Strong-coupling Analysis of Parity Phase Structure in Staggered-Wilson Fermions

We study strong-coupling lattice QCD with staggered-Wilson fermions, with emphasis on discrete symmetries and possibility of their spontaneous breaking. We perform hopping parameter expansion and effective potential analyses in the strong-coupling limit. From gap equations we find nonzero pion condensate in some range of a mass parameter, which indicates existence of the parity-broken phase in lattice QCD with staggered-Wilson fermions. We also find massless pions and PCAC relations around second-order phase boundary. These results suggest that we can take a chiral limit by tuning a mass parameter in lattice QCD with staggered-Wilson fermions as with the Wilson fermion.Comment: 37 pages, 9 figure

Index Theorem and Overlap Formalism with Naive and Minimally Doubled Fermions

We present a theoretical foundation for the Index theorem in naive and minimally doubled lattice fermions by studying the spectral flow of a Hermitean version of Dirac operators. We utilize the point splitting method to implement flavored mass terms, which play an important role in constructing proper Hermitean operators. We show the spectral flow correctly detects the index of the would-be zero modes which is determined by gauge field topology. Using the flavored mass terms, we present new types of overlap fermions from the naive fermion kernels, with a number of flavors that depends on the choice of the mass terms. We succeed to obtain a single-flavor naive overlap fermion which maintains hypercubic symmetry.Comment: 27 pages, 17 figures; references added, version accepted in JHE

Change in Localization of Alkaline Phosphatase and Mannosidase II by Colchicine Treatment of Primary Cultures of Fetal Rat Hepatocytes

We examined the changes in localization of alkaline phosphatase (ALP) and mannosidase II (man II), a Golgi marker, after colchicine treatment of primary cultures of fetal rat hepatocytes, using double immunofluorescence staining and confocal laser microscopy. In hepatocytes cultured in basal medium, ALP was localized in the perinuclear cytoplasm, and man II was observed in the Golgi region of the cytoplasm. When hepatocytes were cultured in dexamethasone-supplemented medium, ALP was also localized in the plasma membrane surrounding the bile canaliculus-like structure that was formed between adjacent cells. In hepatocytes cultured in the same medium containing colchicine, the structure of microtubules in the cytoplasm was lost, man II exhibited granular distribution scattering throughout the cytoplasm, and ALP was localized in coarse granular sites of the cytoplasm. However, ALP was not colocalized at the same sites as man II. The present study indicated that colchicine inhibits the dexamethasone-promoted translocation of ALP to the plasma membrane surrounding the bile canaliculus-like structure in primary cultures of fetal rat hepatocytes by disassembling microtubules and discomposing the Golgi complex

The Conformal Transformation in General Single Field Inflation with Non-Minimal Coupling

The method of a conformal transformation is applied to a general class of single field inflation models with non-minimal coupling to gravity and non-standard kinetic terms, in order to reduce the cosmological perturbative calculation to the conventional minimal coupling case to all orders in perturbation theory. Our analysis is made simple by the fact that all perturbation variables in the comoving gauge are conformally invariant to all orders. The structure of the vacuum, on which cosmological correlation functions are evaluated, is also discussed. We show how quantization in the Jordan frame for non-minimally coupled inflation models can be equivalently implemented in the Einstein frame. It is thereafter argued that the general N-point cosmological correlation functions (of the curvature perturbation) are independent of the conformal frame.Comment: 15 pages, no figure, references adde

Ecto-5’-nucleotidase: Structure function relationships

Ecto-5’-nucleotidase (ecto-5’-NT) is attached via a GPI anchor to the extracellular membrane, where it hydrolyses AMP to adenosine and phosphate. Related 5’-nucleotidases exist in bacteria, where they are exported into the periplasmic space. X-ray structures of the 5’-nucleotidase from E. coli showed that the enzyme consists of two domains. The N-terminal domain coordinates two catalytic divalent metal ions, whereas the C-terminal domain provides the substrate specificity pocket for the nucleotides. Thus, the substrate binds at the interface of the two domains. Here, the currently available structural information on ecto-5’NT is reviewed in relation to the catalytic properties and enzyme function

Mechanisms of organelle division and inheritance and their implications regarding the origin of eukaryotic cells

Mitochondria and plastids have their own DNAs and are regarded as descendants of endosymbiotic prokaryotes. Organellar DNAs are not naked in vivo but are associated with basic proteins to form DNA-protein complexes (called organelle nuclei). The concept of organelle nuclei provides a new approach to explain the origin, division, and inheritance of organelles. Organelles divide using organelle division rings (machineries) after organelle-nuclear division. Organelle division machineries are a chimera of the FtsZ (filamentous temperature sensitive Z) ring of bacterial origin and the eukaryotic mechanochemical dynamin ring. Thus, organelle division machineries contain a key to solve the origin of organelles (eukaryotes). The maternal inheritance of organelles developed during sexual reproduction and it is also probably intimately related to the origin of organelles. The aims of this review are to describe the strategies used to reveal the dynamics of organelle division machineries, and the significance of the division machineries and maternal inheritance in the origin and evolution of eukaryotes