酸敏感离子通道与脑梗死

急性脑梗死约占全部脑卒中的70%,病死率和致残率高,且极易复发。但目前针对急性脑梗死在时间窗内溶栓、抗凝等治疗手段不能从根本上切实有效地修复受损脑组织,且伴有出血等风险。寻找脑梗死形成发展的原因并予以治疗迫在眉睫。酸中毒是引起缺血性脑损伤的重要机制。大量实验研究表明,酸中毒能加重神经元的缺血性损伤,且其梗死面积与酸中毒的程度直接相关。但缺血产生的酸中毒如何引起神经元损伤的确切机制尚不明确。最近研究发现酸中毒能激活一种在中枢及周围神经中广泛存在的膜通道,即酸敏感离子通道,它对Ca2+通透,能引起细胞内Ca2+超载,同时能激活胞内酶引起细胞内蛋白质、脂类及核酸的降解,加重缺血后脑损伤。本文就酸敏感离子通道1a与脑梗死做一综述。     

The enhancement of electrostriction caused by lowering the solvent dielectric constant leads to the decrease of activation energy in trypsin catalysis.

The contribution of electrostriction of the solvent to the stabilization of the negatively charged tetrahedral transition state of a trypsin-catalyzed reaction was probed by means of kinetic studies involving high-pressure and solvent dielectric constant. A good correlation was observed between the increased catalytic efficiency of trypsin and the decreased solvent dielectric constant. When the dielectric constant of the solvents was lowered by 4.68 units, the loss of activation energy and that of free energy of activation were 2.26 kJ/mol and 3.09 kJ/mol, respectively. The activation volume for k(cat) decreased significantly as the dielectric constant of the solvent decreased, indicating that the degree of electrostriction of the solvent around the charged tetrahedral transition state has been enhanced. These observations demonstrate that the increase in the catalytic efficiency of the trypsin reaction with decreasing dielectric constant resulted from the stabilization of electrostatic energy for the formation of an oxyanion hole, and this stabilization was caused by the increase of electrostricted water around the charged tetrahedral transition state. Therefore, we conclude that control of the solvent dielectric constant can stabilize the tetrahedral transition state, and this lowers the activation energy.     

Membrane-trafficking RabA4c involved in the effect of glycine betaine on recovery from chilling stress in Arabidopsis

Glycine betaine (GB) can confer tolerance to several types of stress at low concentrations, either after application to plants or in transgenics engineered to overproduce GB. Based on earlier studies on levels of GB in plants and evidence for effects on gene expression, we hypothesized that at least part of this effect could be ascribed to the activation of the expression of stress tolerance genes. Using a strategy based on high-throughput gene expression analysis with microarrays followed by confirmation with northern blots, we identified Arabidopsis genes upregulated in roots that reinforce intracellular processes protecting cells from oxidative damage and others that appear to be involved in reinforcing a scavenging system for reactive oxygen species (ROS) in cell walls. Upregulated genes in roots include those for the membrane-trafficking RabA4c, the root-specific NADPH-dependent ferric reductase (FRO2) localized to the plasma membrane, mitochondrial catalase 2 and the cell wall peroxidase ATP3a. Comparative studies with wild-type Arabidopsis and knockout mutants for the membrane-trafficking RabA4c gene demonstrated that the mutants respond only slightly to GB, if at all, compared with wild-type in relation to root growth recovery after chilling stress, demonstrating the role of RabA4c in relation to the GB effect. The results point toward links between oxidative stress, gene expression, membrane trafficking and scavenging of ROS such as superoxide and hydrogen peroxide in relation to GB effects on chilling tolerance in plants.     

Protein local structure alignment under the discrete Fréchet distance.

Protein structure alignment is a fundamental problem in computational and structural biology. While there has been lots of experimental/heuristic methods and empirical results, very few results are known regarding the algorithmic/complexity aspects of the problem, especially on protein local structure alignment. A well-known measure to characterize the similarity of two polygonal chains is the famous Fréchet distance, and with the application of protein-related research, a related discrete Fréchet distance has been used recently. In this paper, following the recent work of Jiang et al. we investigate the protein local structural alignment problem using bounded discrete Fréchet distance. Given m proteins (or protein backbones, which are 3D polygonal chains), each of length O(n), our main results are summarized as follows: * If the number of proteins, m, is not part of the input, then the problem is NP-complete; moreover, under bounded discrete Fréchet distance it is NP-hard to approximate the maximum size common local structure within a factor of n(1-epsilon). These results hold both when all the proteins are static and when translation/rotation are allowed. * If the number of proteins, m, is a constant, then there is a polynomial time solution for the problem.     

Characterization of cDNA of lycopene beta-cyclase responsible for a high level of beta-carotene accumulation in Dunaliella salina.

Lycopene beta-cyclase (Lyc-B) is the key enzyme in the catalysis of linear lycopene to form cyclic beta-carotene, an indispensable part of the photosynthetic apparatus and an important source of vitamin A in human and animal nutrition. Studies showing that the microalga Dunaliella salina can accumulate a high level of beta-carotene are lacking. We hypothesize that D. salina is closely involved with the catalytic mechanism of Lyc-B and the molecular regulation of its gene. In this study, we used RT-PCR and RACE-PCR to isolate a 2475 bp cDNA with a 1824 bp open reading frame, encoding a putative Lyc-B, from D. salina. Homology studies showed that the deduced amino acid sequence had a significant overall similarity with sequences of other green algae and higher plants, and that it shared the highest sequence identity, up to 64%, with Lyc-B of Chlamydomonas reinhardtii. Codon analysis showed that synonymous codon usage in the enzyme has a strong bias towards codons ending with adenosine. Two motifs were found in the Lyc-B sequence, one at the N terminus, for binding the hypothetical cofactor FAD, and the other was a substrate carrier motif in oxygenic organisms shared by an earlier carotenogenesis enzyme, phytoene desaturase, and Lyc-B. A tertiary structure prediction suggested that the catalytic or binding site structure within LycB from D. salina is superior to that of both H. pluvialis and C. reinhardtii. The LycB protein from D. salina was quite removed from that of H. pluvialis and C. reinhardtii in the phylogenetic tree. Taken as a whole, this information provides insight into the regulatatory mechanism of Lyc-B at the molecular level and the high level of beta-carotene accumulation in the microalga D. salina.     

Iron plaque enhances phosphorus uptake by rice (Oryza sativa) growing under varying phosphorus and iron concentrations

Both solution culture and pot experiments were performed to investigate (a) the effects of external Fe (II) concentrations and forms on the formation of iron plaque on the roots of rice (Oryza sativa) and subsequent P adsorption on iron plaque and shoot P concentrations and (b) the effects of soil moisture regimes on the formation of iron plaque and P adsorption on root surfaces and P accumulation in shoots. The results showed that iron plaque was significantly increased with increasing Fe²⁺ concentrations in the solution culture. The amounts of P adsorbed on the iron plaque were increased significantly with external Fe²⁺ concentrations. Although shoot P concentration was not significantly affected by Fe²⁺ treatment after incubation for 2 days, it was significantly increased in the Fe‐treated plants compared with Fe‐deprived ones after incubation for 4 days. Soil culture experiment showed that the formation of iron plaque on root surfaces was promoted by exogenous iron, with greater amount of iron plaque being formed by addition of ferric hydroxide than of ferric oxide. Phosphorus adsorption on iron plaque also increased with the addition of iron oxides, and increasing soil P increased the amounts of P associated with the iron plaque and shoot P concentration. The amounts of iron plaque were almost sixfold higher under flooding condition than under field capacity condition. Plants pretreated under flooding condition generally had higher shoot P concentrations when they were transplanted to solutions with varying P levels, and this was most pronounced in the treatment with highest solution P concentration. The results suggest that iron plaque acts as a nutrient reservoir for phosphorus in the rhizosphere and helps enhance P acquisition by rice.     

Dextrorphan: an antagonist for phencyclidine receptors

Radio-binding assay, bioassay and HPLC detection were used to observe the antagonistic effects of dextrorphan on PCP's actions. Dextrorphan displayed high affinity to PCP receptor in the rabbit mesenteric blood vessels. It had weak PCP-like bioactivity, but could antagonize PCP's action dose-dependently in vitro study with the rabbit ear artery preparation and shifted the dose-response curve of PCP to the right. After PCP administration, the content of norepinephrine in the vascular bath medium was increased, which was reversed by dextrorphan. Thus suggests that dextrorphan is an antagonist with very mild agonistic action for PCP receptors.     

心不甘中甾体皂甙元的分离和结构鉴定(2)

自心不甘(Tupistra aurantiaca Wall et Backer)根的醋酸乙酯萃取物经硅胶柱层析分离除可得到1β、2β、3β、4β、5β、7α-hexahydroxyspirost-25(27)-en-6-one外,还得到7个游离的甾体皂甙元A—G,其中A及B分别为3-epiruscogenin及3-epi-neoruscogenin,F为△~(25(27))-pentrogenin(6)、C、D和E系新化合物,经IR、MS、~1H NMR及~(13)C NMR谱鉴定分别推定为ranmogenin A(3)、B(4)和C(5)(兰茂甙元甲、乙和丙)。     

心不甘中甾体皂甙元的分离和结构鉴定(3)

本文报告心不甘(Tupistra aurantiaca Wall et Backer)根的粗甙经盐酸水解后的总甙元中分离的甙元E和F的结构鉴定。甙元F经鉴定为△~(25(27))-pentrogenin(2)。甙元E(ranmo-genin D)为新化合物,其结构经IR、MS、~1H NMR和~(13)C NMR谱分析推定如(1)所示。