982 research outputs found
Properties of Sequential Chromospheric Brightenings and Associated Flare Ribbons
We report on the physical properties of solar sequential chromospheric
brightenings (SCBs) observed in conjunction with moderate-sized chromospheric
flares with associated CMEs. To characterize these ephemeral events, we
developed automated procedures to identify and track subsections (kernels) of
solar flares and associated SCBs using high resolution H-alpha images.
Following the algorithmic identification and a statistical analysis, we compare
and find the following: SCBs are distinctly different from flare kernels in
their temporal characteristics of intensity, Doppler structure, duration, and
location properties. We demonstrate that flare ribbons are themselves made up
of subsections exhibiting differing characteristics. Flare kernels are measured
to have a mean propagation speed of 0.2 km/s and a maximum speed of 2.3 km/s
over a mean distance of 5 x 10^3 km. Within the studied population of SCBs,
different classes of characteristics are observed with coincident negative,
positive, or both negative and positive Doppler shifts of a few km/s. The
appearance of SCBs precede peak flare intensity by ~12 minutes and decay ~1
hour later. They are also found to propagate laterally away from flare center
in clusters at 41 km/s or 89 km/s. Given SCBs distinctive nature compared to
flares, we suggest a different physical mechanism relating to their origin than
the associated flare. We present a heuristic model of the origin of SCBs.Comment: 24 pages, 17 figure
Melanoregulin, Product of the dsu Locus, Links the BLOC-Pathway and Oa1 in Organelle Biogenesis
Humans with Hermansky-Pudlak Syndrome (HPS) or ocular albinism (OA1) display abnormal aspects of organelle biogenesis. The multigenic disorder HPS displays broad defects in biogenesis of lysosome-related organelles including melanosomes, platelet dense granules, and lysosomes. A phenotype of ocular pigmentation in OA1 is a smaller number of macromelanosomes, in contrast to HPS, where in many cases the melanosomes are smaller than normal. In these studies we define the role of the Mregdsu gene, which suppresses the coat color dilution of Myo5a, melanophilin, and Rab27a mutant mice in maintaining melanosome size and distribution. We show that the product of the Mregdsu locus, melanoregulin (MREG), interacts both with members of the HPS BLOC-2 complex and with Oa1 in regulating melanosome size. Loss of MREG function facilitates increase in the size of micromelanosomes in the choroid of the HPS BLOC-2 mutants ruby, ruby2, and cocoa, while a transgenic mouse overexpressing melanoregulin corrects the size of retinal pigment epithelium (RPE) macromelanosomes in Oa1ko/ko mice. Collectively, these results suggest that MREG levels regulate pigment incorporation into melanosomes. Immunohistochemical analysis localizes melanoregulin not to melanosomes, but to small vesicles in the cytoplasm of the RPE, consistent with a role for this protein in regulating membrane interactions during melanosome biogenesis. These results provide the first link between the BLOC pathway and Oa1 in melanosome biogenesis, thus supporting the hypothesis that intracellular G-protein coupled receptors may be involved in the biogenesis of other organelles. Furthermore these studies provide the foundation for therapeutic approaches to correct the pigment defects in the RPE of HPS and OA1
Melanoregulin, Product of the dsu Locus, Links the BLOC-Pathway and Oa1 in Organelle Biogenesis
Humans with Hermansky-Pudlak Syndrome (HPS) or ocular albinism (OA1) display abnormal aspects of organelle biogenesis. The multigenic disorder HPS displays broad defects in biogenesis of lysosome-related organelles including melanosomes, platelet dense granules, and lysosomes. A phenotype of ocular pigmentation in OA1 is a smaller number of macromelanosomes, in contrast to HPS, where in many cases the melanosomes are smaller than normal. In these studies we define the role of the Mregdsu gene, which suppresses the coat color dilution of Myo5a, melanophilin, and Rab27a mutant mice in maintaining melanosome size and distribution. We show that the product of the Mregdsu locus, melanoregulin (MREG), interacts both with members of the HPS BLOC-2 complex and with Oa1 in regulating melanosome size. Loss of MREG function facilitates increase in the size of micromelanosomes in the choroid of the HPS BLOC-2 mutants ruby, ruby2, and cocoa, while a transgenic mouse overexpressing melanoregulin corrects the size of retinal pigment epithelium (RPE) macromelanosomes in Oa1ko/ko mice. Collectively, these results suggest that MREG levels regulate pigment incorporation into melanosomes. Immunohistochemical analysis localizes melanoregulin not to melanosomes, but to small vesicles in the cytoplasm of the RPE, consistent with a role for this protein in regulating membrane interactions during melanosome biogenesis. These results provide the first link between the BLOC pathway and Oa1 in melanosome biogenesis, thus supporting the hypothesis that intracellular G-protein coupled receptors may be involved in the biogenesis of other organelles. Furthermore these studies provide the foundation for therapeutic approaches to correct the pigment defects in the RPE of HPS and OA1
Ac transport studies in polymers by a resistor network and transfer matrix approaches: application to polyaniline
A statistical model of resistor network is proposed to describe a polymer
structure and to simulate the real and imaginary components of its ac
resistivity. It takes into account the polydispersiveness of the material as
well as intrachain and interchain charge transport processes. By the
application of a transfer matrix technique, it reproduces ac resistivity
measurements carried out with polyaniline films in different doping degrees and
at different temperatures. Our results indicate that interchain processes
govern the resistivity behavior in the low frequency region while, for higher
frequencies, intrachain mechanisms are dominant.Comment: LaTeX file, 15 pages, 5 ps figures, to appear in Phys. Rev.
A Characterization of Scale Invariant Responses in Enzymatic Networks
An ubiquitous property of biological sensory systems is adaptation: a step
increase in stimulus triggers an initial change in a biochemical or
physiological response, followed by a more gradual relaxation toward a basal,
pre-stimulus level. Adaptation helps maintain essential variables within
acceptable bounds and allows organisms to readjust themselves to an optimum and
non-saturating sensitivity range when faced with a prolonged change in their
environment. Recently, it was shown theoretically and experimentally that many
adapting systems, both at the organism and single-cell level, enjoy a
remarkable additional feature: scale invariance, meaning that the initial,
transient behavior remains (approximately) the same even when the background
signal level is scaled. In this work, we set out to investigate under what
conditions a broadly used model of biochemical enzymatic networks will exhibit
scale-invariant behavior. An exhaustive computational study led us to discover
a new property of surprising simplicity and generality, uniform linearizations
with fast output (ULFO), whose validity we show is both necessary and
sufficient for scale invariance of enzymatic networks. Based on this study, we
go on to develop a mathematical explanation of how ULFO results in scale
invariance. Our work provides a surprisingly consistent, simple, and general
framework for understanding this phenomenon, and results in concrete
experimental predictions
Radial distribution function of semiflexible polymers
We calculate the distribution function of the end--to--end distance of a
semiflexible polymer with large bending rigidity. This quantity is directly
observable in experiments on single semiflexible polymers (e.g., DNA, actin)
and relevant to their interpretation. It is also an important starting point
for analyzing the behavior of more complex systems such as networks and
solutions of semiflexible polymers. To estimate the validity of the obtained
analytical expressions, we also determine the distribution function numerically
using Monte Carlo simulation and find good quantitative agreement.Comment: RevTeX, 4 pages, 1 figure. Also available at
http://www.cip.physik.tu-muenchen.de/tumphy/d/T34/Mitarbeiter/frey.htm
Low-energy quenching of positronium by helium
Very low-energy scattering of orthopositronium by helium has been
investigated for simultaneous study of elastic cross section and pick-off
quenching rate using a model exchange potential. The present calculational
scheme, while agrees with the measured cross section of Skalsey et al,
reproduces successfully the parameter ^ 1Z_{\makebox{eff}}, the effective
number of electrons per atom in a singlet state relative to the positron.
Together with the fact that this model potential also leads to an agreement
with measured medium energy cross sections of this system, this study seems to
resolve the long-standing discrepancy at low energies among different
theoretical calculations and experimental measurements.Comment: 4 latex pages, 3 postscript figure
Testing QCD factorisation and charming penguins in charmless
We try a global fit of the experimental branching ratios and CP-asymmetries
of the charmless decays according to QCD factorisation. We find it
impossible to reach a satisfactory agreement, the confidence level (CL) of the
best fit is smaller than .1 %.
The main reason for this failure is the difficulty to accomodate several
large experimental branching ratios of the strange channels. Furthermore,
experiment was not able to exclude a large direct CP asymmetry in , which is predicted very small by QCD factorisation.
Trying a fit with QCD factorisation complemented by a charming-penguin inspired
model we reach a best fit which is not excluded by experiment (CL of about 8 %)
but is not fully convincing.
These negative results must be tempered by the remark that some of the
experimental data used are recent and might still evolve significantly.Comment: 21 pages, 4 figures; several typos corrected, added one footnote and
two references, comments added about PQCD. To appear in Phys.Rev.
Computational exploration of molecular receptive fields in the olfactory bulb reveals a glomerulus-centric chemical map
© The Author(s) 2020. This article is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License. To view a copy of this license, visit http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/.Progress in olfactory research is currently hampered by incomplete knowledge about chemical receptive ranges of primary receptors. Moreover, the chemical logic underlying the arrangement of computational units in the olfactory bulb has still not been resolved. We undertook a large-scale approach at characterising molecular receptive ranges (MRRs) of glomeruli in the dorsal olfactory bulb (dOB) innervated by the MOR18-2 olfactory receptor, also known as Olfr78, with human ortholog OR51E2. Guided by an iterative approach that combined biological screening and machine learning, we selected 214 odorants to characterise the response of MOR18-2 and its neighbouring glomeruli. We found that a combination of conventional physico-chemical and vibrational molecular descriptors performed best in predicting glomerular responses using nonlinear Support-Vector Regression. We also discovered several previously unknown odorants activating MOR18-2 glomeruli, and obtained detailed MRRs of MOR18-2 glomeruli and their neighbours. Our results confirm earlier findings that demonstrated tunotopy, that is, glomeruli with similar tuning curves tend to be located in spatial proximity in the dOB. In addition, our results indicate chemotopy, that is, a preference for glomeruli with similar physico-chemical MRR descriptions being located in spatial proximity. Together, these findings suggest the existence of a partial chemical map underlying glomerular arrangement in the dOB. Our methodology that combines machine learning and physiological measurements lights the way towards future high-throughput studies to deorphanise and characterise structure-activity relationships in olfaction.Peer reviewe
Low-Energy Compton Scattering of Polarized Photons on Polarized Nucleons
The general structure of the cross section of scattering with
polarized photon and/or nucleon in initial and/or final state is systematically
described and exposed through invariant amplitudes. A low-energy expansion of
the cross section up to and including terms of order is given which
involves ten structure parameters of the nucleon (dipole, quadrupole,
dispersion, and spin polarizabilities). Their physical meaning is discussed in
detail. Using fixed-t dispersion relations, predictions for these parameters
are obtained and compared with results of chiral perturbation theory. It is
emphasized that Compton scattering experiments at large angles can fix the most
uncertain of these structure parameters. Predictions for the cross section and
double-polarization asymmetries are given and the convergence of the expansion
is investigated. The feasibility of the experimental determination of some of
the struture parameters is discussed.Comment: 41 pages of text, 9 figures; minor revisions prior to publication in
Phys. Rev.
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