Snapshot of HIV pathogenesis in China

Several reviews have focused on the nature of HIV infection and its spread in various geographical regions of China. In contrast, this review provides a comprehensive update on the prevalence of multiple HIV- 1 subtypes, consequent emergence of recombinant and novel forms of HIV- 1 in China, and the implications this may have on HIV diversity and the development of effective vaccines. In addition it also examines the dissemination of primary drug resistance in therapy naive patients, as well as co-infections with two other important viruses-hepatitis B and C. The main purpose of this review is to provide a current snapshot of HIV-1 pathogenesis in China and possibly shed some light on the future of HIV evolution, and potential challenges for future vaccine and anti-retroviral therapeutics against HIV strains in this area.     

Effects of cannabinoid receptor type 2 on endogenous myocardial regeneration by activating cardiac progenitor cells in mouse infarcted heart

Cannabinoid receptor type 2(CB2)activation is recently reported to promote proliferation of some types of resident stem cells(e.g.,hematopoietic stem/progenitor cell or neural progenitor cell).Resident cardiac progenitor cell(CPC)activation and proliferation are crucial for endogenous cardiac regeneration and cardiac repair after myocardial infarction(MI).This study aims to explore the role and possible mechanisms of CB2receptor activation in enhancing myocardial repair.Our results revealed that CB2receptor agonist AM1241 can significantly increase CPCs by c-kit and Runx1 staining in ischemic myocardium as well as improve cardiomyocyte proliferation.AM1241 also decreased serum levels of MDA,TNF-αand IL-6 after MI.In addition,AM1241 can ameliorate left ventricular ejection fraction and fractional shortening,and reduce fibrosis.Moreover,AM1241 treatment markedly increased p-Akt and HO-1 expression,and promoted Nrf-2 nuclear translocation.However,PI3K inhibitor wortmannin eliminated these cardioprotective roles of AM1241.In conclusion,AM1241 could induce myocardial regeneration and improve cardiac function,which might be associated with PI3K/Akt/Nrf2 signaling pathway activation.Our findings may provide a promising strategy for cardiac endogenous regeneration after MI.     

Adaptation to visual stimulation modifies the burst firing property of V1 neurons

The mean firing rate of visual cortical neurons is reduced after prolonged visual stimulation, but the underlying process by which this occurs as well as the biological significance of this phenomenon remains unknown. Computational neuroscience studies indicate that high-frequency bursts in stimulus-driven responses can be transmitted across synapses more reliably than isolated spikes, and thus may carry accurate stimulus-related information. Our research examined whether or not adaptation affects the burst firing property of visual cortical neurons by examining changes in the burst firing changes of V1 neurons during adaptation to the preferred visual stimulus. The results show that adaptation to prolonged visual stimulation significantly decreased burst frequency (bursts/s) and burst length (spikes/burst), but increased burst duration and the interspike interval within bursts. These results suggest that the adaptation of V1 neurons to visual stimulation may result in a decrease of feedforward response gain but an increase of functional activities from lateral and/or feedback connections, which could lead to a reduction in the effectiveness of adapted neurons in transmitting information to its driven neurons.     

Dawn of ocular gene therapy:implications for molecular diagnosis in retinal disease

Personalized medicine aims to utilize genomic information about patients to tailor treatment.Gene replacement therapy for rare genetic disorders is perhaps the most extreme form of personalized medicine,in that the patients’ genome wholly determines their treatment regimen.Gene therapy for retinal disorders is poised to become a clinical reality.The eye is an optimal site for gene therapy due to the relative ease of precise vector delivery,immune system isolation,and availability for monitoring of any potential damage or side effects.Due to these advantages,clinical trials for gene therapy of retinal diseases are currently underway.A necessary precursor to such gene therapies is accurate molecular diagnosis of the mutation(s) underlying disease.In this review,we discuss the application of Next Generation Sequencing(NGS) to obtain such a diagnosis and identify disease causing genes,using retinal disorders as a case study.After reviewing ocular gene therapy,we discuss the application of NGS to the identification of novel Mendelian disease genes.We then compare current,array based mutation detection methods against next NGS-based methods in three retinal diseases:Leber’s Congenital Amaurosis,Retinitis Pigmentosa,and Stargardt’s disease.We conclude that next-generation sequencing based diagnosis offers several advantages over array based methods,including a higher rate of successful diagnosis and the ability to more deeply and efficiently assay a broad spectrum of mutations.However,the relative difficulty of interpreting sequence results and the development of standardized,reliable bioinformatic tools remain outstanding concerns.In this review,recent advances NGS based molecular diagnoses are discussed,as well as their implications for the development of personalized medicine.     

Phyto-availability and speciation change of heavy metals in soils amended with lignin as micro-fertilizer

Lignin is a primary byproduct from the black liquor treatment in paper making industries, its application as micro-fertilizer in agricultural land might provide a promising alternative to sewage discharge. However, application of such a micro-fertilizer might affect the soil properties and result in soil pollution. In this study, the effects of lignin application on phyto-availability and speciation change of heavy metals in soils were investigated. Greenhouse experiments showed that lignin application improved the growth of winter wheat (Triticum aestivum L.) in all three soils investigated. The increase of the biomass for wheat shoot was 59.7%, 39.8% and 12.3% for Beijing soil, Jiangxi soil and Dongbei soil, respectively. In contrast, lignin amendment decreased the concentrations of heavy metals in wheat shoots from 2.2% to 61.0%. Sequential extraction procedure of a three-step BCR was used to investigate the fraction distribution. The extractable fractions were specified as fraction B1: water soluble,     

中国春小麦株高、育性近等基因系的建立及应用

以矮败小麦和中国春小麦为材料,经过杂交和连续回交,得到了中国春小麦遗传背景的分别表现矮秆不育、矮秆可育、高秆不育、高秆可育的近等基因系。根据近等基因系各成员系的株高表现,计算出矮秆基因Rht10的降秆强度是69.8%。借助于赤霉酸处理,在幼芽期就可分出矮败中国春小麦后代的不育株与可育株。 Abstract：　Use Dwarfing Male-sterile Wheat and cv. Chinese Spring as parents, after cross and continuously back cross, the isogenic lines with Chinese Spring background were developed. These lines include dwarfing male-sterile line, dwarfing fertile line, tall male-sterile line and tall fertile line. The dwarfing intensity of gene Rht10 was calculated to be 69.8% according the differences between the isogenic lines. Treated with GA3solution, the male-sterile and fertile plants in Chinese Spring Dwarfing Male-sterile Wheat can be identified clearly when they are seedlings.     

Cloning,Characterization and Primary Function Study of a Novel Gene,Cymg1,Related to Family 2 Cystatins

Cystatins are cysteine proteinase inhibitors,We found two expression sequence tags (ESTs),CA463109 and AV042522,from a mouse testis library using Digital differential display (DDD).By electricalhybridization,a novel gene,Cymgl(GenBank accession No.AY600990),which has a full length of 0.78 kb,and contains four exons and three introns,was cloned from a mouse testis eDNA library.The gene is locatedin the 2G3 area of chromosome 2.The full eDNA encompasses the entire open reading frame,encoding 141amino acid residues.The protein has a cysteine protease inhibitor domain that is related to the family 2cystatins but lacks critical consensus sites important for cysteine protease inhibition.These characteristicsare seen in the CRES subfamily,which are related to the family 2 cystatins and are expressed specifically inthe male reproductive tract.CYMG1 has a 44%(48/108)identity with mouse CRES and 30%(42/140)identity with mouse cystatin C.Northern blot analysis showed that the Cymgl is specifically expressed inadult mouse testes.Cell location studies showed that the GFP-tagged CYMG 1 protein was localized in thecytoplasm of HeLa cells,lmmunohistochemistry revealed that the CYMG1 protein was expressed in mousetestes spermatogonium,spermatocytes,round spermatids,elongating spermatids and spermatozoa.RT-PCRresults also showed that Cymgl was expressed in mouse testes and spermatogonium.The Cymgl expressionlevel varied in different developmental stages:it was low 1 week postpartum,steadily increased 2 to 5 weekspostpartum,and was highest 7 weeks postpartum.The expression level at 5 weeks postpartum was main-tained during 13 to 57 weeks postpartum.The Cymgl expression level in the testes over different develop-mental stages correlates with the mouse spermatogenesis and sexual maturation process.All these indicatethat Cymgl might play an important role in mouse spermatogenesis and sexual maturation. Cystatins are cysteine proteinase inhibitors,We found two expression sequence tags(ESTs),CA463109 and AV042522,from a mouse testis library using Digital differential display (DDD).By electricalhybridization,a novel gene,Cymgl(GenBank accession No.AY600990),which has a full length of 0.78 kb,and contains four exons and three introns,was cloned from a mouse testis eDNA library.The gene is locatedin the 2G3 area of chromosome 2.The full eDNA encompasses the entire open reading frame,encoding 141amino acid residues.The protein has a cysteine protease inhibitor domain that is related to the family 2cystatins but lacks critical consensus sites important for cysteine protease inhibition.These characteristicsare seen in the CRES subfamily,which are related to the family 2 cystatins and are expressed specifically inthe male reproductive tract.CYMG1 has a 44%(48/108)identity with mouse CRES and 30%(42/140)identity with mouse cystatin C.Northern blot analysis showed that the Cymgl is specifically expressed inadult mouse testes.Cell location studies showed that the GFP-tagged CYMG 1 protein was localized in thecytoplasm of HeLa cells,lmmunohistochemistry revealed that the CYMG1 protein was expressed in mousetestes spermatogonium,spermatocytes,round spermatids,elongating spermatids and spermatozoa.RT-PCRresults also showed that Cymgl was expressed in mouse testes and spermatogonium.The Cymgl expressionlevel varied in different developmental stages:it was low 1 week postpartum,steadily increased 2 to 5 weekspostpartum,and was highest 7 weeks postpartum.The expression level at 5 weeks postpartum was main-tained during 13 to 57 weeks postpartum.The Cymgl expression level in the testes over different develop-mental stages correlates with the mouse spermatogenesis and sexual maturation process.All these indicatethat Cymgl might play an important role in mouse spermatogenesis and sexual maturation.