Reduced auger recombination in mid-infrared semiconductor lasers

A quantum-design approach to reduce the Auger losses in two micron InGaSb type-I quantum well edge-emitting lasers is reported. Experimentally realized structures show a 3X reduction in the threshold, which results in 4.6 lower Auger current loss at room temperature. This is equivalent to a carrier lifetime improvement of 5.7 and represents about a 19-fold reduction in the equivalent “Auger coefficient.

Identification of Surprisingly Diverse Type IV Pili, across a Broad Range of Gram-Positive Bacteria

In Gram-negative bacteria, type IV pili (TFP) have long been known to play important roles in such diverse biological phenomena as surface adhesion, motility, and DNA transfer, with significant consequences for pathogenicity. More recently it became apparent that Gram-positive bacteria also express type IV pili; however, little is known about the diversity and abundance of these structures in Gram-positives. Computational tools for automated identification of type IV pilins are not currently available.To assess TFP diversity in Gram-positive bacteria and facilitate pilin identification, we compiled a comprehensive list of putative Gram-positive pilins encoded by operons containing highly conserved pilus biosynthetic genes (pilB, pilC). A surprisingly large number of species were found to contain multiple TFP operons (pil, com and/or tad). The N-terminal sequences of predicted pilins were exploited to develop PilFind, a rule-based algorithm for genome-wide identification of otherwise poorly conserved type IV pilins in any species, regardless of their association with TFP biosynthetic operons (http://signalfind.org). Using PilFind to scan 53 Gram-positive genomes (encoding >187,000 proteins), we identified 286 candidate pilins, including 214 in operons containing TFP biosynthetic genes (TBG+ operons). Although trained on Gram-positive pilins, PilFind identified 55 of 58 manually curated Gram-negative pilins in TBG+ operons, as well as 53 additional pilin candidates in operons lacking biosynthetic genes in ten species (>38,000 proteins), including 27 of 29 experimentally verified pilins. False positive rates appear to be low, as PilFind predicted only four pilin candidates in eleven bacterial species (>13,000 proteins) lacking TFP biosynthetic genes.We have shown that Gram-positive bacteria contain a highly diverse set of type IV pili. PilFind can be an invaluable tool to study bacterial cellular processes known to involve type IV pilus-like structures. Its use in combination with other currently available computational tools should improve the accuracy of predicting the subcellular localization of bacterial proteins

Portrait of Candida albicans Adherence Regulators

Cell-substrate adherence is a fundamental property of microorganisms that enables them to exist in biofilms. Our study focuses on adherence of the fungal pathogen Candida albicans to one substrate, silicone, that is relevant to device-associated infection. We conducted a mutant screen with a quantitative flow-cell assay to identify thirty transcription factors that are required for adherence. We then combined nanoString gene expression profiling with functional analysis to elucidate relationships among these transcription factors, with two major goals: to extend our understanding of transcription factors previously known to govern adherence or biofilm formation, and to gain insight into the many transcription factors we identified that were relatively uncharacterized, particularly in the context of adherence or cell surface biogenesis. With regard to the first goal, we have discovered a role for biofilm regulator Bcr1 in adherence, and found that biofilm regulator Ace2 is a major functional target of chromatin remodeling factor Snf5. In addition, Bcr1 and Ace2 share several target genes, pointing to a new connection between them. With regard to the second goal, our findings reveal existence of a large regulatory network that connects eleven adherence regulators, the zinc-response regulator Zap1, and approximately one quarter of the predicted cell surface protein genes in this organism. This limited yet sensitive glimpse of mutant gene expression changes had thus defined one of the broadest cell surface regulatory networks in C. albicans

The TadV Protein of Actinobacillus actinomycetemcomitans Is a Novel Aspartic Acid Prepilin Peptidase Required for Maturation of the Flp1 Pilin and TadE and TadF Pseudopilins

The tad locus of Actinobacillus actinomycetemcomitans encodes genes for the biogenesis of Flp pili, which allow the bacterium to adhere tenaciously to surfaces and form strong biofilms. Although tad (tight adherence) loci are widespread among bacterial and archaeal species, very little is known about the functions of the individual components of the Tad secretion apparatus. Here we characterize the mechanism by which the pre-Flp1 prepilin is processed to the mature pilus subunit. We demonstrate that the tadV gene encodes a prepilin peptidase that is both necessary and sufficient for proteolytic maturation of Flp1. TadV was also found to be required for maturation of the TadE and TadF pilin-like proteins, which we term pseudopilins. Using site-directed mutagenesis, we show that processing of pre-Flp1, pre-TadE, and pre-TadF is required for biofilm formation. Mutation of a highly conserved glutamic acid residue at position +5 of Flp1, relative to the cleavage site, resulted in a processed pilin that was blocked in assembly. In contrast, identical mutations in TadE or TadF had no effect on biofilm formation, indicating that the mechanisms by which Flp1 pilin and the pseudopilins function are distinct. We also determined that two conserved aspartic acid residues in TadV are critical for function of the prepilin peptidase. Together, our results indicate that the A. actinomycetemcomitans TadV protein is a member of a novel subclass of nonmethylating aspartic acid prepilin peptidases

Mobility Analysis of Highly Conducting Thin Films: Application to ZnO

Hall-effect measurements have been performed on a series of highly conductive thin films of Ga-doped ZnO grown by pulsed laser deposition and annealed in a forming-gas atmosphere (5% H2 in Ar). The mobility as a function of thickness d is analyzed by a simple formula involving only ionized-impurity and boundary scattering and having a single fitting parameter, the acceptor/donor concentration ratio K = NA/ND. For samples with d = 3–100 nm, Kavg = 0.41, giving ND = 4.7×1020 and NA = 1.9×1020 cm−3. Thicker samples require a two-layer formulation due to inhomogeneous annealing

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Improved Photoluminescence of Vertically Aligned ZnO Nanorods Grown on BaSrTiO\u3csub\u3e3\u3c/sub\u3e by Pulsed Laser Deposition

ZnO nanorods were grown on a variety of substrates such as Si, SiO2/Si and sapphire in a large-area pulsed laser deposition chamber designed for sensor device fabrication. Processing conditions were optimized to grow ZnO nanorods with or without seed layers. Au, Cr and BaSrTiO3 (BST) seed layers were investigated to compare their effects on the diameter and orientation of ZnO nanorods. ZnO nanorods were observed to align better when grown on sapphire, Cr or BST seed layers as compared to Au or Si layers. The highest quality nanorods were those grown on BST seed layers, as shown by 4 K photoluminescence donor-bound-exciton linewidths of only 0.5 meV