The number of new X-ray crystallography-based submissions to the Protein Data Bank appears to be at the beginning of a decline, perhaps signalling an end to the era of the dominance of X-ray crystallography within structural biology. This letter, from the viewpoint of a young structural biologist, applies the Copernican method to the life expectancy of crystallography and asks whether the technique is still the mainstay of structural biology. A study of the rate of Protein Data Bank depositions allows a more nuanced analysis of the fortunes of macromolecular X-ray crystallography and shows that cryo-electron microscopy might now be outcompeting crystallography for new labour and talent, perhaps heralding a change in the landscape of the field.

Yung-An Huang, Chih-Hsuan Hsu, Ho-Chieh Chiu, Pei-Yu Hsi, Chris T. Ho, Wei-Lun Lo, and Eric Hwang

Microtubule (MT) is the most abundant cytoskeleton in neurons and controls multiple facets of their development. While the MT-organizing center (MTOC) in mitotic cells is typically located at the centrosome, MTOC in neurons switches to non-centrosomal sites. A handful of cellular components have been shown to promote non-centrosomal MT (ncMT) formation in neurons, yet the regulation mechanism remains unknown. Here we demonstrate that the small GTPase Ran is a key regulator of ncMTs in neurons. Using an optogenetic tool that enables light-induced local production of RanGTP, we demonstrate that RanGTP promotes ncMT plus-end growth along the neurite. Additionally, we discovered that actin waves drive the anterograde transport of RanGTP. Pharmacological disruption of actin waves abolishes the enrichment of RanGTP and reduces growing ncMT plus-ends at the neurite tip. These observations identify a novel regulation mechanism of ncMTs and pinpoint an indirect connection between the actin and MT cytoskeletons in neurons.

Single-wavelength X-ray anomalous diffraction (SAD) is a frequently employed technique to solve the phase problem in X-ray crystallography. The precision and accuracy of recovered anomalous differences are crucial for determining the correct phases. Continuous rotation (CR) and inverse-beam geometry (IBG) anomalous data collection methods have been performed on tetragonal lysozyme and monoclinic survivin crystals and analysis carried out of how correlated the pairs of Friedel's reflections are after scaling. A multivariate Bayesian model for estimating anomalous differences was tested, which takes into account the correlation between pairs of intensity observations and incorporates the a priori knowledge about the positivity of intensity. The CR and IBG data collection methods resulted in positive correlation between I(+) and I(−) observations, indicating that the anomalous difference dominates between these observations, rather than different levels of radiation damage. An alternative pairing method based on near simultaneously observed Bijvoet's pairs displayed lower correlation and it was unsuccessful for recovering useful anomalous differences when using the multivariate Bayesian model. In contrast, multivariate Bayesian treatment of Friedel's pairs improved the initial phasing of the two tested crystal systems and the two data collection methods.

Join National Zoo Conservation Biologist Brian Gratwicke in his work to save Panama's amphibians from extinction. You can also catch up on his dispatches from the field on the Panamanian Amphibian Rescue and Conservation Project's blog: http://amphibianrescue.org/

The post Meet our Scientist: Brian Gratwicke, Amphibian Avenger appeared first on Smithsonian Insider.

The post “How Soil Savvy are You?, is featured in the exhibition “Dig It! The Secrets of Soil,” from the Smithsonian Traveling Exhibition Service appeared first on Smithsonian Insider.

Vince Rossi and Jon Blundell from the Smithsonian’s Digitization Program Office (http://3d.si.edu) apply various 3-D capture methods on the pointed plaster model for the “Greek […]

The post 3-D Scanning “Greek Slave” at American Art appeared first on Smithsonian Insider.

In an excerpt from “60 Minutes” on Sunday, Nov. 1 2016, Scott Pelley follows National Museum of African American History and Culture director Lonnie Burch […]

The post Slave Ship Artifacts Recovered appeared first on Smithsonian Insider.

Meet Nick Pyenson, one of our paleontologists at the National Museum of Natural History. His job as a time traveler is to make discoveries about […]

The post Time Travel With Smithsonian Paleontologist: Nick Pyenson appeared first on Smithsonian Insider.

Tweaks in muscle and wing form give different hummingbird species varying levels of agility. The deft turns of hummingbirds in flight, as shown in a […]

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They’ve got no roots or veins and grow in hanging pendants or tightly packed mats attached to stones, soil and wood. Called by some “the […]

The post Mosses have strong potential to acclimate to global warming, study indicates appeared first on Smithsonian Insider.

For Smithsonian ornithologist Gary Graves it was a captivating spectacle. At an outdoor café in Kingston, Jamaica, Graves watched three mornings in a row as […]

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A global analysis raises the minimum estimated number of tropical tree species to at least 40,000–53,000 worldwide in a paper appearing in Proceedings of the […]

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Coral reefs are home to some of the most colorful, diverse life on the planet. And yet, for all their fame as biodiversity hotspots, it’s […]

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Camouflage is a valuable survival strategy—just ask a chameleon. Scientists have just discovered a new form of mimicry camouflage: beetles that hide by chewing beetle-shaped […]

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When creating a System Composer architecture model, if the following functions are called with an invalid or missing stereotype, it can cause the model to get corrupted and might lead to a MATLAB crash:

• addComponent
• addPort
• connect

When the Signal Editor is saving data, the indicator that the save is occurring does not appear.  You might notice a delay when saving large data files.This bug exists in the following release(s):
R2020a

Interested in Upgrading?

India-based digital payments platform Mintoak has secured a...

La Librería co-founders, Chiara Arroyo (left) and Celene Navarrete (right) at the opening of their brick and mortar store on West Washington Blvd in Mid-City, Feb 21, 2015. The store sells children literature in Spanish. ; Credit: Deepa Fernandes / KPCC

A new Mid-City store specializing in Spanish-language books for children may help chip away at a problem facing public schools expanding their dual-language programs and parents working to raise bilingual children: a lack of books beyond translations of "Curious George."

La Librería, the first children’s Spanish-language literature store in Los Angeles, opened Feb. 21 at a location on West Washington Boulevard. The brick-and-mortar is the dream of two moms who started out selling their volumes at book fairs.

When they first started out, co-founders Celene Navarrete and Chiara Arroyo couldn’t believe the lack locally of good, Spanish-language literature for children.

"Especially in Los Angeles, it was shocking to see the books that I read in Mexico, in my hometown, many of them were not available here," said Navarrete.

So Navarrete and Arroyo began traveling to Mexico, Guatemala, Colombia, and Spain to find authentic, Spanish-language children's books.

"We found the classics, we found the books that we read when we were little," she said.

Although 64 percent of Los Angeles' children are Latino, locating children's works in Spanish beyond translations of popular books in English isn't easy.

This matters to educators who say young children need to read and hear language-rich stories to expand their vocabulary and engage with characters in settings they recognize.

“I’ve been a bilingual educator since the '80s, and as an educator you’re always striving to look for authentic literature,” said Norma Silva, principal of the UCLA Lab School, a dual-language pre-kindergarten and elementary school attached to the university's Graduate School of Education.

By authentic literature, Silva means books originally written in Spanish, using the “luscious language” of rich descriptions and vivid characters. These writings often come from Spanish-speaking countries.

Books translated from English to Spanish aren't enough, Silva said. Besides rich language, Silva looks for books from different countries — "because it’s important that we’re able to delve deeply in understanding differences,” she said. Silva believes books need to reflect the diversity among the children and their families.

Since books from Mexico use different language and tell different tales than books from Guatemala, Colombia or Spain, Silva wants the children at her school to experience them all.

So that’s what adults want.  

According to Scholastic, one of the largest sellers in the U.S. of children's books in Spanish, kids have strong opinions about what they want to read. In a just completed survey, Scholastic found 91 percent of kids aged 6 to 17 said their favorite books were ones they picked themselves.

And kids age 6 to 8 are more likely to want characters that look like them than older kids.

The majority of the Spanish-language books in the March Scholastic catalog are translations of popular English language books, with a few books written in Spanish. The March catalog includes "Clifford the Dog" and stories about Sophia, the Disney princess, in Español.

"Kids who are Latino, they don’t just want to read books that are Latino or by Latino authors or with Latino characters — they want to be exposed to the diverse literature that is out there," said Mariel Lopez, who directs Scholastic's Spanish section.

Lopez adds that teachers in dual language immersion schools request Spanish language books which are translated from English so they can use the same book in both languages.

Luis Orozco, who has represented authors of books for Latino children for years, said changes in the publishing industry haven't helped writers of original Spanish-language works.

"As a result of the advent of technology, a lot of our [U.S.] publishers were forced to consolidate. So a book about a popular character that did well in English was easy to translate," he said.

But Orozco believes there is a major market among people who are eager for their kids to succeed and want more book choices for their children.

“They come to this country because they have better opportunities here," he said. "And the fact of the matter is that the traditional channels of distribution don’t have sales people that speak their language, that can speak to the authenticity of that product.”

At a recent presentation to parents, Orozco talked about the story, “Del Norte al Sur,” written by one of his authors, Rene Colato Lainez. It tackles the issue of family separation due to deportation.

After his talk, he said he sold out of every book.

Navarrete and Arroyo have scoured the Internet and traveled to Spanish-speaking countries to find authentic literature to sell. They found them, to their delight.

“There is this explosion of small independent [children’s] publishers in Spain, in Latin American countries,” Navarrete said. The two carefully selected books that would resonate with kids growing up in Los Angeles, and brought them back to stock their shelves.

At their store's grand opening on Feb. 21, parents and kids flooded in, devouring the books. One mother, bouncing her 10-month-old in a baby carrier, asked if the store had books from Guatemala.

To her surprise, the answer was "yes."

Arroyo and Navarrete hope eventually they can find a way for children to borrow their books for free, like a library. They said their goal is to break down barriers so that any child can read a book that speaks to them.

4 tips for finding and reading Spanish-language literature

1. Look for small or independent publishers that promote Latino authors and illustrators. Here are a few to start with:

• Lee & Low books
• Cinco Puntos Press
• Academia Cultural

2. Rich language matters. Browse for language in books that is rich and expressive. Children are never too young to be exposed to words heavy in imagery, that have double-meanings, or are alliterative. Through vivid descriptions, children can learn words to explain their own feelings and experiences.

3. Engage your children with the language as much as you engage them with the story. Explain the complex words and talk about context and meaning. Rich language can also help early readers with social emotional development, said Norma Silva of UCLA’s Lab School.

4. Besides books in hard copy, look for audio books. There is a long tradition of oral storytelling in many Latin American countries. Stories are told and passed on through generations, and today some Latino writers are also performers. Author Jose-Luis Orozco produces music, rhythms and basic literacy in addition to his stories.

This content is from Southern California Public Radio. View the original story at SCPR.org.

Full Text:

After 16 years of dedicated planning and engineering, scientists at the U.S. Department of Energy's (DOE) Brookhaven National Laboratory have completed a 3.2 gigapixel sensor array for the camera that will be used in the Large Synoptic Survey Telescope (LSST), a massive telescope that will observe the universe like never before. The digital sensor array is composed of about 200 16-megapixel sensors, divided into 21 modules called "rafts." Each raft can function on its own, but when combined, they will view an area of sky that can fit more than 40 full moons in a single image. Researchers will stitch these images together to create a time-lapse movie of the complete visible universe accessible from Chile. Currently under construction on a mountaintop in Chile, LSST is designed to capture the most complete images of our universe that have ever been achieved. The project to build the telescope facility and camera is a collaborative effort among more than 30 institutions from around the world, and it is primarily funded by DOE's Office of Science and the National Science Foundation.

Image credit: SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory

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A National Science Foundation-funded study found that Charles Darwin's famous finches defy what has long been considered a key to evolutionary success: genetic diversity. The research on finches of the Galapagos Islands could change the way conservation biologists think about a species' potential for extinction in naturally fragmented populations. Researchers examined 212 tissue samples from museum specimens and living birds. Some of the museum specimens in the study were collected by Darwin himself in 1835. Only one of the extinct populations, a species called the vegetarian finch, had lower genetic diversity compared to modern survivors. Specifically, researchers believe a biological phenomenon called sink-source dynamics is at play in which larger populations of birds from other islands act as a "source" of immigrants to the island population that is naturally shrinking, the "sink." Without these immigrant individuals, the natural population on the island likely would continue to dwindle to local extinction. The immigrants have diverse genetics because they are coming from a variety of healthier islands, giving this struggling "sink" population inflated genetic diversity.

Image credit: Jose Barreiro

Source: Clive Maund for Streetwise Reports   05/04/2020

Notwithstanding the Fed's seemingly limitless ability to create money to throw at the stock market, which has caused it to rally in recent weeks in the face of a dead economy and apocalyptic jobs data and earnings, etc., all the charts we are going to look at here point to another severe downleg soon.

My attention was drawn to a bearish Rising Wedge completing in the London FTSE index by a colleague in England. So I took a look at it, and sure enough it is. So, I thought I'd take a look at a couple of other European indices, the CAC 40 in France and the German DAX Composite, which showed a very similar picture. Their charts are shown below and as you will see, they are both very bearish, and point to a break lower soon leading to a severe decline.

You will recall that we were thrown somewhat a week or two ago, when the main U.S. indices, the Dow Jones Industrials and the S&P500 index, broke down from their bearish Rising Wedges but then didn't follow through, and instead rose to new highs for the rally from the March lows, which caused us to dump our Puts and then bide our time to see what transpired. The sharp drop at the end of the month—this past Friday—jolted me into action and prompted me to hunt around in a quest for greater clarity regarding what is going on, and it has turned out to be a rewarding search.

While it's not exactly clear what is going on with the main U.S. indices, the picture becomes much clearer when we look at the broader but much less used Wilshire 5000 index. Take a look at this first of all—it's a 5-month chart for the Wilshire 5000 that reveals that it didn't break down from its Rising Wedge about 10 days ago, unlike the Dow Industrials and the S&P500 index, but it did last Friday, which happened to be the end of the month, by a significant margin. This is regarded as an ominous development that probably marks the start of the second major downleg of this bear market. We can also see that the countertrend rally got stopped by the important resistance level shown.

Now take a look at this. The following chart shows that the breakdown from the Wedge happened just two days after the Wilshire 5000 had arrived at an upper range Fibonacci target at a retracement level of 61.8% of the preceding first leg down of the bear market. This is normally as far as a retracement following the first leg down of a bear market gets, and the same happened following the Tech bubble peak in 2000 and the start of the 2007–2008 meltdown.

If we now compare the Wilshire charts above with the S&P500 index chart we realize that the breakdown by the latter about 10 days ago was a false breakdown, inasmuch as, as we have just seen, the Wilshire did not break down at that time.

If we see another heavy drop in the broad stock market shortly, it is of course reasonable to presume that it will coincide with a strong rally in the dollar, so how does that look now? On the following 5-month chart for the dollar index, which has the S&P500 index placed above and gold below for direct comparison, there are several very important points to observe. The first is that when the market tanked into mid-March, the dollar soared just as we would expect it to and as happened in 2008. Then it dropped back sharply later in March as the market rebounded, but it has since been tracking sideways in a trading range marking time as the stock market continued to ascend to complete its relief rally. Right now it is at the support at the bottom of this range where a doji candle formed on Friday suggesting that it is about to start higher again. If the market now proceeds to tank in a second major downwave then we can expect the dollar to soar again, bust out of the top of the current range and probably exceed its mid-March highs.

If the dollar soars then commodities are likely to take another broadside, just as in the first half of March, and just as in 2008, and gold and silver are unlikely to be spared—the Gold Miners Bullish Percent Index is now at an extreme reading of 92% bullish. Copper in particular looks like it will get crushed by another downwave that should take it to new bear market lows by a wide margin.

Originally posted on CliveMaund.com at 4.35 pm EDT on 2nd May 2020.

Clive Maund has been president of www.clivemaund.com, a successful resource sector website, since its inception in 2003. He has 30 years' experience in technical analysis and has worked for banks, commodity brokers and stockbrokers in the City of London. He holds a Diploma in Technical Analysis from the UK Society of Technical Analysts.

Disclosure:
1) Statements and opinions expressed are the opinions of Clive Maund and not of Streetwise Reports or its officers. Clive Maund is wholly responsible for the validity of the statements. Streetwise Reports was not involved in any aspect of the article preparation. Clive Maund was not paid by Streetwise Reports LLC for this article. Streetwise Reports was not paid by the author to publish or syndicate this article.
2) This article does not constitute investment advice. Each reader is encouraged to consult with his or her individual financial professional and any action a reader takes as a result of information presented here is his or her own responsibility. By opening this page, each reader accepts and agrees to Streetwise Reports' terms of use and full legal disclaimer. This article is not a solicitation for investment. Streetwise Reports does not render general or specific investment advice and the information on Streetwise Reports should not be considered a recommendation to buy or sell any security. Streetwise Reports does not endorse or recommend the business, products, services or securities of any company mentioned on Streetwise Reports.
3) From time to time, Streetwise Reports LLC and its directors, officers, employees or members of their families, as well as persons interviewed for articles and interviews on the site, may have a long or short position in securities mentioned. Directors, officers, employees or members of their immediate families are prohibited from making purchases and/or sales of those securities in the open market or otherwise from the time of the interview or the decision to write an article until three business days after the publication of the interview or article. The foregoing prohibition does not apply to articles that in substance only restate previously published company releases.

Charts provided by the author.

CliveMaund.com Disclosure:
The above represents the opinion and analysis of Mr Maund, based on data available to him, at the time of writing. Mr. Maund's opinions are his own, and are not a recommendation or an offer to buy or sell securities. Mr. Maund is an independent analyst who receives no compensation of any kind from any groups, individuals or corporations mentioned in his reports. As trading and investing in any financial markets may involve serious risk of loss, Mr. Maund recommends that you consult with a qualified investment advisor, one licensed by appropriate regulatory agencies in your legal jurisdiction and do your own due diligence and research when making any kind of a transaction with financial ramifications. Although a qualified and experienced stock market analyst, Clive Maund is not a Registered Securities Advisor. Therefore Mr. Maund's opinions on the market and stocks can only be construed as a solicitation to buy and sell securities when they are subject to the prior approval and endorsement of a Registered Securities Advisor operating in accordance with the appropriate regulations in your area of jurisdiction.

baVel, Voxel's electronic transaction platform in...

Marijuanas active components are potentially effective in treating pain, nausea, the anorexia of AIDS wasting, and other symptoms, and should be tested rigorously in clinical trials.

While every mode of transportation in the U.S. will be affected as the climate changes, potentially the greatest impact on transportation systems will be flooding of roads, railways, transit systems, and airport runways in coastal areas because of rising sea levels and surges brought on by more intense storms, says a new report from the National Research Council.

Despite being used for several decades, test-based incentives have not consistently generated positive effects on student achievement, says a new report from the National Research Council.

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On average, Americans die sooner and experience higher rates of disease and injury than people in other high-income countries, says a new report from the National Research Council and Institute of Medicine.

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In the United States, most long-distance trips begin in one metropolitan region and end in another less than 500 miles away.

A new congressionally mandated report from the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine proposes updated revisions to the Special Supplemental Nutrition Program for Women, Infants, and Children (WIC) to better align with the Dietary Guidelines for Americans and promote and support breast-feeding.

A new report from the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine examines policies and practices governing dual-use research in the life sciences – research that could potentially be misused to cause harm – and its findings identify multiple shortcomings.

The number of patients in the U.S. awaiting organ transplantation outpaces the amount of transplants performed in the U.S., and many donated organs are not transplanted each year due to several factors, such as poor organ function, says a new report from the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine.

To enable public transit agencies to engage in more rigorous and effective safety planning, their safety planning records should not be admissible as evidence in civil litigation, says a new report from the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine.

A systemwide change to the culture and climate in higher education is needed to prevent and effectively respond to sexual harassment, says a new report from the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine.

While the management of local and regional stressors threatening coral reefs is critical, these efforts on their own will not be enough in the face of global climate change, says a new interim report by the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine.