Current advances and future prospects in production of recombinant insulin and other proteins to treat diabetes mellitus

Biotechnology Letters - Diabetes mellitus is the most prevalent deadly disease caused by the destruction and dysfunction of pancreatic β cells that consequentially increased blood glucose...     

Effect of Different Physical Factors on efficacy of Thevetia Peruviana leaf extract and bio-formulations

Plant extract possess various secondary metabolites which are antifungal in nature and can be used as a safer alternative to the synthetic fungicides. As we all know that the chemical fungicides are harmful not only for humans but also for animals, other vegetation and for complete ecosystem. To overcome this problem, we have to focused on another alternative which are biologically libel and nonhazardous also. In the present study, herbal formulation was prepared in various combination ratios with Thevetia peruviana leaf extracts, cow dung and neem oil cake. The major aim of this short study is to check the stability of the said plant extracts and prepared herbal formulation on various physical factors like heat, temperature, pH, sunlight and storage etc. The extracts and herbal formulations were exposed to varying conditions of the parameters selected for a precise time period, and then observing the effect as a function of change in the crude extract activity, herbal formulation activity and change minimum inhibitory concentration of plant extract against the Alternaria solani. Control set of MIC, and extract free medium were maintained for comparison in each set of experiment against Alternaria solani. Results suggested that efficacy of leaf extracts and different formulations was not affected by wet heat up to 100 °C while slight reduction in antifungal activity of the plant extract and herbal formulations were observed with dry heat at 100 °C. In addition, slight reduction in activity of extract and herbal formulations was observed with change in pH. However antifungal activity of plant extract as well as herbal formulations, remain unaffected at alkaline pH (pH 9) and neutral pH (pH7). Storage for 6 and 12 months had no negative effect on extract and herbal formulation efficacy and the antifungal activity was observed similar to freshly prepared extract activity. The present study concluded that the plant disease or plant pathogens can be controlled by plant extract and plant based bioformulations by increasing the shelf life with some little changes in the physical parameters such as light, temperature, pH and storage.     

Probiotic properties of yeasts in traditional fermented foods and beverages

The interest in potentiality and functionality of probiotic yeasts from fermented foods has increased drastically over the years. In many fermented foods and beverages, lactic acid bacteria and yeasts exist synergistically by stimulating their growth and survival. Probiotic strains of lactic acid bacteria are more widely studied than potential probiotic yeasts. Saccharomyces cerevisiae variety boulardii is the only commercialized probiotic yeast, which are extensively studied. This review article provides information on the presence of potential probiotic yeasts in some traditional fermented foods and beverages.     

“Ethno-microbiology” of ethnic Indian fermented foods and alcoholic beverages

The concept of “ethno-microbiology” is to understand the indigenous knowledge of the Indian people for production of culturally and organoleptically acceptable fermented foods by natural fermentation. About 1000 types of common, uncommon, rare, exotic and artisan fermented foods and beverages are prepared and consumed in different geographical regions by multi-ethnic communities in India. Indian fermented foods are mostly acidic and some are alkaline, along with various types of alcoholic beverages. A colossal diversity of microorganisms comprising bacteria mostly belongs to phylum Firmicutes, filamentous moulds and enzyme- and alcohol-producing yeasts under phyla Ascomycota and Mucoromycota, and few bacteriophages and archaea have been reported from Indian fermented foods. Some microorganisms associated with fermented foods have functionalities and health promoting benefits. “Ethno-microbiology” of ethnic Indian people has exhibited the proper utilisation of substrates either singly or in combination such as fermented cereal-legume mixture (idli, dosa and dhokla) in South and West India, sticky fermented soybean food (kinema and related foods), fermented perishable leafy vegetable (gundruk and related foods), fermented bamboo shoots (soibum and related foods) and fermented fish (ngari and others) in North East India, and fermented meat and sausage-like products in the Indian Himalayas, fermented coconut beverage (toddy) in coastal regions, and various types of naturally fermented milk products (dahi and related products) in different regions of India. This review has also highlighted the “ethno-microbiology” knowledge of the people involving the consortia of essential microorganisms in traditionally prepared amylolytic starters for production of cereal-based alcoholic beverages. The novelty of this review is the interpretation of ethno-microbiological knowledge innovated by ethnic Indian people on the use of beneficial microorganisms for food fermentation to obtain the desired fermented food products for consumption.     

A comparative in silico analysis of Rab5 proteins from pathogenic species to find its role in the pathogenesis

The enteric protozoan parasite, Entamoeba histolytica (Eh), is the causative agent of amoebic dysentery and liver abscess in humans. It infects around 50 million people worldwide, which is a third general cause of death from parasitic diseases after malaria and schistosomiasis. The other prevalent form of the disease is Visceral leishmaniasis caused by Leishmania donovani which is a human blood parasite. On the other hand, the Toxoplasma gondii is an obligate intracellular protozoan parasite; it causes serious opportunistic infections in HIV‐positive persons. The biological processes in all living organisms are mostly mediated by the proteins, and recognizing new target proteins and finding their function in pathogenesis will help in choosing better diagnostic markers. In eukaryotes, Rab protein plays a major role in pathogenesis. Rabs represent the largest branch in the Ras superfamily of GTPases. Among them, the Rab5 is important in the endocytosis and thus involved in pathogenesis. In this paper, we discussed the physiochemical profiling, modelling, and docking of the Rab5 protein from pathogenic species that is Entamoeba histolytica, Leishmania donovani, and Toxoplasma gondii. The modeled structures from this study and the key residues identified would give a better understanding of the three‐dimensional structure and functional insights into these proteins and help in developing new drug targets.     

Characterization of MCU-Binding Proteins MCUR1 and CCDC90B — Representatives of a Protein Family Conserved in Prokaryotes and Eukaryotic Organelles

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Patients with a non-dysferlin Miyoshi myopathy have a novel membrane repair defect

Two autosomal recessive muscle diseases, limb girdle muscular dystrophy type 2B (LGMD2B) and Miyoshi myopathy (MM), are caused by mutations in the dysferlin gene. These mutations result in poor ability to repair cell membrane damage, which is suggested to be the cause for this disease. However, many patients who share clinical features with MM-type muscular dystrophy do not carry mutations in dysferlin gene. To understand the basis of MM that is not due to mutations in dysferlin gene, we analyzed cells from patients in one such family. In these patients, we found no defects in several potential candidates - annexin A2, caveolin-3, myoferlin and the MMD2 locus on chromosome 10p. Similar to dysferlinopathy, these cells also exhibit membrane repair defects and the severity of the defect correlated with severity of their disease. However, unlike dysferlinopathy, none of the conventional membrane repair pathways are defective in these patient cells. These results add to the existing evidence that cell membrane repair defect may be responsible for MM-type muscular dystrophy and indicate that a previously unsuspected genetic lesion that affects cell membrane repair pathway is responsible for the disease in the non-dysferlin MM patients.     

Using comparative genomics to reorder the human genome sequence into a virtual sheep genome

Background

Is it possible to construct an accurate and detailed subgene-level map of a genome using bacterial artificial chromosome (BAC) end sequences, a sparse marker map, and the sequences of other genomes?

Results

A sheep BAC library, CHORI-243, was constructed and the BAC end sequences were determined and mapped with high sensitivity and low specificity onto the frameworks of the human, dog, and cow genomes. To maximize genome coverage, the coordinates of all BAC end sequence hits to the cow and dog genomes were also converted to the equivalent human genome coordinates. The 84,624 sheep BACs (about 5.4-fold genome coverage) with paired ends in the correct orientation (tail-to-tail) and spacing, combined with information from sheep BAC comparative genome contigs (CGCs) built separately on the dog and cow genomes, were used to construct 1,172 sheep BAC-CGCs, covering 91.2% of the human genome. Clustered non-tail-to-tail and outsize BACs located close to the ends of many BAC-CGCs linked BAC-CGCs covering about 70% of the genome to at least one other BAC-CGC on the same chromosome. Using the BAC-CGCs, the intrachromosomal and interchromosomal BAC-CGC linkage information, human/cow and vertebrate synteny, and the sheep marker map, a virtual sheep genome was constructed. To identify BACs potentially located in gaps between BAC-CGCs, an additional set of 55,668 sheep BACs were positioned on the sheep genome with lower confidence. A coordinate conversion process allowed us to transfer human genes and other genome features to the virtual sheep genome to display on a sheep genome browser.

Conclusion

We demonstrate that limited sequencing of BACs combined with positioning on a well assembled genome and integrating locations from other less well assembled genomes can yield extensive, detailed subgene-level maps of mammalian genomes, for which genomic resources are currently limited.