: A ROS-based open-source mobile robot.

Currently, commercially available intelligent transport robots that are capable of carrying up to 90 kg of load can cost $5,000 or even more. This makes real-world experimentation prohibitively expensive and limits the applicability of such systems to everyday home or industrial tasks. Aside from their high cost, the majority of commercially available platforms are either closed-source, platform-specific or use difficult-to-customize hardware and firmware.

Epitope tagging: general method for tracking recombinant proteins.

Epitope tagging has provided a useful experimental strategy with widespread applicability. The ample variety of epitope tag systems that have been put to use to date provide a collection of attributes relevant to virtually any experimental system. As a consequence, epitope tagging will continue to be a valuable tool for molecular biologists long into the future.

The major nuclear envelope targeting domain of LAP2 coincides with its lamin binding region but is distinct from its chromatin interaction domain.

LAP2 is an integral protein of the inner nuclear membrane which binds lamins and chromosomes and is suggested to have an important role in nuclear envelope organization. In a previous study we identified an internal 76-amino acid region of LAP2 which is required for stable targeting of the protein to the nuclear envelope. Here, we have mapped the lamin binding region of LAP2 and demonstrate that it coincides with this nuclear envelope targeting domain.

Direct evidence for SIR2 modulation of chromatin structure in yeast rDNA.

The yeast SIR2 gene maintains inactive chromatin domains required for transcriptional repression at the silent mating-type loci and telomeres. We previously demonstrated that SIR2 also acts to repress mitotic and meiotic recombination between the tandem ribosomal RNA gene array (rDNA). Here we address whether rDNA chromatin structure is altered by loss of SIR2 function by in vitro and in vivo assays of sensitivity to micrococcal nuclease and dam methyltransferase, respectively, and present the first chromatin study that maps sites of SIR2 action within the rDNA locus.

High levels of the GTPase Ran/TC4 relieve the requirement for nuclear protein transport factor 2.

The GTPase Ran/TC4 and the 14-kDa protein nuclear transport factor 2 (NTF2) are two of the cytosolic factors that mediate nuclear protein import in vertebrates. Previous biochemical studies have shown that NTF2 binds directly to the GDP-bound form of Ran/TC4 and to proteins of the nuclear pore complex that contain phenylalanine-glycine repeats. In the present study we have used molecular genetic approaches to study the Saccharomyces cerevisiae homologue of NTF2.