New insights into myosin evolution and classification.

Myosins are eukaryotic actin-dependent molecular motors important for a broad range of functions like muscle contraction, vision, hearing, cell motility, and host cell invasion of apicomplexan parasites. Myosin heavy chains consist of distinct head, neck, and tail domains and have previously been categorized into 18 different classes based on phylogenetic analysis of their conserved heads. Here we describe a comprehensive phylogenetic examination of many previously unclassified myosins, with particular emphasis on sequences from apicomplexan and other chromalveolate protists including the model organism Toxoplasma, the malaria parasite Plasmodium, and the ciliate Tetrahymena.

Pharmacological characterization of the chemokine receptor, CCR5.

1. We investigated the effects of a number of naturally occurring chemokines (MIP-1alpha, MIP-1beta, RANTES, MCP-2, MCP-3, MCP-4) on different processes linked to the chemokine receptor CCR5 in recombinant CHO cells expressing the receptor at different levels. 2.