The species responsible for the broad extended red emission (ERE), discovered in 1975 and now known to be widespread throughout the Galaxy, still is unidentified. Spanning the range from approximately 540 to 900 nm, the ERE is a photoluminescent process associated with a wide variety of different interstellar environments. Over the years, a number of plausible candidates have been suggested, bu...

Marinomonas sp. strain D104 was isolated from a polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbon-degrading consortium enriched from deep-sea sediment from the Arctic Ocean. The draft genome sequence of D104 (approximately 3.83 Mbp) contains 62 contigs and 3,576 protein-encoding genes, with a G+C content of 44.8%.

The importance of dermal exposure has increased during the last few years, mainly because of the reduction of respiratory exposure to toxicants. Pesticides, aromatic amines and polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons are considered to be the chemicals at highest dermal risk. In the occupational exposure limit lists of the American Conference of Governmental Industrial Hygienists (ACGIH) and of many co...

Novel polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbon dioxygenase gene variants were present in abundances similar to or higher than those of phnA1 from Cycloclasticus spp. at a chronically polluted subantarctic coastal marine environment in Patagonia. These novel gene variants were detected over a 6-year time span and were also present in sediments from temperate Patagonian sites.

Sphingobium sp. 22B is a polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbon-degrading strain isolated from Patagonia, Argentina, with capabilities to withstand the environmental factors of that semiarid region. The draft genome shows the presence of genes related with responses to carbon starvation and drying environmental conditions.

We discuss fluorescence as a method to detect polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons and other organic molecules, as well as minerals on the surface of Mars. We present an instrument design that is adapted from the ChemCam instrument which is currently on the Mars Science Lander Rover Curiosity and thus most of the primary components are currently flight qualified for Mars surface operations, signifi...

Reported herein is the use of γ-cyclodextrin for two tandem functions: (a) the extraction of carcinogenic polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs) from oil samples into aqueous solution and (b) the promotion of highly efficient energy transfer from the newly extracted PAHs to a high-quantum-yield fluorophore. The extraction proceeded in moderate to good efficiencies, and the resulting cyclodextr...

Peptides that specifically bind to the simplest polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbon, naphthalene, were obtained by affinity-based screening using a phage-displayed peptide library. The identified peptide with a β-turn structure showed specific binding to naphthalene present not only on substrates but also in aqueous solutions.

The ability to accurately predict the oxidation and reduction potentials of molecules is very useful in various fields and applications. Quantum mechanical calculations can be used to access this information, yet sometimes the usefulness of these calculations can be limited because of the computational requirements for large systems. Methodologies that yield strong linear correlations between c...

Advenella kashmirensis strain W13003 is a polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbon (PAH)-degrading bacterium isolated from PAH-contaminated marine sediments. Here, we report the 4.8-Mb draft genome sequence of this strain, which will provide insights into the diversity of A. kashmirensis and the mechanism of PAH degradation in the marine environment.