30 research outputs found
Carbon partitioning and export in transgenic Arabidopsis thaliana with altered capacity for sucrose synthesis grown at low temperature: a role for metabolite transporters
We investigated the role of metabolite transporters in cold acclimation by comparing the responses of wild-type (WT) Arabidopsis thaliana (Heynh.) with that of transgenic plants over-expressing sucrose-phosphate synthase (SPSox) or with that of antisense repression of cytosolic fructose-1,6-bisphosphatase (FBPas). Plants were grown at 23 degrees C and then shifted to 5 degrees C. We compared the leaves shifted to 5 degrees C for 3 and 10 d with new leaves that developed at 5 degrees C with control leaves on plants at 23 degrees C. At 23 degrees C, ectopic expression of SPS resulted in 30% more carbon being fixed per day and an increase in sucrose export from source leaves. This increase in fixation and export was supported by increased expression of the plastidic triose-phosphate transporter AtTPT and, to a lesser extent, the high-affinity Suc transporter AtSUC1. The improved photosynthetic performance of the SPSox plants was maintained after they were shifted to 5 degrees C and this was associated with further increases in AtSUC1 expression but with a strong repression of AtTPT mRNA abundance. Similar responses were shown by WT plants during acclimation to low temperature and this response was attenuated in the low sucrose producing FBPas plants. These data suggest that a key element in recovering flux through carbohydrate metabolism in the cold is to control the partitioning of metabolites between the chloroplast and the cytosol, and Arabidopsis modulates the expression of AtTPT to maintain balanced carbon flow. Arabidopsis also up-regulates the expression of AtSUC1, and to lesser extent AtSUC2, as down-stream components facilitate sucrose transport in leaves that develop at low temperatures.info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio
Dynamical control of correlated states in a square quantum dot
In the limit of low particle density, electrons confined to a quantum dot
form strongly correlated states termed Wigner molecules, in which the Coulomb
interaction causes the electrons to become highly localized in space. By using
an effective model of Hubbard-type to describe these states, we investigate how
an oscillatory electric field can drive the dynamics of a two-electron Wigner
molecule held in a square quantum dot. We find that, for certain combinations
of frequency and strength of the applied field, the tunneling between various
charge configurations can be strongly quenched, and we relate this phenomenon
to the presence of anti-crossings in the Floquet quasi-energy spectrum. We
further obtain simple analytic expressions for the location of these
anti-crossings, which allows the effective parameters for a given quantum dot
to be directly measured in experiment, and suggests the exciting possibility of
using ac-fields to control the time evolution of entangled states in mesoscopic
devices.Comment: Replaced with version to be published in Phys. Rev.