An association between the acute phase response and patterns of antigen induced T cell proliferation in juvenile idiopathic arthritis

The aim of this research was to determine whether all memory T cells have the same propensity to migrate to the joint in patients with juvenile idiopathic arthritis. Paired synovial fluid and peripheral blood mononuclear cell proliferative responses to a panel of antigens were measured and the results correlated with a detailed set of laboratory and clinical data from 39 patients with juvenile idiopathic arthritis. Two distinct patterns of proliferative response were found in the majority of patients: a diverse pattern, in which synovial fluid responses were greater than peripheral blood responses for all antigens tested; and a restricted pattern, in which peripheral blood responses to some antigens were more vigorous than those in the synovial fluid compartment. The diverse pattern was generally found in patients with a high acute phase response, whereas patients without elevated acute phase proteins were more likely to demonstrate a restricted pattern. We propose that an association between the synovial fluid T cell repertoire and the acute phase response suggests that proinflammatory cytokines may influence recruitment of memory T cells to an inflammatory site, independent of their antigen specificity. Additionally, increased responses to enteric bacteria and the presence of αEβ7 T cells in synovial fluid may reflect accumulation of gut associated T cells in the synovial compartment, even in the absence of an elevated acute phase response. This is the first report of an association between the acute phase response and the T cell population recruited to an inflammatory site.     

The utility of the morphological variation of pollen for resolving the evolutionary history of Billia (subfam. Hippocastanoideae,Sapindaceae)

In this study, we examined the utility of pollen morphology for resolving questions about the evolutionary history of Billia, which is a poorly known genus of Neotropical trees. Billia has been traditionally circumscribed with two species and treated as sister to Aesculus L. However, the number of species in Billia is uncertain, because the genus exhibits abundant morphological diversity but little discontinuous variation. Therefore, Billia may be monotypic and highly polymorphic, or it may have two species with blurred boundaries due to incipient speciation and/or hybridization. Moreover, one recent molecular phylogenetic study shows Billia nested withinAesculus. Our work sought to address the following questions: (i) Are there discontinuities in the pollen of Billia that may suggest species boundaries? (ii) Does the pollen of Billia show evidence for inter-specific hybridization? (iii) Do the exine morphology and size of pollen in Billia differ from those in Aesculus? Our results from scanning electron microscopy showed that pollen exine morphology is not taxonomically informative in Billia but that there are significant differences in pollen size between red- and white-flowered individuals. Thus, our pollen data support the utility of flower color in Billia for species delimitation. Our assessments of pollen viability do not support hybridization in the genus, but cannot be used to rule it out. Finally, pollen exine morphology may lend some support to an evolutionary origin ofBillia within eastern North American Aesculus. In contrast, data on pollen size suggest that Billia may belong in a topological position outside of Aesculus.     

PA,a stress-induced short cut to switch-on ethylene signalling by switching-off CTR1?

Constitutive triple response 1 (CTR1) is a protein kinase that represses plant responses to ethylene. Recently, we have shown that CTR1 function is negatively regulated by the lipid second messenger phosphatidic acid (PA) in vitro.¹ PA was shown to inhibit (1) CTR1''s protein kinase activity, (2) the intramolecular interaction between N-terminus and kinase domain, and (3) the interaction of CTR1 with the ethylene receptor ETR1. PA typically accumulates within minutes in response to biotic or abiotic stresses, which are known to induce ethylene formation. Although long-term treatment with ethephon does stimulate PA accumulation, our results show no fast increase in PA in response to ethylene. A speculative model is presented which explains how stress-induced PA formation could switch on downstream ethylene responses via interaction of the lipid with CTR1.Key words: lipid signaling, phosphatidic acid, ethylene, constitutive triple response 1, plant stress signaling, protein kinase, phospholipase D     

Time Space Translation: A Hox Mechanism for Vertebrate A-P Patterning

The vertebrate A-P axis is a time axis. The head is made first and more and more posterior levels are made at later and later stages. This is different to the situation in most other animals, for example, in Drosophila. Central to this timing is Hox temporal collinearity (see below). This occurs rarely in the animal kingdom but is characteristic of vertebrates and is used to generate the primary axial Hox pattern using time space translation and to integrate successive derived patterns (see below). This is thus a different situation than in Drosophila, where the primary pattern guiding Hox spatial collinearity is generated externally, by the gap and segmentation genes.     

The high-resolution NMR structure of the R21A Spc-SH3:P41 complex: Understanding the determinants of binding affinity by comparison with Abl-SH3

Background  

SH3 domains are small protein modules of 60–85 amino acids that bind to short proline-rich sequences with moderate-to-low affinity and specificity. Interactions with SH3 domains play a crucial role in regulation of many cellular processes (some are related to cancer and AIDS) and have thus been interesting targets in drug design. The decapeptide APSYSPPPPP (p41) binds with relatively high affinity to the SH3 domain of the Abl tyrosine kinase (Abl-SH3), while it has a 100 times lower affinity for the α-spectrin SH3 domain (Spc-SH3).     

Nucleotide sequence analysis of the lemur beta-globin gene family: evidence for major rate fluctuations in globin polypeptide evolution

Lemur beta-related globin genes have been isolated and sequenced. Orthology of prosimian and human epsilon-, gamma-, and beta-related globin genes was established by dot-matrix analysis. All of these lemur globin genes potentially encode functional beta-related globin polypeptides, though precisely when the gamma-globin gene is expressed remains unknown. The organization of the 18-kb brown lemur beta-globin gene cluster (5' epsilon-gamma-[psi eta-delta]-beta 3') is consistent with its evolution by contraction via unequal crossing-over from the putative ancestral mammalian beta-globin gene cluster (5' epsilon-gamma- eta-delta-beta 3'). The dwarf lemur nonadult globin genes are arranged as in the brown lemur. Similar levels of synonymous (silent) nucleotide substitutions and noncoding DNA sequence differences have accumulated between species in all of these genes, suggesting a uniform rate of noncoding DNA divergence throughout primate beta-globin gene clusters. These differences are comparable with those observed in the nonfunctional psi eta pseudogene and have therefore accumulated at the presumably maximal neutral rate. In contrast, nonsynonymous (replacement) nucleotide substitutions show a significant heterogeneity in distribution for both the same gene in different lineages and different genes in the same lineage. These major fluctuations in replacement but not silent substitution rates cannot be attributed to changes in mutation rate, suggesting that changes in the rate of globin polypeptide evolution in primates is not governed solely by variable mutation rates.