Magnon dark modes and gradient memory

Extensive efforts have been expended in developing hybrid quantum systems to overcome the short coherence time of superconducting circuits by introducing the naturally long-lived spin degree of freedom. Among all the possible materials, single-crystal yttrium iron garnet has shown up very recently as a promising candidate for hybrid systems, and various highly coherent interactions, including strong and even ultra-strong coupling, have been demonstrated. One distinct advantage of these systems is that the spins are in the form of well-defined magnon modes, which allows flexible and precise tuning. Here we demonstrate that by dissipation engineering, a non-Markovian interaction dynamics between the magnon and the microwave cavity photon can be achieved. Such a process enables us to build a magnon gradient memory to store information in the magnon dark modes, which decouple from the microwave cavity and thus preserve a long life-time. Our findings provide a promising approach for developing long-lifetime, multimode quantum memories.Comment: 18 pages, 12 figure

MDT-28/PLIN-1 mediates lipid droplet-microtubule interaction via DLC-1 in Caenorhabditis elegans

Ectopic lipid accumulation in lipid droplets (LD) has been linked to many metabolic diseases. In this study, DHS-3::GFP was used as a LD marker in C. elegans and a forward genetic screen was carried out to find novel LD regulators. There were 140 mutant alleles identified which were divided into four phenotypic categories: enlarged, aggregated, aggregated and small, and decreased. After genetic mapping, mutations in three known LD regulatory genes (maoc-1, dhs-28, daf-22) and a peroxisome-related gene (acox-3) were found to enlarge LDs, demonstrating the reliability of using DHS-3 as a living marker. In the screen, the cytoskeleton protein C27H5.2 was found to be involved in LD aggregation, as was the LD resident/structure-like protein, MDT-28/PLIN-1. Using yeast two-hybrid screening and pull-down assays, MDT-28/PLIN-1 was found to bind to DLC-1 (dynein light chain). Fluorescence imaging confirmed that MDT-28/PLIN-1 mediated the interaction between DHS-3 labeled LDs and DLC-1 labeled microtubules. Furthermore, MDT-28/PLIN-1 was directly bound to DLC-1 through its amino acids 1-210 and 275-415. Taken together, our results suggest that MDT-28/PLIN-1 is involved in the regulation of LD distribution through its interaction with microtubule-related proteins

DIGAP - a Database of Improved Gene Annotation for Phytopathogens

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>Bacterial plant pathogens are very harmful to their host plants, which can cause devastating agricultural losses in the world. With the development of microbial genome sequencing, many strains of phytopathogens have been sequenced. However, some misannotations exist in these phytopathogen genomes. Our objective is to improve these annotations and store them in a central database DIGAP.</p> <p>Description</p> <p>DIGAP includes the following improved information on phytopathogen genomes. (i) All the 'hypothetical proteins' were checked, and non-coding ORFs recognized by the Z curve method were removed. (ii) The translation initiation sites (TISs) of 20% ~ 25% of all the protein-coding genes have been corrected based on the NCBI RefSeq, ProTISA database and an <it>ab initio </it>program, GS-Finder. (iii) Potential functions of about 10% 'hypothetical proteins' have been predicted using sequence alignment tools. (iv) Two theoretical gene expression indices, the codon adaptation index (CAI) and the <it>E</it>(<it>g</it>) index, were calculated to predict the gene expression levels. (v) Potential agricultural bactericide targets and their homology-modeled 3D structures are provided in the database, which is of significance for agricultural antibiotic discovery.</p> <p>Conclusion</p> <p>The results in DIGAP provide useful information for understanding the pathogenetic mechanisms of phytopathogens and for finding agricultural bactericides. DIGAP is freely available at <url>http://ibi.hzau.edu.cn/digap/</url>.</p