Barry Friedman

Background: Initiation or augmentation of pediatric liver transplant programs in the United States faces challenges of limited expertise, small volumes, and regional variation in access to care. PACH launched a prospective plan of pediatric liver program development at two sites (VAUV and FLFH) with the goals of comprehensive multidisciplinary program support, consistent surgical leadership from one team, consensus protocol development, and standardization of perioperative and postoperative care, and comprehensive long‐term follow‐up care plans. A third center, NCCM, was launched in June 2024. Methods: Between January 2016 and December 31, 2024, 140 children received pediatric liver transplants at one of the collaborative sites. A total of 215 PLT were performed at PACH during the same period. Results: Patient and graft survival were 94.4% and 93.2% respectively, with current follow‐up of 1674 ± 1037 days. Overall patient demographics, complications, and patient outcomes were similar among all institutions. Conclusions: A paradigm of systematically extending center experience directly to facilitate safe and high‐quality pediatric liver program establishment has been demonstrated, with the additional benefit of increased split liver graft utilization benefiting both adults and children. The success of this model has implications for optimizing pediatric liver transplant care in the United States.

Low-threshold dark matter detectors, in particular cryogenic detectors based on dielectric materials, are among the best tools for probing sub-GeV dark matter masses. In the coming years, detectors of this type will become sensitive to solar neutrino scattering. Previous work has shown that, for dark matter scattering at very low recoil energies, one must include collective excitations of the electrons in the solid. In this work, we have computed the collective excitations due to neutrino scattering on electrons and nuclei. We find the full electron-scattering response at leading order is captured by five structure factors and identify the leading component with the electron energy-loss function. Then, using silicon and germanium detectors as an example, we perform a dark matter sensitivity study and compute their respective neutrino floors—taking the electronic structure into account for all dark matter and neutrino scattering channels. Lastly, we show that these detectors are sensitive to unexplored scenarios of beyond-Standard Model neutrino physics, within the exposure required to reach the neutrino floor.

It is known that the long-range quantum entanglement exhibited in free fermion systems is sufficient to "thermalize" a small subsystem in that the subsystem reduced density matrix computed from a typical excited eigenstate of the combined system is approximately thermal. Remarkably, fermions without any interactions are thus thought to satisfy the eigenstate thermalization hypothesis. We explore this hypothesis when the fermion subsystem is only minimally coupled to a quantum reservoir (in the form of another fermion system) through a quantum point contact (QPC). The entanglement entropy of two free fermion systems connected by one or more QPCs is examined at finite energy and in the ground state. When the combined system is in a typical excited state, it is shown that the entanglement entropy of a subsystem connected by a small number of QPCs is subextensive, scaling as the linear size of the subsystem (L_{A}). For sufficiently low energies (E) and small subsystems, it is demonstrated numerically that the entanglement entropy S_{A}∼L_{A}E, what one would expect for the thermodynamics of a one-dimensional system. In this limit, we suggest that the entropy carried by each additional QPC is quantized using the one-dimensional finite size and temperature conformal scaling: ΔS_{A}=αlog(1/E)sinh(L_{A}E). The subextensive entropy in the case of a small number of QPCs should be contrasted with the expectation for both classical, ergodic systems and quantum chaotic systems, wherein a restricted geometry might affect the equilibrium relaxation times but not the equilibrium properties themselves, such as extensive entropy and heat capacity.

Scaling arguments are presented for end-to-wall reaction and end-to-end reactions of grafted chains for non-self-avoiding and self-avoiding chains with and

This study presents a new in-vivo microwave imaging method to determine the blood glucose levels of mice directly from their tail using a thermo-elastic optical indicator microscope (TEOIM). By measuring the microwave near-field distribution intensity around the tail, the changing trend of the glucose level can be detected non-invasively when the mouse tail is exposed to 7 GHz microwave irradiation. The microwave electric field distribution was visualized by the metasurface-based optical indicator, showing that the average intensity values are proportional to the blood glucose levels. The clinical accuracy of TEOIM glucose monitoring systems was evaluated using the Clarke error grid (CEG) analysis method, where 100% of the measurement points were in the A + B zone of the CEG. Based on the experimental results, the TEOIM can adequately detect the blood glucose concentration in the 170-500 mg/dL range. The testing results achieve a mean absolute relative difference (MARD) of 7.05% for the measurement and a root mean squared error (RMSE) of 24.85 mg/dL. The potential improvement methods of the imaging system for non-invasive glucose measurement were discussed, emphasizing future research plans to enhance accuracy and validation, which may positively impact healthcare and diabetes screening. This method provides a novel approach for the non-invasive sensing of blood glucose concentrations in-vivo using a CCD sensor.

We developed a microwave glucose sensor based on the modified first-order Hilbert curve design and measured glucose concentration in aqueous solutions by using a real-time microwave near-field electromagnetic interaction technique. We observed S₂₁ transmission parameters of the sensor at resonant frequencies depend on the glucose concentration. We could determine the glucose concentration in the 0–250 mg/dL concentration range at an operating frequency of near 6 GHz. The measured minimum detectable signal was 0.0156 dB/(mg/dL) and the measured minimum detectable concentration was 1.92 mg/dL. The simulation result for the minimum detectable signal and the minimum detectable concentration was 0.0182 dB/(mg/dL) and 1.65 mg/dL, respectively. The temperature instability of the sensor for human glycemia in situ measurement range (27–34 °C for fingers and 36–40 °C for body temperature ranges) can be improved by the integration of the temperature sensor in the microwave stripline platform and the obtained data can be corrected during signal processing. The microwave signal–temperature dependence is almost linear with the same slope for a glucose concentration range of 50–150 mg/dL. The temperature correlation coefficient is 0.05 dB/°C and 0.15 dB/°C in 27–34 °C and 36–40 °C temperature range, respectively. The presented system has a cheap, easy fabrication process and has great potential for non-invasive glucose monitoring.

The formation of Faraday waves (FWs) at the surfactant-covered free surface of a vertically vibrated liquid layer is considered. The layer is subjected to a vertical temperature gradient. The surfactant is insoluble. Linear stability analysis and the Floquet method are used for disturbances with arbitrary wave numbers to find the regions of critical vibration amplitude where FWs are generated. The problem is considered for the semi-infinite liquid layer, as well as for the layer of a finite depth. It is shown numerically, that in the semi-infinite case the critical tongue of a neutral stability curve corresponding to the lowest value of the forcing amplitude is related to the subharmonic instability mode. It changes to the harmonic one in the case of finite depth. The influence of thermocapillary Marangoni number on the critical amplitude of FWs is studied. The growth of that number stabilizes the system, however, this effect is very weak.