Research on inflammatory bowel disease (IBD) has produced mounting evidence for the modulation of microRNAs (miRNAs) during pathogenesis. MiRNAs are small, non-coding RNAs that interfere with the translation of mRNAs. Their high stability in free circulation at various regions of the body allows researchers to utilise miRNAs as biomarkers and as a focus for potential treatments of IBD.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFMetagenomic profiling of the human gut microbiome has discovered DNA from dietary yeasts like Saccharomyces cerevisiae. However, it is unknown if the S. cerevisiae detected by common metagenomic methods are from dead dietary sources, or from live S.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFFront Cell Infect Microbiol
August 2021
The metabolite-rich environment that is the intestinal lumen contains metabolic by-products deriving from microbial fermentation and host cell metabolism, with resident macrophages being constantly exposed to this metabolic flux. Succinate, lactate and itaconate are three metabolites secreted by primed macrophages due to a fragmented tri-carboxylic acid (TCA) cycle. Additionally, succinate and lactate are known by-products of microbial fermentation.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFAdipic acid production by yeast fermentation is gaining attention as a renewable source of platform chemicals for making nylon products. However, adipic acid toxicity inhibits yeast growth and fermentation. Here, we performed a chemogenomic screen in to understand the cellular basis of adipic acid toxicity.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFPhage (New Rochelle)
March 2020
One of the main challenges in developing phage therapy and manufacturing phage products is the reliable evaluation of their efficacy, performance, and quality. Since phage virulence is intrinsically difficult to fully capture, researchers have turned to rapid but partially inadequate methods for its evaluation. This study demonstrates a standardized quantitative method to assess phage virulence based on three parameters: the virulence index ( )-quantifying the virulence of a phage against a host, the local virulence ( )-assessing killing potential at given multiplicities of infection (MOIs), and -the MOI at which the phage achieves 50% of its maximum theoretical virulence.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFThe conversion of plant material into biofuels and high value products is a two-step process of hydrolysing plant lignocellulose and next fermenting the sugars produced. However, lignocellulosic hydrolysis not only frees sugars for fermentation it simultaneously generates toxic chemicals, including phenolic compounds which severely inhibit yeast fermentation. To understand the molecular basis of phenolic compound toxicity, we performed genome-wide chemogenomic screens in Saccharomyces cerevisiae to identify deletion mutants that were either hypersensitive or resistant to three common phenolic compounds found in plant hydrolysates: coniferyl aldehyde, ferulic acid and 4-hydroxybenzoic acid.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFThe generation of micro- and nano-topography similar to those found in the extra cellular matrix of three-dimensional tissues is one technique used to recapitulate the cell-tissue physiology found in the native tissues. Despite the fact that ample studies have been conducted on the physiological significance of endothelial cells alignment parallel to shear stress, as this is the normal physiologic arrangement for healthy arterial EC, very few studies have examined the use of topographical signals to initiate endothelial cell alignment. Here, we have examined the ability for our mouse embryonic stem cell-derived endothelial cells (ESC-EC) to align on various microchip topographical systems.
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