Publications by authors named "M Kierans"
Article Synopsis
- Researchers investigated the role of specific soil fungi in releasing inorganic phosphate and removing lead from contaminated media, using organic phosphate sources.
- The fungi Aspergillus niger and Paecilomyces javanicus effectively liberated inorganic phosphate while growing on lead-containing substrates, leading to significant lead precipitation and the formation of minerals like pyromorphite and lead oxalate.
- The study highlights two main mechanisms of lead biomineralization influenced by the fungi's nutritional preferences, contributing to a better understanding of bioremediation strategies and the ecological roles of soil fungi.
Fungi play important roles in biogeochemical processes such as organic matter decomposition, bioweathering of minerals and rocks, and metal transformations and therefore influence elemental cycles for essential and potentially toxic elements, e.g., P, S, Pb, and As.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFSaprotrophic fungi were investigated for their bioweathering effects on the vanadium- and lead-containing insoluble apatite group mineral, vanadinite [Pb5 (VO4 )3 Cl]. Despite the insolubility of vanadinite, fungi exerted both biochemical and biophysical effects on the mineral including etching, penetration and formation of new biominerals. Lead oxalate was precipitated by Aspergillus niger during bioleaching of natural and synthetic vanadinite.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFMicroemulsions are physically stable oil/water clear dispersions, spontaneously formed and thermodynamically stable. They are composed in most cases of water, oil, surfactant and cosurfactant. Microemulsions are stable, self-preserving antimicrobial agents in their own right.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFBackground: Loss of function mutations in the centrosomal protein TALPID3 (KIAA0586) cause a failure of primary cilia formation in animal models and are associated with defective Hedgehog signalling. It is unclear, however, if TALPID3 is required only for primary cilia formation or if it is essential for all ciliogenesis, including that of motile cilia in multiciliate cells.
Results: FOXJ1, a key regulator of multiciliate cell fate, is expressed in the dorsal neuroectoderm of the chicken forebrain and hindbrain at stage 20HH, in areas that will give rise to choroid plexuses in both wt and talpid(3) embryos.