Characteristics of the disorder in the composition of the internal medium and kidney function of vertebrate animals after cisplatin administration

In rats, 5 days after injection of cisplatin (5 mg/kg of body weight) the urea content of the blood serum significantly increased; in pigeons, elevation of the uric acid was observed. No significant changes were found in the blood serum of the frog Rana temporaria even after injection of 40 mg/kg of cisplatin. In the black sculpin Myoxocephalus scorpius, injections of 50 mg/kg of cisplatin resulted in hypermagnesemia. Swelling of the kidney and changes in its electrolyte content were observed in rats, pigeons, and frogs, the wet weight of the kidney increased in rats and pigeons. In all the animals, accumulation of platinum in the kidney was observed, its content being dependent on the injected dose. The data obtained reveal lower sensitivity of the kidney in cold blood vertebrates to toxic effect of cisplatin and demonstrate that the pattern of disturbances in composition of the blood serum is related to the extent of the excretory function of the kidney within the species.     

ProSAAS and prohormone convertase 1 are broadly expressed during mouse development

ProSAAS (encoded by mouse gene Pcsk1n) is a recently described neuroendocrine secretory pathway protein that is cleaved into smaller peptides that may function in cell-cell signalling. ProSAAS and its processing intermediates are also potent inhibitors of prohormone convertase 1 (PC1), which is encoded by mouse gene Pcsk1. In order to gain insight into the function of proSAAS, we have examined the distribution of several proSAAS-derived peptides and PC1 by immunohistochemistry throughout mouse development. The distribution patterns of both SAAS and PC1 are broad from E9 to E11, with some enrichment in neural tube-derived tissues. By E15, the expression of SAAS is largely restricted to neuroendocrine tissues known to produce bioactive peptides. In general, the expression pattern of PC1 overlaps with that of SAAS and other proSAAS-derived peptides, consistent with the hypothesis that proSAAS functions as an endogenous PC1 inhibitor.     

On the Reproductive Diapause in the Predatory Ladybird Cheilomenes sexmaculata (Fabricius, 1781) (Coleoptera,Coccinellidae)

Entomological Review - The ability to enter reproductive diapause was experimentally studied in females of the laboratory population of the predatory ladybird Cheilomenes sexmaculata originated...     

Flux Imbalance Analysis and the Sensitivity of Cellular Growth to Changes in Metabolite Pools

Stoichiometric models of metabolism, such as flux balance analysis (FBA), are classically applied to predicting steady state rates - or fluxes - of metabolic reactions in genome-scale metabolic networks. Here we revisit the central assumption of FBA, i.e. that intracellular metabolites are at steady state, and show that deviations from flux balance (i.e. flux imbalances) are informative of some features of in vivo metabolite concentrations. Mathematically, the sensitivity of FBA to these flux imbalances is captured by a native feature of linear optimization, the dual problem, and its corresponding variables, known as shadow prices. First, using recently published data on chemostat growth of Saccharomyces cerevisae under different nutrient limitations, we show that shadow prices anticorrelate with experimentally measured degrees of growth limitation of intracellular metabolites. We next hypothesize that metabolites which are limiting for growth (and thus have very negative shadow price) cannot vary dramatically in an uncontrolled way, and must respond rapidly to perturbations. Using a collection of published datasets monitoring the time-dependent metabolomic response of Escherichia coli to carbon and nitrogen perturbations, we test this hypothesis and find that metabolites with negative shadow price indeed show lower temporal variation following a perturbation than metabolites with zero shadow price. Finally, we illustrate the broader applicability of flux imbalance analysis to other constraint-based methods. In particular, we explore the biological significance of shadow prices in a constraint-based method for integrating gene expression data with a stoichiometric model. In this case, shadow prices point to metabolites that should rise or drop in concentration in order to increase consistency between flux predictions and gene expression data. In general, these results suggest that the sensitivity of metabolic optima to violations of the steady state constraints carries biologically significant information on the processes that control intracellular metabolites in the cell.     

Ecological and evolutionary aspects of photothermal regulation of diapause in Trichogramma

Facultative winter diapause in species of the genus Trichogramma Westw. (Hymenoptera, Trichogrammatidae) is regulated, like in the majority of other insects, by photoperiod and temperature. In trichograms, prepupae are diapausing, but sensitivity to length of the light day and to temperature as to the cue factors inducing diapause is characteristic of all stages of development from embryo to the egg-laying female. The action of the cue factors affects not only the current, but also the subsequent generations. Under natural conditions the photothermal regulation provides the timely induction of the diapause coordinated both with astronomical year time (the photoperiodic reaction) and with specificity of this season (the temperature reaction). In the course of special experiments in trichograms there are also revealed the "rudimentary" reactions that have lost their adaptive role. Results of these studies prove once more that specificity of photoperiodic and temperature reactions inducing diapause and their relative importance and confinement to certain sensitive stages are determined not only by peculiarities of ecology of different insect taxa, but also by the course of their previous evolution.     

Cognitive performance in relapsing remitting multiple sclerosis: A longitudinal study in daily practice using a brief computerized cognitive battery

Background  

There is need for a cognitive test battery that can be easily used in clinical practice to detect or monitor cognitive performance in patients with multiple sclerosis (MS). In order to conduct, in this patient group, a preliminary investigation of the validity and utility of a brief computerized battery, the Cognitive Drug Research (CDR) battery, we longitudinally assessed cognition in patients with relapsing remitting (RR) MS.     

Emergence of Thamugadia ivaschkini microfilaria from the stomach into the hemocoel of Sergentomyia arpaklensis sandflies

Regularities of migration of microfilarians from the stomach to haemocoel in connection with blood digestion and peritrophic membrane formation were studied in sandflies of S. arpaklensis experimentally infected with larvae of Th. ivaschkini. Whatever the number of swallowed parasites, the average number of larvae reaching the haemocoel does not exceed 5. Factors limiting the invasion are the thick layer of prosecretion of the peritrophic membrane and a peculiar way of clot formation during the feeding of S. arpaklensis sandflies with blood of reptiles. The results obtained are compared with data on members of the genus Phlebotomus and other bloodsucking Diptera.     

On the factors inducing the inhibition of diapause in the progeny of diapause females of Trichogramma telengai

The ability to enter diapause in the progeny of Trichogramma Westw. (Hymenoptera: Trichogrammatidae) females that have undergone diapause is markedly reduced or even completely absent. This maternal inhibition of diapause can result from three types of factors: (i) environmental factors that induce maternal diapause; (ii) maternal diapause itself; and (iii) diapause‐terminating environmental factors. The present study aims to determine the factors that prevent diapause in the progeny of a Trichogramma telengai Sor. generation that has undergone diapause. Different tendencies to enter diapause in the maternal generation are induced by different photoperiods (LD 12 : 12 h, 16 : 8 h and 18 : 6 h) during development of the grandmaternal generation and different temperatures (from 10 to 15 °C) during larval development of the maternal generation. To terminate diapause, prepupae of the maternal generation are kept at 4–5 °C in the dark. To estimate the ability to enter diapause, the progeny generation is incubated at 14 °C. The results suggest that the inhibition of the tendency to enter diapause in the progeny of T. telengai females that have undergone diapause is caused by diapause itself rather than by diapause‐inducing or diapause‐terminating environmental factors. This result can be used to clarify the mechanism of the inhibition of diapause in the progeny of females that have undergone diapause.