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The X-ray crystal structure of peroxiredoxin bound to sulphiredoxin is solved. In this structure of the co-complex, the carboxy terminus of peroxiredoxin is completely unfolded, and it is 'packed' onto the backside of sulphiredoxin, away from the sulphiredoxin active site. Binding studies and activity analyses of site-directed mutants at this interface show that the interaction is required for repair to occur.
Aminoacyl-tRNA synthetases attach amino acids to tRNAs. Occasionally, an incorrect amino acid will attached to the wrong tRNA, and this must be reversed, or edited, to prevent the wrong amino acid from being incorporated into protein. This paper shows that the same base-pair in the tRNA that is important for the aminoacyl reaction is also important for editing, and that surprisingly, the proofreading site is in a different domain of the protein.
Near-surface warming in the Arctic has been almost twice as large as the global average over the past few decades. The vertical structure of temperature change in this region during the late twentieth century is examined and evidence is found for temperature amplification well above the surface. The causes of this amplification aloft remain uncertain, as feedbacks associated with the recent reduction in snow and ice cover are unlikely to be the cause.
A theoretical study proposes that magnetic monopoles may appear not as elementary but as emergent particles in complex, strongly-correlated magnetic systems such as spin ice, in analogy to fractional electric charges in quantum Hall systems. This theory explains a mysterious phase transition in spin ice that has been observed experimentally.
Numb functions as a tumour suppressor protein by regulating another tumour suppressor, p53. Numb binds and inhibits the activity of the ubiquitin ligase HDM2, and thereby promotes p53 stability and function. Low levels of Numb expression in breast tumours is associated with a poor prognosis.
The segmentation of the Drosophila melanogaster embryo is a well-known paradigm for pattern formation in development. However, the quantitative description of the transcriptional control mechanisms underlying this process is still missing. A new approach to the problem of predicting the pattern of gene expression based on cis-regulatory sequence is described. This new algorithm modelling protein–DNA interactions is likely to prove useful for many other protein–DNA interaction systems.
