4,480 research outputs found
Flavor-Spin Symmetry and the Tensor Charge
Exploiting an approximate phenomenological symmetry of the
light axial vector mesons and using pole dominance, we calculate the flavor
contributions to the nucleon tensor charge. The result depends on the decay
constants of the axial vector mesons and their couplings to the nucleons.Comment: Talk given at 3rd Circum-Pan-Pacific Symposium on High Energy Spin
Physics (SPIN 2001), Beijing, China, 8-13 Oct 200
Studies of Photoprotection Against Porphyrin Photosensitization Using Dithiothreitol and Glycerol
Although protection against ionizing radiation by compounds containing sulfhydryl (SN) groups, such as cysteine, has been reported, these agents have been unsuccessful to date in protecting mammals against non-ionizing radiation (>200nm). This study describes successful photoprotection by dithiothreitol (DTT) and glycerol against porphyrin photosensitization having an action spectrum of 400nm. Test models used were red blood cells (RBC) obtained from patients with erythropoietic protoporphyria (EPP) and mice photo-sensitized by hematoporphyrin (HP). A mortality rate approaching a lethal dose in 50% of the animals in 1 day (LD50/24 hrs) was established in 100 white mice that had received an intraperitoneal injection of 100mg HP/kg body wt., and were then irradiated with 5 × 106 ergs/cm2 from a fluorescent light source emitting 320-450nm radiation. Another 100 mice were treated in an identical manner except that they received, in addition to HP, 80mg DTT/kg body weight in a 5.5% glycerol solution. This group showed 75% reduction in mortality (p < 0.03). No lethal effects were observed in animals treated with DTT and glycerol or HP in the above concentrations without 400nm irradiation. RBC obtained from patients with EPP and exposed to 107 ergs/mm2 of 400nm radiation showed 100% hemolysis after 180min. These cells, when irradiated under identical conditions except for the addition of DTT, manifested only 19% hemolysis during this period of time. Measurements of SH groups of RBC from patients with EPP showed a progressive decrease during photohemolysis. Comparison of the rate of photohemolysis of normal and glucose-6-phosphate dehydrogenase (G6PD) deficient RBC irradiated in the presence of protoporphyrin IX revealed that G6PD deficient RBC, which have an impaired ability to produce reduced glutathione (GSH), were more susceptible to porphyrin-induced photohemolysis. These studies demonstrate that DTT and glycerol offer photoprotection in an in vivo mammalian system against porphyrin photosensitization. It is suggested that the mechanism of the photoprotective action against 320-450nm radiation has many features similar to that of radioprotection by thiols and glycerol against ionizing radiation
Kinetic pinning and biological antifreezes
Biological antifreezes protect cold-water organisms from freezing. An example
are the antifreeze proteins (AFPs) that attach to the surface of ice crystals
and arrest growth. The mechanism for growth arrest has not been heretofore
understood in a quantitative way. We present a complete theory based on a
kinetic model. We use the `stones on a pillow' picture. Our theory of the
suppression of the freezing point as a function of the concentration of the AFP
is quantitatively accurate. It gives a correct description of the dependence of
the freezing point suppression on the geometry of the protein, and might lead
to advances in design of synthetic AFPs.Comment: 4 pages, 4 figure
Novel Transversity Properties in Semi-Inclusive Deep Inelastic Scattering
The -odd distribution functions contributing to transversity properties of
the nucleon and their role in fueling nontrivial contributions to azimuthal
asymmetries in semi-inclusive deep inelastic scattering are investigated. We
use a dynamical model to evaluate these quantities in terms of HERMES
kinematics.Comment: 5 pages revtex; 5 eps figures. References added. To appear as a Rapid
Communication in Physical Review
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Characterisation of microRNA expression in post-natal mouse mammary gland development.
BACKGROUND: The differential expression pattern of microRNAs (miRNAs) during mammary gland development might provide insights into their role in regulating the homeostasis of the mammary epithelium. Our aim was to analyse these regulatory functions by deriving a comprehensive tissue-specific combined miRNA and mRNA expression profile of post-natal mouse mammary gland development.We measured the expression of 318 individual murine miRNAs by bead-based flow-cytometric profiling of whole mouse mammary glands throughout a 16-point developmental time course, including juvenile, puberty, mature virgin, gestation, lactation, and involution stages. In parallel whole-genome mRNA expression data were obtained. RESULTS: One third (n = 102) of all murine miRNAs analysed were detected during mammary gland development. MicroRNAs were represented in seven temporally co-expressed clusters, which were enriched for both miRNAs belonging to the same family and breast cancer-associated miRNAs. Global miRNA and mRNA expression was significantly reduced during lactation and the early stages of involution after weaning. For most detected miRNA families we did not observe systematic changes in the expression of predicted targets. For miRNA families whose targets did show changes, we observed inverse patterns of miRNA and target expression. The data sets are made publicly available and the combined expression profiles represent an important community resource for mammary gland biology research. CONCLUSION: MicroRNAs were expressed in likely co-regulated clusters during mammary gland development. Breast cancer-associated miRNAs were significantly enriched in these clusters. The mechanism and functional consequences of this miRNA co-regulation provide new avenues for research into mammary gland biology and generate candidates for functional validation.RIGHTS : This article is licensed under the BioMed Central licence at http://www.biomedcentral.com/about/license which is similar to the 'Creative Commons Attribution Licence'. In brief you may : copy, distribute, and display the work; make derivative works; or make commercial use of the work - under the following conditions: the original author must be given credit; for any reuse or distribution, it must be made clear to others what the license terms of this work are
Meeting report : GBIF hackathon-workshop on Darwin Core and sample data (22-24 May 2013)
© The Author(s), 2014. This article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License. The definitive version was published in Standards in Genomic Sciences 9 (2014): 585-598, doi:10.4056/sigs.4898640.The workshop-hackathon was convened by the Global Biodiversity Information Facility (GBIF) at its secretariat in Copenhagen over 22-24 May 2013 with additional support from several projects (RCN4GSC, EAGER, VertNet, BiSciCol, GGBN, and Micro B3). It assembled a team of experts to address the challenge of adapting the Darwin Core standard for a wide variety of sample data. Topics addressed in the workshop included 1) a review of outstanding issues in the Darwin Core standard, 2) issues relating to publishing of biodiversity data through Darwin Core Archives, 3) use of Darwin Core Archives for publishing sample and monitoring data, 4) the case for modifying the Darwin Core Text Guide specification to support many-to-many relations, and 5) the generalization of the Darwin Core Archive to a “Biodiversity Data Archive”. A wide variety of use cases were assembled and discussed in order to inform further developments.We gratefully acknowledge support from the Global Biodiversity Information Facility (GBIF), from the Global Genome Biodiversity Network (GGBN), from the EU 7FP Biodiversity, Bioinformatics, Biotechnology project (Micro B3), and from the US National Science Foundation (NSF) through the following grants: DBI-0840989 [Research Coordination Network for the Ge-nomic Standards Consortium (RCN4GSC)], IIS-1255035 [EAGER: An Interoperable Information Infrastructure for Biodiversity Research (I3BR)], ABI Development: Collaborative Research: VertNet, a New Model for Bio-diversity Networks (DBI-1062193), and Collaborative Research: BiSciCol Tracker: Towards a tagging and tracking infrastructure for biodiversity science collec-tions (DBI-0956426)
Track Reconstruction and Performance of DRIFT Directional Dark Matter Detectors using Alpha Particles
First results are presented from an analysis of data from the DRIFT-IIa and
DRIFT-IIb directional dark matter detectors at Boulby Mine in which alpha
particle tracks were reconstructed and used to characterise detector
performance--an important step towards optimising directional technology. The
drift velocity in DRIFT-IIa was [59.3 +/- 0.2 (stat) +/- 7.5 (sys)] m/s based
on an analysis of naturally-occurring alpha-emitting background. The drift
velocity in DRIFT-IIb was [57 +/- 1 (stat) +/- 3 (sys)] m/s determined by the
analysis of alpha particle tracks from a Po-210 source. 3D range reconstruction
and energy spectra were used to identify alpha particles from the decay of
Rn-222, Po-218, Rn-220 and Po-216. This study found that (22 +/- 2)% of Po-218
progeny (from Rn-222 decay) are produced with no net charge in 40 Torr CS2. For
Po-216 progeny (from Rn-220 decay) the uncharged fraction is (100 +0 -35)%.Comment: 27 pages, 12 figures, 5 tables. Submitted to Nuclear Instruments and
Methods in Physics Research, Section A. Subj-class: Instrumentation and
Detector
A mechanism for the T-odd pion fragmentation function
We consider a simple rescattering mechanism to calculate a leading twist
-odd pion fragmentation function, a favored candidate for filtering the
transversity properties of the nucleon. We evaluate the single spin azimuthal
asymmetry for a transversely polarized target in semi-inclusive deep inelastic
scattering (for HERMES kinematics). Additionally, we calculate the double
-odd asymmetry in this framework.Comment: 6 pages revtex, 7 eps figures, references added and updated in this
published versio
Spin interactions and switching in vertically tunnel-coupled quantum dots
We determine the spin exchange coupling J between two electrons located in
two vertically tunnel-coupled quantum dots, and its variation when magnetic (B)
and electric (E) fields (both in-plane and perpendicular) are applied. We
predict a strong decrease of J as the in-plane B field is increased, mainly due
to orbital compression. Combined with the Zeeman splitting, this leads to a
singlet-triplet crossing, which can be observed as a pronounced jump in the
magnetization at in-plane fields of a few Tesla, and perpendicular fields of
the order of 10 Tesla for typical self-assembled dots. We use harmonic
potentials to model the confining of electrons, and calculate the exchange J
using the Heitler-London and Hund-Mulliken technique, including the long-range
Coulomb interaction. With our results we provide experimental criteria for the
distinction of singlet and triplet states and therefore for microscopic spin
measurements. In the case where dots of different sizes are coupled, we present
a simple method to switch on and off the spin coupling with exponential
sensitivity using an in-plane electric field. Switching the spin coupling is
essential for quantum computation using electronic spins as qubits.Comment: 13 pages, 9 figure
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MicroRNA expression profiling of human breast cancer identifies new markers of tumor subtype.
BACKGROUND: MicroRNAs (miRNAs), a class of short non-coding RNAs found in many plants and animals, often act post-transcriptionally to inhibit gene expression. RESULTS: Here we report the analysis of miRNA expression in 93 primary human breast tumors, using a bead-based flow cytometric miRNA expression profiling method. Of 309 human miRNAs assayed, we identify 133 miRNAs expressed in human breast and breast tumors. We used mRNA expression profiling to classify the breast tumors as luminal A, luminal B, basal-like, HER2+ and normal-like. A number of miRNAs are differentially expressed between these molecular tumor subtypes and individual miRNAs are associated with clinicopathological factors. Furthermore, we find that miRNAs could classify basal versus luminal tumor subtypes in an independent data set. In some cases, changes in miRNA expression correlate with genomic loss or gain; in others, changes in miRNA expression are likely due to changes in primary transcription and or miRNA biogenesis. Finally, the expression of DICER1 and AGO2 is correlated with tumor subtype and may explain some of the changes in miRNA expression observed. CONCLUSION: This study represents the first integrated analysis of miRNA expression, mRNA expression and genomic changes in human breast cancer and may serve as a basis for functional studies of the role of miRNAs in the etiology of breast cancer. Furthermore, we demonstrate that bead-based flow cytometric miRNA expression profiling might be a suitable platform to classify breast cancer into prognostic molecular subtypes.RIGHTS : This article is licensed under the BioMed Central licence at http://www.biomedcentral.com/about/license which is similar to the 'Creative Commons Attribution Licence'. In brief you may : copy, distribute, and display the work; make derivative works; or make commercial use of the work - under the following conditions: the original author must be given credit; for any reuse or distribution, it must be made clear to others what the license terms of this work are
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