High impulsivity predicts the switch to compulsive cocaine-taking     

Belin D  Mar AC  Dalley JW  Robbins TW  Everitt BJ 《Science (New York, N.Y.)》2008,320(5881):1352-1355

Both impulsivity and novelty-seeking have been suggested to be behavioral markers of the propensity to take addictive drugs. However, their relevance for the vulnerability to compulsively seek and take drugs, which is a hallmark feature of addiction, is unknown. We report here that, whereas high reactivity to novelty predicts the propensity to initiate cocaine self-administration, high impulsivity predicts the development of addiction-like behavior in rats, including persistent or compulsive drug-taking in the face of aversive outcomes. This study shows experimental evidence that a shift from impulsivity to compulsivity occurs during the development of addictive behavior, which provides insights into the genesis and neural mechanisms of drug addiction.  相似文献   

A bond-fluctuation mechanism for stochastic switching in wired molecules     

Ramachandran GK  Hopson TJ  Rawlett AM  Nagahara LA  Primak A  Lindsay SM 《Science (New York, N.Y.)》2003,300(5624):1413-1416

Stochastic on-off conductivity switching observed in phenylene-ethynylene oligomers has been explained in terms of changes in ring conformations, or electron localization, or both. We report the observation of stochastic on-off switching in the simplest of wired molecules: octanedithiol, decanedithiol, and dodecanedithiol bonded on an Au(111) surface. Stochastic switching was observed even when a top gold contact was pressed on by a conducting atomic force microscope tip at constant force. The rate of switching increased substantially at 60 degrees C, a temperature at which these films are commonly annealed. Because such switching in alkanethiols is unlikely to be caused by internal molecular electronic changes and cannot be fully accounted for by breaking of the top contact, we argue that the cause is the well-known mobility of molecules tethered to gold via a thiol linkage.  相似文献   

Physiology. The tick-tock of aging?     

Antebi A 《Science (New York, N.Y.)》2005,310(5756):1911-1913

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Bats limit arthropods and herbivory in a tropical forest     

Kalka MB  Smith AR  Kalko EK 《Science (New York, N.Y.)》2008,320(5872):71

Previous exclosure studies measuring the top-down control of arthropod abundance and herbivory combined the effects of birds and bats. We experimentally partitioned bird predation from bat predation in a lowland tropical forest in Panama and measured the direct effects (arthropod abundance) and indirect effects (herbivory). The exclusion of birds and bats each directly increased arthropod abundance on plants: Bird-exclosed plants contained 65% more, and bat-exclosed plants 153% more, arthropods than controls. Birds and bats also indirectly increased herbivory: Bird-exclosed plants suffered 67% more, and bat-exclosed plants 209% more, herbivory than controls. We conclude that bats have dramatic ecological effects that were previously overlooked.  相似文献   

The structure of the eukaryotic ribosome at 3.0 Å resolution     

Ben-Shem A  Garreau de Loubresse N  Melnikov S  Jenner L  Yusupova G  Yusupov M 《Science (New York, N.Y.)》2011,334(6062):1524-1529

Ribosomes translate genetic information encoded by messenger RNA into proteins. Many aspects of translation and its regulation are specific to eukaryotes, whose ribosomes are much larger and intricate than their bacterial counterparts. We report the crystal structure of the 80S ribosome from the yeast Saccharomyces cerevisiae--including nearly all ribosomal RNA bases and protein side chains as well as an additional protein, Stm1--at a resolution of 3.0 angstroms. This atomic model reveals the architecture of eukaryote-specific elements and their interaction with the universally conserved core, and describes all eukaryote-specific bridges between the two ribosomal subunits. It forms the structural framework for the design and analysis of experiments that explore the eukaryotic translation apparatus and the evolutionary forces that shaped it.  相似文献   

Phosphorylation of retinoblastoma protein by viral protein with cyclin-dependent kinase function     

Hume AJ  Finkel JS  Kamil JP  Coen DM  Culbertson MR  Kalejta RF 《Science (New York, N.Y.)》2008,320(5877):797-799

As obligate intracellular parasites, viruses expertly modify cellular processes to facilitate their replication and spread, often by encoding genes that mimic the functions of cellular proteins while lacking regulatory features that modify their activity. We show that the human cytomegalovirus UL97 protein has activities similar to cellular cyclin-cyclin-dependent kinase (CDK) complexes. UL97 phosphorylated and inactivated the retinoblastoma tumor suppressor, stimulated cell cycle progression in mammalian cells, and rescued proliferation of Saccharomyces cerevisiae lacking CDK activity. UL97 is not inhibited by the CDK inhibitor p21 and lacks amino acid residues conserved in the CDKs that permit the attenuation of kinase activity. Thus, UL97 represents a functional ortholog of cellular CDKs that is immune from normal CDK control mechanisms.  相似文献   

Structure of the uncleaved human H1 hemagglutinin from the extinct 1918 influenza virus     

Stevens J  Corper AL  Basler CF  Taubenberger JK  Palese P  Wilson IA 《Science (New York, N.Y.)》2004,303(5665):1866-1870

The 1918 "Spanish" influenza pandemic represents the largest recorded outbreak of any infectious disease. The crystal structure of the uncleaved precursor of the major surface antigen of the extinct 1918 virus was determined at 3.0 angstrom resolution after reassembly of the hemagglutinin gene from viral RNA fragments preserved in 1918 formalin-fixed lung tissues. A narrow avian-like receptor-binding site, two previously unobserved histidine patches, and a less exposed surface loop at the cleavage site that activates viral membrane fusion reveal structural features primarily found in avian viruses, which may have contributed to the extraordinarily high infectivity and mortality rates observed during 1918.  相似文献   

Identification of a DNA nonhomologous end-joining complex in bacteria     

Weller GR  Kysela B  Roy R  Tonkin LM  Scanlan E  Della M  Devine SK  Day JP  Wilkinson A  d'Adda di Fagagna F  Devine KM  Bowater RP  Jeggo PA  Jackson SP  Doherty AJ 《Science (New York, N.Y.)》2002,297(5587):1686-1689

In eukaryotic cells, double-strand breaks (DSBs) in DNA are generally repaired by the pathway of homologous recombination or by DNA nonhomologous end joining (NHEJ). Both pathways have been highly conserved throughout eukaryotic evolution, but no equivalent NHEJ system has been identified in prokaryotes. The NHEJ pathway requires a DNA end-binding component called Ku. We have identified bacterial Ku homologs and show that these proteins retain the biochemical characteristics of the eukaryotic Ku heterodimer. Furthermore, we show that bacterial Ku specifically recruits DNA ligase to DNA ends and stimulates DNA ligation. Loss of these proteins leads to hypersensitivity to ionizing radiation in Bacillus subtilis. These data provide evidence that many bacteria possess a DNA DSB repair apparatus that shares many features with the NHEJ system of eukarya and suggest that this DNA repair pathway arose before the prokaryotic and eukaryotic lineages diverged.  相似文献   

The Miller volcanic spark discharge experiment     

Johnson AP  Cleaves HJ  Dworkin JP  Glavin DP  Lazcano A  Bada JL 《Science (New York, N.Y.)》2008,322(5900):404

Miller's 1950s experiments used, besides the apparatus known in textbooks, one that generated a hot water mist in the spark flask, simulating a water vapor-rich volcanic eruption. We found the original extracts of this experiment in Miller's material and reanalyzed them. The volcanic apparatus produced a wider variety of amino acids than the classic one. Release of reduced gases in volcanic eruptions accompanied by lightning could have been common on the early Earth. Prebiotic compounds synthesized in these environments could have locally accumulated, where they could have undergone further processing.  相似文献   

Carbon-based supercapacitors produced by activation of graphene     

Zhu Y  Murali S  Stoller MD  Ganesh KJ  Cai W  Ferreira PJ  Pirkle A  Wallace RM  Cychosz KA  Thommes M  Su D  Stach EA  Ruoff RS 《Science (New York, N.Y.)》2011,332(6037):1537-1541

Supercapacitors, also called ultracapacitors or electrochemical capacitors, store electrical charge on high-surface-area conducting materials. Their widespread use is limited by their low energy storage density and relatively high effective series resistance. Using chemical activation of exfoliated graphite oxide, we synthesized a porous carbon with a Brunauer-Emmett-Teller surface area of up to 3100 square meters per gram, a high electrical conductivity, and a low oxygen and hydrogen content. This sp(2)-bonded carbon has a continuous three-dimensional network of highly curved, atom-thick walls that form primarily 0.6- to 5-nanometer-width pores. Two-electrode supercapacitor cells constructed with this carbon yielded high values of gravimetric capacitance and energy density with organic and ionic liquid electrolytes. The processes used to make this carbon are readily scalable to industrial levels.  相似文献