Elevated iron deposition has been reported in Parkinson's disease (PD). However, the route of iron uptake leading to high deposition in the substantia nigra is unresolved. Here, we show a mechanism in enhanced Fe uptake via S-nitrosylation of divalent metal transporter 1 (DMT1).
View Article and Find Full Text PDFThe high-throughput antibiotic resistance gene (ARG) qPCR array, initially published in 2012, is increasingly used to quantify resistance and mobile determinants in environmental matrices. Continued utility of the array; however, necessitates improvements such as removing or redesigning questionable primer sets, updating targeted genes and coverage of available sequences. Towards this goal, a new primer design tool (EcoFunPrimer) was used to aid in identification of conserved regions of diverse genes.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFIntroduction: Retention on antiretroviral therapy (ART) is critical for the successful adoption of the test and treat policy by sub-Saharan African countries, and for realizing the United Nations programme on HIV and AIDS target of 90-90-90. This qualitative study explores HIV positive clients' reasons for discontinuing ART under the MaxART test and treat implementation study in Swaziland.
Methods: Clients identified as lost to follow-up (LTFU) in the programme database, who had initiated ART under the intervention arm of the MaxART study, were purposively selected from two facilities.
The community assembly process, which purports that the trade-off between the stochastic process and the deterministic process, is the central issue of community ecology, and is one of the most controversial ecological issues. The current research investigated the fungal community in the forests of the Guandi Mountains and elucidated the relative role of the stochastic and deterministic processes in the assembly of soil fungal community on a local scale. The correlation analysis and redundancy analysis of the physicochemical factors in soil and dominant fungal phyla, as well as the structural equation model analysis, showed that these physicochemical factors and aboveground vegetation diversity had significant effects on fungal communities.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFThe maintaining mechanism of community diversity is the core of community ecology. The mine tailing is a good field for studying on the underlying mechanism of community diversity, as a kind of original bare land with heavy metal pollution, where the physicochemical characteristics of soil change with the restoration periods. We examined the driving forces for bacterial community diversity based on the investigation of edaphic factors, plant community, and bacterial communities in Shibahe copper mine tailing, Shanxi.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFSoil microorganisms drive the biogeochemical process of carbon, nitrogen, phosphorus and sulfur, and play a key role in maintaining soil carbon sink and ecosystem function. The study on effects of environmental and spatial factors on the structure of microbial community in boreal coniferous forest soil will provide theoretical basis for making management measures in local forest ecosystem. Our research analyzed five soil fungi communities (LpMC1, LpMC2, PwMC, PtMC, and BMC) in four forest types, including forest, forest, forest and spp.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFThe relative importance of the deterministic versus stochastic processes underlying community dynamics has long been a central theme in community ecology, and is intensively debated in the field. Microbial communities play key roles in nutrient cycling and the flow of energy in ecosystems. The research on the structural dynamics of microbial community will provide data and theoretical support for understanding the assembly mechanisms of community, and for predicting the dynamics of microbial community under environmental stress.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFMining for metal and mineral resources lead to the rapid rise of tailings dams and caused serious damage to the ecological environment of the mining area. Soil physicochemical characteristics and enzyme activities were important indexes for ecosystem functions, and they were also important factors in evaluating soil restoration qualities. We selected nine sub-dams of the Eighteen River copper tailings in Yuanqu County, and analyzed the relationship between soil physicochemical properties and soil enzyme activities.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFThe cis(c)-9, trans(t)-11 (c9,t11) and t10,c12 isomers of conjugated linoleic acid (CLA) have been reported as agonists of peroxisome proliferator-activated receptor (PPAR) and beneficial in lipidemia and glycemia. However, it is unclear whether CLA isomers enhance or antagonize effects of conventional drugs targeting PPAR. Male Sprague-Dawley rats were fed high fat diet (HFD) for 8 weeks and treated without or with CLA, rosiglitazone or both for 4 weeks.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFIntroduction And Aim: Hepatocyte growth factor (HGF) has been shown to ameliorate liver inflammation and fibrosis; however, the mechanism underlying its effects in non-alcoholic steatohepatitis (NASH) is unclear. This study aimed to analyse the relationship between the JAK2-STAT3 signalling pathway and the ameliorating effect of HGF on NASH.
Material And Methods: Mice were fed a high-fat diet (HFD) for 16 weeks, and then plasma and hepatic tissues were collected.
Environmental selection and dispersal limitation are two basic processes underlying community assembly. The relative importance of those two processes differs across scales, community identities, and community types. The processes responsible for structuring microbial communities in soil of temperate subalpine forest are poorly understood.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFA large amount of available protein-protein interaction (PPI) data has been generated by high-throughput experimental techniques. Uncovering functional modules from PPI networks will help us better understand the underlying mechanisms of cellular functions. Numerous computational algorithms have been designed to identify functional modules automatically in the past decades.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFMotivation: Much global attention has been paid to antibiotic resistance in monitoring its emergence, accumulation and dissemination. For rapid characterization and quantification of antibiotic resistance genes (ARGs) in metagenomic datasets, an online analysis pipeline, ARGs-OAP has been developed consisting of a database termed Structured Antibiotic Resistance Genes (the SARG) with a hierarchical structure (ARGs type-subtype-reference sequence).
Results: The new release of the database, termed SARG version 2.
Environmental gradient have strong effects on community assembly processes. In order to reveal the effects of alkaline mine drainage (AlkMD) on bacterial and denitrifying bacterial community compositions and diversity in tailings reservoir, here we conducted an experiment to examine all and core bacterial taxa and denitrifying functional genes's (nirS, nirK, nosZ) abundance along a chemical gradient in tailings water in Shibahe copper tailings in Zhongtiaoshan, China. Differences in bacterial and denitrifying bacterial community compositions in different habitats and their relationships with environmental parameters were analyzed.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFObjective: To determine if discussing cochlear implantation (CI) with patients with enlarged vestibular aqueducts (EVA) and their families before reaching audiological criteria for CI candidacy effects the length of time between reaching audiological candidacy and CI surgery, and to describe the universal newborn hearing screening (UNHS) results and communication modality in this sample.
Patients: Forty-two patients (25 females) with confirmed EVA and cochlear implants.
Intervention(s): Diagnostic CI visit.
Silicone implants are used widely in the field of plastic surgery and are used in a large population. However, their safety profile, especially the silicone-induced immune response, has been a major concern for plastic surgeons for decades. It has been hypothesized that there is a cause and effect relation between silicone and immunity, but this is controversial.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFMitophagy is a cellular quality-control pathway, which is essential for elimination of unhealthy mitochondria. While mitophagy is critical to pancreatic β-cell function, the posttranslational signals governing β-cell mitochondrial turnover are unknown. Here, we report that ubiquitination is essential for the assembly of a mitophagy regulatory complex, comprised of the E3 ligase Nrdp1, the deubiquitinase enzyme USP8, and Clec16a, a mediator of β-cell mitophagy with unclear function.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFThe roles of specific fatty acids in breast cancer etiology are unclear, particularly among premenopausal women. We examined 34 individual fatty acids, measured in blood erythrocytes collected between 1996 and 1999, and breast cancer risk in a nested case-control study of primarily premenopausal women in the Nurses' Health Study II. Breast cancer cases diagnosed after blood collection and before June 2010 (n = 794) were matched to controls and conditional logistic regression was used to estimate OR's (95% CI's) for associations of fatty acids with breast cancer; unconditional logistic regression was used for stratified analyses.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFPyomelanin is the major constituent of pigment in melanogenic strains of bacteria. However, eumelanin, synthesized from tyrosine via L-DOPA and polyphenol oxidases (PPOs), may also be present in this genus since L-DOPA is frequently detected in culture fluids of several species. To address this question, we used a deletion mutant of strain WS, in which pyomelanin synthesis is completely blocked under normal culture conditions.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFThe objective of this study was to determine the effect of miR‑29a‑3p inhibitor on the migration and invasion of colorectal cancer cell lines (CRC) and the underlying molecular mechanisms. miR‑29a‑3p was detected using reverse transcription-quantitative polymerase chain reaction (RT‑qPCR) in the CRC cell lines HCT11, CaCo2, HT29, SW480 and SW620. An invasive subpopulation designated SW480‑7 was derived from the parental cell line, detected by Transwell and Transwell Matrigel assays.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFEnvironmental toxicants such as 2,3,7,8-tetrachlorodibenzo--dioxin (TCDD), an aryl hydrocarbon receptor (AhR), are known to induce host toxicity and structural shifts in the gut microbiota. Key bacterial populations with similar or opposing functional responses to AhR ligand exposure may potentially help regulate expression of genes associated with immune dysfunction. To examine this question and the mechanisms for AhR ligand-induced bacterial shifts, C57BL/6 gnotobiotic mice were colonized with and without segmented filamentous bacteria (SFB) - an immune activator.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFHypertrophic scar is a pathogenic form of scar formation with no recognized treatment to date. Its molecular mechanism is related to the abnormal proliferation and transition of fibroblasts and overproduction of extracellular matrix. FKBP10 is a molecular chaperone able to regulate α-smooth muscle actin expression and pro-collagen maturation in fibroblasts.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFExposure to divalent metals such as iron and manganese is thought to increase the risk for Parkinson's disease (PD). Under normal circumstances, cellular iron and manganese uptake is regulated by the divalent metal transporter 1 (DMT1). Accordingly, alterations in DMT1 levels may underlie the abnormal accumulation of metal ions and thereby disease pathogenesis.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFAntimicrobial resistance genes (ARGs) present in the environment pose a risk to human health due to potential for transfer to human pathogens. Surveillance is an integral part of mitigating environmental dissemination. Quantification of the mobile genetic element class 1 integron-integrase gene (intI1) has been proposed as a surrogate to measuring multiple ARGs.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFAnalysis of transcriptome revealed that a membrane occupation and recognition nexus (MORN) repeat protein-encoding gene of Euplotes octocarinatus (Eo-morn-9-31) was a candidate for programmed +1 ribosomal frameshifting (+1 PRF). In this study, a dual-luciferase assay was performed to detect its expression. The result showed that the MORN repeat protein (Eo-MORN-9-31) could be produced by the +1 PRF event during the process of translation in yeast and the frameshifting efficiency was about 4-5%.
View Article and Find Full Text PDF