Plasma Citrate and Succinate Are Associated With Neurocognitive Impairment in Older People With HIV.

Background: Neurocognitive impairment (NCI) is associated with monocyte activation in people with HIV (PWH). Activated monocytes increase glycolysis, reduce oxidative phosphorylation, and accumulate citrate and succinate, tricarboxylic acid (TCA) cycle metabolites that promote inflammation-this metabolic shift may contribute to NCI and slowed gait speed in PWH.

Methods: Plasma citrate and succinate were assayed by liquid chromatography-mass spectrometry from 957 participants upon entry to a multicenter, prospective cohort of older PWH.

Bmal1 knockdown suppresses wake and increases immobility without altering orexin A, corticotrophin-releasing hormone, or glutamate decarboxylase.

Objective: To determine the effect of Bmal1 knockdown (KD) on sleep, activity, immobility, hypothalamic levels of orexin, corticotrophin-releasing hormone (CRH), and GABAergic glutamate decarboxylase (GAD).

Methods: We used Bmal1 siRNA, or control siRNA intracerebroventricular (ICV) injection to knock down Bmal1 in C57BL/6 mice. Sleep polysomnography, wheel-running activity, and tail suspension test were performed.

Proteomic profiling of the hypothalamus in two mouse models of narcolepsy.

Narcolepsy is a disabling neurological disorder of sleepiness linked to the loss of neurons producing orexin neuropeptides in the hypothalamus. Two well-characterized phenotypic mouse models of narcolepsy, loss-of-function (orexin-knockout), and progressive loss of orexin (orexin/ataxin-3) exist. The open question is whether the proteomics signatures of the hypothalamus would be different between the two models.

Proteome and Protein Network Analyses of Memory T Cells Find Altered Translation and Cell Stress Signaling in Treated Human Immunodeficiency Virus Patients Exhibiting Poor CD4 Recovery.

 Human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) patients who experience poor CD4 T-cell recovery despite viral suppression during antiretroviral therapy (ART) are known as immunological nonresponders. The molecular mechanism(s) underlying incomplete immune restoration during ART is not fully understood.  Label-free quantitative proteomics on single-cell type central memory T cells were used to reveal relative protein abundance changes between nonresponder, responder (good CD4 recovery during ART), and healthy individuals.

C57BL/6J mouse apolipoprotein A2 gene is deterministic for apnea.

Rationale: Brainstem apolipoprotein AII (apoa2) mRNA expression correlates with apnea in breathing present in the adult C57Bl/6J (B6) sleep apnea model.

Objectives: To test the hypothesis that the B6 apoa2 gene contributes to the trait, we performed plethysmographic testing in apoa2 knock out (KO: -/-) mice, an in situ brainstem-spinal cord preparation comparing KO to WT (+/+) mice, and B6xDBA recombinant inbred strains (RISs).

Measurements And Main Results: Apoa2 WT do, but KO and heterozygote (+/-) mice do not exhibit apnea during post-hypoxic breathing, measured in vivo.

Neuronal Hemoglobin Expression and Its Relevance to Multiple Sclerosis Neuropathology.

Multiple sclerosis (MS) is characterized by demyelination and progressive neurological disability. Previous studies have reported defects to mitochondria in MS including decreased expression of nuclear encoded electron transport chain subunit genes and inhibition of respiratory complexes. We previously reported increased levels of the hemoglobin β subunit (Hbb) in mitochondrial fractions isolated from postmortem MS cortex compared to controls.

Effects of orexin 2 receptor activation on apnea in the C57BL/6J mouse.

Background: The hypothesis was that an orexin 2 receptor (OX2R) agonist would prevent sleep-related disordered breathing.

Methods: In C57BL/6J (B6) mice, body plethysmography was performed with and without EEG monitoring of state (wakefulness, NREM and REM sleep). Outcome was apnea rate/h during sleep-wake states at baseline and with an intracerebroventricular administration of vehicle, 4 nMol of agonist OB(DL), and 4 nMol of an antagonist, TCS OX2 29.

A SELDI mass spectrometry study of experimental autoimmune encephalomyelitis: sample preparation, reproducibility, and differential protein expression patterns.

Background: Experimental autoimmune encephalomyelitis (EAE) is an autoimmune, inflammatory disease of the central nervous system that is widely used as a model of multiple sclerosis (MS). Mitochondrial dysfunction appears to play a role in the development of neuropathology in MS and may also play a role in disease pathology in EAE. Here, surface enhanced laser desorption ionization mass spectrometry (SELDI-MS) has been employed to obtain protein expression profiles from mitochondrially enriched fractions derived from EAE and control mouse brain.

Analysis of the mitochondrial proteome in multiple sclerosis cortex.

Mitochondrial dysfunction has been proposed to play a role in the neuropathology of multiple sclerosis (MS). Previously, we reported significant alterations in the transcription of nuclear-encoded electron transport chain genes in MS and confirmed translational alterations for components of Complexes I and III that resulted in reductions in their activity. To more thoroughly and efficiently elucidate potential alterations in the expression of mitochondrial and related proteins, we have characterized the mitochondrial proteome in postmortem MS and control cortex using Surface-Enhanced Laser Desorption Ionization Time of Flight Mass Spectrometry (SELDI-TOF-MS).