Increase in heart glutathione redox ratio and total antioxidant capacity and decrease in lipid peroxidation after vitamin e dietary supplementation in guinea pigs

Dietary treatment with three diets differing in vitamin E, Low E (15 mg of vitamin E/kg diet), Medium E (150 mg/kg), or High E (1,500 mg/kg), resulted in guinea pigs with low (but nondeficient), intermediate, or high heart a-tocopherol concentration. Neither the antioxidant enzymes superoxide dismutase, catalase, glutathione peroxidase, and reductase, nor the nonenzymatic antioxidants, GSH, ascorbate, and uric acid were homeostatically depressed by increases in heart a-tocopherol. Protection from both enzymatic (NADPH dependent) and nonenzymatic (ascorbate-Fe²⁺) lipid peroxidation was strongly increased by vitamin E supplementation from Low to Medium E Whereas no additional gain was obtained from the Medium E to the High E group. The GSH/GSSG and GSH/total glutathione ratios increased as a function of the vitamin E dietary concentration closely resembling the shape of the dependence of heart a-tocopherol on dietary vitamin E. The results show the capacity of dietary vitamin E to increase the global antioxidant capacity of the heart and to improve the heart redox status in both the lipid and water-soluble compartments. This capacity occurred at levels six times higher than the minimum daily requirement of vitamin E, even in the presence of optimum dietary vitamin C concentrations and basal unstressed conditions. The need for vitamin E dietary supplementation seems specially important in this tissue due to the low constitutive levels of endogenous enzymatic and nonenzymatic antioxidants present of the mammalian heart in comparison with those of other internal organs.     

The CUPID (Cultural and Psychosocial Influences on Disability) study: methods of data collection and characteristics of study sample

Background

The CUPID (Cultural and Psychosocial Influences on Disability) study was established to explore the hypothesis that common musculoskeletal disorders (MSDs) and associated disability are importantly influenced by culturally determined health beliefs and expectations. This paper describes the methods of data collection and various characteristics of the study sample.

Methods/Principal Findings

A standardised questionnaire covering musculoskeletal symptoms, disability and potential risk factors, was used to collect information from 47 samples of nurses, office workers, and other (mostly manual) workers in 18 countries from six continents. In addition, local investigators provided data on economic aspects of employment for each occupational group. Participation exceeded 80% in 33 of the 47 occupational groups, and after pre-specified exclusions, analysis was based on 12,426 subjects (92 to 1018 per occupational group). As expected, there was high usage of computer keyboards by office workers, while nurses had the highest prevalence of heavy manual lifting in all but one country. There was substantial heterogeneity between occupational groups in economic and psychosocial aspects of work; three- to five-fold variation in awareness of someone outside work with musculoskeletal pain; and more than ten-fold variation in the prevalence of adverse health beliefs about back and arm pain, and in awareness of terms such as “repetitive strain injury” (RSI).

Conclusions/Significance

The large differences in psychosocial risk factors (including knowledge and beliefs about MSDs) between occupational groups should allow the study hypothesis to be addressed effectively.     

Humpback whale abundance in the North Pacific estimated by photographic capture‐recapture with bias correction from simulation studies

We estimated the abundance of humpback whales in the North Pacific by capture‐recapture methods using over 18,000 fluke identification photographs collected in 2004–2006. Our best estimate of abundance was 21,808 (CV = 0.04). We estimated the biases in this value using a simulation model. Births and deaths, which violate the assumption of a closed population, resulted in a bias of +5.2%, exclusion of calves in samples resulted in a bias of ?10.5%, failure to achieve random geographic sampling resulted in a bias of ?0.4%, and missed matches resulted in a bias of +9.3%. Known sex‐biased sampling favoring males in breeding areas did not add significant bias if both sexes are proportionately sampled in the feeding areas. Our best estimate of abundance was 21,063 after accounting for a net bias of +3.5%. This estimate is likely to be lower than the true abundance due to two additional sources of bias: individual heterogeneity in the probability of being sampled (unquantified) and the likely existence of an unknown and unsampled breeding area (?8.7%). Results confirm that the overall humpback whale population in the North Pacific has continued to increase and is now greater than some prior estimates of prewhaling abundance.     

Pharmaco-toxicological study of Kageneckia oblonga, Rosaceae

The probable antipyretic, antiinflammatory, analgesic and antioxidant properties of Kageneckia oblonga, Rosaceae, were investigated and the major compounds of its active extracts were isolated. The study comprised the acute toxicity of the extracts of global methanol, hexane, dichloromethane and methanol. The cytotoxicity of global methanol extract was studied in three tumoral cell lines. All the extracts exhibited the pharmacological activities under study. Methanol and dichloromethane were the most toxic extracts. From the global methanol extract, isolations were performed of prunasin, 23,24- dihydro-cucurbitacin F, and a new cucurbitacin, 3beta-(beta-D-glucosyloxy)-16alpha,23alpha-epoxycucurbita-5,24-diene-11-one. The cytotoxicity of both cucurbitacins on human neutrophils at the assayed concentrations was not statistically significant. In-vitro assays showed that both cucurbitacins can be partly responsible for the analgesic, antipyretic, and anti-inflammatory activities. Evaluation was done of the cytotoxicity of global methanol extract, 23, 24-dihydrocucurbitacin F, aqueous extracts and prunasin against P-388 murine leukaemia, A-549 human lung carcinoma and HT-29 colon carcinoma. Since global methanol extract presented a strong cytotoxicity against P-388 murine leukaemia, A-549 human lung carcinoma, and HT-29 cell lines, it is highly probable that this extract contain one or more cytotoxic compounds that could be investigated for their potential use as an agent against cancer.     

Genomic compatibility between two phyllotine rodent species evaluated through their hybrids

In order to investigate the genomic compatibility between allopatric rodent species, Phyllotis darwini and Phyllotis magister, we have studied several cytogenetic and reproductive features of their laboratory hybrids. Of thirty-one pairings between species, only five were successful, producing eleven newborns. Like parents, hybrids had 38 metacentric chromosomes, except for the subtelocentric Y chromosome inherited from P. magister. There was almost total C and G band correspondence between homeologous autosomes. However, parental sex chromosomes had different morphology, C and G bands. Ag-NOR bands appeared as small telomeric Ag+ regions, distributed in four chromosomal pairs of darwini, three of magister and four homeologous chromosomes of the hybrids. The three forms had similar indexes of NOR activity per cell, in spite of the variability in NOR expression which was always detected. Usually, only one member of parental homologous chromosomes showed AgNOR+; nevertheless, both homeologous chromosomes were active in many hybrid cells. The frequencies of cells that expressed their ribosomal genes in the two homologous or homeologous NOR chromosomes were similar in parental and hybrid cells. These results strongly suggest that ribosomal genes of both parental genomes would function codominantly in the hybrids. The gonad histological and morphometric analyses showed that hybrids conformed to Haldane's rule, since females were fertile and males were infertile. Our results indicate that P. darwini and P. magister genomes can function in relative harmony and compatibility when they are placed together in their laboratory generated hybrids, suggesting that these species have few genetic differences, probably because they have recently diverged.     

First account on the larval biology of a Litomosoides filaria,from a bat

Litomosoides filariae are parasites of unrelated groups of hosts, including bats, marsupials, ancient and modern rodents. The four life cycles to-date elucidated, develop in terrestrial mammals and, at least experimentally, in the mite Ornithonyssus bacoti. A batch of mites was fed on an infected bat, Artibeus jamaicensis captured in Costa Rica, and 18 days later one infective larva was recovered. Its morphology was similar to that of other Litomosoides species, with the characteristic long buccal capsule. These first accounts on the larval biology of Litomosoides from Microchiroptera confirm the unity of the genus which supports the view that it has passed from one group of hosts to another by means of captures.     

p53 codon 72 polymorphism and risk of cervical cancer

Storey et al. (1998) implicated the proline/argine polymorphism of the codon 72 of the tumor-suppressor gene p53 in the development of cervical cancer (CC) with the observation that the p53 protein is more efficiently inactivated by the E6 oncoprotein of human papillomavirus in p53 arginine as compared with its proline isoform. These authors further noted that in the United Kingdom, individuals homozygous for the arginine allele were several times more susceptible to HPV-associated tumorigenesis that proline/arginine heterozygotes. Subsequent studies in different countries failed to unanimously confirm this association. Motivated by the high incidence of CC in Chile, we undertook a case control study obtaining the following frequencies for genotypes PP, AP and AA in 60 ICC cases and 53 carefully selected controls: 0.067, 0.250, 0.683 and 0.075, 0.453, 0.472 respectively. A significant difference (X2 = 3.19 p < 0.02) and an odds ratio of 2.62 supported Storey et al (1998)'s results. In addition, rejecting previous hypotheses about the world distribution of the p53 codon 72 polymorphism, we conclude that this distribution most likely represents ancient human dispersal routes. Several methodological and biological explanations for the results obtained in previous negative association studies are briefly discussed.     

Limitations on geminivirus genome size imposed by plasmodesmata and virus-encoded movement protein: insights into DNA trafficking

Animals and plants evolved systems to permit non-cell-autonomous trafficking of RNA, whereas DNA plays a cell-autonomous role. In plants, plasmodesmata serve as the conduit for this phenomenon, and viruses have evolved to use this pathway for the spread of infectious nucleic acids. In this study, a plant DNA virus was used to explore the constraints imposed on the movement of DNA through this endogenous RNA trafficking pathway. The combined properties of the geminivirus-encoded movement protein and plasmodesmata were shown to impose a strict limitation on the size of the viral genome at the level of cell-to-cell movement. Size-increased viral genome components underwent homologous and nonhomologous recombination to overcome this strict limitation. Our results provide insights into the genetic mechanisms that underlie viral evolution and provide a likely explanation for why relatively few types of plant DNA viruses have evolved: they would have had to overcome the constraints imposed by an endogenous system operating to ensure that DNA acts in a cell-autonomous manner.     

The Guanine Nucleotide Exchange Factor ARNO mediates the activation of ARF and phospholipase D by insulin

Background  

Phospholipase D (PLD) is involved in many signaling pathways. In most systems, the activity of PLD is primarily regulated by the members of the ADP-Ribosylation Factor (ARF) family of GTPases, but the mechanism of activation of PLD and ARF by extracellular signals has not been fully established. Here we tested the hypothesis that ARF-guanine nucleotide exchange factors (ARF-GEFs) of the cytohesin/ARNO family mediate the activation of ARF and PLD by insulin.     

Anion protection of CuZnSOD during peroxidative activity with H(2)O(2)

The "peroxidase" activity of the copper-zinc superoxide dismutase is a poorly sustained activity because of the competing inactivation of the enzyme. New evidence suggests that the bound oxidant may be partitioning between oxidizing the enzyme or oxidizing small anions. At constant peroxide, nitrite and azide only partially protect the enzyme (50%) against loss of copper(I) and inactivation up to one anion per copper. Beyond that level, there is no further protection. Bicarbonate ion also protects, but larger amounts are required. These data suggest that there is significant oxidation of the enzyme even in the presence of the small anions and therefore the formation of the bound oxidant cannot be sustained in a true catalytic process.