880 research outputs found
Native Tertiary Structure and Nucleoside Modifications Suppress tRNA's Intrinsic Ability to Activate the Innate Immune Sensor PKR
Interferon inducible protein kinase PKR is an essential component of innate immunity. It is activated by long stretches of dsRNA and provides the first line of host defense against pathogens by inhibiting translation initiation in the infected cell. Many cellular and viral transcripts contain nucleoside modifications and/or tertiary structure that could affect PKR activation. We have previously demonstrated that a 5′-end triphosphate-a signature of certain viral and bacterial transcripts-confers the ability of relatively unstructured model RNA transcripts to activate PKR to inhibit translation, and that this activation is abrogated by certain modifications present in cellular RNAs. In order to understand the biological implications of native RNA tertiary structure and nucleoside modifications on PKR activation, we study here the heavily modified cellular tRNAs and the unmodified or the lightly modified mitochondrial tRNAs (mt-tRNA). We find that both a T7 transcript of yeast tRNAPhe and natively extracted total bovine liver mt-tRNA activate PKR in vitro, whereas native E. coli, bovine liver, yeast, and wheat tRNAPhe do not, nor do a variety of base- or sugar-modified T7 transcripts. These results are further supported by activation of PKR by a natively folded T7 transcript of tRNAPhe in vivo supporting the importance of tRNA modification in suppressing PKR activation in cells. We also examine PKR activation by a T7 transcript of the A14G pathogenic mutant of mt-tRNALeu, which is known to dimerize, and find that the misfolded dimeric form activates PKR in vitro while the monomeric form does not. Overall, the in vitro and in vivo findings herein indicate that tRNAs have an intrinsic ability to activate PKR and that nucleoside modifications and native RNA tertiary folding may function, at least in part, to suppress such activation, thus serving to distinguish self and non-self tRNA in innate immunity
A Unified Algebraic Approach to Few and Many-Body Correlated Systems
The present article is an extended version of the paper {\it Phys. Rev.} {\bf
B 59}, R2490 (1999), where, we have established the equivalence of the
Calogero-Sutherland model to decoupled oscillators. Here, we first employ the
same approach for finding the eigenstates of a large class of Hamiltonians,
dealing with correlated systems. A number of few and many-body interacting
models are studied and the relationship between their respective Hilbert
spaces, with that of oscillators, is found. This connection is then used to
obtain the spectrum generating algebras for these systems and make an algebraic
statement about correlated systems. The procedure to generate new solvable
interacting models is outlined. We then point out the inadequacies of the
present technique and make use of a novel method for solving linear
differential equations to diagonalize the Sutherland model and establish a
precise connection between this correlated system's wave functions, with those
of the free particles on a circle. In the process, we obtain a new expression
for the Jack polynomials. In two dimensions, we analyze the Hamiltonian having
Laughlin wave function as the ground-state and point out the natural emergence
of the underlying linear symmetry in this approach.Comment: 18 pages, Revtex format, To appear in Physical Review
Negative Energy in String Theory and Cosmic Censorship Violation
We find asymptotically anti de Sitter solutions in N=8 supergravity which
have negative total energy. This is possible since the boundary conditions
required for the positive energy theorem are stronger than those required for
finite mass (and allowed by string theory). But stability of the anti de Sitter
vacuum is still ensured by the positivity of a modified energy, which includes
an extra surface term. Some of the negative energy solutions describe classical
evolution of nonsingular initial data to naked singularities. Since there is an
open set of such solutions, cosmic censorship is violated generically in
supergravity. Using the dual field theory description, we argue that these
naked singularities will be resolved in the full string theory.Comment: 23 pages, 2 figures, v2: argument for forming naked singularities
clarified, references adde
Gravitational collapse of a Hagedorn fluid in Vaidya geometry
The gravitational collapse of a high-density null charged matter fluid,
satisfying the Hagedorn equation of state, is considered in the framework of
the Vaidya geometry. The general solution of the gravitational field equations
can be obtained in an exact parametric form. The conditions for the formation
of a naked singularity, as a result of the collapse of the compact object, are
also investigated. For an appropriate choice of the arbitrary integration
functions the null radial outgoing geodesic, originating from the shell
focussing central singularity, admits one or more positive roots. Hence a
collapsing Hagedorn fluid could end either as a black hole, or as a naked
singularity. A possible astrophysical application of the model, to describe the
energy source of gamma-ray bursts, is also considered.Comment: 14 pages, 2 figures, to appear in Phys. Rev.
Application of information entropy to nuclei
Shannon's information entropies in position- and momentum- space and their
sum are calculated for various - and - shell nuclei using a
correlated one-body density matrix depending on the harmonic oscillator size
and the short range correlation parameter which originates from a
Jastrow correlation function. It is found that the information entropy sum for
a nucleus depends only on the correlation parameter through the simple
relation , where , and
depend on the mass number . A similar approximate expression
is also valid for the root mean square radius of the nucleus as function of
leading to an approximate expression which connects with the root mean
square radius. Finally, we propose a method to determine the correlation
parameter from the above property of as well as the linear dependence of
on the logarithm of the number of nucleons.Comment: 10 pages, 10 EPS figures, RevTeX, Phys.Rev.C accepted for publicatio
Two-Dimensional Unoriented Strings And Matrix Models
We investigate unoriented strings and superstrings in two dimensions and
their dual matrix quantum mechanics. Most of the models we study have a tachyon
tadpole coming from the RP^2 worldsheet which needs to be cancelled by a
renormalization of the worldsheet theory. We find evidence that the dual matrix
models describe the renormalized theory. The singlet sector of the matrix
models is integrable and can be formulated in terms of fermions moving in an
external potential and interacting via the Calogero-Moser potential. We show
that in the double-scaling limit the latter system exhibits particle-hole
duality and interpret it in terms of the dual string theory. We also show that
oriented string theories in two dimensions can be continuously deformed into
unoriented ones by turning on non-local interactions on the worldsheet. We find
two unoriented superstring models for which only oriented worldsheets
contribute to the S-matrix. A simple explanation for this is found in the dual
matrix model.Comment: 36 pages, harvmac, 2 eps figure
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