Calcium Export from Neurons and Multi-Kinase Signaling Cascades Contribute to Ouabain Neuroprotection in Hyperhomocysteinemia.

Pathological homocysteine (HCY) accumulation in the human plasma, known as hyperhomocysteinemia, exacerbates neurodegenerative diseases because, in the brain, this amino acid acts as a persistent -methyl-d-aspartate receptor agonist. We studied the effects of 0.1-1 nM ouabain on intracellular Ca signaling, mitochondrial inner membrane voltage (φ), and cell viability in primary cultures of rat cortical neurons in glutamate and HCY neurotoxic insults.

Crystal structure and location of gp131 in the bacteriophage phiKZ virion.

Pseudomonas phage ϕKZ and its two close relatives ϕPA3 and 201ϕ2-1 are very large bacteriophages that form a separate branch in phage classification because their genomes are very different from the rest of GenBank sequence data. The contractile tail of ϕKZ is built from at least 32 different proteins, but a definitive structural function is assigned to only one of them-the tail sheath protein. Here, we report the crystal structure of the C-terminal domain of another phiKZ tail protein, gene product 131 (gp131C).