浙江及其邻近地区的紫堇属植物

浙江及其邻近地区有紫堇属(Corydalis Vent.)植物18种、5变种和1变型。本文各并了2变种,订正了1种的名称,发表2个新变种——全叶土元胡和浙江黄堇,并提升1个变种——无距小花黄堇。讨论了小花黄堇、全叶延胡索和台湾黄堇的某些问题。文中附名录和分布表及种子扫描电镜照片10张。     

金花茶子叶在离体培养中胚状体的发生和小植株的形成

研究了金花茶(Camellia chrysantha(Hu)Tuyama)子叶在离体培养中体细胞胚状体发生的条件。在MS基本培养基中附加苄基嘌呤(BA)或苄基嘌呤与萘乙酸(NAA)组合,诱导了胚状体发生。组织学观察表明,胚状体起源于子叶的表皮细胞。在增添细胞分裂素和生长素的MS或改良B_5液体培养基里振荡培养,明显地促进了胚状体根的生长和茎的发育。胚状体在继代培养中能保持旺盛的再生能力。已得到两个繁殖率较高的胚状体无性系。在合适的条件下,胚状体能长成正常的小植株。     

甲状腺激素对豚鼠卡那霉素中毒性耳聋的预防作用

卡那霉素、庆大霉素等抗生素常引起耳聋,目前尚无较好的防治方法。卡那霉素对内耳的毒性作用,主要先影响有关的酶功能,继而破坏毛细胞而致聋。甲状腺激素具有促进蛋白质合成、增强细胞生物氧化的功能。因此可能具有减轻卡那霉素耳毒性的作用。本实验以耳廓反射、内耳生物电及耳蜗铺片为指标,观察甲状腺激素对卡那霉素耳中毒的预防。实验豚鼠分两组,各13只,对照组每天注射卡那霉素300mg/kg,共10天;甲状腺素组先隔天服甲状腺片20mg共四次,以后给予与对照组相同剂量卡那霉素,同时仍隔天服甲状腺片20mg直至停药后16天,前后总共服17次。结果:(1)耳廓反射阈变化,对8、4、2KHz三个频率听力均下降的耳,对照组为11只耳,甲状腺素组为3只耳,两者差异显著。听力下降的频率范围及程度,对照组比甲状腺素组更大。对照组听力下降开始出现的时间明显早于甲状腺素组;(2)内耳生物电,0～80dβ不同程度短声引起的耳蜗微音器电位与听神经动作电位幅值甲状腺素组动物均高于对照组;(8)耳蜗铺片,对照组大部分动物耳蜗各回的毛细胞严重变性缺损,甲状腺素组耳蜗病变仅局限在底回。以上结果表明甲状腺激素能减轻卡那霉素的耳毒性,为耳毒性抗生素致聋的防治提供了一条新的研究途径。     

Combined radiation therapy and dendritic cell vaccine for treating solid tumors with liver micro-metastasis

BACKGROUND: Tumor metastasis and relapse are major obstacles in combating human malignant diseases. Neither radiotherapy alone nor injection of dendritic cells (DCs) can successfully overcome this problem. Radiation induces tumor cell apoptosis and necrosis, resulting in the release of tumor antigen and danger signals, which are favorable for DC capturing antigens and maturation. Hence, the strategy of combined irradiation and DC vaccine may be a novel approach for treating human malignancies and early metastasis. METHODS: To develop an effective combined therapeutic approach, we established a novel concomitant local tumor and liver metastases model through subcutaneous (s.c.) and intravenous (i.v.) injection. We selected the optimal time for DC injection after irradiation and investigated the antitumor effect of combining irradiation with DC intratumoral injection and the related mechanism. RESULTS: Combined treatment with radiotherapy and DC vaccine could induce a potent antitumor immune response, resulting in a significant decrease in the rate of local tumor relapse and the numbers of liver metastases. The related mechanisms for this strong antitumor immunity of this combined therapy might be associated with the production of apoptotic and necrotic tumor antigens and heat shock proteins after irradiation, phagocytosis, migration and maturation of DCs, and induction of more efficient tumor-specific cytotoxic T lymphocyte activity through a cross-presentation pathway. CONCLUSIONS: Co-administration of local irradiation and intratumoral DC injection may be a promising strategy for treating radiosensitive tumors and eliminating metastasis in the clinic.     

Orbilia querci sp. nov. and its knob-forming nematophagous anamorph

Orbilia querci, a new nematode-trapping fungus, was found on rotten wood of Quercus sp. in Huai-rou County, Beijing, China. It is characterized by having a tear-shaped spore body in the cylindrical ascospore. Pure culture was obtained from the ascospores. Conidiophores were simple or occasionally branched, bearing a single conidium on the tip. Conidia were spindle-shaped, mostly with 3-septa. Nematodes were captured by means of adhesive stalked knobs. The adhesive knobs were produced frequently on nutritional agar plates even in the absence of challenging nematodes. Its anamorph is placed in Dactylellina and named as D. querci. The sequence divergence of the ITS1 region between the fungus and the other knob-forming species tested was 23.8-33.4%, supporting O. querci as a distinct species. This is the first report of the connection between a knob-forming nematophagous hyphomycete and an Orbilia teleomorph.     

Ubiquitous expression of mRFP1 in transgenic mice

Fluorescent proteins provide a powerful means to track gene expression and cellular behaviors in the study of model organisms such as mice. Among the new generation of fluorescent protein markers, the monomeric red fluorescent protein mRFP1 is particularly attractive because of its rapid maturation and minimal interference with GFP and GFP-derived markers. Here we evaluate the utility of mRFP1 as a marker in transgenic mice. We show that high level and ubiquitous expression of mRFP1 does not affect mouse development, general physiology, or reproduction. mRFP1 expression can be readily detected with unaided eyes under daylight in transgenic mice on the albino background. The intensity of mRFP1 signals can be used to distinguish homozygous and heterozygous transgenic mice. Together, these features make mRFP1 an attractive marker for broad applications in transgenic research.     

Modeling the water use efficiency of soybean and maize plants under environmental stresses: application of a synthetic model of photosynthesis-transpiration based on stomatal behavior

Understanding the variability of plant WUE and its control mechanism can promote the comprehension to the coupling relationship of water and carbon cycle in terrestrial ecosystem, which is the foundation for developing water-carbon coupling cycle model. In this paper, we made clear the differences of net assimilation rate, transpiration rate, and WUE between the two species by comparing the experiment data of soybean (Glycine max Merr.) and maize (Zea mays L.) plants under water and soil nutrient stresses. WUE of maize was about two and a half times more than that of soybean in the same weather conditions. Enhancement of water stresses led to the marked decrease of Am and Em of two species, but water stresses of some degree could improve WUE, and this effect was more obvious for soybean. WUE of the two species changed with psiL in a second-order curve relation, and the WUE at high fertilization was higher than that at low fertilization, this effect was especially obvious for maize. Moreover, according to the synthetic model of photosynthesis-transpiration based on stomatal behavior (SMPTSB) presented by Yu et al. (2001), the WUE model and its applicability were discussed with the data measured in this experiment. The WUE estimated by means of the model accorded well with the measured values. However, this model underestimated the WUE for maize slightly, thus further improvement on the original model was made in this study. Finally, by discussing some physiological factors controlling Am and WUE, we made clear the physiological explanation for differences of the relative contributions of stomata- and mesophyll processes to control of Am and WUE, and the applicability of WUE model between the two species. Because the requirement to stomatal conductance by unit change of net assimilation rate is different, the responses of opening-closing activity of stomata to environmental stresses are different between the two species. To obtain the same level of net assimilation rate, soybean has to open its stomata more widely to keep small stomatal resistance, as compared with maize.     

Increase of PTP levels in vascular injury and in cultured aortic smooth muscle cells treated with specific growth factors

Migration and proliferation of vascular smooth muscle cells are key events in injury-induced neointima formation. Several growth factors and ANG II are thought to be involved in neointima formation. A recent report indicated that vascular injury is associated with increased mRNA levels of protein tyrosine phosphatase (PTP)-1B (PTP-1B). In the present study, we tested the following hypotheses: 1) rat carotid artery injury induces the expression of PTP-1B, Src homology-2 domain phosphatase (SHP-2), and PTP-proline, glutamate, serine, and threonine sequence (PEST) protein; and 2) polypeptide growth factors as well as ANG II increase the levels of tyrosine phosphatases in cultured rat aortic smooth muscle cells. We found that vascular injury induced by balloon catheter increases the protein levels of aforementioned phosphatases and that these effects occur in a PTP specific, as well as temporally and regionally specific, manner. Moreover, treatment of cultured primary rat aortic smooth muscle cells with PDGF or bFGF, but not with IGF1, EGF, or ANG II, increases PTP-1B, SHP-2, and PTP-PEST protein levels. These results suggest that increased PDGF and bFGF levels, occurring after vascular injury, may induce expression of several PTPs.