[en] We report lattice calculations of the low-lying baryon mass spectrum, with an emphasis on the introduction of two new techniques. One is the constrained fitting method based on Bayesian statistics which allows reliable extraction of excited states. The other is the use of the overlap fermion action which preserves exact chiral symmetry of QCD on the lattice and allows us to reach deep down into the chiral regime (our pion mass is as low as 180 MeV) where interesting chiral dynamics are exposed. One example is the elusive Roper state N(1440)1/2+ which shows up naturally as the 1st-excited state of the nucleon from the standard interpolating field. Together with other baryons, our preliminary results indicate that the level-ordering of the low-lying baryon states on the lattice is largely consistent with experiment and with that expected from meson-exchange quark models

[en] The masses and dispersions of light hadrons are calculated in lattice QCD using an O(a²) tadpole-improved gluon action and an O(a²) tadpole-improved next-nearest-neighbor fermion action originally proposed by Hamber and Wu. Two lattices of constant volume with lattice spacings of approximately 0.40 fm and 0.24 fm are considered. The results reveal some scaling violations at the coarser lattice spacing on the order of 5%. At the finer lattice spacing, the nucleon to rho mass ratio reproduces state-of-the-art results using unimproved actions. Good dispersion and rotational invariance up to momenta of pa ≅ 1 are also found. The relative merit of alternative choices for improvement operators is assessed through close comparisons with other plaquette-based tadpole-improved actions

[en] Investigations of the quasifree reaction A(γ, K Y)B are presented in the distorted wave impulse approximation (DWIA). For this purpose, we present a revised tree-level model of elementary kaon photoproduction that incorporates hadronic form factors consistent with gauge invariance, uses SU(3) values for the Born couplings and uses resonances consistent with multi-channel analyses. The potential of exclusive quasifree kaon photoproduction on nuclei to reveal details of the hyperon-nucleus interaction is examined. Detailed predictions for the coincidence cross section, the photon asymmetry, and the hyperon polarization and their sensitivities to the ingredients of the model are obtained for all six production channels. Under selected kinematics these observables are found to be sensitive to the hyperon-nucleus final state interaction. Some polarization observables are found to be insensitive to distortion effects, making them ideal tools to search for possible medium modifications of the elementary amplitude

[en] The topological charge is studied on lattices of large physical volume and fine lattice spacing. We illustrate how a parity transformation on the SU(3) link-variables of lattice gauge configurations reverses the sign of the topological charge and leaves the action invariant. Random applications of the parity transformation are proposed to traverse from one topological charge sign to the other. The transformation provides an improved unbiased estimator of the ensemble average and is essential in improving the ergodicity of the Markov chain process

[en] We study the quenched chiral behavior of hadrons with the pseudoscalar mass as low as ∼ 280 MeV. We look for quenched chiral logs in the pion mass, determine the renormalized quark mass, and observe quenched artifacts in the a₀ and N* propagators. The calculation is done on a quenched lattice of size 20⁴ and a = 0.148(2) fm using overlap fermions and an improved gauge action

[en] We introduce the ''Sequential Empirical Bayes Method'', an adaptive constrained-curve fitting procedure for extracting reliable priors. These are then used in standard augmented-chi-square fits on separate data. This better stabilizes fits to lattice QCD overlap-fermion data at very low quark mass where a priori values are not otherwise known. We illustrate the efficacy of the method with data from overlap fermions, on a quenched 16³ x 28 lattice with spatial size La = 3.2 fm and pion mass as low as ∼ 180 MeV

[en] We introduce the Dirac eigenmode filtering of topological charge density associated with Ginsparg-Wilson fermions as a tool to investigate the local structure of topological charge fluctuations in QCD. The resulting framework is used to demonstrate that the bulk of topological charge in QCD does not appear in the form of unit quantized lumps. This means that the mixing of ''would-be'' zeromodes associated with such lumps is probably not the prevalent microscopic mechanism for spontaneous chiral symmetry breaking in QCD. To characterize the coherent local behavior in topological charge density at low energy, we compute the charges contained in maximal coherent spheres enclosing non-overlapping peaks. We find a continuous distribution essentially ending at ∼0.5. Finally, we study, for the first time, the overlap-operator topological-charge-density correlators and find consistency with non-positivity at nonzero physical distance. This represents a non-trivial check on the locality (in gauge paths) of the overlap Dirac operator for realistic gauge backgrounds

[en] We study the quenched chiral behavior of the pion with mass as low as ∼ 180 MeV. The calculation is done on a quenched lattice of size 16³ x 28 and a = 0.2 fm with 80 configurations using overlap fermions and an improved gauge action. Using an improved constrained curve fitting technique, we find that the ground state pseudoscalar mass versus bare quark mass behavior is well controlled with small statistical errors; this permits a reliable fit of the quenched chiral log effects, a determination of the chiral log parameter ((delta) = 0.26(3)), and an estimate of the renormalized mass of the light quark (m^#ovr MS#(μ = 2 GeV) = 3.7(3) MeV)

[en] The overlap fermion offers the tremendous advantage of exact chiral symmetry on the lattice, but is numerically intensive. This can be made affordable while still providing large lattice volumes, by using coarse lattice spacing, given that good scaling and localization properties are established. Here, using overlap fermions on quenched Iwasaki gauge configurations, we demonstrate directly that the overlap Dirac operator's range is comfortably small in lattice units for each of the lattice spacings 0.20 fm, 0.17 fm, and 0.13 fm (and scales to zero in physical units in the continuum limit). In particular, our direct results contradict recent speculation that an inverse lattice spacing of 1 GeV is too low to have satisfactory localization. Furthermore, hadronic masses (available on the two coarser lattices) scale very well

[en] Purpose: To evaluate the effect of q.d. or b.i.d. radiotherapy (RT) on the outcome of patients with locally advanced non-small-cell lung cancer. Methods and Materials: We retrospectively reviewed the outcome of 261 patients with medically inoperable or surgically unresectable Stage II-IIIB non-small-cell lung cancer, who were treated with combined modality cisplatin-based chemotherapy and RT. Chemotherapy was administered either sequentially or concurrently with thoracic RT. The median follow-up was 18 months (range 2-92). Treatment groups included sequential chemotherapy and q.d. RT (n=109), concurrent chemotherapy and q.d. RT (n=48), and concurrent chemotherapy and b.i.d. RT (n=104). Of the 261 patients, 97% had a Karnofsky performance score ≥80, and 86.2% had ≤5% weight loss in the 3 months before diagnosis; 66.7% had nonsquamous cell histologic features. All but 8 patients had Stage IIIA-B disease. Results: The 2- and 5-year locoregional control rate was 42.4% and 25.7% for the q.d. group and 70.6% and 45.8% for the b.i.d. group, respectively (p=0.0001). The 2- and 5-year disease-free survival rate was 26.7% and 6.5% for the q.d. group and 39.6% and 27.3% for the b.i.d. group, respectively (p=0.0114). The corresponding overall survival rates were 35.9% and 9.4% for the q.d. group and 38.7% and 26.1% for the b.i.d. group. No difference was found in the rate of distant metastasis between the 2 groups. Multivariate analysis indicated that b.i.d. RT was a favorable prognostic factor for locoregional control and disease-free survival. Conclusion: RT b.i.d. significantly improved locoregional control and disease-free survival compared with RT q.d. in patients with Stage IIIA-B non-small-cell lung cancer