Identification of sites phosphorylated by the vaccinia virus B1R kinase in viral protein H5R

Background: Vaccinia virus gene B1R encodes a erine/threonine protein kinase. In vitro this protein kinase phosphorylates ribosomal proteins Sa and S2 and vaccinia virus protein H5R, proteins that become phosphorylated during infection. Nothing is known about the sites phosphorylated on these proteins or the general substrate specificity of the kinase. The work described is the first to address these questions. Results: Vaccinia virus protein H5R was phosphorylated by the B1R protein kinase in vitro, digested with V8 protease, and phosphopeptides separated by HPLC. The N-terminal sequence of one radioactively labelled phosphopeptide was determined and found to correspond to residues 81-87 of the protein, with Thr-84 and Thr-85 being phosphorylated. A synthetic peptide based on this region of the protein was shown to be a substrate for the B1R protein kinase, and the extent of phosphorylation was substantially decreased if either Thr residue was replaced by an Ala. Conclusions: We have identified the first phosphorylation site for the vaccinia virus B1R protein kinase. This gives important information about the substrate-specificity of the enzyme, which differs from that of other known protein kinases. It remains to be seen whether the same site is phosphorylated in vivo

Langevin Simulation of Thermally Activated Magnetization Reversal in Nanoscale Pillars

Numerical solutions of the Landau-Lifshitz-Gilbert micromagnetic model incorporating thermal fluctuations and dipole-dipole interactions (calculated by the Fast Multipole Method) are presented for systems composed of nanoscale iron pillars of dimension 9 nm x 9 nm x 150 nm. Hysteresis loops generated under sinusoidally varying fields are obtained, while the coercive field is estimated to be 1979 $\pm$ 14 Oe using linear field sweeps at T=0 K. Thermal effects are essential to the relaxation of magnetization trapped in a metastable orientation, such as happens after a rapid reversal of an external magnetic field less than the coercive value. The distribution of switching times is compared to a simple analytic theory that describes reversal with nucleation at the ends of the nanomagnets. Results are also presented for arrays of nanomagnets oriented perpendicular to a flat substrate. Even at a separation of 300 nm, where the field from neighboring pillars is only $\sim$ 1 Oe, the interactions have a significant effect on the switching of the magnets.Comment: 19 pages RevTeX, including 12 figures, clarified discussion of numerical technique

Pion form factor analysis using NLO analytic perturbation theory

I present results for the pion's electromagnetic form factor in the spacelike region, which implement the most advanced perturbative information currently available for this observable in conjunction with a pion distribution amplitude that agrees with the CLEO data on the pion-photon transition form factor at the $1\sigma$ level. I show that using for the running strong coupling and its powers their analytic versions in the sense of Shirkov and Solovtsov, the obtained predictions become insensitive to the renormalization scheme and scale setting adopted. Joining the hard contribution with the soft part on account of local duality and respecting the Ward identity at $Q^2=0$, the agreement with the available experimental data, including expectations from planned experiments at JLab, is remarkable both in trend and magnitude. I also comment on Sudakov resummation within the analytic approach.Comment: 5 pages, 3 figures embedded; uses espcrc2.tex. Invited talk presented at QCD04, 5-9 July 2004, Montpellier, Franc

Can extra dimensions accessible to the SM explain the recent measurement of anomalous magnetic moment of the muon?

We investigate whether models with flat extra dimensions in which SM fields propagate can give a significant contribution to the anomalous magnetic moment of the muon (MMM). In models with only SM gauge and Higgs fields in the bulk, the contribution to the MMM from Kaluza-Klein (KK) excitations of gauge bosons is very small. This is due to the constraint on the size of the extra dimensions from tree-level effects of KK excitations of gauge bosons on precision electroweak observables such as Fermi constant. If the quarks and leptons are also allowed to propagate in the (same) bulk (``universal'' extra dimensions), then there are no contributions to precision electroweak observables at tree-level. However, in this case, the constraint from one-loop contribution of KK excitations of (mainly) the top quark to T parameter again implies that the contribution to the MMM is small. We show that in models with leptons, electroweak gauge and Higgs fields propagating in the (same) bulk, but with quarks and gluon propagating in a sub-space of this bulk, both the above constraints can be relaxed. However, with only one Higgs doublet, the constraint from the process b -> s gamma requires the contribution to the MMM to be smaller than the SM electroweak correction. This constraint can be relaxed in models with more than one Higgs doublet.Comment: Latex, 11 pages, 1 ps fig. included. In the revised version, a reference has been added. Version to be published in Phys. Lett.

The 3s Proton Occupancy in 206-Pb

This research was sponsored by the National Science Foundation Grant NSF PHY 87-1440

Test of the DWBA Description of Transfer Reactions at Intermediate Energies by Measuring a Complete Set of Single Nucleon Transfer and Elastic Scattering Data

This research was sponsored by the National Science Foundation Grant NSF PHy 87-1440

Test of the DWBA Description of Transfer Reactions at Intermediate Energies by Measuring a Complete Set of Single Nucleon and Elastic Scattering Data

This research was sponsored by the National Science Foundation Grant NSF PHY 87-1440

New vistas of the meson structure in QCD from low to high energies

This talk presents issues pertaining to the quark structure of the pion within QCD, both from the theoretical and from the experimental point of view. We review and discuss the pion-photon transition form factor and the pion's electromagnetic form factor vs. corresponding experimental data from the CLEO Collaboration and the JLab. We also examine the extent to which recent high-precision lattice computations of the second moment of the pion's distribution amplitude conform with theoretical models. Finally, we include predictions for the azimuthal asymmetry of the $\mu^+$ distribution in the polarized $\mu$-pair-induced DY production employing various pion distribution amplitudes.Comment: 6 pages, 7 figures, 2 tables. Talk presented at International Workshop on e^+e^- collisions from Phi to Psi, Frascati, Italy, 7-10 April 2008. V2 is an exclusive HEP version which includes predictions from AdS/QCD. V3: typo in title correcte

A jump-growth model for predator-prey dynamics: derivation and application to marine ecosystems

This paper investigates the dynamics of biomass in a marine ecosystem. A stochastic process is defined in which organisms undergo jumps in body size as they catch and eat smaller organisms. Using a systematic expansion of the master equation, we derive a deterministic equation for the macroscopic dynamics, which we call the deterministic jump-growth equation, and a linear Fokker-Planck equation for the stochastic fluctuations. The McKendrick--von Foerster equation, used in previous studies, is shown to be a first-order approximation, appropriate in equilibrium systems where predators are much larger than their prey. The model has a power-law steady state consistent with the approximate constancy of mass density in logarithmic intervals of body mass often observed in marine ecosystems. The behaviours of the stochastic process, the deterministic jump-growth equation and the McKendrick--von Foerster equation are compared using numerical methods. The numerical analysis shows two classes of attractors: steady states and travelling waves.Comment: 27 pages, 4 figures. Final version as published. Only minor change