Resource Bounded Immunity and Simplicity

Revisiting the thirty years-old notions of resource-bounded immunity and simplicity, we investigate the structural characteristics of various immunity notions: strong immunity, almost immunity, and hyperimmunity as well as their corresponding simplicity notions. We also study limited immunity and simplicity, called k-immunity and feasible k-immunity, and their simplicity notions. Finally, we propose the k-immune hypothesis as a working hypothesis that guarantees the existence of simple sets in NP.Comment: This is a complete version of the conference paper that appeared in the Proceedings of the 3rd IFIP International Conference on Theoretical Computer Science, Kluwer Academic Publishers, pp.81-95, Toulouse, France, August 23-26, 200

Role of the Landau-Migdal Parameters with the Pseudovector and the Tensor Coupling in Relativistic Nuclear Models -- The Quenching of the Gamow-Teller Strength --

Role of the Landau-Migdal parameters with the pseudovector ($g_a$) and the tensor coupling ($g_t$) is examined for the giant Gamow-Teller (GT) states in the relativistic random phase approximation (RPA). The excitation energy is dominated by both $g_a$ and $g_t$ in a similar way, while the GT strength is independent of $g_a$ and $g_t$ in the RPA of the nucleon space, and is quenched, compared with that in non-relativistic one. The coupling of the particle-hole states with nucleon-antinucleon states is expected to quench the GT strength further through $g_a$.Comment: 7 pages, ReVTe

Towards Nominal Formal Languages

We introduce formal languages over infinite alphabets where words may contain binders. We define the notions of nominal language, nominal monoid, and nominal regular expressions. Moreover, we extend history-dependent automata (HD-automata) by adding stack, and study the recognisability of nominal languages

Nominal Regular Expressions for Languages over Infinite Alphabets

We propose regular expressions to abstractly model and study properties of resource-aware computations. Inspired by nominal techniques – as those popular in process calculi – we extend classical regular expressions with names (to model computational resources) and suitable operators (for allocation, deallocation, scoping of, and freshness conditions on resources). We discuss classes of such nominal regular expressions, show how such expressions have natural interpretations in terms of languages over infinite alphabets, and give Kleene theorems to characterise their formal languages in terms of nominal automata

Stable replication of the EBNA1/OriP-mediated baculovirus vector and its application to anti-HCV gene therapy

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>Hepatitis C virus (HCV) is one of the main causes of liver-related morbidity and mortality. Although combined interferon-α-ribavirin therapy is effective for about 50% of the patients with HCV, better therapies are needed and preventative vaccines have yet to be developed. Short-hairpin RNAs (shRNAs) inhibit gene expression by RNA interference. The application of transient shRNA expression is limited, however, due to the inability of the shRNA to replicate in mammalian cells and its inefficient transduction. The duration of transgene (shRNA) expression in mammalian cells can be significantly extended using baculovirus-based shRNA-expressing vectors that contain the latent viral protein Epstein-Barr nuclear antigen 1 (EBNA1) and the origin of latent viral DNA replication (OriP) sequences. These recombinant vectors contain compatible promoters and are highly effective for infecting primary hepatocyte and hepatoma cell lines, making them very useful tools for studies of hepatitis B and hepatitis C viruses. Here, we report the use of these baculovirus-based vector-derived shRNAs to inhibit core-protein expression in full-length hepatitis C virus (HCV) replicon cells.</p> <p>Results</p> <p>We constructed a long-term transgene shRNA expression vector that contains the EBV <it>EBNA1 </it>and <it>OriP </it>sequences. We also designed baculovirus vector-mediated shRNAs against the highly conserved core-protein region of HCV. HCV core protein expression was inhibited by the EBNA1/OriP baculovirus vector for at least 14 days, which was considerably longer than the 3 days of inhibition produced by the wild-type baculovirus vector.</p> <p>Conclusion</p> <p>These findings indicate that we successfully constructed a long-term transgene (shRNA) expression vector (Ac-EP-shRNA452) using the EBNA1/OriP system, which was propagated in <it>Escherichia coli </it>and converted into mammalian cells. The potential anti-HCV activity of the long-term transgene (shRNA) expression vector was evaluated with the view of establishing highly effective therapeutic agents that can be further developed for HCV gene therapy applications.</p