Engineering microalgae for water phosphorus recovery to close the phosphorus cycle

As a finite and non-renewable resource, phosphorus (P) is essential to all life and crucial for crop growth and food production. The boosted agricultural use and associated loss of P to the aquatic environment are increasing environmental pollution, harming ecosystems, and threatening future global food security. Thus, recovering and reusing P from water bodies is urgently needed to close the P cycle. As a natural, eco-friendly, and sustainable reclamation strategy, microalgae-based biological P recovery is considered a promising solution. However, the low P-accumulation capacity and P-removal efficiency of algal bioreactors restrict its application. Herein, it is demonstrated that manipulating genes involved in cellular P accumulation and signalling could triple the Chlamydomonas P-storage capacity to ~7% of dry biomass, which is the highest P concentration in plants to date. Furthermore, the engineered algae could recover P from wastewater almost three times faster than the unengineered one, which could be directly used as a P fertilizer. Thus, engineering genes involved in cellular P accumulation and signalling in microalgae could be a promising strategy to enhance P uptake and accumulation, which have the potential to accelerate the application of algae for P recovery from the water body and closing the P cycle.     

Genes Encoding Proteolytic Enzymes Fungalysin and Subtilisin in Dermatophytes of Human and Animal Origin: A Comparative Study

Mycopathologia - Dermatophytes are among the most successful fungal pathogens in humans, but their virulence mechanisms have not yet been fully characterized. Dermatophytic fungi secrete proteases...     

Health surveillance of specific pathogen-free and conventionally-housed mice and rats in Korea.

The present study contains information about proper microbiological monitoring of laboratory animals' health and the standardization of microbiological monitoring methods in Korea. Microbiological quality control for laboratory animals, composed of biosecurity and health surveillance, is essential to guard against research complications and public health dangers that have been associated with adventitious infections. In this study, one hundred and twenty-two mice and ninety rats from laboratory animal breeding companies and one animal facility of the national universities in Korea were monitored in 2000-2003. Histopathologically, thickening of the alveolar walls and lymphocytic infiltration around the bronchioles were observed in mice and rats from microbiologically contaminated facilities. Cryptosporidial oocysts were observed in the gastric pits of only conventionally-housed mice and rats. Helicobacter spp. infection was also detected in 1 of 24 feces DNA samples in mice and 9 of 40 feces DNA samples in rats by PCR in 2003, but they were not Helicobacter hepaticus. This paper describes bacteriological, parasitological, and virological examinations of the animals.     

RNA-Seq transcriptome analysis reveals Maackia amurensis leukoagglutinin has antitumor activity in human anaplastic thyroid cancer cells

Molecular Biology Reports - Lectins are carbohydrate-binding molecules that can bind specifically to the sugar residues of glycoconjugates and are found in almost all organisms. Plant lectins...     

Explicit and implicit memory during sleep

Sleep and Biological Rhythms - The purpose of this study was to indicate the changes in the implicit and explicit memory under awake and sleep conditions by using a battery that can measure...