An analysis of proton fluxes coupled to electron transport and ATP synthesis in chloroplast thylakoids

Electron transport, phosphorylation and internal proton concentration were measured in illuminated spinach chloroplast thylakoid membranes under a number of conditions. Regardless of the procedure used to vary these parameters, the data fit a simple chemiosmotic model. Protons from Photosystem II did not appear to be utilized differently from those derived from Photosystem I. The maximal phosphorylation efficiency ($\text{P}\text{e}{}_2$) for photophosphorylation in washed thylakoids under oxidizing conditions is likely to be $\text{4}\text{3}$. This value is consistent with a proton-to-electron-pair ratio of 4 for electron flow through both photosystems and a proton-to-ATP ratio of 3 for the chloroplast proton-ATPase.     

Inhibition of phosphate transport in human erythrocytes by water-soluble carbodiimides

Phosphate entry into human erythrocytes is irreversibly inhibited by treatment of the cells with the water-soluble carbodiimides 1-ethy1-3-(3-dimethylaminopropyl)carbodiimide hydrochloride (EDC) and 1-cyclohexyl-3-(2-morpholinoethyl)-carbodiimide metho-p-toluene sulfonate (CMC) in the absence of added nucleophile. EDC is the more potent inhibitor (40% inhibition, 2 mM EDC, 5 min, 37°C, 50% hematocrit, pH 6.9), while more than 20 mM CMC is required to give the same inhibition under identical conditions. EDC inhibition is temperature-dependent, being complete in 5 min at 37°C, and sensitive to extracellular pH. At pH 6.9 only 50% of transport is rapidly inhibited by EDC, but at alkaline pH over 80% of transport is inhibited. Inhibition is not prevented by modification of membrane sulfhydryl groups but is decreased in the presence of 4,4′-dinitrostilbene-2,2′-disulfonic acid (DNDS), a reversible competitive inhibitor of anion transport. EDC treatment leads to crosslinking of erythrocyte membrane proteins, but differences between the time course of this action and inhibition of transport indicate that most transport inhibition is not due to crosslinking of membrane proteins.     

Substrate Degradation and Pressure Tolerance of Free-Living and Attached Bacterial Populations in the Intestines of Shallow-Water Fish

This report compares recovery of non-O1 Vibrio cholerae strains from seven California coastal sites during the winter and summer of 1983. A total of 41 identified and 27 presumptive nn-O1 V. cholerae strains were recovered from six of seven coastal sites in the summer. A 5-to 56-fold increase in the numbers of organisms isolated from different sites occurred in the summer months, when water temperatures were 1.9 to 5.1 degrees C higher. At the three sites where the highest levels of non-O1 V. cholerae were found, pollution, as measured by the total number of coliforms, exceeded the legal limit (less than 1,000 coliforms per 100 ml.).     

Effect of Monensin on Growth and Methanogenesis of Methanobacterium formicicum

Monensin inhibited methanogenesis from formate but not from H₂-CO₂ by resting-cell suspensions of Methanobacterium formicicum. The antibiotic severely inhibited growth on formate. The lag phase of H₂-CO₂-grown cultures was prolonged by monensin, but these cultures recovered from the initial inhibition. The recovery did not result from the development of a monensin-resistant population or inactivation of the antibiotic.     

Ribosyl-diphthamide: Confirmation of structure by fast atom bombardment mass spectrometry

Diphtheria toxin inactivates protein synthesis elongation factor 2 by attaching ADP-ribose to an unusual post-translational amino acid derivative, diphthamide, in the factor. Previously, we prepared ribosyl-diphthamide from the ADP-ribosyl-factor and proposed on the basis of NMR spectral analysis that it is 1-α-d-ribofuranosyl-2-[3-carboxyamido-3-(trimethylammonio)propyl]histidine [N. J. Oppenheimer, and J. W. Bodley, (1981) J. Biol. Chem.256, 8579–8581 and op. cit.]. Now, using fast atom bomardment mass spectrometry, the intact cation of ribosyl-diphthamide has been observed in the gas phase. The theoretical mass of the structure proposed for ribosyl-diphthamide uniquely agrees with the observed mass of the inact cation of the compound to within 2 ppm. Collisional activation decomposition mass spectral analysis provided additional structural confirmation. Thus, although the compound has not been synthesized, all available evidence appears uniquely consistent with the structure of ribosyl-diphthamide previously proposed.     

Chromosomal transplantation

Dissociated cells of middle-to-late blastulae were exposed to 0.1 mg colchicine/ml and achieved 92% metaphase arrest. These cells contained a haploid set of Bombina maxima (Anura:Discoglossidae) chromosomes. When transplanted into the enucleated eggs of B. orientalis, some donor cells stimulated development to the late blastula and middle gastrula stages. — Most (17/20) of the embryos resulting from chromosomal transplantation were nonmosaic aneuploids. A high percentage of recipient egg enucleation (93%), the ratio of long-to-short chromosomes, and the presence of species-specific marker chromosomes proved that chromosomes were transplanted from the donor cells. Therefore, metaphase chromosomes lacking intact spindle apparatuses were injected into and incorporated by amphibian eggs. These chromosomes were replicated in all cells of the resulting embryos. The aneuploidy of these embryos is explained by an inability of the recipient egg to locate and replicate many transplanted chromosomes (44%) before first cleavage.     

Cryopreservation of Plasmodium chabaudi. II. Cooling and warming rates

Various cooling and warming rates were investigated to determine the optimum conditions for cryopreserving the intraerythrocytic stages of Plasmodium chabaudi. Infected blood, equilibrated in 10% v/v glycerol at 37 degrees C or in 15% v/v Me2SO at 0 degree C for 10 min, was cryopreserved using cooling rates between 1 and 5100 degrees C min-1. After overnight storage in liquid nitrogen the samples were warmed at 12,000 degrees C min-1. Warming rates between 1 and 12,000 degrees C min-1 were investigated using samples previously cooled at 3600 degrees C min-1. After thawing, the glycerol and Me2SO were removed by dilution in 15% v/v glucose-supplemented phosphate-buffered saline. Survival was assayed by inoculation of groups of five mice each with 10(6) infected cells and the time taken to reach a level of 2% parasitemia estimated. The optimum cooling rate was 3600 degrees C min-1 for parasites frozen using either 10% glycerol or 15% Me2SO; the pre-2% patent periods were 0.90 and 1.01 days above control values (representing survival levels of 21 and 17.5%, respectively). The optimum warming rate was 12,000 degrees C min-1; the pre-2% patent periods were 1.01 and 1.32 days above control values, respectively (18 and 10% survival), for glycerol and Me2SO. With ethanediol (5% v/v) and sucrose (15% w/v) as cryoprotectants the optimum warming rates were also 12,000 degrees C min-1 while the optimum cooling rates were 330 and 3600 degrees C min-1, respectively.(ABSTRACT TRUNCATED AT 250 WORDS)     

Bloom's syndrome and EM9 cells in BrdU-containing medium exhibit similarly elevated frequencies of sister chromatid exchange but dissimilar amounts of cellular proliferation and chromosome disruption

Bloom's syndrome (BS) and EM9 cells both display elevated frequencies of sister chromatid exchange (SCE) following growth for two rounds of DNA replication in bromodeoxyuridine (BrdU)-containing medium. To learn whether hyperresponsiveness to BrdU itself might play a role in causing the SCE elevation, the effects of BrdU on two other parameters, cellular proliferation and chromosome disruption, were examined, comparing the responses of BS and normal lymphoblastoid cells and of EM9 and CHO cells. BS and normal cells responded similarly with respect to growth for 4 days in BrdU-containing medium (0, 1, 3, and 5 g/ml). Chromosome aberrrations were increased only slightly in the BS and normal cells after 2 days in BrdU. CHO cells responded to growth in BrdU-containing medium like BS and normal cells; however, little growth of EM9 was detected at any of the BrdU concentrations employed. CHO and EM9 cells also exhibited strikingly different amounts of chromosome damage following growth in BrdU. After 2 days in 1, 3, and 5 g/ml BrdU 21%, 46%, and 50%, respectively, of the CHO cells had chromosome aberrations in contrast to 92%, 96%, and 98% of the EM9 cells. Most of the aberrations in the BrdU-treated CHO cells consisted of what appeared to be polycentric and ring chromosomes or chromosomes exhibiting telomere association. Acentric fragments were absent from most cells with polycentric and ring chromosomes, indicating either that the abnormal chromosomes were formed during an earlier cell cycle or that the abnormal chromosomes represent a form of association in which the telomeres are apposed so tightly that the juncture between chromosomes cannot be identified microscopically. EM9 cells treated with BrdU exhibited many chromatid and isochromatid gaps and breaks as well as numerous quadriradial, triradial, and complex interchange configurations. In addition, the types of aberrations present in CHO cells also were increased greatly in number. The different responses of BS and EM9 cells to growth in BrdU suggest that the molecular defects in the two cell types are different.