Contrasting Roles of Islet Resident Immunoregulatory Macrophages and Dendritic Cells in Experimental Autoimmune Type 1 Diabetes

The innate immune system critically shapes diabetogenic adaptive immunity during type 1 diabetes (T1D) pathogenesis. While the role of tissue-infiltrating monocyte-derived macrophages in T1D is well established, the role of their tissue-resident counterparts remains undefined. We now demonstrate that islet resident macrophages (IRMs) from non-autoimmune mice have an immunoregulatory phenotype and powerfully induce FoxP3+ Tregs in vitro. The immunoregulatory phenotype and function of IRMs is compromised by TLR4 activation in vitro. Moreover, as T1D approaches in NOD mice, the immunoregulatory phenotype of IRMs is diminished as is their relative abundance compared to immunostimulatory DCs. Our findings suggest that maintenance of IRM abundance and their immunoregulatory phenotype may constitute a novel therapeutic strategy to prevent and/or cure T1D.     

Molecular docking of potential inhibitors with the mTOR protein

The mTOR (mammalian or mechanistic Target of Rapamycin) is linked with oral cancer. Therefore, it is of interest to study the molecular docking-based binding of paclitaxel (a FDA approved drug for oral cancer) and its analogues with mTOR. Hence, we report the binding features of 10-Deacetyltaxol, 7-Epi-10-deacetyltaxol, 7-Epi-Taxol and 6alpha-Hydroxypaclitaxel with mTOR for further consideration.     

FDRAnalysis: a tool for the integrated analysis of tandem mass spectrometry identification results from multiple search engines

Confident identification of peptides via tandem mass spectrometry underpins modern high-throughput proteomics. This has motivated considerable recent interest in the postprocessing of search engine results to increase confidence and calculate robust statistical measures, for example through the use of decoy databases to calculate false discovery rates (FDR). FDR-based analyses allow for multiple testing and can assign a single confidence value for both sets and individual peptide spectrum matches (PSMs). We recently developed an algorithm for combining the results from multiple search engines, integrating FDRs for sets of PSMs made by different search engine combinations. Here we describe a web-server and a downloadable application that makes this routinely available to the proteomics community. The web server offers a range of outputs including informative graphics to assess the confidence of the PSMs and any potential biases. The underlying pipeline also provides a basic protein inference step, integrating PSMs into protein ambiguity groups where peptides can be matched to more than one protein. Importantly, we have also implemented full support for the mzIdentML data standard, recently released by the Proteomics Standards Initiative, providing users with the ability to convert native formats to mzIdentML files, which are available to download.     

S-glutathionylation activates STIM1 and alters mitochondrial homeostasis

Oxidant stress influences many cellular processes, including cell growth, differentiation, and cell death. A well-recognized link between these processes and oxidant stress is via alterations in Ca²⁺ signaling. However, precisely how oxidants influence Ca²⁺ signaling remains unclear. Oxidant stress led to a phenotypic shift in Ca²⁺ mobilization from an oscillatory to a sustained elevated pattern via calcium release–activated calcium (CRAC)–mediated capacitive Ca²⁺ entry, and stromal interaction molecule 1 (STIM1)– and Orai1-deficient cells are resistant to oxidant stress. Functionally, oxidant-induced Ca²⁺ entry alters mitochondrial Ca²⁺ handling and bioenergetics and triggers cell death. STIM1 is S-glutathionylated at cysteine 56 in response to oxidant stress and evokes constitutive Ca²⁺ entry independent of intracellular Ca²⁺ stores. These experiments reveal that cysteine 56 is a sensor for oxidant-dependent activation of STIM1 and demonstrate a molecular link between oxidant stress and Ca²⁺ signaling via the CRAC channel.     

The multiple roles of light-harvesting chlorophyll a/b-protein complexes define structure and optimize function of Arabidopsis chloroplasts: A study using two chlorophyll b-less mutants

The multiple roles of light-harvesting chlorophyll a/b-protein complexes in the structure and function of Arabidopsis chloroplasts were investigated using two chlorophyll b-less mutants grown under metal halide lamps with a significant far-red component. In ch1-3, all six light-harvesting proteins of photosystem (PS) II were greatly decreased; in ch1-3lhcb5, Lhcb5 was completely absent while the other five proteins were further decreased. The thylakoids of ch1-3 were less negatively-charged than the wild type, and those of ch1-3lhcb5 were even less so. Despite the expected weaker electrostatic repulsion, however, thylakoids in leaves of the mutants were not well stacked, an effect we attribute to lower van der Waals attraction, lower electrostatic attraction between opposite charges, and the absence or instability of PSII supercomplexes and peripheral light-harvesting trimers. The quantum yield of oxygen evolution in leaves decreased from 0.109 (wild type) to 0.087 (ch1-3) and 0.081 (ch1-3lhcb5) O₂ (photon absorbed)^− 1; we attribute this decrease to an excessive spillover from PSII to PSI, a limited PSII antenna, and increased light-independent thermal dissipation in PSII in the mutants. Destabilization of the donor side of PSII, indicated by slower electron donation to the redox-active tyrosine Y_Z in ch1-3, probably enhanced PSII susceptibility to photoinactivation, increased the non-functional PSII complexes in vivo, and further inactivated PSII complexes in vitro. The evolution of chlorophyll b-containing chloroplasts seems to fine-tune oxygenic photosynthesis.     

Replicating rather than nonreplicating adenovirus-human immunodeficiency virus recombinant vaccines are better at eliciting potent cellular immunity and priming high-titer antibodies

A major challenge in combating the human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) epidemic is the development of vaccines capable of inducing potent, persistent cellular immunity and broadly reactive neutralizing antibody responses to HIV type 1 (HIV-1). We report here the results of a preclinical trial using the chimpanzee model to investigate a combination vaccine strategy involving sequential priming immunizations with different serotypes of adenovirus (Ad)/HIV-1(MN)env/rev recombinants and boosting with an HIV envelope subunit protein, oligomeric HIV(SF162) gp140deltaV2. The immunogenicities of replicating and nonreplicating Ad/HIV-1(MN)env/rev recombinants were compared. Replicating Ad/HIV recombinants were better at eliciting HIV-specific cellular immune responses and better at priming humoral immunity against HIV than nonreplicating Ad-HIV recombinants carrying the same gene insert. Enhanced cellular immunity was manifested by a greater frequency of HIV envelope-specific gamma interferon-secreting peripheral blood lymphocytes and better priming of T-cell proliferative responses. Enhanced humoral immunity was seen in higher anti-envelope binding and neutralizing antibody titers and better induction of antibody-dependent cellular cytotoxicity. More animals primed with replicating Ad recombinants mounted neutralizing antibodies against heterologous R5 viruses after one or two booster immunizations with the mismatched oligomeric HIV-1(SF162) gp140deltaV2 protein. These results support continued development of the replicating Ad-HIV recombinant vaccine approach and suggest that the use of replicating vectors for other vaccines may prove fruitful.     

DACH1: Its Role as a Classifier of Long Term Good Prognosis in Luminal Breast Cancer

Background

Oestrogen receptor (ER) positive (luminal) tumours account for the largest proportion of females with breast cancer. Theirs is a heterogeneous disease presenting clinical challenges in managing their treatment. Three main biological luminal groups have been identified but clinically these can be distilled into two prognostic groups in which Luminal A are accorded good prognosis and Luminal B correlate with poor prognosis. Further biomarkers are needed to attain classification consensus. Machine learning approaches like Artificial Neural Networks (ANNs) have been used for classification and identification of biomarkers in breast cancer using high throughput data. In this study, we have used an artificial neural network (ANN) approach to identify DACH1 as a candidate luminal marker and its role in predicting clinical outcome in breast cancer is assessed.

Materials and methods

A reiterative ANN approach incorporating a network inferencing algorithm was used to identify ER-associated biomarkers in a publically available cDNA microarray dataset. DACH1 was identified in having a strong influence on ER associated markers and a positive association with ER. Its clinical relevance in predicting breast cancer specific survival was investigated by statistically assessing protein expression levels after immunohistochemistry in a series of unselected breast cancers, formatted as a tissue microarray.

Results

Strong nuclear DACH1 staining is more prevalent in tubular and lobular breast cancer. Its expression correlated with ER-alpha positive tumours expressing PgR, epithelial cytokeratins (CK)18/19 and ‘luminal-like’ markers of good prognosis including FOXA1 and RERG (p<0.05). DACH1 is increased in patients showing longer cancer specific survival and disease free interval and reduced metastasis formation (p<0.001). Nuclear DACH1 showed a negative association with markers of aggressive growth and poor prognosis.

Conclusion

Nuclear DACH1 expression appears to be a Luminal A biomarker predictive of good prognosis, but is not independent of clinical stage, tumour size, NPI status or systemic therapy.     

Protein disulfide isomerase assisted protein folding in malaria parasites

In eukaryotes, the formation of protein disulfide bonds among cysteine residues is mediated by protein disulfide isomerases and occurs in the highly oxidised environment of the endoplasmic reticulum. This process is poorly understood in malaria parasites. In this paper, we report the gene isolation, sequence and phylogenetic comparisons, protein structure and thioredoxin-domain analyses of nine protein disulfide isomerases-like molecules from five species of malaria parasites including Plasmodium falciparum and Plasmodium vivax (human), Plasmodium knowlesi (simian) and Plasmodium berghei and Plasmodium yoelii (murine). Four of the studied protein disulfide isomerases belong to P. falciparum malaria and have been named PfPDI-8, PfPDI-9, PfPDI-11 and PfPDI-14, based on their chromosomal location. Among these, PfPDI-8 bears the closest similarity to a prototype PDI molecule with two thioredoxin domains (containing CGHC active sites) and a C-terminal Endoplasmic reticulum retrieval signal, SEEL. PfPDI-8 is expressed during all stages of parasite life cycle and is highly conserved (82-96% identity at amino acid level) in the other four Plasmodium species studied. Detailed biochemical analysis of PfPDI-8 revealed that this molecule is a potent oxido-reductase enzyme that facilitated the disulfide-dependent conformational folding of EBA-175, a leading malaria vaccine candidate. These studies open the avenues to understand the process of protein folding and secretory pathway in malaria parasites that in turn might aid in the production of superior recombinant vaccines and provide novel drug targets.