Molecular Insights into the Rhamnolipid-Promoted Enzymatic Performance on Removing Phenolic Pollutants.

Horseradish peroxidase (HRP) is a metalloenzyme widely used in various biochemical applications but is susceptible to activity loss and instability under suboptimal conditions. In this study, rhamnolipid (RL) was, for the first time, employed as an additive to enhance the catalytic performance of HRP, including in a dual-enzyme cascade system with glucose oxidase (GOx). We carried out catalytic experiments on phenol degradation and showed that protecting HRP from deactivation is critical in maintaining the high catalytic effect in the dual-enzyme cascade.

Significance of in-situ dry-ice blasting on the microstructure, crystallinity and bonding strength of plasma-sprayed hydroxyapatite coatings.

To obtain hydroxyapatite (HA) coatings with high crystallinity which have long-term stability in clinical applications, coarse powders were usually injected to less energetic plasma. However, the HA coatings accumulated by partly melted particles usually have high porosity and poor mechanical properties, especially poor bonding strength. In this work, by profiting its quenching and mechanical impact, dry-ice blasting was in-situ employed during plasma spray process to improve the microstructure characterization and bonding strength of HA coatings.

Prognostic and predictive role of JWA and XRCC1 expressions in gastric cancer.

Purpose: To investigate the expression pattern and significance of DNA repair genes JWA and X-ray repair cross complement group 1 (XRCC1) in gastric cancer.

Experimental Design: Expressions of JWA and XRCC1 were assessed by immunohistochemistry in a training cohort and they went into a second testing cohort and finally to a validating cohort. Prognostic and predictive role of JWA and XRCC1 expression status in cases treated with surgery alone or combined with adjuvant chemotherapy was evaluated, respectively.

Overexpression of Cullin1 is associated with poor prognosis of patients with gastric cancer.

Cullin1 (Cul1) is a scaffold protein of the ubiquitin E3 ligase Skp1/Cullin1/Rbx1/F-box protein complex, which ubiquitinates a broad range of proteins involved in cell-cycle progression, signal transduction, and transcription. To investigate the role of Cullin1 in the development of gastric cancer, we examined the expression of Cullin1 in primary gastric cancer tissues and analyzed the correlation between Cullin1 expression and clinicopathologic variables and patients survival. We constructed a tissue microarray that includes 792 primary gastric cancer tissues and evaluated the Cullin1 expression by immunohistochemistry in the tumor biopsies.

Exposure to residential indoor air induces heritable DNA mutations in mice.

Exposure to the mixed indoor air pollutants released from synthetic materials and chemical products poses a serious public health problem, but little evidence has been provided to clarify whether such pollutants at environmentally relevant concentrations produce inheritable germline mutations. In the present study, mice were exposed to samples of indoor air from a newly decorated apartment bedroom. Results showed expanded simple tandem repeat (ESTR) mutations occurring in the germline of control and exposed parents, which were also detected in their offspring using three probes, Ms6-hm, Hm-2, and MMS10.

Exposure to formaldehyde induces heritable DNA mutations in mice.

Our recent studies showed that exposure to mixed indoor air pollutants in a newly decorated residential apartment induced expanded simple tandem repeats (ESTR) mutations in mice, and the mutations were mainly inherited from the paternal germ line. Formaldehyde (FA) is a type of major volatile organic chemical (VOC) present in indoor air, and a constituent known to be associated with sick building syndrome. In the present study, mice were exposed to different concentrations of FA (0, 2, 20, or 200 mg/m(3)).