影响光合细菌类胡萝卜素形成因素的研究

对已初步确认为球形红假单胞菌属的S—1菌株进行了类胡萝卜素形成因素的研究。通过对光照强度、温度、pH、碳源、氮源、生长因子和无机盐成份等培养条件的探讨,找到了适合类胡萝卜素形成的条件,为开发光合细菌类胡萝卜素提供了依据。     

基于同源重组的裂殖壶菌遗传转化体系的构建及验证

【目的】裂殖壶菌是一种能高效生产DHA的海洋真菌;基因工程技术已经成功应用在微生物改造和代谢机理研究中,利用基因工程技术对裂殖壶菌进行改造首先需要构建适合裂殖壶菌的遗传转化体系;【方法】本文利用电转化的方法将含有18S r DNA同源重组片段的ble基因导入裂殖壶菌中,通过zeocin抗性平板筛选出阳性菌株,并设计ble基因引物,以裂殖壶菌基因组为模板,进行PCR验证ble基因是否成功结合到裂殖壶菌染色体上。【结果】筛选获得的抗性菌株基因组上确实PCR出ble基因片段,对改造菌株与原始菌株进行发酵培养,发现改造后菌株在生物量、油脂含量、DHA含量及脂肪酸分布等方面和原始菌株基本一致。【结论】抗性基因的插入不会影响菌株的正常代谢,该体系的构建为后续其他外源基因导入奠定基础。     

Expression and characterization of recombinant single-chain salmon class I MHC fused with beta2-microglobulin with biological activity

Heterodimeric class I major histocompatibility complex (MHC) molecules consist of a putative 45-kDa heavy chain and a 12-kDa beta2-microglobulin (beta2m) light chain. The knowledge about MHC genes in Atlantic salmon accumulated during the last decade has allowed us to generate soluble and stable MHC class I molecules with biological activity. We report here the use of a bacterial expression system to produce the recombinant single-chain MHC molecules based on a specific allele Sasa-UBA*0301. This particular allele was selected because previous work has shown its association with the resistance to infectious salmon anaemia virus. The single-chain salmon MHC class I molecule has been designed and generated, in which the carboxyl terminus of beta2m is joined together with a flexible 15 or 20 amino acid peptide linker to the amino terminus of the heavy chain (Sasabeta2mUBA*0301). Monoclonal antibodies were successfully produced against both the MHC class I heavy chain and beta(2)m, and showed binding to the recombinant molecule. The recombinant complex Sasabeta2mUBA*0301 was expressed and isolated; the production was scaled up by adjusting to its optimal conditions. Subsequently, the recombinant proteins were purified by affinity chromatography using mAb against beta2m and alpha3. Eluates were analyzed by Western blot and refolded by the removal of denaturant. The correct folding was confirmed by measuring its binding capacity against mAb produced to recognize the native form of MHC molecules by biosensor analysis. This production of sufficient amounts of class I MHC proteins may represent a useful tool to study the peptide-binding specificity of MHC class I molecules, in order to design a peptide vaccine against viral pathogens.     

Novel scaffold for cathepsin K inhibitors

Pyrrolopyrimidine, a novel scaffold, allows to adjust interactions within the S3 subsite of cathepsin K. The core intermediate 10 facilitated the P3 optimization and identified highly potent and selective cathepsin K inhibitors 11-20.     

Sentence alignment using feed forward neural network

Parallel corpora have become an essential resource for work in multi lingual natural language processing. However, sentence aligned parallel corpora are more efficient than non-aligned parallel corpora for cross language information retrieval and machine translation applications. In this paper, we present a new approach to align sentences in bilingual parallel corpora based on feed forward neural network classifier. A feature parameter vector is extracted from the text pair under consideration. This vector contains text features such as length, punctuate score, and cognate score values. A set of manually prepared training data has been assigned to train the feed forward neural network. Another set of data was used for testing. Using this new approach, we could achieve an error reduction of 60% over length based approach when applied on English-Arabic parallel documents. Moreover this new approach is valid for any language pair and it is quite flexible approach since the feature parameter vector may contain more/less or different features than that we used in our system such as lexical match feature.     

Alcohol Dehydrogenase Accentuates Ethanol-Induced Myocardial Dysfunction and Mitochondrial Damage in Mice: Role of Mitochondrial Death Pathway

Objectives

Binge drinking and alcohol toxicity are often associated with myocardial dysfunction possibly due to accumulation of the ethanol metabolite acetaldehyde although the underlying mechanism is unknown. This study was designed to examine the impact of accelerated ethanol metabolism on myocardial contractility, mitochondrial function and apoptosis using a murine model of cardiac-specific overexpression of alcohol dehydrogenase (ADH).

Methods

ADH and wild-type FVB mice were acutely challenged with ethanol (3 g/kg/d, i.p.) for 3 days. Myocardial contractility, mitochondrial damage and apoptosis (death receptor and mitochondrial pathways) were examined.

Results

Ethanol led to reduced cardiac contractility, enlarged cardiomyocyte, mitochondrial damage and apoptosis, the effects of which were exaggerated by ADH transgene. In particular, ADH exacerbated mitochondrial dysfunction manifested as decreased mitochondrial membrane potential and accumulation of mitochondrial O₂^•−. Myocardium from ethanol-treated mice displayed enhanced Bax, Caspase-3 and decreased Bcl-2 expression, the effect of which with the exception of Caspase-3 was augmented by ADH. ADH accentuated ethanol-induced increase in the mitochondrial death domain components pro-caspase-9 and cytochrome C in the cytoplasm. Neither ethanol nor ADH affected the expression of ANP, total pro-caspase-9, cytosolic and total pro-caspase-8, TNF-α, Fas receptor, Fas L and cytosolic AIF.

Conclusions

Taken together, these data suggest that enhanced acetaldehyde production through ADH overexpression following acute ethanol exposure exacerbated ethanol-induced myocardial contractile dysfunction, cardiomyocyte enlargement, mitochondrial damage and apoptosis, indicating a pivotal role of ADH in ethanol-induced cardiac dysfunction possibly through mitochondrial death pathway of apoptosis.     

A Novel Targeted Multi-Functional Fusion Protein Possesses Inhibitory Activities Against Bacteria, Thrombin and Platelet Aggregation

In the present study, we designed a novel targeted multi-functional fusion protein LHAD composed of LL-37, FXa recognition peptide, hirudin-12-residue, AAP, and RGD peptide. It was expressed in the Pichia pastoris GS115 strain and purified by affinity chromatography. The in vitro studies suggested that the novel designed protein exhibited antibacterial activity, anti-platelet aggregation and anti-thrombin activities. Moreover, the capability of anti-thrombin was significantly increased compared to that of natural hirudin. Our study may provide a potential approach to design multi-functional drugs for the prevention and management of thrombosis.     

Middle and Early Upper Devonian Miospore Zonations in Eastern Yunnan and the Significance of Their Stratigraphy

The Devonian marine and non marine deposits were widely distributed in East Yunnan, where rich marine faunas and floras were present. The Middle and early Upper Devonian miospores of Eastern Yunnan were also abundant and usually well- preserved. The present paper provides both analysis of qualitative and quantitative composition development of Middle and early Upper Devonian spore assemblage in Eastern Yunnan, and a palynological zonatlon containing four successive assemblage zones: 1.Zone of Calyptosporites velatus-Rhabdosporites langii (VL); 2. Zone of Archaeozonotriletes variabilis-Calyptosporites proteus (VP); 3. Zone of Geminospora lemurata-Cristatisporites triangulatus (LT); 4. Zone of Archaeoperisaccus ovalis-Lagenicula bullosum (OB). The Middle and early Upper Devonian spore assemblages of Eastern Yunnan may be compared with those in South China and West Qinling. The spore zonation possesses stratigraphical dating of the Devonian megafloras of the region, particularly those from the Middle and Upper Devonian. The proposed spore zonation is closely compared with that erected for the Middle and early Upper Devonian of Old Sandstone Continent and adjacent Region. Based on palynological data, the reconstruction of Paleogeography and Paleoecology are discussed.     

Rapid Evolution of Simple Sequence Repeat Induced by Allopolyploidization

Microsatellite evolution normally occurs in diploids. Until now, there has been a lack of direct experimental evidence for microsatellite evolution following allopolyploidization. In the present study, F₁ hybrids and newly synthesized allopolyploids were derived from Triticum aestivum Chinese Spring × Secale cereale Jinzhou-heimai. One hundred and sixty-three wheat simple sequence repeat (SSR) markers were used to investigate the variation of wheat microsatellites after allopolyploidization and variation of the PCR products of 29 of the SSR markers was observed. Of these 29 SSR markers, 15 were unable to produce products from amphiploids. The other 14 SSR markers did produce products from parental wheat, F₁ hybrids and amphiploids. However, the length of the products amplified from amphiploids was different from the length of the products amplified from parental wheat and F₁ hybrids. Sequencing indicated that the length variation of the 14 microsatellites stemmed mainly from variation in the number of repeat units. The alteration of repeat units occurred in both perfect and compound repeats. In some compound SSR loci, one motif was observed to expand whereas another to contract. Almost all the microsatellite evolution observed in this study could be explained by the slipped-strand mispairing model. The results of this study seem to indicate that stress caused by allopolyploidization might be one of the factors that induce microsatellite evolution. In addition, the findings of present study provided an instance of how simple sequence repeats evolved after allopolyploidization.     

RETRACTED ARTICLE: Mast cells are the main interleukin 17-positive cells in anticitrullinated protein antibody-positive and -negative rheumatoid arthritis and osteoarthritis synovium

Introduction  

Mast cells have been implicated to play a functional role in arthritis, especially in autoantibody-positive disease. Among the cytokines involved in rheumatoid arthritis (RA), IL-17 is an important inflammatory mediator. Recent data suggest that the synovial mast cell is a main producer of IL-17, although T cells have also been implicated as prominent IL-17 producers as well. We aimed to identify IL-17 expression by mast cells and T cells in synovium of arthritis patients.