Evaluation of neuroretina following i.v. or intra-CSF AAV9 gene replacement in mice with MPS IIIA, a childhood dementia.

Background: Sanfilippo syndrome (mucopolysaccharidosis type IIIA; MPS IIIA) is a childhood dementia caused by inherited mutations in the sulfamidase gene. At present, there is no treatment and children with classical disease generally die in their late teens. Intravenous or intra-cerebrospinal fluid (CSF) injection of AAV9-gene replacement is being examined in human clinical trials; evaluation of the impact on brain disease is an intense focus; however, MPS IIIA patients also experience profound, progressive photoreceptor loss, leading to night blindness.

Direct biodiesel production from wet spent coffee grounds.

Utilization of waste spent coffee grounds (SCG) remains limited and requires pre-treatment before being discarded to avoid pollution to the environment. Lipids contained in SCG could be converted to biodiesel through an transesterification method. Current transesterification of wet SCG biomass, conducted at high reaction temperature to reduce the water effect and reduce reaction time, is energy intensive.

Wnt/β-catenin signaling induces the myomiRs miR-133b and miR-206 to suppress Pax7 and induce the myogenic differentiation program.

The downregulation of Pax7 expression is an essential requirement for adult muscle progenitor cell differentiation during muscle regeneration. We previously found that canonical Wnt signals drive myogenic differentiation by positively regulating the expression of myogenic target genes, and also by negatively regulating Pax7 expression. To better understand how Wnt signals repress Pax7 expression, we screened for Wnt-regulated microRNAs (miRNAs) that could target the Pax7 3'untranslated region (UTR).

The UDP-Glycosyltransferase (UGT) Superfamily: New Members, New Functions, and Novel Paradigms.

UDP-glycosyltransferases (UGTs) catalyze the covalent addition of sugars to a broad range of lipophilic molecules. This biotransformation plays a critical role in elimination of a broad range of exogenous chemicals and by-products of endogenous metabolism, and also controls the levels and distribution of many endogenous signaling molecules. In mammals, the superfamily comprises four families: UGT1, UGT2, UGT3, and UGT8.