Structure determination of Split-soret Cytochrome from a Desulfovibrio species isolated from a human abdominal abcess

The determined structure of the split-soret cytochrome (SSC) isolated from Desulfovibrio desulfuricans ATCC 27774 (D.d.) revealed a new Heme arrangement, which suggests that this protein constitutes a new cytochrome class.. SSC is a 52.6kDa homodimer containing four hemes at one end of the molecule. In each monomer the two hemes have their edges overlapped within van der Waals contacts. The polypeptide chain of each monomer supplies the sixth ligand to the heme-iron of the other monomer. A similar protein was recently purified from a homologous Desulfovibrio clinical strain isolated from an abdominal wall abscess in human patient2. Crystals of this SSC were grown using vapour diffusion method in the presence of agarose gel. Diffraction data were collected using X-ray synchrotron radiation at the ESRF, beamline, ID 14-1. The structure will be solved by molecular replacement using the structure of the D.d. as a starting model

On the Nonlinear Stability of Asymptotically Anti-de Sitter Solutions

Despite the recent evidence that anti-de Sitter spacetime is nonlinearly unstable, we argue that many asymptotically anti-de Sitter solutions are nonlinearly stable. This includes geons, boson stars, and black holes. As part of our argument, we calculate the frequencies of long-lived gravitational quasinormal modes of AdS black holes in various dimensions. We also discuss a new class of asymptotically anti-de Sitter solutions describing noncoalescing black hole binaries.Comment: 26 pages. 5 figure

Elucidating the mitochondrial proteome of Toxoplasma gondii reveals the presence of a divergent cytochrome c oxidase

The mitochondrion of apicomplexan parasites is critical for parasite survival, although the full complement of proteins that localize to this organelle has not been defined. Here we undertake two independent approaches to elucidate the mitochondrial proteome of the apicomplexan Toxoplasma gondii. We identify approximately 400 mitochondrial proteins, many of which lack homologs in the animals that these parasites infect, and most of which are important for parasite growth. We demonstrate that one such protein, termed TgApiCox25, is an important component of the parasite cytochrome c oxidase (COX) complex. We identify numerous other apicomplexan-specific components of COX, and conclude that apicomplexan COX, and apicomplexan mitochondria more generally, differ substantially in their protein composition from the hosts they infect. Our study highlights the diversity that exists in mitochondrial proteomes across the eukaryotic domain of life, and provides a foundation for defining unique aspects of mitochondrial biology in an important phylum of parasites.This work was supported by a Discovery Grant and QEII fellowship from the Australian Research Council (ARC DP110103144) to GvD

Orbital stability: analysis meets geometry

We present an introduction to the orbital stability of relative equilibria of Hamiltonian dynamical systems on (finite and infinite dimensional) Banach spaces. A convenient formulation of the theory of Hamiltonian dynamics with symmetry and the corresponding momentum maps is proposed that allows us to highlight the interplay between (symplectic) geometry and (functional) analysis in the proofs of orbital stability of relative equilibria via the so-called energy-momentum method. The theory is illustrated with examples from finite dimensional systems, as well as from Hamiltonian PDE's, such as solitons, standing and plane waves for the nonlinear Schr{\"o}dinger equation, for the wave equation, and for the Manakov system

Behavior of a Model Dynamical System with Applications to Weak Turbulence

We experimentally explore solutions to a model Hamiltonian dynamical system derived in Colliander et al., 2012, to study frequency cascades in the cubic defocusing nonlinear Schr\"odinger equation on the torus. Our results include a statistical analysis of the evolution of data with localized amplitudes and random phases, which supports the conjecture that energy cascades are a generic phenomenon. We also identify stationary solutions, periodic solutions in an associated problem and find experimental evidence of hyperbolic behavior. Many of our results rely upon reframing the dynamical system using a hydrodynamic formulation.Comment: 22 pages, 14 figure

The interplay of crack hopping, delamination and interface failure in drying nanoparticle films

Films formed through the drying of nanoparticle suspensions release the build-up of strain through a variety of different mechanisms including shear banding, crack formation and delamination. Here we show that important connections exist between these different phenomena: delamination depends on the dynamics of crack hopping, which in turn is influenced by the presence of shear bands. We also show that delamination does not occur uniformly across the film. As cracks hop they locally initiate the delamination of the film which warps with a timescale much longer than that associated with the hopping of cracks. The motion of a small region of the delamination front, where the shear component of interfacial crack propagation is believed to be enhanced, results in the deposition of a complex zig-zag pattern on the supporting substrate

How soft substrates affect the buckling delamination of thin films through crack front sink-in

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