Formation of amyloid-like aggregates through the attachment of protein molecules to a Congo red scaffolding framework ordered under the influence of an electric field

This study describes a technique which makes it possible to introduce the amyloid-like order to protein aggregates by using the scaffolding framework built from supramolecular, fibrillar Congo red structures arranged in an electric field. The electric field was used not only to obtain a uniform orientation of the charged dye fibrils, but also to make the fibrils long, compact and rigid due to the delocalization of pi electrons, which favors ring stacking and, as a consequence, results in an increased tendency to self-assemble. The protein molecules (immunoglobulin L chain lambda, ferritin) attached to this easily adsorbing dye framework assume its ordered structure. The complex precipitating as plate-like fragments shows birefringence in polarized light. The parallel organization of fibrils can be observed with an electron microscope. The dye framework may be removed via reduction with sodium dithionite, leaving the aggregated protein molecules in the ordered state, as confirmed by X-ray diffraction studies.      

Spectral theory of some degenerate elliptic operators with local singularities

This paper is based on our previous results (Haroske and Skrzypczak (2008) [23], Haroske and Skrzypczak (in press) [25]) on compact embeddings of Muckenhoupt weighted function spaces of Besov and Triebel-Lizorkin type with example weights of polynomial growth near infinity and near some local singularity. Our approach also extends (Haroske and Triebel (1994) [21]) in various ways. We obtain eigenvalue estimates of degenerate pseudodifferential operators of type b₂○p(x,D)○b₁ where bi∈Lri(Rn,wi), wi∈A_∞, i=1,2, and , ?>0. Finally we deal with the ‘negative spectrum’ of some operator Hγ=A−γV for γ→∞, where the potential V may have singularities (in terms of Muckenhoupt weights), and A is a positive elliptic pseudodifferential operator of order ?>0, self-adjoint in L₂(Rn). This part essentially relies on the Birman-Schwinger principle. We conclude this paper with a number of examples, also comparing our results with preceding ones.     

On prospects for dark matter indirect detection in the Constrained MSSM

We apply a rigorous statistical analysis to the Constrained MSSM to derive the most probable ranges of the diffuse gamma radiation flux from the direction of the Galactic center and of the positron flux from the Galactic halo due to neutralino dark matter annihilation, for several different choices of the halo model and propagation model parameters. We find that, for a specified halo profile, and assuming flat priors, the 68% probability range of the integrated γ-ray flux spans about one order of magnitude, while the 95% probability range can be much larger and extend over four orders of magnitude (even exceeding five for a tiny region at small neutralino mass). The detectability of the signal by GLAST depending primarily on the cuspiness of the halo profile. The positron flux, on the other hand, appears to be too small to be detectable by PAMELA, unless the boost factor is at least of order ten and/or the halo profile is extremely cuspy. We also briefly discuss the sensitivity of our results to the choice of priors.     

Porphyrins meso-substituted with phenanthrene and 1,10-phenanthroline

Meso-tetrakis(9-phenanthryl)porphyrin and meso-tetrakis(1,10-phenanthrolin-4-yl)porphyrin were obtained and characterized by spectroscopy methods. The porphyrin containing phenanthroline substituents was formed with much smaller yield. It showed much slower progress of metallation with Cu(I) and Zn(II) ions than the phenanthreneporphyrin. While attachment of phenanthrene did not result in any meaningful changes in the uv vis spectrum when compared to other meso-substituted tetraarylporphyrins (except that of [2.2]paracyclophanylporphyrin), the appearance of two N centers in each meso substituent substantially altered porphyrin absorption in the 530–600 nm region. Although the 1 H nmr 300 MHz spectra of both porphyrins showed the same deshielding of β-pyrrole protons, the shielding of NH protons was more advanced in phenanthrolineporphyrin.     

The 1−(2.48MeV β−)0+ transition from 148Pm,the IAS process and the nuclear structure of the ground states involved

The β-moments of the 1^?(2.48 MeV β^?)0⁺ transition in the decay of ¹⁴⁸Pm have been derived from the experimental data available. These phenomenological results have been used to propose the ¹⁴⁸Pm ground state configuration in the framework of the two-quasiparticle model. It is confirmed that the high ft value is due rather to the smallness of the individual β-moments than to a strong cancellation effect. The β-moment ratio Λ (=〈α〉/ξ〈ir〉) is discussed in detail. The present results are compared with values provided by the IAS process.     

Existence of solutions for wave-type hemivariational inequalities with noncoercive viscosity damping

In this paper we prove the existence of solutions for a hyperbolic hemivariational inequality of the form

u″+Au′+Bu+∂j(u)∋f,     

The decay of theT=1 isospin triplet inA=12 systems. III. Higher order effects in the evaluation of the asymmetry parameters α∓ for the electron emission from aligned12B and12N

Nuclear Structure: calculation of the asymmetry α_? ofβ rays emitted from polarized¹²B and¹²N nuclei including higher order contributions. Comparison with recent experimental values. The asymmetry parameters α_? and α₊ were evaluated including higher order corrections in the framework of the formulae derived in a previous paper. It was found that since α_? is affected by strong cancellation effects the corrective terms give in this case a very important contribution. The agreement between predicted theoretical values and very recent experimental data is excellent for bothβ ^? andβ ⁺ decays. The experimental results can be understood without invoking the existence of the induced pseudotensor interaction.     

Physicochemical and surface properties of alumina modified with rare earth oxides, III. Dispersion of supported platinum

The effect of various amounts of lanthanides on the dispersion of Pt on Al₂O₃ — Ln₂O₃ (where Ln = La, Ce) has been studied by hydrogen chemisorption in a pulse chromatographic system.This revised version was published online in December 2005 with corrections to the Cover Date.     

Smolyak's Algorithm for Integration and L 1-Approximation of Multivariate Functions with Bounded Mixed Derivatives of Second Order

We propose and analyze two algorithms for multiple integration and L ₁-approximation of functions that have bounded mixed derivatives of order 2. The algorithms are obtained by applying Smolyak's construction (see [8]) to one-dimensional composite midpoint rules (for integration) and to one-dimensional piecewise linear interpolation algorithm (for L ₁-approximation). Denoting by n the number of function evaluations used, the worst case error of the obtained Smolyak's cubature is asymptotically bounded from above by

A Monte Carlo algorithm for weighted integration over

We present and analyze a new randomized algorithm for numerical computation of weighted integrals over the unbounded domain . The algorithm and its desirable theoretical properties are derived based on certain stochastic assumptions about the integrands. It is easy to implement, enjoys convergence rate, and uses only standard random number generators. Numerical results are also included.