Methylation landscape in the genome of higher plants of agronomical interest

In eukaryotic cells the methylation of cytosines in DNA is an essential mechanism which is implied in the dynamic organization of the genome structure, in relation to genes expression. Plant genomes contain a significant proportion and variable according to the species, of sequences which are likely to be methylated during the life of the plant. It is known that the establishment and the maintenance of methylation profiles in both genomic areas and specific sequences constitute a crucial mediator in the modulation of genes expression during development. Recent studies have evidenced the implication of epimutations in the adaptation of plants to their environment particularly in response to biotic and abiotic stresses. Recently, the complete mapping of methylation in the genomes of Arabidopsis thaliana and rice provided invaluable information on the distribution of methylation within genes in relation to their expression. The impact of changes in the methylation profiles on the characters of agronomic importance has not been intensively studied yet, whereas this question takes a considerable importance in the context of an increasing food demand and foreseen global climate changes. The METHYLANDSCAPE project proposes to isolate genomic DNA sequences on the basis of their degree of methylation and to connect the variation of their methylation profiles with, on the one hand, the expression of the corresponding genes and, on the other hand, with environmental or developmental processes. Thus, it should be possible to identify genes which expression is differentially controlled by methylation during development and/or in situation of stress, and likely to have an influence on the agronomic value of the plant. The METHYLANDSCAPE partners thus propose to bring signification advances in plant genomics on four original species, by integrating DNA methylation mapping and the relationship between epigenome and transcriptome, up to the generation of methylation-sensitive markers linked with characters of agronomic importance. (Texte intégral

Dynamics of photoinduced Charge Density Wave-metal phase transition in K0.3MoO3

We present first systematic studies of the photoinduced phase transition from the ground charge density wave (CDW) state to the normal metallic (M) state in the prototype quasi-1D CDW system K0.3MoO3. Ultrafast non-thermal CDW melting is achieved at the absorbed energy density that corresponds to the electronic energy difference between the metallic and CDW states. The results imply that on the sub-picosecond timescale when melting and subsequent initial recovery of the electronic order takes place the lattice remains unperturbed.Comment: Phys. Rev. Lett., accepted for publicatio

Quantum kinetic description of Coulomb effects in one-dimensional nano-transistors

In this article, we combine the modified electrostatics of a one-dimensional transistor structure with a quantum kinetic formulation of Coulomb interaction and nonequilibrium transport. A multi-configurational self-consistent Green's function approach is presented, accounting for fluctuating electron numbers. On this basis we provide a theory for the simulation of electronic transport and quantum charging effects in nano-transistors, such as gated carbon nanotube and whisker devices and one-dimensional CMOS transistors. Single-electron charging effects arise naturally as a consequence of the Coulomb repulsion within the channel

Debye screening and Meissner effect in a three-flavor color superconductor

I compute the gluon self-energy in a color superconductor with three flavors of massless quarks, where condensation of Cooper pairs breaks the color and flavor SU(3)_c x U(3)_V x U(3)_A symmetry of QCD to the diagonal subgroup SU(3)_{c+V}. At zero temperature, all eight electric gluons obtain a Debye screening mass, and all eight magnetic gluons a Meissner mass. The Debye as well as the Meissner masses are found to be equal for the different gluon colors. These masses determine the coefficients of the kinetic terms in the effective theory for the low-energy degrees of freedom. Their values agree with those obtained by Son and Stephanov.Comment: 10 pages, 1 figure (eps

The Kepler equation for inspiralling compact binaries

Compact binaries consisting of neutron stars / black holes on eccentric orbit undergo a perturbed Keplerian motion. The perturbations are either of relativistic origin or are related to the spin, mass quadrupole and magnetic dipole moments of the binary components. The post-Newtonian motion of such systems decouples into radial and angular parts. We present here for the first time the radial motion of such a binary encoded in a generalized Kepler equation, with the inclusion of all above-mentioned contributions, up to linear order in the perturbations. Together with suitably introduced parametrizations, the radial motion is solved completely

Searching for Perfect Fluids: Quantum Viscosity in a Universal Fermi Gas

We measure the shear viscosity in a two-component Fermi gas of atoms, tuned to a broad s-wave collisional (Feshbach) resonance. At resonance, the atoms strongly interact and exhibit universal behavior, where the equilibrium thermodynamic properties and the transport coefficients are universal functions of the density $n$ and temperature $T$. We present a new calibration of the temperature as a function of global energy, which is directly measured from the cloud profiles. Using the calibration, the trap-averaged shear viscosity in units of $\hbar\,n$ is determined as a function of the reduced temperature at the trap center, from nearly the ground state to the unitary two-body regime. Low temperature data is obtained from the damping rate of the radial breathing mode, while high temperature data is obtained from hydrodynamic expansion measurements. We also show that the best fit to the high temperature expansion data is obtained for a vanishing bulk viscosity. The measured trap-averaged entropy per particle and shear viscosity are used to estimate the ratio of the shear viscosity to the entropy density, which is compared that conjectured for a perfect fluid.Comment: 20 pages, 10 figure

Geometrical quadrupolar frustration in DyB4_4

Physical properties of DyB$_4$ have been studied by magnetization, specific heat, and ultrasonic measurements. The magnetic entropy change and the ultrasonic properties in the intermediate phase II indicate that the degeneracy of internal degrees of freedom is not fully lifted in spite of the formation of magnetic order. The ultrasonic attenuation and the huge softening of $C_{44}$ in phase II suggests existence of electric-quadrupolar (orbital) fluctuations of the 4$f$-electron. These unusual properties originate from the geometrical quadrupolar frustration.Comment: 4 pages, 4 figures, accepted for publication in Journal of the Physical Society of Japa