Beschreibung: Jupiter's X-ray auroral emission in the polar cap region results from particles which have undergone strong field-aligned acceleration into the ionosphere [ Cravens et al. , 2003]. The origin of precipitating ions and electrons and the time variability in the X-ray emission are essential to uncover the driving mechanism for the high energy acceleration. The magnetospheric location of the source field line where the X-ray is generated is likely affected by the solar wind variability. However, these essential characteristics are still unknown because the long-term monitoring of the X-rays and contemporaneous solar wind variability has not been carried out. In Apr 2014, the first long-term multi-wavelength monitoring of Jupiter's X-ray and EUV auroral emissions was made by the Chandra X-ray Observatory, XMM-Newton, and Hisaki satellite. We find that the X-ray count rates are positively correlated with the solar wind velocity and insignificantly with the dynamic pressure. Based on the magnetic field mapping model, a half of the X-ray auroral region was found to be open to the interplanetary space. The other half of the X-ray auroral source region is magnetically connected with the pre-noon to post-dusk sector in the outermost region of the magnetosphere, where the Kelvin-Helmholtz (KH) instability, magnetopause reconnection, and quasi-periodic particle injection potentially take place. We speculate that the high energy auroral acceleration is associated with the KH instability and/or magnetopause reconnection. This association is expected to also occur in many other space plasma environments such as Saturn and other magnetized rotators.

Beschreibung: Forty clinical isolates of multidrug-resistant Pseudomonas aeruginosa were obtained in a medical setting in Hanoi, Vietnam. Whole genomes of all 40 isolates were sequenced by MiSeq (Illumina), and phylogenic trees were constructed from the single nucleotide polymorphism concatemers. Of these 40 isolates, 24 (60.0%) harbored metallo-β-lactamase-encoding genes, including bla IMP-15 , bla IMP-26 , bla IMP-51 , and/or bla NDM-1 . Of these 24 isolates, 12 harbored bla IMP-26 and belonged to sequence type 235 (ST235). Escherichia coli expressing bla IMP-26 was significantly more resistant to doripenem and meropenem than E. coli expressing bla IMP-1 and bla IMP-15 . IMP-26 showed higher catalytic activity against doripenem and meropenem than IMP-1 and against all carbapenems tested, including doripenem, imipenem, meropenem, and panipenem, than did IMP-15. These data suggest that clinical isolates of multidrug-resistant ST235 P. aeruginosa producing IMP-26 with increased carbapenem-hydrolyzing activities are spreading in medical settings in Vietnam.

Beschreibung: Microwave imaging diagnostics are powerful tools that are used to obtain details of complex structures and behaviors of such systems as magnetically confined plasmas. For example, microwave imaging reflectometry and microwave imaging interferometers are suitable for observing phenomena that are involved with electron density fluctuations; moreover, electron cyclotron emission imaging diagnostics enable us to accomplish the significant task of observing MHD instabilities in large tokamaks. However, microwave imaging systems include difficulties in terms of multi-channelization and cost. Recently, we solved these problems by developing a Horn-antenna Mixer Array (HMA), a 50 - 110 GHz 1-D heterodyne- type antenna array, which can be easily stacked as a 2-D receiving array, because it uses an end-fire element. However, the HMA still evidenced problems owing to the requirement for local oscillation (LO) optics and an expensive high-power LO source. To solve this problem, we have devel...

Beschreibung: Motivation: Deep sequencing of the transcripts of regulatory non-coding RNA generates footprints of post-transcriptional processes. After obtaining sequence reads, the short reads are mapped to a reference genome, and specific mapping patterns can be detected called read mapping profiles, which are distinct from random non-functional degradation patterns. These patterns reflect the maturation processes that lead to the production of shorter RNA sequences. Recent next-generation sequencing studies have revealed not only the typical maturation process of miRNAs but also the various processing mechanisms of small RNAs derived from tRNAs and snoRNAs. Results: We developed an algorithm termed SHARAKU to align two read mapping profiles of next-generation sequencing outputs for non-coding RNAs. In contrast with previous work, SHARAKU incorporates the primary and secondary sequence structures into an alignment of read mapping profiles to allow for the detection of common processing patterns. Using a benchmark simulated dataset, SHARAKU exhibited superior performance to previous methods for correctly clustering the read mapping profiles with respect to 5'-end processing and 3'-end processing from degradation patterns and in detecting similar processing patterns in deriving the shorter RNAs. Further, using experimental data of small RNA sequencing for the common marmoset brain, SHARAKU succeeded in identifying the significant clusters of read mapping profiles for similar processing patterns of small derived RNA families expressed in the brain. Availability and Implementation: The source code of our program SHARAKU is available at http://www.dna.bio.keio.ac.jp/sharaku/ , and the simulated dataset used in this work is available at the same link. Accession code: The sequence data from the whole RNA transcripts in the hippocampus of the left brain used in this work is available from the DNA DataBank of Japan (DDBJ) Sequence Read Archive (DRA) under the accession number DRA004502. Contact: yasu@bio.keio.ac.jp Supplementary information: Supplementary data are available at Bioinformatics online.

Beschreibung: A new temperature retrieval from Atmospheric Infrared Sounder with a fine horizontal resolution of 13.5 km was used to examine gravity wave (GW) characteristics in the austral summer at an altitude of 39 km in the subtropical stratosphere over eight years from 2003/2004 − 2010/2011. Using an S-transform method, GW components were extracted, and GW variances, horizontal wavenumbers and their orientations were determined at each grid point and time. Both climatology and interannual variability of the GW variance were large in the subtropical South Pacific. About 70 % of the interannual variation in the GW variance there was regressed to El Niño-Southern Oscillation (ENSO) index. The regression coefficient exhibits a geographical distribution similar to that of the precipitation. In contrast, the regression coefficient of the GW variance to the quasi-biennial oscillation of the equatorial lower stratosphere was not significant in the South Pacific. These results indicate that the interannual variability of GW variance in the South Pacific is controlled largely by the convective activity modulated by the ENSO. An interesting feature is that the GW variance is maximized slightly southward of the precipitation maximum. Possible mechanisms causing the latitudinal difference are (1) dense distribution of islands, which effectively radiate GWs with long vertical wavelengths, to the south of the precipitation maximum, (2) selective excitation of southward propagating GWs in the northward vertical wind shear in the troposphere, and (3) southward refraction of GWs in the latitudinal shear of background zonal wind in the stratosphere.

Beschreibung: Budding yeast divides asymmetrically, giving rise to a mother cell that progressively ages and a daughter cell with full lifespan. It is generally assumed that mother cells retain damaged, lifespan limiting materials (“aging factors”) through asymmetric division. However, the identity of these aging factors and the mechanisms through which they...