白细胞介素及其受体研究进展

已被发现和命名的白介素有19种,其相应的受体大多也已被克隆及鉴定。白介素及其受体的结构特征决定了其信号转导和功能效应的共性和特性。许多白介素及可溶性受体在临床疾病的治疗中可能起重要作用,同时这也带动了对白介素及其受体的基因工程研究。随着基因组计划的日趋完成和一些新的分子生物学技术方法的建立,对白介素及其受体的研究在许多方面都面临着新的机遇和挑战。     

NIRF, a novel ubiquitin ligase, interacts with hepatitis B virus core protein and promotes its degradation

Hepatitis B virus (HBV) core protein (HBc) is a major component of viral nucleocapsid and a multifunctional protein involved in viral maturation and release. It is unstable and present in cells at low level because of K96 lysine residue, which is a ubiquitin acceptor site. Np95/ICBP90-like RING finger protein (NIRF) has auto-ubiquitination activity which is the hallmark of a ubiquitin ligase. In the present study, ubiquitin ligase, NIRF, binds to HBc and leads to the proteasome-mediated degradation of HBc in vivo. NIRF down-regulates HBc protein level, resulting in the decrease of the amount of HBV particles in supernatant of HepG2.2.15 cells. However knockdown of NIRF significantly increases endogenous HBc protein level, leading to HBV release. The results reveal that NIRF interacts with HBc and promotes the degradation of HBc in vivo. The pathway of NIRF-mediated ubiquitin–proteasome affects the release of HBV particles by controlling the amounts of HBc. It indicates that NIRF may participate in the maturation of HBV.     

Optimal Formation Reconfiguration Control of Multiple UCAVs Using Improved Particle Swarm Optimization

Optimal formation reconfiguration control of multiple Uninhabited Combat Air Vehicles （UCAVs） is a complicated global optimum problem. Particle Swarm Optimization （PSO） is a population based stochastic optimization technique inspired by social behaviour of bird flocking or fish schooling. PSO can achieve better results in a faster, cheaper way compared with other bio-inspired computational methods, and there are few parameters to adjust in PSO. In this paper, we propose an improved PSO model for solving the optimal formation reconfiguration control problem for multiple UCAVs. Firstly, the Control Parameterization and Time Diseretization （CPTD） method is designed in detail. Then, the mutation strategy and a special mutation-escape operator are adopted in the improved PSO model to make particles explore the search space more efficiently. The proposed strategy can produce a large speed value dynamically according to the variation of the speed, which makes the algorithm explore the local and global minima thoroughly at the same time. Series experimental results demonstrate the feasibility and effectiveness of the proposed method in solving the optimal formation reconfiguration control problem for multiple UCAVs.     

Residue conservation information for generating near-native structures in protein-protein docking

MOTIVATION: Protein-protein docking algorithms typically generate large numbers of possible complex structures with only a few of them resembling the native structure. Recently (Duan et al., Protein Sci, 14:316-218, 2005), it was observed that the surface density of conserved residue positions is high at the interface regions of interacting protein surfaces, except for antibody-antigen complexes, where a lesser number of conserved positions than average is observed at the interface regions. Using this observation, we identified putative interacting regions on the surface of interacting partners and significantly improved docking results by assigning top ranks to near-native complex structures. In this paper, we combine the residue conservation information with a widely used shape complementarity algorithm to generate candidate complex structures with a higher percentage of near-native structures (hits). What is new in this work is that the conservation information is used early in the generation stage and not only in the ranking stage of the docking algorithm. This results in a significantly larger number of generated hits and an improved predictive ability in identifying the native structure of protein-protein complexes. RESULTS: We report on results from 48 well-characterized protein complexes, which have enough residue conservation information from the same 59 benchmark complexes used in our previous work. We compute conservation indices of residue positions on the surfaces of interacting proteins using available homologous sequences from UNIPROT and calculate the solvent accessible surface area. We combine this information with shape-complementarity scores to generate candidate protein-protein complex structures. When compared with pure shape-complementarity algorithms, performed by FTDock, our method results in significantly more hits, with the improvement being over 100% in many instances. We demonstrate that residue conservation information is useful not only in refinement and scoring of docking solutions, but also helpful in enrichment of near-native-structures during the generation of candidate geometries of complex structures.     

过氧亚硝基阴离子通过JAK/STAT信号途径促进系膜细胞纤连蛋白的合成

氧化应激是糖尿病肾病的重要发病机制之一。过氧亚硝基阴离子(peroxynitrite,ONOO–)是参与氧化应激损伤的重要成员,与糖尿病及其并发症密切相关。该文观察高糖环境下ONOO–对系膜细胞合成纤连蛋白(fibronectin,FN)的影响,并探讨其作用机制。实验中,人肾小球系膜细胞分为4组:正常对照组、高糖组、高糖+尿酸组及高糖+AG490组。培养12,24,48 h后收集细胞及其上清液、并提取细胞总蛋白。采用酶联免疫吸附实验(ELISA)检测细胞上清液中FN的含量,采用免疫细胞化学和Western blot检测NT总蛋白(ONOO–生成的生物标志物)、p-JAK2及p-STAT3蛋白的表达。结果显示,与同期正常组相比,高糖组NT总蛋白、p-JAK2及p-STAT3的表达及FN含量明显增高(P<0.05),并且随着时间的延长表达逐渐增多,以48 h组最为显著;高糖+尿酸组,NT、p-JAK2、p-STAT3及FN较高糖组明显减少(P<0.05);高糖+AG490组,p-JAK2、p-STAT3及FN较高糖组明显减少(P<0.05),但NT表达与高糖组差异无统计学意义(P>0.05)。由此可见,高糖环境下系膜细胞中存在ONOO–的过量表达,ONOO–通过JAK/STAT信号途径促进系膜细胞FN的合成。     

皂荚化学成分和生物活性的研究进展

我国的皂荚植物主要有皂荚、山皂荚、野皂荚和三刺皂荚.对皂荚的萜类、黄酮类、酚酸类、甾体类等化学成分及其抗菌、杀虫、抗病毒、抗肿瘤、免疫调节作用等生物学活性进行了综述.