皖南尖吻蝮蛇毒出血毒素Ⅳ的纯化与初步鉴定

从皖南尖吻蝮蛇（Ａｇｋｉｓｔｒｏｄｏｎａｃｕｔｕｓ）毒液中经ＤＥＡＥ－Ｓｅｐｈａｒｏｓｅ和ＳｅｐｈａｃｒｙｌＳ－２００两步凝胶柱层析首次纯化出一种中分子量出血毒素（简称ＡａＨⅣ）．经ＳＤＳ－ＰＡＧＥ和等电聚焦凝胶电泳测定其分子量为４４ｋＤ,等电点为ｐＨ５．０．从５００ｍｇ粗毒中可获得２０ｍｇＡａＨⅣ纯品．ＡａＨⅣ有较强的出血活性,最小出血剂量（ＭＨＤ）为０．４μｇ．     

异羟基洋地黄毒甙元(Digoxigenin)标记的RNA探针在丁型肝炎病毒核酸杂交中的应用

应用异羟基洋地黄毒甙元(Digoxigenin)标记的RNA探针,检测了人和黑猩猩血清及肝脏中丁型肝炎病毒核酸,并与~(32)P标记同一探针做了比较。结果表明,异羟基洋地黄毒甙元标记的RNA探针的杂交效果与同位索探针一致(同源cDNA0.2pg),可用于人和动物血清及肝脏标本内HDV核酸的检测。     

球形芽孢杆菌Ts—1毒蛋白的分离纯化

Bacillus sphaericus strain Ts-1 is highly insecticidal to larvae of the mosquito. It's insecticidal component is toxic proteins. The toxin was extracted from spore-crystal complexes by disruption in a Sonicator Cell Disruptor Model W-220F followed by treatment with 0.05 mol/L NaOH. Fraction recovered from chromatography of the spore-crystal complexes on column of Sephadex G-200 were assayed against mosquito larvae and the toxic fractions from gel chromatography were subjected to SDS-PAGE. The toxic proteins in B. sphaericus Ts-1 spore-crystal complex migrated in position corresponding to 42kD and 43kD. Bioassay of the two purified proteins prepared by PAGE indicated that they were all toxic to mosquito larvae. Toxic protein was further purified by DEAE-cellulose chromatography. The toxic protein with a molecular weight of 42kD was obtained.     

Oxidative stress-resistance assay for screening yeast strains overproducing heterologous proteins

Many natural proteins have been developed into drugs and produced for direct application. Identifying improved hosts to achieve high-level heterologous protein production is a challenge in the study of heterologous protein expression in recombinant yeast. In this study, a novel high-throughput assay to screen such overproducing Saccharomyces cerevisiae strains was systematically developed. The protocol designed was based on screening host strain derivatives with increased superoxide dismutase dependent resistance to oxidative stress. Yeast cells transformed with recombinant plasmid carrying SOD1 gene as a reporter responded exquisitely to oxidative stress induced by elevated concentrations of paraquat. Improved yeast strains resulting from screening clones subjected to genome shuffling through selective pressure argue for a more effective screening system compared with traditonal selection. Moreover, this approach can be employed in general biochemical analysis without utilization of flow cytometry or well plate reader. Therefore, it is expected that the high-throughput assay would make superior strains producing heterologous proteins.     

Development and application of photoautotrophic micropropagation plant system

Research has revealed that most chlorophyllous explants/plants in vitro have the ability to grow photoautotrophically (without sugar in the culture medium), and that the low or negative net photosynthetic rate of plants in vitro is not due to poor photosynthetic ability, but to the low CO₂ concentration in the air-tight culture vessel during the photoperiod. Moreover, numerous studies have been conducted on improving the in vitro environment and investigating its effects on growth and development of cultures/plantlets on nearly 50 species since the concept of photoautotrophic micropropagation was developed more than two decades ago. These studies indicate that the photoautotrophic growth in vitro of many plant species can be significantly promoted by increasing the CO₂ concentration and light intensity in the vessel, by decreasing the relative humidity in the vessel, and by using a fibrous or porous supporting material with high air porosity instead of gelling agents such as agar. This paper reviews the development and characteristics of photoautotrophic micropropagation systems and the effects of environmental conditions on the growth and development of the plantlets. The commercial applications and the perspective of photoautotrophic micropropagation systems are discussed.     

Data-Driven Modeling to Assess Receptivity for Rift Valley Fever Virus

Rift Valley Fever virus (RVFV) is an enzootic virus that causes extensive morbidity and mortality in domestic ruminants in Africa, and it has shown the potential to invade other areas such as the Arabian Peninsula. Here, we develop methods for linking mathematical models to real-world data that could be used for continent-scale risk assessment given adequate data on local host and vector populations. We have applied the methods to a well-studied agricultural region of California with 1 million dairy cattle, abundant and competent mosquito vectors, and a permissive climate that has enabled consistent transmission of West Nile virus and historically other arboviruses. Our results suggest that RVFV outbreaks could occur from February–November, but would progress slowly during winter–early spring or early fall and be limited spatially to areas with early increases in vector abundance. Risk was greatest in summer, when the areas at risk broadened to include most of the dairy farms in the study region, indicating the potential for considerable economic losses if an introduction were to occur. To assess the threat that RVFV poses to North America, including what-if scenarios for introduction and control strategies, models such as this one should be an integral part of the process; however, modeling must be paralleled by efforts to address the numerous remaining gaps in data and knowledge for this system.     

Tunable Triple-Band Plasmonically Induced Transparency Effects Based on Double π-Shaped Metamaterial Resonators

Tunable triple-peaks with the transmission intensity of more than 90% plasmonically induced transparency metamaterial resonator based on nested double π-shaped metallic structure is proposed at the terahertz frequency region, which is consisted of three sets of gold nanorods with different sizes placed on a dielectric substrate of SiO₂. The coupling effect of localized electric field between different parts of the proposed structure can be used to explain the physical mechanism of three transparent windows. The finite-difference time-domain (FDTD) is used to study the spectral properties of the proposed structure, and the influence of the size of the nanorods and the relative distance between them on the spectral characteristics are also discussed. It can be seen that some obvious shift phenomena occur in the spectra with the change of these nanorods. These results indicate that the proposed structure opens up new avenues in many related applications, especially for multi-channel filters, optical switches, and sensors.