ita 90.

Quasi-Dirac neutrinos and solar neutrino data

Conselho Nacional de Desenvolvimento Científico e Tecnológico (CNPq)

Optimum-Path Forest Applied for Breast Masses Classification

In Computer-Aided Diagnosis-based schemes in mammography analysis each module is interconnected, which directly affects the system operation as a whole. The identification of mammograms with and without masses is highly needed to reduce the false positive rates regarding the automatic selection of regions of interest for further image segmentation. This study aims to evaluate the performance of three techniques in classifying regions of interest as containing masses or without masses (without clinical findings), as well as the main contribution of this work is to introduce the Optimum-Path Forest (OPF) classifier in this context, which has never been done so far. Thus, we have compared OPF against with two sorts of neural networks in a private dataset composed by 120 images: Radial Basis Function and Multilayer Perceptron (MLP). Texture features have been used for such purpose, and the experiments have demonstrated that MLP networks have been slightly better than OPF, but the former is much faster, which can be a suitable tool for real-time recognition systems.

Constraining the absolute neutrino mass scale and Majorana CP violating phases by future 0νββ decay experiments

Assuming that neutrinos are Majorana particles, in a three-generation framework, current and future neutrino oscillation experiments can determine six out of the nine parameters which fully describe the structure of the neutrino mass matrix. We try to clarify the interplay among the remaining parameters, the absolute neutrino mass scale and two CP violating Majorana phases, and how they can be accessed by future neutrinoless double beta (0vυββ) decay experiments, for the normal as well as for the inverted order of the neutrino mass spectrum. Assuming the oscillation parameters to be in the range presently allowed by atmospheric, solar, reactor, and accelerator neutrino experiments, we quantitatively estimate the bounds on m 0, the lightest neutrino mass, that can be inferred if the next generation 0υββ decay experiments can probe the effective Majorana mass (m ee) down to ∼1 meV. In this context we conclude that in the case that neutrinos are Majorana particles, (a) if m 0≳300 meV, i.e., within the range directly attainable by future laboratory experiments as well as astrophysical observations, then m ee≳30 meV must be observed, (b) if m 0 ≤ 300 meV, results from future 0υββ decay experiments combined with stringent bounds on the neutrino oscillation parameters, especially the solar ones, will place much stronger limits on the allowed values of m 0 than these direct experiments. For instance, if a positive signal is observed around m ee = 10 meV, we estimate 3≲m 0/meV≲65 at 95% C.L.; on the other hand, if no signal is observed down to m ee = 10 meV, then m 0≲55 meV at 95% C.L.

Neutrino mixing effects on the tau-neutrino mass limit

We point out that the usual experimental upper bounds on the ''tau-neutrino mass'' do not apply if neutrino mixing is considered. The suppression of the population of the tau decay spectrum near the end point, caused by mixing, may be compensated by an enhancement because of a resonant mechanism of hadronization. It is necessary therefore to analyze the whole spectrum to infer some limit to the '' tau-neutrino mass.'' We argue that, consequently, neutrino mixing evades the objection to interpret the KARMEN anomaly as a heavy sequential neutrino.