A study of low-lying states of 76As using the 75As(d,p) reaction

The ⁷⁵As(d, p)⁷⁶As reaction was investigated with 11 MeV deuterons. Thirty levels of the residual nucleus were identified up to about 1.8 MeV excitation energy, and angular distributions were measured. Spectroscopic factors and l_n values were obtained for low-lying transitions by means of a distorted-wave analysis of the differential cross sections. The l_n = 4 transition to the ground state of ⁷⁶As and the presence of l_n = 2 transitions to low-lying levels provide a strong support to the assumption that nuclei in this mass region have a large deformation parameter. The results are compared with the ⁷⁵As(n, γ)⁷⁶As data.     

Generating the alternating group by cyclic triples

It is shown that a collection of circular permutations of length three on an n-set generates the alternating group A_n if and only if the associated graph is connected. It follows that [$\text{1}\text{2}\text{n}$] circular permutations of length three may generateA_n.     

On path connected graphs

Given n and i, n > 2, 2 ≤ i ≤ n ? 1, the smallest size of an n-graph without endvertices is obtained, which ensures a path of length i between any two vertices of the graph.     

The protonated Schiff base of halorhodopsin from Natronobacterium pharaonis is hydrolyzed at elevated temperatures

Halorhodopsin from Natronobacterium pharaonis (pHR) is a light-driven chloride pump in which photoisomerzation of a retinal chromophore triggers a photocycle which leads to a chloride anion transport across the plasma membrane. Similarly to other retinal proteins the protonated Schiff base (PSB), which covalently links the retinal to the protein, does not experience hydrolysis reaction at room temperature even though several water molecules are located in the protonated Schiff base (PSB) vicinity. In the present studies we have revealed that in contrast to other studied archaeal rhodopsins, temperature increase to about 70 degrees C hydrolyses the PSB linkage of pHR. The rate of the reaction is affected by Cl-concentration and reveals an anion binding site (in addition to the Cl- in the SB vicinity) with a binding constant of 100mM (measured at 70 degrees C). We suggest that this binding site is located on the extracellular side and its possible role in the Cl-pumping mechanism is discussed. The rate of the hydrolysis reaction is affected by the nature of the anion bound to pHR. Substitution of the Cl- anion by Br-, I- and SCN- exhibits similar behavior to that of CI- in the region of 100mM but higher concentrations are needed for N3-, HCOO- and NO2-to achieve similar behavior. Steady state pigment illumination accelerates the reaction and reduces the energy of activation and the frequency factor. Adjusting the sample temperature to 25 degrees C following the hydrolysis reaction led to about 80% pigment recovery. However, the newly reformed pigment is different from the mother pigment and has different characteristics. It is concluded that the apo-membrane adopts a modified conformation and/or aggregated state which rebinds the retinal to give a new conformation of the pHR pigment.     

An autoxidation study of C2 substituted pyrimidine amino reductones

Three pyrimidine derivatives (8a-c), differing from isouramil and divicine at C2, have been synthesized and their autoxidation rates measured spectrophotometrically. The autoxidation rates of all five pyrimidines (8a-c, isouramil and divicine) were correlated with values (rho=−1.28, r²=0.949).     

Observation of soliton tunneling phenomena and soliton ejection

We study, theoretically and experimentally, the nonlinear dynamics of a wave packet launched inside a trap potential. Increasing the power of the wave packet transforms its dynamics from linear tunneling through a potential barrier, to soliton tunneling, and eventually, above a well-defined threshold, to the ejection of a soliton from the potential trap.     

On the arithmetic of tight closure

We provide a negative answer to an old question in tight closure theory by showing that the containment in holds for infinitely many but not for almost all prime characteristics of the field . This proves that tight closure exhibits a strong dependence on the arithmetic of the prime characteristic. The ideal has then the property that the cohomological dimension fluctuates arithmetically between 0 and .

     

Observation of vortex-ring "discrete" solitons in 2D photonic lattices

We present the experimental observation of both on-site and off-site vortex-ring solitons of unity topological charge in a nonlinear photonic lattice, along with a theoretical study of their propagation dynamics and stability.