Involvement of excitatory amino acid receptors in long-term potentiation in the Schaffer collateral-commissural pathway of rat hippocampal slices.

The present article reviews studies from our laboratory, which have shown that excitatory amino acids receptors of the N-methyl-D-aspartate type are involved in the induction of long-term potentiation in the Schaffer collateral-commissural pathway of rat hippocampal slices. The nature of the excitatory amino acid receptors that mediate the response that is modified by the induction of long-term potentiation is also considered. The mechanism of induction of long-term potentiation is discussed, as are some possible stages that are required for the maintenance of this process. Some new data are presented concerning the ability of N-methyl-D-aspartate to potentiate synaptic transmission and to depress the amplitude of the presynaptic fibre volley. Concerning the potentiation, it is shown that brief (1-2 min) perfusion of slices with N-methyl-D-aspartate is sufficient to potentiate synaptic transmission for at least 3 h. The N-methyl-D-aspartate induced depression of the presynaptic fibre volley is shown to be transient and independent of synaptic transmission.     

Chemical Composition of Aqueous Ethanol Extract of Luffa cylindrica Leaves and Its Effect on Representation of Caspase‐8, Caspase‐3, and the Proliferation Marker Ki67 in Intrinsic Molecular Subtypes of Breast Cancer in Vitro

Breast cancer constitutes the second most prevalent cancer in Egypt, the problem needs more trends in treatment and treatment development either by regimen modification or introducing new drugs, and the main objective of this study is to screen the effects of the aqueous ethanol herbal extract of Luffa cylindrica leaves on different types of breast cancer cell lines representing different molecular subtypes of the disease. The major active constituents of the extract were tentatively identified by LC/MS which revealed the presence of phenolic compound derivatives and saponin that may be responsible in part for the activity of the extract. The emphasis was laid on the main apoptotic pathways as well as the extract effect on the normal cell line. Results of phytochemical investigation, cell cycle analysis, and molecular analysis of apoptotic and proliferative markers have shown effective anticancer activity against MCF‐7, BT‐474, and MDA‐MB‐231 cell lines which represent three subtypes of breast cancer, luminal A, luminal B, and triple negative, respectively. On the other hand, the effects on normal lung fibroblast cell line are less prominent at the dose used for treating breast cancer cell lines.     

<Emphasis Type="Italic">Nonomuraea insulae</Emphasis> sp. nov., isolated from forest soil

Strain H2R21^T, a novel actinobacterium, isolated from a forest soil sample collected from Heybeliada, Istanbul, Turkey, and a polyphasic approach was used for characterisation of the strain. Chemotaxonomic and morphological characterisation of strain H2R21^T indicated that it belongs to the genus Nonomuraea. 16S rRNA gene sequence similarity showed that the strain is closely related to Nonomuraea purpurea 1SM4-01^T (99.1%) and Nonomuraea solani CGMCC 4.7037^T (98.4%). DNA–DNA relatedness values were found to be lower than 70% between the isolate and its phylogenetic neighbours N. purpurea 1SM4-01^T, N. solani CGMCC 4.7037^T and Nonomuraea rhizophila YIM 67092^T. The whole cell hydrolysates of strain H2R21^T were found to contain meso-diaminopimelic acid as the diagnostic diamino acid and glucose, madurose, mannose and ribose as the cell sugars. The polar lipids were identified as phosphatidylglycerol, diphosphatidylglycerol, phosphatidylmethylethanolamine, phosphatidylethanolamine, hydroxy-phosphatidylethanolamine, dihydroxy-phosphatidylethanolamine, phosphatidylinositol, glycophosphatidylinositol, two glycophospholipids and two unidentified lipids. The predominant menaquinones were identified as MK-9(H₄) and MK-9(H₆). The major fatty acids were found to be iso-C_16:0, iso-C_16:0 2OH and C_17:0 10-methyl. On the basis of DNA–DNA relatedness data and some phenotypic characteristics, it is evident that strain H2R21^T can be distinguished from the closely related species in the genus Nonomuraea. Thus, it is concluded that strain H2R21^T represents a novel species of the genus Nonomuraea, for which the name Nonomuraea insulae sp. nov. is proposed. The type strain is H2R21^T (= DSM 102915^T = CGMCC 4.7338^T = KCTC 39769^T).     

Nicotinic Acetylcholine Receptors Control Encoding and Retrieval of Associative Recognition Memory through Plasticity in the Medial Prefrontal Cortex

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Two new species of the genus Zercon C. L. Koch from the Inner Aegean Region of Turkey (Acari: Mesostigmata: Zerconidae)

Two new species of the mite genus Zercon C. L. Koch, 1836 have been found: Zercon ekizi sp. n. and Zercon emirdagicus sp. n. are described and illustrated from female specimens collected in Afyonkarahisar and Kütahya provinces, Turkey. The similarities and differences between the related species are discussed.

http://www.zoobank.org/urn:lsid:zoobank.org:pub:7388D199-2D1D-49F7-9747-4F49E8810067     

Length–weight relationship of five commercially important freshwater fish species in the Kashmir Valley,India

Length–weight relationships were analysed for five commercially important freshwater fishes, namely, Bangana diplostoma (Heckel, 1838), Schizopyge niger (Heckel, 1838), Schizothorax curvifrons (Heckel, 1838), Schizothorax plagiostomus (Heckel, 1838) and Glyptosternon reticulatum (McClelland, 1842) from different water bodies in the Kashmir Valley, India. A total of 610 samples were collected between October 2013 and May 2015 using various indigenous cast nets. Of these five species, Schizopyge niger has a new maximum length record for the FishBase LWR database.     

Chemical and Genetic Comparative Analysis of Gentiana crassicaulis and Gentiana macrophylla

Gentiana crassicaulis Duthie ex Burk . and Gentiana macrophylla Pall . are two main sources of Radix Gentianae Macrophyllae (Qinjiao) available in markets, which has a wide range of anti‐inflammatory effects and has been extensively used for fighting rheumatoid arthritis. However, they vary in terms of chemical compositions, pharmacological activities, and biomass. In this study, a combined chemical and genetic (HPLC and DNA barcoding) approach was used to compare these two plants. Four predominant bioactive compounds, namely, gentiopicroside, loganic acid, swertiamarin, and sweroside, were used to assess the chemical variations. Based on chemical variations, 15 samples were clustered into two groups through PCA analyses. DNA barcoding utilizing the variable nuclear ITS2 regions were sequenced, aligned, and compared. Together with 61 sequences collected from GenBank, 76 batches of Qinjiao were clustered in two groups according to species origin. The genetic relationships indicated by the ITS2‐based NJ tree were consistent with the chemical variations. Thus, the chemical profiles determined by HPLC and DNA profiles obtained from ITS2 region could be applied for the quality control of Qinjiao.