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One of the main challenges in ultrafast material science is to trigger phase transitions with short pulses of light. Here we show how strain waves, launched by electronic and structural precursor phenomena, determine a coherent macroscopic transformation pathway for the semiconducting-to-metal transition in bistable Ti 3 O 5 nanocrystals. Employing femtosecond powder X-ray diffraction, we measure the lattice deformation in the phase transition as a function of time. We monitor the early intra-cell distortion around the light absorbing metal dimer and the long range deformations governed by acoustic waves propagating from the laser-exposed Ti 3 O 5 surface. We developed a simplified elastic model demonstrating that picosecond switching in nanocrystals happens concomitantly with the propagating acoustic wavefront, several decades faster than thermal processes governed by heat diffusion. Ultrafast control of materials draws interest. Here, the authors extend X-ray powder diffraction to the femtosecond timescale to follow the photo-induced semiconductor to metal transition in titanium pentaoxide, observing a phase front that moves at the speed of sound and proposing a little explored mechanism.

Long-term lunar missions by humans will require a toxicological and hygienic assessment of the biological activity of lunar dust as one of the main factors limiting the duration of human stay on the lunar surface. The review summarizes the results of research aimed at studying the toxic process of acute and chronic effects of lunar dust and imitators upon inhalation and intratracheal administration to animals. The analysis of the biological activity of the particles after their penetration into the respiratory tract and lung tissues was carried out. Based on the modern understanding of the pathogenesis of pulmonary fibrosis, a hypothesis regarding the development of the toxic process of lung damage under the influence of lunar dust was formulated: mechanical damage of the alveolar epithelium by the particles, increased microvascular permeability, development of local and systemic autoimmune inflammatory reactions, activation of cytokine regulation of the inflammatory, and fibroplastic process in the lungs and heart.

Organisms from bacteria to humans sense and react to light. Proteins that contain the light-sensitive molecule retinal couple absorption of light to conformational changes that produce a signal or move ions across a membrane. Nogly et al. used an x-ray laser to probe the earliest structural changes to the retinal chromophore within microcrystals of the ion pump bacteriorhodopsin (see the Perspective by Moffat). The excited-state retinal wiggles but is held in place so that only one double bond of retinal is capable of isomerizing. A water molecule adjacent to the proton-pumping Schiff base responds to changes in charge distribution in the chromophore even before the movement of atoms begins. Science , this issue p. eaat0094 ; see also p. 127 Ultrafast crystallography captures the response of the pigment of bacteriorhodopsin to absorption of light. Ultrafast isomerization of retinal is the primary step in photoresponsive biological functions including vision in humans and ion transport across bacterial membranes. We used an x-ray laser to study the subpicosecond structural dynamics of retinal isomerization in the light-driven proton pump bacteriorhodopsin. A series of structural snapshots with near-atomic spatial resolution and temporal resolution in the femtosecond regime show how the excited all-trans retinal samples conformational states within the protein binding pocket before passing through a twisted geometry and emerging in the 13-cis conformation. Our findings suggest ultrafast collective motions of aspartic acid residues and functional water molecules in the proximity of the retinal Schiff base as a key facet of this stereoselective and efficient photochemical reaction.

Vision is initiated by the rhodopsin family of light-sensitive G protein-coupled receptors (GPCRs) 1 . A photon is absorbed by the 11- cis retinal chromophore of rhodopsin, which isomerizes within 200 femtoseconds to the all- trans conformation 2 , thereby initiating the cellular signal transduction processes that ultimately lead to vision. However, the intramolecular mechanism by which the photoactivated retinal induces the activation events inside rhodopsin remains experimentally unclear. Here we use ultrafast time-resolved crystallography at room temperature 3 to determine how an isomerized twisted all -trans retinal stores the photon energy that is required to initiate the protein conformational changes associated with the formation of the G protein-binding signalling state. The distorted retinal at a 1-ps time delay after photoactivation has pulled away from half of its numerous interactions with its binding pocket, and the excess of the photon energy is released through an anisotropic protein breathing motion in the direction of the extracellular space. Notably, the very early structural motions in the protein side chains of rhodopsin appear in regions that are involved in later stages of the conserved class A GPCR activation mechanism. Our study sheds light on the earliest stages of vision in vertebrates and points to fundamental aspects of the molecular mechanisms of agonist-mediated GPCR activation. One picosecond after photoactivation, isomerized retinal pulls away from half of its numerous interactions with its binding pocket, and the excess of the photon energy is released through an anisotropic protein breathing motion in the direction of the extracellular space.

Measurements of open charm and beauty production cross sections in deep inelastic ep scattering at HERA from the H1 and ZEUS Collaborations are combined. Reduced cross sections are obtained in the kinematic range of negative four-momentum transfer squared of the photon 2.5GeV2≤Q2≤2000GeV2 and Bjorken scaling variable 3·10-5≤xBj≤5·10-2. The combination method accounts for the correlations of the statistical and systematic uncertainties among the different datasets. Perturbative QCD calculations are compared to the combined data. A next-to-leading order QCD analysis is performed using these data together with the combined inclusive deep inelastic scattering cross sections from HERA. The running charm- and beauty-quark masses are determined as mc(mc)=1.290-0.041+0.046(exp/fit)-0.014+0.062(model)-0.031+0.003(parameterisation) GeV and mb(mb)=4.049-0.109+0.104(exp/fit)-0.032+0.090(model)-0.031+0.001(parameterisation)GeV.

Cross sections for elastic and proton-dissociative photoproduction of J / ψ mesons are measured with the H1 detector in positron-proton collisions at HERA. The data were collected at ep centre-of-mass energies and , corresponding to integrated luminosities of and , respectively. The cross sections are measured as a function of the photon-proton centre-of-mass energy in the range 25< W γp <110 GeV. Differential cross sections d σ /d t , where t is the squared four-momentum transfer at the proton vertex, are measured in the range | t |<1.2 GeV 2 for the elastic process and | t |<8 GeV 2 for proton dissociation. The results are compared to other measurements. The W γp and t -dependences are parametrised using phenomenological fits.

DESY is one of the world-wide leading centers for research with particle accelerators, synchrotron light and astroparticles. DESY participates in LHC as a Tier-2 center, supports on-going analyzes of HERA data, is a leading partner for ILC, and runs the National Analysis Facility (NAF) for LHC and ILC in the framework of the Helmholtz Alliance, Physics at the Terascale. For the research with synchrotron light major new facilities are operated and built (FLASH, PETRA-III, and XFEL). DESY furthermore acts as Data-Tier1 centre for the Neutrino detector IceCube. Established within the EGI-project DESY operates a grid infrastructure which supports a number of virtual Organizations (VO), incl. ATLAS, CMS, and LHCb. Furthermore, DESY hosts some of HEP and non-HEP VOs, such as the HERA experiments and ILC as well as photon science communities. The support of the new astroparticle physics VOs IceCube and CTA is currently set up. As the global structure of the grid offers huge resources which are perfect for batch-like computing, DESY has set up the National Analysis Facility (NAF) which complements the grid to allow German HEP users for efficient data analysis. The grid infrastructure and the NAF use the same physics data which is distributed via the grid. We call the conjunction of grid and NAF the DESY Grid Centre. In the contribution to CHEP2012 we will in depth discuss the conceptional and operational aspects of our multi-VO and multi-community Grid Centre and present the system setup. We will in particular focus on the interplay of Grid and NAF and present experiences of the operations.

The HERAPDF2.0 ensemble of parton distribution functions (PDFs) was introduced in 2015. The final stage is presented, a next-to-next-to-leading-order (NNLO) analysis of the HERA data on inclusive deep inelastic ep scattering together with jet data as published by the H1 and ZEUS collaborations. A perturbative QCD fit, simultaneously of αs(MZ2) and the PDFs, was performed with the result αs(MZ2)=0.1156±0.0011(exp)-0.0002+0.0001(model+parameterisation)±0.0029(scale). The PDF sets of HERAPDF2.0Jets NNLO were determined with separate fits using two fixed values of αs(MZ2), αs(MZ2)=0.1155 and 0.118, since the latter value was already chosen for the published HERAPDF2.0 NNLO analysis based on HERA inclusive DIS data only. The different sets of PDFs are presented, evaluated and compared. The consistency of the PDFs determined with and without the jet data demonstrates the consistency of HERA inclusive and jet-production cross-section data. The inclusion of the jet data reduced the uncertainty on the gluon PDF. Predictions based on the PDFs of HERAPDF2.0Jets NNLO give an excellent description of the jet-production data used as input.

A combination is presented of the inclusive deep inelastic cross sections measured by the H1 and ZEUS Collaborations in neutral and charged current unpolarised e ± p scattering at HERA during the period 1994-2000. The data span six orders of magnitude in negative four-momentum-transfer squared, Q 2 , and in Bjorken x . The combination method used takes the correlations of systematic uncertainties into account, resulting in an improved accuracy. The combined data are the sole input in a NLO QCD analysis which determines a new set of parton distributions, HERAPDF1.0, with small experimental uncertainties. This set includes an estimate of the model and parametrisation uncertainties of the fit result.

The strong coupling constant α s is determined from inclusive jet and dijet cross sections in neutral-current deep-inelastic ep scattering (DIS) measured at HERA by the H1 collaboration using next-to-next-to-leading order (NNLO) QCD predictions. The dependence of the NNLO predictions and of the resulting value of α s ( m Z ) at the Z -boson mass m Z are studied as a function of the choice of the renormalisation and factorisation scales. Using inclusive jet and dijet data together, the strong coupling constant is determined to be α s ( m Z ) = 0.1157 ( 20 ) exp ( 29 ) th . Complementary, α s ( m Z ) is determined together with parton distribution functions of the proton (PDFs) from jet and inclusive DIS data measured by the H1 experiment. The value α s ( m Z ) = 0.1142 ( 28 ) tot obtained is consistent with the determination from jet data alone. The impact of the jet data on the PDFs is studied. The running of the strong coupling is tested at different values of the renormalisation scale and the results are found to be in agreement with expectations.