Organophosphate pesticide chlorpyrifos and its metabolite 3,5,6-trichloropyridinol downregulate the expression of genes essential for spermatogenesis in caprine testes.

Organophosphate pesticides have potent endocrine disrupting effects, hence banned in many countries. However, many organophosphates like chlorpyrifos, malathion et cetera continue to be used in some countries (Wołejko et al., 2022; Wołejko et al.

Molecular Crosstalk Between Adherens Junction Proteins, E-cadherin and Nectin-4.

Cell-cell junctions formed by the association of cell adhesion molecules facilitate physiological events necessary for growth and development of multicellular organisms. Among them, cadherins and nectins organize and assemble to form adherens junction, which thereby mechanically couples interacting cells. A detailed understanding of the crosstalk involving these cell adhesion molecules is fundamental to the study of the various developmental processes.

Goat mammary epithelial cells provide a better expression system for production of recombinant human bone morphogenetic protein 2 compared to Chinese hamster ovarian cells.

Bone Morphogenetic Protein 2 (BMP2), a member of the Transforming Growth Factor-β (TGF-β) super family of proteins and is instrumental in the repair of fractures. The synthesis of BMP2 involves extensive post-translational processing and several studies have demonstrated the abysmally low production of rhBMP2 in eukaryotic systems, which may be due to the short half-life of the bioactive protein. Consequently, production costs of rhBMP2 are quite high, limiting its availability to the general populace.

Isolation and characterisation of promoters from mouse genome to drive post-meiotic germ cell-specific robust gene expression for functional genomics studies.

The generation of spermatozoa from developing germ cells through mitotic and meiotic divisions is a highly regulated and complex process. Any defect in this process, may lead to subfertility/infertility. The role of different transcripts (mRNA/miRNA/lncRNA) in regulation of the pre-meiotic, meiotic, and post-meiotic stages of spermatogenesis are being proposed based on various multiomics based approaches.

Molecular and structural basis of TIGIT: Nectin-4 interaction, a recently discovered pathway crucial for cancer immunotherapy.

TIGIT (T cell immunoglobulin and ITIM domain) is an inhibitory receptor expressed on T and NK cells that interact with cell surface glycoprotein belonging to the nectin and nectin-like family of cell adhesion molecules, particularly nectin-2 and nectin-like 5 (PVR). Nectin-4 has been recently identified as a novel ligand for TIGIT and the interaction among them inhibits NK cell cytotoxicity. In this study, biophysical experiments were conducted to decipher the mechanism of this novel interaction, followed by structure-guided mutagenesis studies to map the nectin-4 binding interface on TIGIT.