Sodium Brightening of (3200) Phaethon Near Perihelion

Sunskirting asteroid (3200) Phaethon has been repeatedly observed in STEREO HI1 imagery to anomalously brighten and produce an antisunward tail for a few days near each perihelion passage, phenomena previously attributed to the ejection of micron-sized dust grains. Color imaging by the SOHO LASCO coronagraphs during the 2022 May apparition indicate that the observed brightening and tail development instead capture the release of sodium atoms, which resonantly fluoresce at the 589.0/589.6 nm D lines. While HI1's design bandpass nominally excludes the D lines, filter degradation has substantially increased its D line sensitivity, as quantified by the brightness of Mercury's sodium tail in HI1 imagery. Furthermore, the expected fluorescence efficiency and acceleration of sodium atoms under solar radiation readily reproduce both the photometric and morphological behaviors observed by LASCO and HI1 during the 2022 apparition and the 17 earlier apparitions since 1997. This finding connects Phaethon to the broader population of sunskirting and sungrazing comets observed by SOHO, which often also exhibit bright sodium emission with minimal visible dust, but distinguishes it from other sunskirting asteroids without detectable sodium production under comparable solar heating. These differences may reflect variations in the degree of sodium depletion of near-surface material, and thus the extent and/or timing of any past or present resurfacing activity.Comment: 30 pages, 14 figures, 6 tables; PSJ, in pres

RNA Interference by Single- and Double-stranded siRNA With a DNA Extension Containing a 3′ Nuclease-resistant Mini-hairpin Structure

Selective gene silencing by RNA interference (RNAi) involves double-stranded small interfering RNA (ds siRNA) composed of single-stranded (ss) guide and passenger RNAs. siRNA is recognized and processed by Ago2 and C3PO, endonucleases of the RNA-induced silencing complex (RISC). RISC cleaves passenger RNA, exposing the guide RNA for base-pairing with its homologous mRNA target. Remarkably, the 3' end of passenger RNA can accommodate a DNA extension of 19-nucleotides without loss of RNAi function. This construct is termed passenger-3'-DNA/ds siRNA and includes a 3'-nuclease-resistant mini-hairpin structure. To test this novel modification further, we have now compared the following constructs: (I) guide-3'-DNA/ds siRNA, (II) passenger-3'-DNA/ds siRNA, (III) guide-3'-DNA/ss siRNA, and (IV) passenger-3'-DNA/ss siRNA. The RNAi target was SIRT1, a cancer-specific survival factor. Constructs I-III each induced selective knock-down of SIRT1 mRNA and protein in both noncancer and cancer cells, accompanied by apoptotic cell death in the cancer cells. Construct IV, which lacks the SIRT1 guide strand, had no effect. Importantly, the 3'-DNA mini-hairpin conferred nuclease resistance to constructs I and II. Resistance required the double-stranded RNA structure since single-stranded guide-3'-DNA/ss siRNA (construct III) was susceptible to serum nucleases with associated loss of RNAi activity. The potential applications of 3'-DNA/siRNA constructs are discussed. Molecular Therapy-Nucleic Acids (2014) 2, e141; doi:10.1038/mtna.2013.68; published online 7 January 2014

Genomic Inference of the Metabolism and Evolution of the Archaeal Phylum Aigarchaeota

Microbes of the phylum Aigarchaeota are widely distributed in geothermal environments, but their physiological and ecological roles are poorly understood. Here we analyze six Aigarchaeota metagenomic bins from two circumneutral hot springs in Tengchong, China, to reveal that they are either strict or facultative anaerobes, and most are chemolithotrophs that can perform sulfide oxidation. Applying comparative genomics to the Thaumarchaeota and Aigarchaeota, we find that they both originated from thermal habitats, sharing 1154 genes with their common ancestor. Horizontal gene transfer played a crucial role in shaping genetic diversity of Aigarchaeota and led to functional partitioning and ecological divergence among sympatric microbes, as several key functional innovations were endowed by Bacteria, including dissimilatory sulfite reduction and possibly carbon monoxide oxidation. Our study expands our knowledge of the possible ecological roles of the Aigarchaeota and clarifies their evolutionary relationship to their sister lineage Thaumarchaeota

Bragg guiding of domain-like nonlinear modes and kink arrays in lower-index core structures

We introduce a novel class of stable nonlinear modes trapped in a lower-index film core sandwiched between two optical lattices, or in the cylindrical core of a radial lattice, imprinted in defocusing media. Such family of nonlinear modes transforms into defect lattice solitons when the core width is sufficiently small or into an array of kinks when the width is large enough. We find that higher-order modes with multiple zeros inside the guiding core can be stable in one-dimensional settings.Comment: 12 pages, 3 figures, to appear in Optics Letter

The mitochondrial genome of Paragyrodactylus variegatus (Platyhelminthes: Monogenea): differences in major non-coding region and gene order compared to Gyrodactylus

Publisher's Version/PDFBackground: Paragyrodactylus Gvosdev and Martechov, 1953, a viviparous genus of ectoparasite within the Gyrodactylidae, contains three nominal species all of which infect Asian river loaches. The group is suspected to be a basal lineage within Gyrodactylus Nordmann, 1832 sensu lato although this remains unclear. Further molecular study, beyond characterization of the standard Internal Transcribed Spacer region, is needed to clarify the evolutionary relationships within the family and the placement of this genus. Methods: The mitochondrial genome of Paragyrodactylus variegatus You, King, Ye and Cone, 2014 was amplified in six parts from a single worm, sequenced using primer walking, annotated and analyzed using bioinformatic tools. Results: The mitochondrial genome of P. variegatus is 14,517 bp, containing 12 protein-coding genes (PCGs), 22 transfer RNA (tRNA) genes, two ribosomal RNA (rRNA) genes and a major non-coding region (NCR). The overall A + T content of the mitochondrial genome is 76.3%, which is higher than all reported mitochondrial genomes of monogeneans. All of the 22 tRNAs have the typical cloverleaf secondary structure, except tRNACys, tRNASer1 and tRNASer2 that lack the dihydrouridine (DHU) arm. There are six domains (domain III is absent) and three domains in the inferred secondary structures of the large ribosomal subunit (rrnL) and small ribosomal subunit (rrnS), respectively. The NCR includes six 40 bp tandem repeat units and has the double identical poly-T stretches, stem-loop structure and some surrounding structure elements. The gene order (tRNAGln, tRNAMet and NCR) differs in arrangement compared to the mitochondrial genomes reported from Gyrodactylus spp. Conclusion: The Duplication and Random Loss Model and Recombination Model together are the most plausible explanations for the variation in gene order. Both morphological characters and characteristics of the mitochondrial genome support Paragyrodactylus as a distinct genus from Gyrodactylus. Considering their specific distribution and known hosts, we believe that Paragyrodactylus is a relict freshwater lineage of viviparous monogenean isolated in the high plateaus of central Asia on closely related river loaches

Implementation of a quantum algorithm to solve Bernstein-Vazirani's parity problem without entanglement on an ensemble quantum computer

Bernstein and Varizani have given the first quantum algorithm to solve parity problem in which a strong violation of the classical imformation theoritic bound comes about. In this paper, we refine this algorithm with fewer resource and implement a two qubits algorithm in a single query on an ensemble quantum computer for the first time