210 research outputs found
Strain improvement and strain maintenance revisited. The use of actinoplanes teichomyceticus atcc 31121 protoplasts in the identification of candidates for enhanced teicoplanin production
Multicellular cooperation in actinomycetes is a division of labor-based beneficial trait where phenotypically specialized clonal subpopulations, or genetically distinct lineages, perform complementary tasks. The division of labor improves the access to nutrients and optimizes reproductive and vegetative tasks while reducing the costly production of secondary metabolites and/or of secreted enzymes. In this study, we took advantage of the possibility to isolate genetically distinct lineages deriving from the division of labor, for the isolation of heterogeneous teicoplanin producer phenotypes from Actinoplanes teichomyceticus ATCC 31121. In order to efficiently separate phenotypes and associated genomes, we produced and regenerated protoplasts. This approach turned out to be a rapid and effective strain improvement method, as it allowed the identification of those phenotypes in the population that produced higher teicoplanin amounts. Interestingly, a heterogeneous teicoplanin complex productivity pattern was also identified among the clones. This study suggests that strain improvement and strain maintenance should be integrated with the use of protoplasts as a strategy to unravel the hidden industrial potential of vegetative mycelium
New Avoparcin-like Molecules from the Avoparcin Producer Amycolatopsis coloradensis ATCC 53629
Amycolatopsis coloradensis ATCC 53629 is the producer of the glycopeptide antibiotic avoparcin. While setting up the production of the avoparcin complex, in view of its use as analytical standard, we uncovered the production of a to-date not described ristosamynil-avoparcin. Ristosamynil-avoparcin is produced together with α-and β-avoparcin (overall indicated as the avoparcin complex). Selection of one high producer morphological variant within the A. coloradensis population, together with the use of a new fermentation medium, allowed to increase productivity of the avoparcin complex up to 9 g/L in flask fermentations. The selected high producer displayed a non-spore forming phenotype. All the selected phenotypes, as well as the original unselected population, displayed invariably the ability to produce a complex rich in ristosamynil-avoparcin. This suggested that the original strain deposited was not conforming to the description or that long term storage of the lyovials has selected mutants from the original population
The Hough Transform and the Impact of Chronic Leukemia on the Compact Bone Tissue from CT-Images Analysis
Computational analysis of X-ray Computed Tomography (CT) images allows the assessment of alteration of bone structure in adult patients with Advanced Chronic Lymphocytic Leukemia (ACLL), and may even offer a powerful tool to assess the development of the disease (prognostic potential). The crucial requirement for this kind of analysis is the application of a pattern recognition method able to accurately segment the intra-bone space in clinical CT images of the human skeleton. Our purpose is to show how this task can be accomplished by a procedure based on the use of the Hough transform technique for special families of algebraic curves. The dataset used for this study is composed of sixteen subjects including eight control subjects, one ACLL survivor, and seven ACLL victims. We apply the Hough transform approach to the set of CT images of appendicular bones for detecting the compact and trabecular bone contours by using ellipses, and we use the computed semi-axes values to infer information on bone alterations in the population affected by ACLL. The effectiveness of this method is proved against ground truth comparison. We show that features depending on the semi-axes values detect a statistically significant difference between the class of control subjects plus the ACLL survivor and the class of ACLL victims
Continuous slice functional calculus in quaternionic Hilbert spaces
The aim of this work is to define a continuous functional calculus in
quaternionic Hilbert spaces, starting from basic issues regarding the notion of
spherical spectrum of a normal operator. As properties of the spherical
spectrum suggest, the class of continuous functions to consider in this setting
is the one of slice quaternionic functions. Slice functions generalize the
concept of slice regular function, which comprises power series with
quaternionic coefficients on one side and that can be seen as an effective
generalization to quaternions of holomorphic functions of one complex variable.
The notion of slice function allows to introduce suitable classes of real,
complex and quaternionic --algebras and to define, on each of these
--algebras, a functional calculus for quaternionic normal operators. In
particular, we establish several versions of the spectral map theorem. Some of
the results are proved also for unbounded operators. However, the mentioned
continuous functional calculi are defined only for bounded normal operators.
Some comments on the physical significance of our work are included.Comment: 71 pages, some references added. Accepted for publication in Reviews
in Mathematical Physic
Quantization and noiseless measurements
In accordance with the fact that quantum measurements are described in terms
of positive operator measures (POMs), we consider certain aspects of a
quantization scheme in which a classical variable is associated
with a unique positive operator measure (POM) , which is not necessarily
projection valued. The motivation for such a scheme comes from the well-known
fact that due to the noise in a quantum measurement, the resulting outcome
distribution is given by a POM and cannot, in general, be described in terms of
a traditional observable, a selfadjoint operator. Accordingly, we notice that
the noiseless measurements are the ones which are determined by a selfadjoint
operator. The POM in our quantization is defined through its moment
operators, which are required to be of the form , , with
a fixed map from classical variables to Hilbert space operators. In
particular, we consider the quantization of classical \emph{questions}, that
is, functions taking only values 0 and 1. We compare two concrete
realizations of the map in view of their ability to produce noiseless
measurements: one being the Weyl map, and the other defined by using phase
space probability distributions.Comment: 15 pages, submitted to Journal of Physics
Relativistic Partial Wave Analysis Using the Velocity Basis of the Poincare Group
The velocity basis of the Poincare group is used in the direct product space
of two irreducible unitary representations of the Poincare group. The velocity
basis with total angular momentum j will be used for the definition of
relativistic Gamow vectors.Comment: 14 pages; revte
Quantum theory of successive projective measurements
We show that a quantum state may be represented as the sum of a joint
probability and a complex quantum modification term. The joint probability and
the modification term can both be observed in successive projective
measurements. The complex modification term is a measure of measurement
disturbance. A selective phase rotation is needed to obtain the imaginary part.
This leads to a complex quasiprobability, the Kirkwood distribution. We show
that the Kirkwood distribution contains full information about the state if the
two observables are maximal and complementary. The Kirkwood distribution gives
a new picture of state reduction. In a nonselective measurement, the
modification term vanishes. A selective measurement leads to a quantum state as
a nonnegative conditional probability. We demonstrate the special significance
of the Schwinger basis.Comment: 6 page
On the lattice structure of probability spaces in quantum mechanics
Let C be the set of all possible quantum states. We study the convex subsets
of C with attention focused on the lattice theoretical structure of these
convex subsets and, as a result, find a framework capable of unifying several
aspects of quantum mechanics, including entanglement and Jaynes' Max-Ent
principle. We also encounter links with entanglement witnesses, which leads to
a new separability criteria expressed in lattice language. We also provide an
extension of a separability criteria based on convex polytopes to the infinite
dimensional case and show that it reveals interesting facets concerning the
geometrical structure of the convex subsets. It is seen that the above
mentioned framework is also capable of generalization to any statistical theory
via the so-called convex operational models' approach. In particular, we show
how to extend the geometrical structure underlying entanglement to any
statistical model, an extension which may be useful for studying correlations
in different generalizations of quantum mechanics.Comment: arXiv admin note: substantial text overlap with arXiv:1008.416
Quantum measurement problem and cluster separability
A modified Beltrametti-Cassinelli-Lahti model of measurement apparatus that
satisfies both the probability reproducibility condition and the
objectification requirement is constructed. Only measurements on microsystems
are considered. The cluster separability forms a basis for the first working
hypothesis: the current version of quantum mechanics leaves open what happens
to systems when they change their separation status. New rules that close this
gap can therefore be added without disturbing the logic of quantum mechanics.
The second working hypothesis is that registration apparatuses for microsystems
must contain detectors and that their readings are signals from detectors. This
implies that separation status of a microsystem changes during both preparation
and registration. A new rule that specifies what happens at these changes and
that guarantees the objectification is formulated and discussed. A part of our
result has certain similarity with 'collapse of the wave function'.Comment: 31 pages, no figure. Published versio
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