In vitro antiviral activity of phlorotannins isolated from Ecklonia cava against porcine epidemic diarrhea coronavirus infection and hemagglutination

Despite the prepdominat agent causing severe entero-pathogenic diarrhea in swine, there are no effective therapeutical treatment of porcine epidemic diarrhea virus (PEDV). In this study, we evaluated the antiviral activity of five phlorotannins isolated from Ecklonia cava (E. cava) against PEDV. In vitro antiviral activity was tested using two different assay strategies: (1) blockage of the binding of virus to cells (simultaneous-treatment assay) and (2) inhibition of viral replication (post-treatment assay). In simultaneous-treatment assay, compounds 2–5 except compound 1 exhibited antiviral activities of a 50% inhibitory concentration (IC₅₀) with the ranging from 10.8 ± 1.4 to 22.5 ± 2.2 μM against PEDV. Compounds 1–5 were completely blocked binding of viral spike protein to sialic acids at less than 36.6 μM concentrations by hemagglutination inhibition. Moreover, compounds 4 and 5 of five phlorotannins inhibited viral replication with IC₅₀ values of 12.2 ± 2.8 and 14.6 ± 1.3 μM in the post-treatment assay, respectively. During virus replication steps, compounds 4 and 5 exhibited stronger inhibition of viral RNA and viral protein synthesis in late stages (18 and 24 h) than in early stages (6 and 12 h). Interestingly, compounds 4 and 5 inhibited both viral entry by hemagglutination inhibition and viral replication by inhibition of viral RNA and viral protein synthesis, but not viral protease. These results suggest that compounds isolated from E. cava have strong antiviral activity against PEDV, inhibiting viral entry and/or viral replication, and may be developed into natural therapeutic drugs against coronavirus infection.     

Association of the CTLA4 Gene with Graves' Disease in the Chinese Han Population

To determine whether genetic heterogeneity exists in patients with Graves'' disease (GD), the cytotoxic T-lymphocyte associated 4 (CTLA-4) gene, which is implicated a susceptibility gene for GD by considerable genetic and immunological evidence, was used for association analysis in a Chinese Han cohort recruited from various geographic regions. Our association study for the SNPs in the CTLA4 gene in 2640 GD patients and 2204 control subjects confirmed that CTLA4 is the susceptibility gene for GD in the Chinese Han population. Moreover, the logistic regression analysis in the combined Chinese Han cohort revealed that SNP rs231779 (allele frequencies p = 2.81×10⁻⁹, OR = 1.35, and genotype distributions p = 2.75×10⁻⁹, OR = 1.42) is likely the susceptibility variant for GD. Interestingly, the logistic regression analysis revealed that SNP rs35219727 may be the susceptibility variant to GD in the Shandong population; however, SNP, rs231779 in the CTLA4 gene probably independently confers GD susceptibility in the Xuzhou and southern China populations. These data suggest that the susceptibility variants of the CTLA4 gene varied between the different geographic populations with GD.     

Assignment of 1H, 13C and 15N resonances of the reduced human IgG1 CH3 domain

Here we report the NMR resonance assignments for the reduced form of human IgG1 C_H3 domain, a 26 kDa dimer in solution (residues 341–447). The assignments have been deposited in the BioMagResBank with a BMRB accession number of 15204.     

Evolutionary History of Assassin Bugs (Insecta: Hemiptera: Reduviidae): Insights from Divergence Dating and Ancestral State Reconstruction

Assassin bugs are one of the most successful clades of predatory animals based on their species numbers (∼6,800 spp.) and wide distribution in terrestrial ecosystems. Various novel prey capture strategies and remarkable prey specializations contribute to their appeal as a model to study evolutionary pathways involved in predation. Here, we reconstruct the most comprehensive reduviid phylogeny (178 taxa, 18 subfamilies) to date based on molecular data (5 markers). This phylogeny tests current hypotheses on reduviid relationships emphasizing the polyphyletic Reduviinae and the blood-feeding, disease-vectoring Triatominae, and allows us, for the first time in assassin bugs, to reconstruct ancestral states of prey associations and microhabitats. Using a fossil-calibrated molecular tree, we estimated divergence times for key events in the evolutionary history of Reduviidae. Our results indicate that the polyphyletic Reduviinae fall into 11–14 separate clades. Triatominae are paraphyletic with respect to the reduviine genus Opisthacidius in the maximum likelihood analyses; this result is in contrast to prior hypotheses that found Triatominae to be monophyletic or polyphyletic and may be due to the more comprehensive taxon and character sampling in this study. The evolution of blood-feeding may thus have occurred once or twice independently among predatory assassin bugs. All prey specialists evolved from generalist ancestors, with multiple evolutionary origins of termite and ant specializations. A bark-associated life style on tree trunks is ancestral for most of the lineages of Higher Reduviidae; living on foliage has evolved at least six times independently. Reduviidae originated in the Middle Jurassic (178 Ma), but significant lineage diversification only began in the Late Cretaceous (97 Ma). The integration of molecular phylogenetics with fossil and life history data as presented in this paper provides insights into the evolutionary history of reduviids and clears the way for in-depth evolutionary hypothesis testing in one of the most speciose clades of predators.     

Selective Capture of 5-hydroxymethylcytosine from Genomic DNA

5-methylcytosine (5-mC) constitutes ~2-8% of the total cytosines in human genomic DNA and impacts a broad range of biological functions, including gene expression, maintenance of genome integrity, parental imprinting, X-chromosome inactivation, regulation of development, aging, and cancer¹. Recently, the presence of an oxidized 5-mC, 5-hydroxymethylcytosine (5-hmC), was discovered in mammalian cells, in particular in embryonic stem (ES) cells and neuronal cells^2-4. 5-hmC is generated by oxidation of 5-mC catalyzed by TET family iron (II)/α-ketoglutarate-dependent dioxygenases^{2, 3}. 5-hmC is proposed to be involved in the maintenance of embryonic stem (mES) cell, normal hematopoiesis and malignancies, and zygote development^{2, 5-10}. To better understand the function of 5-hmC, a reliable and straightforward sequencing system is essential. Traditional bisulfite sequencing cannot distinguish 5-hmC from 5-mC¹¹. To unravel the biology of 5-hmC, we have developed a highly efficient and selective chemical approach to label and capture 5-hmC, taking advantage of a bacteriophage enzyme that adds a glucose moiety to 5-hmC specifically¹².Here we describe a straightforward two-step procedure for selective chemical labeling of 5-hmC. In the first labeling step, 5-hmC in genomic DNA is labeled with a 6-azide-glucose catalyzed by β-GT, a glucosyltransferase from T4 bacteriophage, in a way that transfers the 6-azide-glucose to 5-hmC from the modified cofactor, UDP-6-N3-Glc (6-N3UDPG). In the second step, biotinylation, a disulfide biotin linker is attached to the azide group by click chemistry. Both steps are highly specific and efficient, leading to complete labeling regardless of the abundance of 5-hmC in genomic regions and giving extremely low background. Following biotinylation of 5-hmC, the 5-hmC-containing DNA fragments are then selectively captured using streptavidin beads in a density-independent manner. The resulting 5-hmC-enriched DNA fragments could be used for downstream analyses, including next-generation sequencing.Our selective labeling and capture protocol confers high sensitivity, applicable to any source of genomic DNA with variable/diverse 5-hmC abundances. Although the main purpose of this protocol is its downstream application (i.e., next-generation sequencing to map out the 5-hmC distribution in genome), it is compatible with single-molecule, real-time SMRT (DNA) sequencing, which is capable of delivering single-base resolution sequencing of 5-hmC.     

H-2 antigens,on mast cell membrane,as target antigens for anaphylactic degranulation

When single mast cells were isolated by micromanipulation, specific H-2 antigen-bearing mast cells were degranulated upon incubation with alloimmune sera (DAAD). When specific alloantigens were presented by lymphoid cells only, no degranulation occurred. Only antigen-bearing mast cells were degranulated, irrespectively of the presence of antigen-bearing lymphoid cells. Therefore, in DAAD, anaphylactic alloantibodies can and must recognize specific H-2 antigens on the mast cell membrane and simultaneously deliver the degranulation signal, through an Fc-Fc receptor interaction on the surface of the same mast cell.     

Identification and gene expression profiling of the Pum1 and Pum2 members of the Pumilio family in the chicken

Members of the Pumilio (Pum) family of RNA-binding proteins act as translational repressors and are required for germ cell development and asymmetric division. We identified the chicken Pum1 and Pum2 genes and analyzed their expression patterns in various tissues. Comparative sequence analysis of the Pum1 and Pum2 proteins from the drosophila, chicken, mouse, and human revealed a high degree of evolutionary conservation in terms of the levels of homology of the peptide sequences and the structure of Pumilio homology domain (PUM-HD), C-terminal RNA-binding domain, with similar spacing between the adjacent Pum eight tandem repeats. In addition, phylogenetic patterns of pumilio family showed that Pum 1 and 2 of chicken are more closely related to those of mouse and human than other species and Pum1 is more conserved than Pum2. Using real-time RT-PCR, the expression levels of the Pum1 and Pum2 genes were found to be highest in hatched female gonads, and high-level expression of Pum2 was detected in 12-day and hatched gonads among the various chicken embryonic tissues tested. In adult tissues, the expression levels of Pum1 and Pum2 were expressed at higher levels in the testis and muscle than in any other tissue. The characteristics of the tissue-specific expression of Pum genes suggest that Pum1 and Pum2 have effects crucially in particular stage during development of chicken gonads depending on sexual maturation.