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The outer segment of vertebrate photoreceptors is a specialized compartment that hosts all the signaling components required for visual transduction. Specific to rod photoreceptors is an unusual set of three glutamic acid-rich proteins (GARPs) as follows: two soluble forms, GARP1 and GARP2, and the N-terminal cytoplasmic domain (GARP′ part) of the B1 subunit of the cyclic GMP-gated channel. GARPs have been shown to interact with proteins at the rim of the disc membrane. Here we characterized native GARP1 and GARP2 purified from bovine rod photoreceptors. Amino acid sequence analysis of GARPs revealed structural features typical of “natively unfolded” proteins. By using biophysical techniques, including size-exclusion chromatography, dynamic light scattering, NMR spectroscopy, and circular dichroism, we showed that GARPs indeed exhibit a large degree of intrinsic disorder. Analytical ultracentrifugation and chemical cross-linking showed that GARPs exist in a monomer/multimer equilibrium. The results suggested that the function of GARP proteins is linked to their structural disorder. They may provide flexible spacers or linkers tethering the cyclic GMP-gated channel in the plasma membrane to peripherin at the disc rim to produce a stack of rings of these protein complexes along the long axis of the outer segment. GARP proteins could then provide the environment needed for protein interactions in the rim region of discs.
The D-meson spectral density at finite temperature is obtained within a self-consistent coupled-channel approach. For the bare meson–baryon interaction, a separable potential is taken, whose parameters are fixed by the position and width of the Λc(2593) resonance. The quasiparticle peak stays close to the free D-meson mass, indicating a small change in the effective mass for finite density and temperature. Furthermore, the spectral density develops a considerable width due to the coupled-channel structure. Our results indicate that the medium modifications for the D-mesons in nucleus-nucleus collisions at FAIR (GSI) will be dominantly on the width and not, as previously expected, on the mass.
We study the gluonic phase in a two-flavor color superconductor as a function of the ratio of the gap over the chemical potential mismatch, Δ/δμ. We find that the gluonic phase resolves the chromomagnetic instability encountered in a two-flavor color superconductor for Δ/δμ<2. We also calculate approximately the free energies of the gluonic phase and the single plane-wave LOFF phase and show that the former is favored over the latter for a wide range of coupling strengths.
We propose to use the hadron number fluctuations in the limited momentum regions to study the evolution of initial flows in high energy nuclear collisions. In this method by a proper preparation of a collision sample the projectile and target initial flows are marked in fluctuations in the number of colliding nucleons. We discuss three limiting cases of the evolution of flows, transparency, mixing and reflection, and present for them quantitative predictions obtained within several models. Finally, we apply the method to the NA49 results on fluctuations of the negatively charged hadron multiplicity in Pb+Pb interactions at 158A GeV and conclude that the data favor a hydrodynamical model with a significant degree of mixing of the initial flows at the early stage of collisions.
Schwarze Löcher im Labor? : Auf der Suche nach einer experimentellen Bestätigung der Stringtheorie
(2006)
Schwarze Löcher – das sind im Allgemeinen alles verschlingende, gigantisch schwere astronomische Objekte mit bis zu einigen Milliarden Sonnenmassen. Am Frankfurt Institute for Advanced Studies (FIAS) und am Institut für Theoretische Physik sind in den vergangenen fünf Jahren eine ganz neue Art von Schwarzen Löchern theoretisch vorhergesagt worden, die genau das Gegenteil der astronomisch gemessenen Giganten darstellen, nämlich winzig kleine Schwarze Löcher, so genannte »mini black holes«. Auftreten könnten sie, wenn im kommenden Jahr der neue Teilchenbeschleuniger am CERN in Genf in Betrieb genommen wird.
A new imaging method that combines high-efficiency fast-neutron detection with sub-ns time resolution is presented. This is achieved by exploiting the high neutron detection efficiency of a thick scintillator and the fast timing capability and flexibility of light-pulse detection with a dedicated image intensifier. The neutron converter is a plastic scintillator slab or, alternatively, a scintillating fibre screen. The scintillator is optically coupled to a pulse counting image intensifier which measures the 2-dimensional position coordinates and the Time-Of-Flight (TOF) of each detected neutron with an intrinsic time resolution of less than 1 ns. Large-area imaging devices with high count rate capability can be obtained by lateral segmentation of the optical readout channels.
The freeze out of the expanding systems, created in relativistic heavy ion collisions, is discussed. We combine kinetic freeze out equations with Bjorken type system expansion into a unified model. The important feature of the proposed scenario is that physical freeze out is completely finished in a finite time, which can be varied from 0 (freeze out hypersurface) to infinit. The dependence of the post freeze out distribution function on the freeze out time will be studied. Model allows analytical analyses for the simplest systems such as pion gas. We shall see that the basic freeze out features, pointed out in the earlier works, are not smeared out by the expansion of the system. The entropy evolution in such a scenario is also studied.
The elliptic flow for Lambda hyperons and K0s mesons was measured by the NA49 experiment in semicentral Pb+Pb collisions at 158A GeV. The standard method of correlating particles with an event plane has been used. Measurements of v2 near mid-rapidity are reported as a function of centrality, rapidity and transverse momentum. Elliptic flow of Lambda and K0s particles increases both with the impact parameter and with the transverse momentum. It is compared with v2 for pions and protons as well as with various model predictions. The NA49 results are compared with data from NA45/CERES and STAR experiments.
The effects of the onset of deconfinement on longitudinal and transverse flow are studied. First, we analyze longitudinal pion spectra from Elab = 2A GeV to √sNN = 200 GeV within Landau’s hydrodynamical model and the UrQMD transport approach. From the measured data on the widths of the pion rapidity spectra, we extract the sound velocity c2s in the early stage of the reactions. It is found that the sound velocity has a local minimum (indicating a softest point in the equation of state, EoS) at Ebeam = 30A GeV. This softening of the EoS is compatible with the assumption of the formation of a mixed phase at the onset of deconfinement. Furthermore, the energy excitation function of elliptic flow (v2) from Ebeam = 90A MeV to √sNN = 200 GeV is explored within the UrQMD framework and discussed in the context of the available data. The transverse flow should also be sensitive to changes in the equation of state. Therefore, the underestimation of elliptic flow by the UrQMD model calculation above Elab = 30A GeV might also be explained by assuming a phase transition from a hadron gas to the quark gluon plasma around this energy. This would be consistent with the model calculations, indicating a transition from hadronic matter to “string matter” in this energy range.