Prolyl hydroxylase activity as an index of liver damage induced by ethanol

It was found that chronic intoxication of rats with ethanol results in an increase of prolyl hydroxylase activity in liver and serum of the experimental animals. The increase of enzyme activity precedes the morphological symptoms of liver damage. The possibility arises that the assay of prolyl hydroxylase in serum or in liver biopsy samples could be useful for the diagnosis of the tendency of some individuals to develop liver cirrhosis induced by ethanol.     

A comparison of interfertility and in vitro DNA-DNA reassociation as criteria for speciation in the genus Kluyveromyces

Hybridization studies based on the use of the prototrophic selection technique were undertaken to compare interfertility and DNA-DNA reassociation as criteria for speciation purposes in the yeast genus Kluyveromyces. Degrees of DNA-DNA reassociation > 70% between strains as reported in the literature, were found to correlate with high recombination frequencies. Degrees of DNA-DNA reassociation < 20% between strains did however, not invariably coincide with the absence of interfertility between strains. If interfertility is accepted as criterion for conspecificity, the hitherto reported low degrees ( < 20%) of DNA-DNA reassociation in Kluyveromyces cannot confidently be employed for speciation purposes.