Differential diagnosis of Charcot arthropathy and osteomyelitis

Foot problems are common causes of morbidity in patients with diabetes mellitus. Foot ulcers are the leading cause of hospitalization in diabetic patients. Bones may be involved in two different clinical conditions: osteomyelitis and Charcot osteoarthropathy. Osteomyelitis usually develops by spreading from contiguous soft tissue to underlying bone. Charcot foot is deformation of foot as a result of muscle athrophy, bone and joint structure changes in a joint as a secondary complication of neuropathy. To distinguish bone infection from non-infectious bone disorders as in Charcot joint may be difficult, especially if there is no skin ulceration. So, the mere absence of skin ulcers does not exclude the diagnosis of osteomyelitis.     

Evaluation of the natural killer cytotoxicity and the levels of cytokines in rats with type I diabetes mellitus

Type I diabetes mellitus (insulin-dependent DM = IDDM) is a chronic disease characterized by specific destruction of pancreatic beta cells, resulting in an absolute lack of insulin. Immune mechanisms, genetic susceptibility, and environmental factors are all implicated in the pathogenesis of Type 1 diabetes. This study was aimed at determining the efficiency of cytokines, natural killer (NK) cells in the pathophysiology of IDDM. Therefore, we evaluated the plasma levels of cytokines by specific enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay (ELISA) and the cytotoxicity activity of NK cells by anti-candididal index in rats with type I diabetes. We found that the cytotoxicity activity of NK cells in IDDM groups significantly decreased compared to the control groups. The levels of interferon-gamma (IFN-gamma) in IDDM groups were slightly higher than in healthy controls. These results indicate that the changes of T H1 type cytokines such as IFN-gamma and NK cell activity can play a role in the etiology of IDDM. The data may provide new strategies for the treatment of IDDM.     

Certain Non-Standard Coding Tables Appear to be More Robust to Error Than the Standard Genetic Code

Since the identification of the Standard Coding Table as a “universal” method to translate genetic information into amino acids, exceptions to this rule have been reported, and to date there are nearly 20 alternative genetic coding tables deployed by either nuclear genomes or organelles of organisms. Why are these codes still in use and why are new codon reassignments occurring? This present study aims to provide a new method to address these questions and to analyze whether these alternative codes present any advantages or disadvantages to the organisms or organelles in terms of robustness to error. We show that two of the alternative coding tables, The Ciliate, Dasycladacean and Hexamita Nuclear Code (CDH) and The Flatworm Mitochondrial Code (FMC), exhibit an advantage, while others such as The Yeast Mitochondrial Code (YMC) are at a significant disadvantage. We propose that the Standard Code is likely to have emerged as a “local minimum” and that the “coding landscape” is still being searched for a “global” minimum.     

Extending signaling pathways with protein-interaction networks. Application to apoptosis

Cells exploit signaling pathways during responses to environmental changes, and these processes are often modulated during disease. Particularly, relevant human pathologies such as cancer or viral infections require downregulating apoptosis signaling pathways to progress. As a result, the identification of proteins responsible for these changes is essential for the diagnostics and development of therapeutics. Transferring functional annotation within protein interaction networks has proven useful to identify such proteins, although this is not a trivial task. Here, we used different scoring methods to transfer annotation from 53 well-studied members of the human apoptosis pathways (as known by 2005) to their protein interactors. All scoring methods produced significant predictions (compared to a random negative model), but its number was too large to be useful. Thus, we made a final prediction using specific combinations of scoring methods and compared it to the proteins related to apoptosis signaling pathways during the last 5 years. We propose 273 candidate proteins that may be relevant in apoptosis signaling pathways. Although some of them have known functions consistent with their proposed apoptotsis involvement, the majority have not been annotated yet, leaving room for further experimental studies. We provide our predictions at http://sbi.imim.es/web/Apoptosis.php.     

Synthesis, characterization and electrochemical behavior of oxo-bridged (arylimido)[tris(3,5-dimethylpyrazolyl)borato] molybdenum(V) complexes

Reaction of the oxo-molybdenum(V) precursor [MoTp*(O)Cl₂] [Tp* = hydrotris(3,5-dimethyl-1-pyrazolyl)borate] with H₂NC₆H₄R-4 (R = OEt; OPr) in refluxing toluene in the presence of Et₃N afforded the binuclear oxo-bridged oxo(arylimido) molybdenum(V) complexes [Tp*Mo(O)Cl](μ-O)[Tp*Mo(NC₆H₄OR-4)Cl]. Surprisingly, a similar reaction between [MoTp*(O)Cl₂] and C₆H₅NH₂ yielded the previously reported compound [{MoTp*(O)Cl}₂(μ-O)] as the only product. The new compounds were characterized by microanalytical data, mass spectrometry, IR and ¹H NMR spectroscopy. Cyclic voltammetric studies of the new compounds, of the previously reported compounds [Tp*Mo(O)Cl](μ-O)[Tp*Mo(NAr)Cl] (Ar = C₆H₄OMe-4, C₆H₄F-3, C₆H₄Cl-4, C₆H₄Br-4, and C₆H₄I-3), and of [{MoTp*(O)Cl}₂(μ-O)] revealed a reversible one-electron oxidation process that is little affected by the nature of the substituent on the aryl group, whereas it is greatly affected by replacement of the imido ligand with an oxo ligand. The [{MoTp*(O)Cl}₂(μ-O)] compound also shows a one-electron reduction process.     

Karyotype variation within some native populations of oriental spruce (<Emphasis Type="Italic">Picea orientalis</Emphasis>) in Turkey

Karyological studies have been investigated within 8 native Anatolian populations of oriental spruce (Picea orientalis (L.) Link) in Turkey. The somatic chromosome number of 2n = 2x = 24 has been observed in all accessions. The karyotypes are generally asymmetrical with most of the chromosomes having median to median-submedian centromeres. Inter-population variability of the karyotype was summarized with cluster analysis. We found that the karyotypes have positively correlated with the altitudes of the natural habitats. The high value of karyotype asymmetry may be attributed to both microenvironment and natural regeneration methods used in oriental spruce.