HBB contributes to individualized aconitine-induced cardiotoxicity in mice via interfering with ABHD5/AMPK/HDAC4 axis.

The root of Aconitum carmichaelii Debx. (Fuzi) is an herbal medicine used in China that exerts significant efficacy in rescuing patients from severe diseases. A key toxic compound in Fuzi, aconitine (AC), could trigger unpredictable cardiotoxicities with high-individualization, thus hinders safe application of Fuzi.

Sciadonic acid ameliorates cyclophosphamide-induced immunosuppression by modulating the immune response and altering the gut microbiota.

Background: Cyclophosphamide (Cy) is a frequently used chemotherapeutic drug, but long-term Cy treatment can cause immunosuppression and intestinal mucosal damage. The intestinal mucosal barrier and gut flora play important roles in regulating host metabolism, maintaining physiological functions and protecting immune homeostasis. Dysbiosis of the intestinal flora affects the development of the intestinal microenvironment, as well as the development of various external systemic diseases and metabolic syndrome.

Bile acids promote the development of HCC by activating inflammasome.

Background: Hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) is associated with chronic inflammation caused by different factors; especially, the interaction of inflammatory pathways and bile acids (BAs) can affect hepatocyte proliferation, death, and regeneration, but whether BAs promote HCC progression through inflammatory pathways and the mechanisms is still unclear.

Methods And Results: By examining cancer and tumor-adjacent tissue BA levels and genes associated with BA homeostasis in 37 HCC patients, we found that total bile acids (TBAs) were decreased by 36% and varying degrees of changes in factors regulating BA homeostasis (p < 0.05).

Sciadonic acid attenuates high-fat diet-induced obesity in mice with alterations in the gut microbiota.

Obesity has been reported to be associated with dysbiosis of gut microbiota. Sciadonic acid (SC) is one of the main functional components of "Merrillii" seed oil. However, the effect of SC on high-fat diet (HFD)-induced obesity has not been elucidated.

Antidiabetic effect of sciadonic acid on type 2 diabetic mice through activating the PI3K-AKT signaling pathway and altering intestinal flora.

Type 2 diabetes mellitus (T2DM) is a metabolic disease characterized by hyperglycemia. The aim of this work was to investigate the effect of sciadonic acid (SA) on disorders of glucolipid metabolism and intestinal flora imbalance and to further investigate its potential molecular mechanism of anti-diabetes. The experimental data indicated that SA could alleviate hyperlipidemia, insulin resistance, oxidative stress, the inflammatory response, repair liver function damage, and promote glycogen synthesis caused by T2DM.

c-Myc-PD-L1 Axis Sustained Gemcitabine-Resistance in Pancreatic Cancer.

Pancreatic cancer ranks fourth among cancer-related deaths, with a 5-years overall survival rate being below 10%. Gemcitabine (dFdC) has been considered the first-line drug for patients with pancreatic cancer. However, the clinical effectiveness is less than 20% due to drug resistance.

Alcohol triggered bile acid disequilibrium by suppressing BSEP to sustain hepatocellular carcinoma progression.

Bile acids (BAs), the most important components of bile, attribute predominately to maintain metabolic homeostasis. In hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) patients, the BAs homeostasis was seriously disturbed, especially in those patients with alcohol-intake history. However, whether alcohol consumption could promote HCC progression via influencing BAs homeostasis and the precise mechanism underlying are still unclear.

Tumor Microenvironment Acidity Triggers Lipid Accumulation in Liver Cancer via SCD1 Activation.

Unlabelled: Acidification is recognized as the predominant characteristic of the tumor microenvironment (TME) and contributes to tumor progression. However, the mechanism of extracellular acidic TME directly influences intercellular pathologic responses remains unclear. Meanwhile, acidic TME is mainly ascribed to aberrant metabolism of lipids and glucose, but whether and how acidity affects metabolic reprogramming, especially for lipid metabolism, is still unknown.

Screening tumor specificity targeted by arnicolide D, the active compound of Centipeda minima and molecular mechanism underlying by integrative pharmacology.

Ethnopharmacological Relevance: Herb-derived anti-tumor agents, such as paclitaxel and vincristine, exert significant but varied effectivenesses towards different cancer types. Similarly, Centipeda minima (CM) is a well-known traditional Chinese medicine that has been used to treat rhinitis, relieve pain and reduce swelling, and recently found to exert overwhelming anti-tumor effects against breast cancer, colon cancer, and nasopharyngeal carcinoma with different response rates. However, what is the optimizing cancer model that benefits most from CM, and what is the specific target underlying still require more exclusive and profound investigations.

AKR2A interacts with KCS1 to improve VLCFAs contents and chilling tolerance of Arabidopsis thaliana.

Arabidopsis thaliana AKR2A plays an important role in plant responses to cold stress. However, its exact function in plant resistance to cold stress remains unclear. In the present study, we found that the contents of very long-chain fatty acids (VLCFAs) in akr2a mutants were decreased, and the expression level of KCS1 was also reduced.

The molecular chaperon AKR2A increases the mulberry chilling-tolerant capacity by maintaining SOD activity and unsaturated fatty acids composition.

Chilling is common in nature and can damage most plant species, particularly young leaves and buds. Mulberry (Morus spp.) is an economically important food source for the domesticated silkworm (Bombyx mori).

The formation of occlusion-derived virus is affected by the expression level of ODV-E25.

Odv-e25 is a core gene of baculoviruses and encodes a 25.5 kDa protein located on both budded virus (BV) and occlusion-derived virus (ODV). Our previous study demonstrated that ODV-E25 was required for the formation of intranuclear microvesicles and ODV, and an odv-e25 deletion mutant could be rescued by re-expression of odv-e25 under its native promoter.

Immobilization of foreign protein into polyhedra of Bombyx mori nucleopolyhedrovirus (BmNPV).

In the late phase of Bombyx mori nucleopolyhedrovirus (BmNPV) infection, a large amount of polyhedra appear in the infected cell nucleolus, these polyhedra being dense protein crystals protecting the incorporated virions from the harsh environment. To investigate whether the foreign protein could be immobilized into the polyhedra of BmNPV, two recombinant baculoviruses were generated by a novel BmNPV polyhedrin-plus (polh(+)) Bac-to-Bac system, designated as vBmBac(polh(+))-enhanced green fluorescent protein (EGFP) and vBmBac(polh(+))-LacZ, which can express the polyhedrin and foreign protein simultaneously. Light microscopy analysis showed that all viruses produced polyhedra of normal appearance.

Autographa californica multiple nucleopolyhedrovirus odv-e25 (Ac94) is required for budded virus infectivity and occlusion-derived virus formation.

Autographa californica multiple nucleopolyhedrovirus (AcMNPV) odv-e25 is a core gene found in all lepidopteran baculoviruses, but its function is unknown. In this study, we generated an odv-e25-knockout AcMNPV and investigated the roles of ODV-E25 in the baculovirus life cycle. The odv-e25 knockout was subsequently rescued by reinserting the odv-e25 gene into the same virus genome.

[Co-occlusion of foreign protein into polyhedra with BmNPV polyhedrin].

In order to make clear the packing mechanism of the BmNPV polyhedra, a polyhedrin gene negative recombinant baculovirus, vBmBac(polh-)-5B-EGFP, expressing EGFP was constructed, and used to infect BmN cells jointly with wild-type BmNPV. Fluorescent microscopic observation demonstrated that EGFP and polyhedrin were expressed simultaneously, and the EGFP expression and polyhedra formation occurred in most of the jointly infected cells. Analysis of the purified polyhedra from jointly infected BmN cells showed that the foreign proteins were present in the polyhedra.

Proteomic analysis of peritrophic membrane (PM) from the midgut of fifth-instar larvae, Bombyx mori.

The insect peritrophic membrane (PM), separating midgut epithelium and intestinal contents, is protective lining for the epithelium and plays the important role in absorption of nutrients, and also is the first barrier to the pathogens ingested through oral feeding. In order to understand the biological function of silkworm larval PM, shotgun liquid chromatography tandem mass spectrometry (LC-MS/MS) approach was applied to investigate its protein composition. Total 47 proteins were identified, of which 51.

Autographa californica multiple nucleopolyhedrovirus odv-e66 is an essential gene required for oral infectivity.

Autographa californica multiple nucleopolyhedrovirus (AcMNPV) odv-e66 is a core gene and encodes an occlusion-derived virus (ODV)-specific envelope protein, ODV-E66. The N-terminal 23 amino acid of the envelope protein ODV-E66 are sufficient to direct native and fusion proteins to induced membrane microvesicles and the viral envelope during infection with AcMNPV. In this study, an odv-e66-knockout bacmid can not express N-terminal hydrophobic domains was constructed via homologous recombination in Escherichia coli.

The Bombyx mori nucleopolyhedrovirus (BmNPV) ODV-E56 envelope protein is also a per os infectivity factor.

The Bombyx mori nucleopolyhedrovirus (BmNPV) odv-e56 gene is a late gene and encodes an occlusion-derived virus (ODV)-specific envelope protein, ODV-E56. To determine its role in the BmNPV life cycle, an odv-e56 null virus, BmE56D, was constructed through homologous recombination. A repaired virus was also constructed, named BmE56DR.

Construction of a BmNPV polyhedrin-plus Bac-to-Bac baculovirus expression system for application in silkworm, Bombyx mori.

The baculovirus expression vector system is one of the most powerful and versatile eukaryotic expression systems available. However, as the recombinant baculovirus is usually generated by replacing the foreign gene into the polyhedrin locus, the resulting polyhedrin-negative virus is less infectious to the host larvae when administered via oral ingestion. This limits the large-scale production of the recombinant protein, as the host larvae can only be inoculated through dorsal injection, which is a laborious task.

Chiral ionic liquids: synthesis, properties, and enantiomeric recognition.

We have synthesized a series of structurally novel chiral ionic liquids which have a either chiral cation, chiral anion, or both. Cations are an imidazolium group, while anions are based on a borate ion with spiral structure and chiral substituents. Both (or all) stereoisomeric forms of each compound in the series can be readily synthesized in optically pure form by a simple one-step process from commercially available reagents.

Spectroscopic investigations of solvent effect on chiral interactions.

The spectrophotometric method was used to determine the mechanism of chiral interactions between a known chiral selector, tert-butyl carbamoylated quinine (t-BuCQN), and N-derivative amino acids (DNB-Leu). Results obtained on binding constants, free energy of binding (DeltaG), and difference in free energy of binding (DeltaDeltaG) values seem to suggest that there are three possible types of interactions between DNB-Leu and t-BuCQN: electrostatic interaction between the carboxylate group of the DNB-Leu and the ammonium group of the t-BuCQN, the donor-acceptor charge-transfer type of interaction between the (acceptor) aromatic group of the amino acid and the (donor) aromatic group of the t-BuCQN, and the hydrogen-bonding interaction between the amide group of the DNB-Leu and the carbonyl group of t-BuCQN. The strongest interaction will be observed if all of three interactions are in operation as in the case of DNB-Leu.

Chiral ionic liquid that functions as both solvent and chiral selector for the determination of enantiomeric compositions of pharmaceutical products.

We have successfully synthesized both enantiomers of a novel chiral ionic liquid, (R)- and (S)-[(3-chloro-2-hydroxypropyl) trimethylammonium][bis((trifluoromethyl)sulfonyl)amide] ((R)- and (S)-[CHTA]+[Tf2N]-) in optically pure form by a simple ion exchange reaction from corresponding chloride salts that are commercially available. In addition to the ease of preparation, this chiral IL has relatively high thermal stability (up to 300 degrees C), is liquid at room temperature (glass transition temperature of -58.4 degrees C), and exhibits strong enantiomeric recognition.

Near-infrared spectroscopic method for the sensitive and direct determination of aggregations of surfactants in various media.

A new cmc determination method based on a NIR spectroscopic technique has been developed. Comparing to other cmc determination methods, this NIR method is universal, sensitive, nonintrusive and nonadditive; namely, it can be used for the direct measurements of cmc of normal micelles as well as reversed micelles, without adding any dye or fluorescent probe. cmc values of various surfactants including CTAB, SDS, Triton X-100, Brij-35, Brij-700, Tween-20, SB-12, SB3-10 determined by this method agree very well with those determined by other methods.