301 research outputs found
Identifying short motifs by means of extreme value analysis
The problem of detecting a binding site -- a substring of DNA where
transcription factors attach -- on a long DNA sequence requires the recognition
of a small pattern in a large background. For short binding sites, the matching
probability can display large fluctuations from one putative binding site to
another. Here we use a self-consistent statistical procedure that accounts
correctly for the large deviations of the matching probability to predict the
location of short binding sites. We apply it in two distinct situations: (a)
the detection of the binding sites for three specific transcription factors on
a set of 134 estrogen-regulated genes; (b) the identification, in a set of 138
possible transcription factors, of the ones binding a specific set of nine
genes. In both instances, experimental findings are reproduced (when available)
and the number of false positives is significantly reduced with respect to the
other methods commonly employed.Comment: 6 pages, 5 figure
Chromomagnetism in nuclear matter
Quarks are color charged particles. Due to their motion there is a strong
possibility of generation of color magnetic field. It is shown that however
hadrons are color singlet particles they may have non-zero color magnetic
moment. Due to this color magnetic moment hadrons can show color interaction.
In this paper we have studied the chromomagnetic properties of nuclear matter.Comment: 6 pages, 1 figure, accepted for publication in Int. J. Theor. Phy
Phase Space Reduction and Vortex Statistics: An Anyon Quantization Ambiguity
We examine the quantization of the motion of two charged vortices in a
Ginzburg--Landau theory for the fractional quantum Hall effect recently
proposed by the first two authors. The system has two second-class constraints
which can be implemented either in the reduced phase space or
Dirac-Gupta-Bleuler formalism. Using the intrinsic formulation of statistics,
we show that these two ways of implementing the constraints are inequivalent
unless the vortices are quantized with conventional statistics; either
fermionic or bosonic.Comment: 14 pages, PHYZZ
Nucleon to Delta Weak Excitation Amplitudes in the Non-relativistic Quark Model
We investigate the nucleon to Delta(1232) vector and axial vector amplitudes
in the non-relativistic quark model of the Isgur-Karl variety. A particular
interest is to investigate the SU(6) symmetry breaking, due to color hyperfine
interaction. We compare the theoretical estimates to recent experimental
investigation of the Adler amplitudes by neutrino scattering.Comment: \documentstyle[aps]{revtex}, 21pages; 11 postscript figures. Accepted
for publication by Phys. Rev.
Preparation of biogenic gas vesicle nanostructures for use as contrast agents for ultrasound and MRI
Gas vesicles (GVs) are a unique class of gas-filled protein nanostructures that are detectable at subnanomolar concentrations and whose physical properties allow them to serve as highly sensitive imaging agents for ultrasound and MRI. Here we provide a protocol for isolating GVs from native and heterologous host organisms, functionalizing these nanostructures with moieties for targeting and fluorescence, characterizing their biophysical properties and imaging them using ultrasound and MRI. GVs can be isolated from natural cyanobacterial and haloarchaeal host organisms or from Escherichia coli expressing a heterologous GV gene cluster and purified using buoyancy-assisted techniques. They can then be modified by replacing surface-bound proteins with engineered, heterologously expressed variants or through chemical conjugation, resulting in altered mechanical, surface and targeting properties. Pressurized absorbance spectroscopy is used to characterize their mechanical properties, whereas dynamic light scattering (DLS)and transmission electron microscopy (TEM) are used to determine nanoparticle size and morphology, respectively. GVs can then be imaged with ultrasound in vitro and in vivo using pulse sequences optimized for their detection versus background. They can also be imaged with hyperpolarized xenon MRI using chemical exchange saturation transfer between GV-bound and dissolved xenon—a technique currently implemented in vitro. Taking 3–8 d to prepare, these genetically encodable nanostructures enable multimodal, noninvasive biological imaging with high sensitivity and potential for molecular targeting
Effective Lagrangian Approach to the Theory of Eta Photoproduction in the Region
We investigate eta photoproduction in the resonance region
within the effective Lagrangian approach (ELA), wherein leading contributions
to the amplitude at the tree level are taken into account. These include the
nucleon Born terms and the leading -channel vector meson exchanges as the
non-resonant pieces. In addition, we consider five resonance contributions in
the - and - channel; besides the dominant , these are:
and . The amplitudes for the
and the photoproduction near threshold have significant
differences, even as they share common contributions, such as those of the
nucleon Born terms. Among these differences, the contribution to the
photoproduction of the -channel excitation of the is the most
significant. We find the off-shell properties of the spin-3/2 resonances to be
important in determining the background contributions. Fitting our effective
amplitude to the available data base allows us to extract the quantity
, characteristic of the
photoexcitation of the resonance and its decay into the
-nucleon channel, of interest to precise tests of hadron models. At the
photon point, we determine it to be from
the old data base, and from a
combination of old data base and new Bates data. We obtain the helicity
amplitude for to be from the old data base, and from the combination of the old data base and new Bates
data, compared with the results of the analysis of pion photoproduction
yielding , in the same units.Comment: 43 pages, RevTeX, 9 figures available upon request, to appear in
Phys. Rev.
Perturbative Renormalizations of Anyon Quantum Mechanics
In bosonic end perturbative calculations for quantum mechanical anyon systems
a regularization and renormalization procedure, analogous to those used in
field theory, is necessary. I examine the reliability and the physical
interpretation of the most commonly used bosonic end regularization procedures.
I then use the regularization procedure with the most transparent physical
interpretation to derive some bosonic end perturbation theory results on anyon
spectra, including a 3-anyon ground state energy.Comment: 19 pages, Plain LaTex, MIT-CTP-232
Approach to Perturbative Results in the N-Delta Transition
We show that constraints from perturbative QCD calculations play a role in
the nucleon to Delta(1232) electromagnetic transition even at moderate momentum
transfer scales. The pQCD constraints, tied to real photoproduction data and
unseparated resonance response functions, lead to explicit forms for the
helicity amplitudes wherein the E2/M1 ratio remains small at moderately large
momentum transfer.Comment: 4 pages, 2 figures, ReVTe
Effects Of The Quantity On The Spin Structure Functions Of Nucleons In The Resonance Region
In this paper, we investigate the effects of the quantity on
the spin-structure functions of nucleons in the resonance region. The Schwinger
sum rule for the spin structure function at the real photon limit
is derived for the nucleon treated as a composite system, and it provides a
crucial constraint on the longitudinal transition operator which has not been
treated consistently in the literature. The longitudinal amplitude is evaluated in the quark model with the transition operator that
generates the Schwinger sum rule. The numerical results of the quantity
are presented for both spin structure functions and
in the resonance region. Our results show that this quantity
plays an important role in the low region, which can be tested in the
future experiments at CEBAF.Comment: 20 pages, latex, 4 postscript figures can be obtained from the autho
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