The chemistry of deformation: how solutes soften pure metals     

Trinkle DR  Woodward C 《Science (New York, N.Y.)》2005,310(5754):1665-1667

Solutes have been added to strengthen elemental metals, generating usable materials for millennia; in the 1960s, solutes were found to also soften metals. Despite the empirical correlation between the "electron number" of the solute and the change in strength of the material to which it is added, the mechanism responsible for softening is poorly understood. Using state-of-the-art quantum-mechanical methods, we studied the direct interaction of transition-metal solutes with dislocations in molybdenum. The interaction increases dramatically with increasing electron number and strongly influences the mechanisms responsible for plasticity in these materials. Our quantitative model explains solution softening of metals by using changes in energy and stress scales of plasticity from solutes.  相似文献   

Eco1-dependent cohesin acetylation during establishment of sister chromatid cohesion     

Rolef Ben-Shahar T  Heeger S  Lehane C  East P  Flynn H  Skehel M  Uhlmann F 《Science (New York, N.Y.)》2008,321(5888):563-566

Replicated chromosomes are held together by the chromosomal cohesin complex from the time of their synthesis in S phase onward. This requires the replication fork-associated acetyl transferase Eco1, but Eco1's mechanism of action is not known. We identified spontaneous suppressors of the thermosensitive eco1-1 allele in budding yeast. An acetylation-mimicking mutation of a conserved lysine in cohesin's Smc3 subunit makes Eco1 dispensable for cell growth, and we show that Smc3 is acetylated in an Eco1-dependent manner during DNA replication to promote sister chromatid cohesion. A second set of eco1-1 suppressors inactivate the budding yeast ortholog of the cohesin destabilizer Wapl. Our results indicate that Eco1 modifies cohesin to stabilize sister chromatid cohesion in parallel with a cohesion establishment reaction that is in principle Eco1-independent.  相似文献   

A Burkholderia pseudomallei toxin inhibits helicase activity of translation factor eIF4A     

Cruz-Migoni A  Hautbergue GM  Artymiuk PJ  Baker PJ  Bokori-Brown M  Chang CT  Dickman MJ  Essex-Lopresti A  Harding SV  Mahadi NM  Marshall LE  Mobbs GW  Mohamed R  Nathan S  Ngugi SA  Ong C  Ooi WF  Partridge LJ  Phillips HL  Raih MF  Ruzheinikov S  Sarkar-Tyson M  Sedelnikova SE  Smither SJ  Tan P  Titball RW  Wilson SA  Rice DW 《Science (New York, N.Y.)》2011,334(6057):821-824

The structure of BPSL1549, a protein of unknown function from Burkholderia pseudomallei, reveals a similarity to Escherichia coli cytotoxic necrotizing factor 1. We found that BPSL1549 acted as a potent cytotoxin against eukaryotic cells and was lethal when administered to mice. Expression levels of bpsl1549 correlate with conditions expected to promote or suppress pathogenicity. BPSL1549 promotes deamidation of glutamine-339 of the translation initiation factor eIF4A, abolishing its helicase activity and inhibiting translation. We propose to name BPSL1549 Burkholderia lethal factor 1.  相似文献   

Cross-species identification of Mendel's I locus     

Armstead I  Donnison I  Aubry S  Harper J  Hörtensteiner S  James C  Mani J  Moffet M  Ougham H  Roberts L  Thomas A  Weeden N  Thomas H  King I 《Science (New York, N.Y.)》2007,315(5808):73

A key gene involved in plant senescence, mutations of which partially disable chlorophyll catabolism and confer stay-green leaf and cotyledon phenotypes, has been identified in Pisum sativum, Arabidopsis thaliana, and Festuca pratensis by using classical and molecular genetics and comparative genomics. A stay-green locus in F. pratensis is syntenically equivalent to a similar stay-green locus on rice chromosome 9. Functional testing in Arabidopsis of a homolog of the rice candidate gene revealed (i) senescence-associated gene expression and (ii) a stay-green phenotype after RNA interference silencing. Genetic mapping in pea demonstrated cosegregation with the yellow/green cotyledon polymorphism (I/i) first reported by Gregor Mendel in 1866.  相似文献   

N-linked glycan profiling of mature human milk by high-performance microfluidic chip liquid chromatography time-of-flight tandem mass spectrometry     

Dallas DC  Martin WF  Strum JS  Zivkovic AM  Smilowitz JT  Underwood MA  Affolter M  Lebrilla CB  German JB 《Journal of agricultural and food chemistry》2011,59(8):4255-4263

N-Linked glycans of skim human milk proteins were determined for three mothers. N-Linked glycans are linked to immune defense, cell growth, and cell-cell adhesion, but their functions in human milk are undetermined. Protein-bound N-linked glycans were released with peptidyl N-glycosidase F (PNGase F), enriched by graphitized carbon chromatography, and analyzed with Chip-TOF MS. To be defined as N-glycans, compounds were required, in all three procedural replicates, to match, within 6 ppm, against a theoretical human N-glycan library and be at least 2-fold higher in abundance in PNGase F-treated than in control samples. Fifty-two N-linked glycan compositions were identified, and 24 were confirmed via tandem mass spectra analysis. Twenty-seven compositions have been found previously in human milk, and 25 are novel compositions. By abundance, 84% of N-glycans were fucosylated and 47% were sialylated. The majority (70%) of total N-glycan abundance was composed of N-glycans found in all three milk samples.  相似文献   

Turning back the tide of American mink invasion at an unprecedented scale through community participation and adaptive management     

Rosalind Bryce  Matthew K. Oliver  Llinos Davies  Helen Gray  Jamie Urquhart  Xavier Lambin 《Biological conservation》2011,(1):575-583

Successful eradications of harmful invasive species have been mostly confined to islands while control programs in mainland areas remain small, uncoordinated and vulnerable to recolonisation. To allow the recovery of threatened native species, innovative management strategies are required to remove invasives from large areas. We took an adaptive approach to achieve large scale eradication of invasive American mink in North East Scotland. The project was centred on the Cairngorms National Park (Scotland), with the primary aim of protecting endangered water vole populations. The project was initiated by scientists and supported and implemented through a partnership comprising a government agency, national park authority and local fisheries boards. Capitalising on the convergent interests of a diverse range of local stakeholders, we created a coordinated coalition of trained volunteers to detect and trap mink. Starting in montane headwaters, we systematically moved down river catchments, deploying mink rafts, an effective detection and trapping platform. Volunteers took increasing responsibility for raft monitoring and mink trapping as the project progressed. Within 3 years, the project removed 376 mink from 10570 km² with the involvement of 186 volunteers. Capture rate within sub-catchments increased with greater connectivity to mink in other sub-catchments and with proximity to the coast where there is more productive habitat. The main factor underpinning the success of this project was functional volunteer participation. The project is a reason for optimism that the tide of invasion can be rolled back on a large scale where the convergent interest of local communities can be harnessed.  相似文献   

The conservation game     

Mark Colyvan  James Justus  Helen M. Regan 《Biological conservation》2011,(4):1246-1253

Conservation problems typically involve groups with competing objectives and strategies. Taking effective conservation action requires identifying dependencies between competing strategies and determining which action optimally achieves the appropriate conservation goals given those dependencies. We show how several real-world conservation problems can be modeled game-theoretically. Three types of problems drive our analysis: multi-national conservation cooperation, management of common-pool resources, and games against nature. By revealing the underlying structure of these and other problems, game-theoretic models suggest potential solutions that are often invisible to the usual management protocol: decision followed by monitoring, feedback and revised decisions. The kind of adaptive management provided by the game-theoretic approach therefore complements existing adaptive management methodologies.  相似文献   

Determination of angiotensin I-converting enzyme activity in equine blood: lack of agreement between methods of analysis     

Maria Fernanda de M. Costa  Adriana K. Carmona  Marcio F. M. Alves  Timothy M. Ryan  Helen M. Davies  Garry A. Anderson  Ron F. Slocombe 《Journal of veterinary science (Suw?n-si, Korea)》2011,12(1):21-25

Angiotensin-I converting enzyme (ACE) is a key regulator of blood pressure, electrolytes and fluid homeostasis through conversion of angiotensin I into angiotensin II. Recently, a genetic polymorphism of the ACE gene, which accounts for 47% of the variation of ACE activity in blood, has been advocated as a biomarker of athletic aptitude. Different methods of analysis and determination of ACE activity in plasma have been used in human and equine research without a consensus of a "gold standard" method. Different methods have often been used interchangeably or cited as being comparable in the existing literature; however, the actual agreement between assays has not been investigated. Therefore, in this study, we evaluated the level of agreement between three different assays using equine plasma obtained from 29 horses. Two spectrophotometric assays using Furylacryloyl-phenylalanyl-glycyl-glycine as substrate and one fluorimetric assay utilizing o-aminobenzoic acid-FRK-(Dnp)P-OH were employed. The results revealed that the measurements from the different assays were not in agreement, indicating that the methods should not be used interchangeably for measurement of equine ACE activity. Rather, a single method of analysis should be adopted to achieve comparable results and critical appraisal of the literature is needed when attempting to compare results obtained from different assays.  相似文献   

Involvement of dehydroalanine and dehydrobutyrine in the addition of glutathione to nisin     

Rose NL  Sporns P  Dodd HM  Gasson MJ  Mellon FA  McMullen LM 《Journal of agricultural and food chemistry》2003,51(10):3174-3178

Nisin variants and fragments were reacted with glutathione, and the products of the reactions were analyzed by matrix-assisted laser desorption/ionization time-of-flight mass spectrometry (MALDI-TOF MS) and liquid chromatography/mass spectrometry (LC-MS). Reactions between glutathione and either [Ala5]nisin or [Ala33]nisin resulted in products with two glutathione molecules conjugated to one nisin variant molecule. Only one glutathione molecule was added to [Ala5,Ala33]nisin. Fragmentation of the nisin molecule resulted in nisin 1-12, nisin 1-20, and nisin 1-32 fragments. Each fragment retained two dehydro residues, which subsequently underwent reaction with glutathione. The data indicated that the dehydroalanine residues of nisin are sites of addition for glutathione. Such addition renders the nisin molecule inactive.  相似文献   

President's letter     

Helen M. Jones 《Australian veterinary journal》1983,60(Z2):1-1

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