Dramatically Enhanced Superconductivity in Elemental Bismuth from Excitonic Fluctuation Exchange.

Motivated by the remarkable discovery of superconductivity in elemental Bismuth at ambient pressure, we study its normal state in detail using a combination of tight-binding (TB) band-structure supplemented by dynamical mean-field theory (DMFT). We show that a two-fluid model composed of preformed and dynamically fluctuating excitons coupled to a tiny number of carriers provides a unified rationalization of a range of ill-understood normal state spectral and transport data. Based on these, we propose that resonant scattering involving a very low density of renormalized carriers and the excitonic liquid drives logarithmic enhancement of vertex corrections, boosting superconductivity in Bi. A confirmatory test for our proposal would be the experimental verification of an excitonic semiconductor with electronic nematicity as a 'competing order' on inducing a semi-metal-to semiconductor transition in Bi by an external perturbation like pressure.

The unusual normal state and charge-density-wave order in 2H-NbSe2.

Competition between collective states like charge-density-wave and superconductivity, unencumbered by the spin degrees of freedom, is played out in some of the transition metal dichalcogenides. Although 2H-NbSe2 has received much less attention than some of the other members of the family (such as 1T-TiSe2 and 2H-TaSe2) of late, it shows superconductivity at 7.2 K and incommensurate charge ordering at 33 K. Recent experiments, notably angle resolved photoemission spectroscopy, have cast serious doubts on the theories based on Fermi surface nesting and electron-phonon interaction. The normal state has been found to be a poor, incoherent metal and remarkably, the coherence increases in the broken symmetry state. From a preformed excitonic liquid scenario, we show that there exists a natural understanding of the experimental data on 2H-NbSe2, based on electron-electron interaction. The collective instabilities, in this scenario, are viewed as a condensation of an incoherent excitonic liquid already present at high temperature.

A novel segmentation approach for noisy medical images using intuitionistic fuzzy divergence with neighbourhood-based membership function.

Medical image segmentation demands higher segmentation accuracy especially when the images are affected by noise. This paper proposes a novel technique to segment medical images efficiently using an intuitionistic fuzzy divergence-based thresholding. A neighbourhood-based membership function is defined here. The intuitionistic fuzzy divergence-based image thresholding technique using the neighbourhood-based membership functions yield lesser degradation of segmentation performance in noisy environment. Its ability in handling noisy images has been validated. The algorithm is independent of any parameter selection. Moreover, it provides robustness to both additive and multiplicative noise. The proposed scheme has been applied on three types of medical image datasets in order to establish its novelty and generality. The performance of the proposed algorithm has been compared with other standard algorithms viz. Otsu's method, fuzzy C-means clustering, and fuzzy divergence-based thresholding with respect to (1) noise-free images and (2) ground truth images labelled by experts/clinicians. Experiments show that the proposed methodology is effective, more accurate and efficient for segmenting noisy images.

Efficacy and Safety of Terbinafine Hydrochloride 1% Cream vs. Sertaconazole Nitrate 2% Cream in Tinea Corporis and Tinea Cruris: A Comparative Therapeutic Trial.

CONTEXT: To the best of our knowledge, till date no study comparing the efficacy and safety of terbinafine hydrochloride 1% cream and sertaconazole nitrate 2% cream has been done in localized tinea corporis and tinea cruris. AIMS: This clinical trial was carried out to study and compare the efficacy of topical terbinafine hydrochloride 1% cream and sertaconazole nitrate 2% cream in localized tinea corporis and tinea cruris and to know the adverse effects of these antifungal creams. SETTINGS AND DESIGN: In this prospective, single blind, randomized control trial with two arms, patient were randomized into two groups Group A (treatment with terbinafine cream) and Group B (treatment with sertaconazole cream). A total of 38 patients were enrolled for the study, 20 patients in group A and 18 patients in group B. But five patients of group A and three patients of group B were lost for follow-ups. Therefore sample size was of 30 patients with 15 patients in group A and group B each. MATERIALS AND METHODS: Patients in group A and B were treated with twice daily topical 1% terbinafine hydrochloride and 2% sertaconazole nitrate cream respectively for a total duration of three weeks. Clinical improvement in signs and symptoms of each clinical parameter, namely itching, erythema, papules, pustules, vesicles, and scaling were graded weekly and clinical cure was assessed. KOH mount and culture was done weekly up to 3 weeks to access mycological cure. Fungal culture was done on Sabouraud's dextrose agar with chloramphenicol and cycloheximide. STATISTICAL ANALYSIS USED: Statistical analysis was done using students paired and unpaired t-tests from the data obtained. RESULTS: Comparison between Group A and Group B for complete cure (clinical and mycological) showed that at the end of 3 weeks both terbinafine and sertaconazole groups had 100% complete cure. When the two groups were compared for complete cure, at the end of 1(st) and 2(nd) week, statistically non-significant results were observed (P = 0.461 and P = 0.679 respectively). However, at the end of 2(nd) week, complete cure rate for terbinafine was 80% as compared to 73.35% for sertaconazole with no statistical significance. In both Group A and Group B, clinically significant local side effects like erythema, swelling, stinging sensation, or increased itching were not noticed. A majority of our patients in both the group showed Trichophyton rubrum followed by Trichophyton mentagrophytes growth on culture. In Group A, 11 patients showed growth of T. rubrum, 2 patients showed growth of T. mentagrophytes, and 1 patient had only KOH test positive. In Group B, 10 patients revealed growth of T. rubrum, followed by growth of T. mentagrophytes in 3 and Microsporum canis in 2 patients. The therapeutic response is more or less same in infection with different species. CONCLUSIONS: The newer fungistatic drug sertaconazole nitrate 2% cream was as effective as terbinafine hydrochloride 1% cream which is one of the fungicidal drugs, though terbinafine hydrochloride 1% cream has higher rates of complete cure at the end of 2 weeks as compared to sertaconazole nitrate 2% cream. Both the drugs showed good tolerability with no adverse effects.

Quantum critical phase and Lifshitz transition in an extended periodic Anderson model.

We study the quantum phase transition in f-electron systems as a quantum Lifshitz transition driven by selective-Mott localization in a realistic extended Anderson lattice model. Using dynamical mean-field theory (DMFT), we find that a quantum critical phase with anomalous ω/T scaling separates a heavy Landau-Fermi liquid from ordered phase(s). This non-Fermi liquid state arises from a lattice orthogonality catastrophe originating from orbital-selective Mott localization. Fermi surface reconstruction occurs via the interplay between and penetration of the Green function zeros to the poles, leading to violation of Luttinger's theorem in the strange metal. We show how this naturally leads to scale-invariant responses in transport. Thus, our work represents a specific DMFT realization of the hidden-FL and FL* theories, and holds promise for the study of 'strange' metal phases in quantum matter.

Preformed excitonic liquid route to a charge density wave in 2H-TaSe2.

Recent experiments on 2H-TaSe(2) contradict the long-held view of the charge density wave arising from a nested band structure. An intrinsically strong coupling view, involving a charge density wave state arising as a Bose condensation of preformed excitons emerges as an attractive, albeit scantily investigated alternative. Using the local density approximation plus multiorbital dynamic mean field theory, we show that this scenario agrees with a variety of normal state data for 2H-TaSe(2). Based thereupon, the ordered states in a subset of dichalcogenides should be viewed as instabilities of a correlated, preformed excitonic liquid.

A study of changes in the body composition components in the patients with pulmonary tuberculosis.

The present study deals with the analysis of body composition components of 86 randomly selected patients with confirmed pulmonary tuberculosis aged 16- 70 years collected from the District Tuberculosis Centre and Hospital, Amritsar. An adequate number of controls were also taken for comparison. The findings of the present study showed highly significant differences (p < or = 0.001) in all the twelve kinanthropometric variables except height. When the data was further analyzed between sputum negative and sputum positive patients with pulmonary tuberculosis, highly significant differences (p < or = 0.001) were found only in total body fat and statistically significant differences (p < or = 0.05) were observed in weight, chest circumference in normal position, abdominal circumference, right calf and buttock circumferences. It may be concluded that TB patients were more malnourished than normal people. Thus, special nutritional care should be taken to the TB patients to give them a better quality of life.