Large-scale analysis of influenza A virus nucleoprotein sequence conservation reveals potential drug-target sites

The nucleoprotein (NP) of the influenza A virus encapsidates the viral RNA and participates in the infectious life cycle of the virus. The aims of this study were to find the degree of conservation of NP among all virus subtypes and hosts and to identify conserved binding sites, which may be utilised as potential drug target sites. The analysis of conservation based on 4430 amino acid sequences identified high conservation in known functional regions as well as novel highly conserved sites. Highly variable clusters identified on the surface of NP may be associated with adaptation to different hosts and avoidance of the host immune defence. Ligand binding potential overlapping with high conservation was found in the tail-loop binding site and near the putative RNA binding region. The results provide the basis for developing antivirals that may be universally effective and have a reduced potential to induce resistance through mutations.Peer reviewe

Clustering in Deep (Submillimeter) Surveys

Hughes & Gaztanaga (2001, see article in these proceedings) have presented realistic simulations to address key issues confronting existing and forthcoming submm surveys. An important aspect illustrated by the simulations is the effect induced on the counts by the sampling variance of the large-scale galaxy clustering. We find factors of up to 2-4 variation (from the mean) in the extracted counts from deep surveys identical in area (6 sqr arcmin) to the SCUBA surveys of the Hubble Deep Fields (HDF). Here we present a recipe to model the expected degree of clustering as a function of sample area and redshift.Comment: 5 pages, 1 figure, UMass/INAOE conference proceedings on `Deep millimeter surveys', eds. J. Lowenthal and D. Hughes, World Scientifi

CCD imaging of the inner coma jets of comet P/Halley

We analyze the inner coma section of a CCD image of comet P/Halley taken at 1807 UT on 13 March 1986 using a C2 filter (wavelength 5000 to 5200A, half maximum) with the 3.8 m Anglo Australian Telescope at Siding Springs, Australia. Atmospheric turbulence leads to a spreading of the image detail and this produces a blander image of the inner coma region with a slower radial decrease of brightness in comparison to the unaffected image. We remove this smearing by utilizing the point spread function of a star on the same CCD image. Jets were then revealed by removing the average background. Analysis of the jet structure enabled us to estimate the lower limit of the parent molecule velocity. This is found to be 0.3 km s(exp -1)