Can teleconnections help to improve the seasonal prediction over the Southern African Development Community Region?

The limited skill of seasonal climate predictions in some regions of the Southern African Development Community (SADC) restricts their potential application to the development of climate services. This study explores the feasibility of improving the quality of these predictions by using the observed relationship between Essential Climate Variables (ECVs) and large-scale teleconnection indices, namely Niño3.4, the Atlantic Niño and the Indian Ocean Dipole.

Stromal C-type lectin receptor COLEC12 integrates H. pylori, PGE2-EP2/4 axis and innate immunity in gastric diseases.

Tissue stroma is known to be important in regulating Hp-mediated inflammation, but its interaction with Hp and dendritic cells (DCs) remains to be determined. To this end, the potential crosstalk between H. pylori (Hp) infected gastric stromal cells (Hp-GSCs) and DCs was investigated.

Single molecule force spectroscopy reveals the molecular mechanical anisotropy of the FeS4 metal center in rubredoxin.

Mechanical anisotropy is an important feature of materials. Depending on the direction it is pulled, a material can exhibit very different mechanical properties. Mechanical anisotropy on the microscopic scale has also been observed for individual elastomeric proteins.

Anti-interleukin-6 receptor antibody inhibits the progression in human colon carcinoma cells.

Background: Interleukin-6 (IL-6) promotes proliferation and invasion in colorectal carcinoma, and serum IL-6 levels are correlated with survival in patients with colorectal carcinoma. In this study, we attempted to clarify the signal pathway downstream of IL-6 and the role of the IL-6 receptor complex in terms of the biological effects of clonogenic growth and invasiveness in colorectal carcinoma cells.

Materials And Methods: IL-6-stimulated SW480 cells were treated with IL-6 receptor neutralization antibody, mitogen-activated protein kinase (MAPK) inhibitor and phosphatidylinositol 3-kinase inhibitor, and clonogenic growth and invasiveness were assessed.

The effect of Longan seed polyphenols on colorectal carcinoma cells.

Background: Polyphenol-rich longan seed extract (LSP) is a free radical scavenger and antioxidant. However, the effect of LSP on the growth of human colorectal carcinoma cells (CRC) has not yet been evaluated.

Materials And Methods: Polyphenols of longan seeds were extracted and measured by colorimetry.

Drosophila notal bristle as a novel assessment tool for pathogenic study of Tau toxicity and screening of therapeutic compounds.

To elucidate the Tau gain-of-toxicity functional mechanism and to search for potential treatments, we overexpressed human Tau variants (hTau) in the dorsal mesothorax (notum) of Drosophila. Overexpression of Tau variants caused loss of notal bristles, and the phenotype was used for evaluating toxicity of ectopic Tau. The bristle loss phenotype was found to be highly associated with the toxicity of hyperphosphoryled Tau in flies.

Involvement of nPKC-MAPK pathway in the decrease of nucleophosmin/B23 during megakaryocytic differentiation of human myelogenous leukemia K562 cells.

Human myelogenous leukemia K562 cells were induced to undergo megakaryocytic differentiation by long-term treatment with phorbol ester 12-O-tetradecanoyl-phorbol-13-acetate (TPA). The protein level of nucleophosmin/B23 (NPM/B23), a nucleolar protein, was substantially decreased upon TPA treatment. In this study, we found that the proteasome inhibitors blocked the decrease of NPM/B23 protein in response to TPA, suggesting the proteasomes were involved in the downregulation of NPM/B23 upon megakaryocytic differentiation.