Characteristics of the maintenance of the upright posture in subjects touching an external object while standing on a moving or immobile platform

Postural sway was compared for humans touching an external object while standing on an immobile or slowly moving posturographic platform. When the platform moves, the central nervous system may interpret the movement of the point of the contact with the external object as the movement of the body relative to the support or as the movement of the support itself. Thus, the information concerning the body position that is provided by the touch becomes ambiguous. It was demonstrated that contact with an external object during standing on an unstable support leads to a decrease in support sway. When a subject stands on a moving platform, this decrease is smaller than in the case of an immobile platform. Contact with an external object causes a decrease in postural responses to shank muscle vibrations on an immobile platform. On a moving platform, this decrease is nonsignificant. The change in postural sway depending on the unambiguity of afferent information is discussed in terms of the interaction between afferent signals of different modalities on the basis of the body scheme in subjects maintaining balance.Translated from Fiziologiya Cheloveka, Vol. 31, No. 1, 2005, pp. 59–65.Original Russian Text Copyright © 2005 by Kazennikov, Shlykov, Levik.     

Involvement of the Lipopolysaccharides of Azospirilla in the Interaction with Wheat Seedling Roots

The present study was undertaken to comparatively investigate the attachment capacities of Azospirillum brasilenseSp245 and its lipopolysaccharide-defective Omegon-Km mutants KM018 and KM252, as well as their activities with respect to the alteration of the morphology of wheat seedling root hairs. The adsorption dynamics of the parent Sp245 and mutant KM252 strains of azospirilla on the seedling roots of the soft spring wheat cv. Saratovskaya 29 were similar; however, the attachment capacity of the mutant KM252 was lower than that of the parent strain throughout the incubation period (15 min to 48 h). The mutation led to a considerable decrease in the hydrophobicity of the Azospirillumcell surface. The lipopolysaccharides extracted from the outer membrane of A. brasilenseSp245 and mutant cells with hot phenol and purified by chromatographic methods were found to induce the deformation of the wheat seedling root hairs, the lipopolysaccharide of the parent strain being the most active in this respect. The role of the carbohydrate moiety of lipopolysaccharides in the interaction of Azospirillumcells with plants is discussed.     

Physical work capacity of athletes with different types of adaptation of the cardiorespiratory system

Indices of physical work capacity in athletes with different types of adaptation of the cardiorespiratory system that are engaged in various kinds of sports and have sports ranks from Master of Sports to Grade 2 have been studied. It has been shown that the highest physical work capacity is typical of athletes that have the inotropic type of adaptation, and the lowest, of athletes with the chronotropic type of adaptation. High indices of physical work capacity were recorded in athletes with the respiratory type of adaptation. Types of adaptation affect the indices of physical work capacity, and it is possible to forecast sports results on their basis.     

Selective staining of human platelet glycoproteins using nitrocellulose transfer of electrophoresed proteins and peroxidase-conjugated lectins

Platelet proteins (0.5-5 micrograms) were electrophoresed in a one-dimensional or an unreduced-reduced, two-dimensional sodium dodecyl sulfate gel system. The separated proteins were then transferred electrophoretically to nitrocellulose and reacted with peroxidase-conjugated lectins. Visualization of specific glycoproteins which bound the lectins was made by the chromogenic reaction catalyzed by peroxidase utilizing 3,3'-diaminobenzidine as the substrate. Wheat germ agglutinin specifically reacted with and allowed the visualization of glycoprotein Ib. Peanut agglutinin also specifically stained glycoprotein Ib after treatment of the nitrocellulose transferred proteins with neuraminidase. Ricinus communis agglutinin I stained thrombospondin, a 260 kDa protein, and factor VIII. Concanavalin A stained mainly glycoproteins IIb, III, IV, and V. Glycoproteins Ia, Ic, IIa, and other minor glycoproteins could be separated by unreduced-reduced, two-dimensional gel electrophoresis and were stained weakly with wheat germ agglutinin conjugates. These techniques were found to be reproducible as well as easily applied to the analysis and identification of platelet glycoproteins, particularly when dealing with a limited amount of platelets.     

Reversible hyperphosphorylation and reorganization of vimentin intermediate filaments by okadaic acid in 9L rat brain tumor cells.

Okadaic acid (OA), a protein phosphatase inhibitor, was found to induce hyperphosphorylation and reorganization of vimentin intermediate filaments in 9L rat brain tumor cells. The process was dose dependent. Vimentin phosphorylation was initially enhanced by 400 nM OA in 30 min and reached maximal level (about 26-fold) when cells were treated with 400 nM OA for 90 min. Upon removal of OA, dephosphorylation of the hyperphosphorylated vimentin was observed and the levels of phosphorylation returned to that of the controls after the cells recovered under normal growing conditions for 11 h. The phosphorylation and dephosphorylation of vimentin induced by OA concomitantly resulted in reversible reorganization of vimentin filaments and alteration of cell morphology. Cells rounded up as they were entering mitosis in the presence of OA and returned to normal appearance after 11 h of recovery. Immuno-staining with anti-vimentin antibody revealed that vimentin filaments were disassembled and clustered around the nucleus when the cells were treated with OA but subsequently returned to the filamentous states when OA was removed. Two-dimensional electrophoresis analysis further revealed that hyperphosphorylation of vimentin generated at least seven isoforms having different isoelectric points. Furthermore, the enhanced vimentin phosphorylation was accompanied by changes in the detergent-solubility of the protein. In untreated cells, the detergent-soluble and -insoluble vimentins were of equal amounts but the solubility could be increased when vimentins were hyperphosphorylated in the presence of OA. Taken together, the results indicated that OA could be involved in reversible hyperphosphorylation and reorganization of vimentin intermediate filaments, which may play an important role in the structure-function regulation of cytoskeleton in the cell.     

Human Discrimination of the Angular Velocity of the Vertical Movement of an Acoustic Image in Opposite Directions

The discrimination of the angular velocity of ventrodorsal and dorsoventral movement of an acoustic image was studied in nine test subjects. The experiments were performed using an apparent movement produced by consecutive activation of loudspeakers located along an arc in the vertical plane. The differential thresholds were measured by the minimum increment method. As the velocity of an acoustic image movement in opposite directions increased, the values of its mean absolute differential thresholds increased monotonically. Regression lines plotted by linear approximation of these values did not differ significantly.     

Effects of different sterols on the inhibition of cell culture growth caused by the growth retardant tetcyclacis

Cell division in cell suspension cultures can be completely blocked by the growth retardant tetcyclacis at a concentration of 10^-4 mol l^-1. In rice cells it has been demonstrated that the growth inhibition can be completely overcome by application of cholesterol independent of the duration of pretreatment with tetcyclacis. In suspension cultures of maize and soybean, too, the effect of tetcyclacis on cell division was neutralized by adding cholesterol. Other plant sterols, stigmasterol, campesterol and sitosterol were active in a decreasing order. Modifications in the cholesterol perhydro-cyclopentanophenanthrene-ring system indicate that the hydroxyl group at C-3 and the double bond between C-5 and C-6 in ring B are required for the activity. In contrast, gibberellic acid as well as ent-kaurenoic acid could not compensate retardant effects. Likewise, tetcyclasis did not change the level of gibberellins in rice cells as shown by radioimmunoassay. Thus, it is concluded that in cell suspension cultures sterols play a more important role in cell division than gibberellins.Abbreviation GA_x gibberelin A_x     

Wnt-7a in feather morphogenesis: involvement of anterior-posterior asymmetry and proximal-distal elongation demonstrated with an in vitro reconstitution model.

How do vertebrate epithelial appendages form from the flat epithelia? Following the formation of feather placodes, the previously radially symmetrical primordia become anterior-posterior (A-P) asymmetrical and develop a proximo-distal (P-D) axis. Analysis of the molecular heterogeneity revealed a surprising parallel of molecular profiles in the A-P feather buds and the ventral-dorsal (V-D) Drosophila appendage imaginal discs. The functional significance was tested with an in vitro feather reconstitution model. Wnt-7a expression initiated all over the feather tract epithelium, intensifying as it became restricted first to the primordia domain, then to an accentuated ring pattern within the primordia border, and finally to the posterior bud. In contrast, sonic hedgehog expression was induced later as a dot within the primordia. RCAS was used to overexpress Wnt-7a in reconstituted feather explants derived from stage 29 dorsal skin to further test its function in feather formation. Control skin formed normal elongated, slender buds with A-P orientation, but Wnt-7a overexpression led to plateau-like skin appendages lacking an A-P axis. Feathers in the Wnt-7a overexpressing skin also had inhibited elongation of the P-D axes. This was not due to a lack of cell proliferation, which actually was increased although randomly distributed. While morphogenesis was perturbed, differentiation proceeded as indicated by the formation of barb ridges. Wnt-7a buds have reduced expression of anterior (Tenascin) bud markers. Middle (Notch-1) and posterior bud markers including Delta-1 and Serrate-1 were diffusely expressed. The results showed that ectopic Wnt-7a expression enhanced properties characteristic of the middle and posterior feather buds and suggest that P-D elongation of vertebrate skin appendages requires balanced interactions between the anterior and posterior buds.     

Radiation inactivation target size of rat adipocyte glucose transporters in the plasma membrane and intracellular pools

The in situ assembly states of the glucose transport carrier protein in the plasma membrane and in the intracellular (microsomal) storage pool of rat adipocytes were assessed by studying radiation-induced inactivation of the D-glucose-sensitive cytochalasin B binding activities. High energy radiation inactivated the glucose-sensitive cytochalasin B binding of each of these membrane preparations by reducing the total number of the binding sites without affecting the dissociation constant. The reduction in total number of binding sites was analyzed as a function of radiation dose based on target theory, from which a radiation-sensitive mass (target size) was calculated. When the plasma membranes of insulin-treated adipocytes were used, a target size of approximately 58,000 daltons was obtained. For adipocyte microsomal membranes, we obtained target sizes of approximately 112,000 and 109,000 daltons prior to and after insulin treatment, respectively. In the case of microsomal membranes, however, inactivation data showed anomalously low radiation sensitivities at low radiation doses, which may be interpreted as indicating the presence of a radiation-sensitive inhibitor. These results suggest that the adipocyte glucose transporter occurs as a monomer in the plasma membrane while existing in the intracellular reserve pool either as a homodimer or as a stoichiometric complex with a protein of an approximately equal size.