The interaction of galectin-8 C-terminal domain with cell surface glycoconjugates modulates membrane elasticity to stimulate antigen uptake and presentation to CD4 T cells.

Galectins constitute a family of soluble lectins with unique capacity to induce macroscale rearrangements upon interacting with cell membrane glycoconjugates. Galectin-8 (Gal-8) is acknowledged for its role in facilitating antigen uptake and processing upon engaging with cell surface glycoconjugates on antigen-presenting cells (APCs). Gal-8 consists of two covalently fused N- and C-terminal carbohydrate recognition domains (N- and C-CRD), each exhibiting distinct glycan specificity.

Investigating yielding behavior of heterogeneous vehicles at a semi-controlled crosswalk.

It is well known that pedestrians are vulnerable road users. Their risk of being injured or killed in road traffic crashes is even higher as vehicle drivers often violate traffic rules and do not slow down or yield in front of crosswalks. In order to reduce this risk, many countries have issued strict regulations requiring vehicles to yield to pedestrians in front of crosswalks.

Synergistic effect of GRA7 and profilin proteins in vaccination against chronic Toxoplasma gondii infection.

Toxoplasmosis is a zoonotic disease with worldwide prevalence in humans and warm-blooded animal populations. In livestock Toxoplasma gondii is the causal agent of significant economic losses since it can cause abortions in goats and sheep. It is estimated that one third of the world population is infected.

Optimized Adenoviral Vector That Enhances the Assembly of FMDV O1 Virus-Like Particles Increases Its Potential as Vaccine for Serotype O Viruses.

Although replication-defective human adenovirus type 5 (Ad5) vectors that express the capsid-encoding region of foot-and-mouth disease virus (FMDV) have been proven to be effective as vaccines in relevant species for several viral strains, the same result was not consistently achieved for the O1/Campos/Brazil/58 strain. In the present study, an optimization of the Ad5 system was explored and was proven to enhance the expression of FMDV capsid proteins and their association into virus-like particles (VLPs). Particularly, we engineered a novel Ad5 vector (Ad5[P]) which harbors the foreign transcription unit in a leftward orientation relative to the Ad5 genome, and drives the expression of the FMDV sequences from an optimized cytomegalovirus (CMV) enhancer-promoter as well.