The C-terminal region affects the activity of photoactivated adenylyl cyclase from Oscillatoria acuminata.

Photoactivated adenylyl cyclase (PAC) is a unique protein that, upon blue light exposure, catalyzes cAMP production. The crystal structures of two PACs, from Oscillatoria acuminata (OaPAC) and Beggiatoa sp. (bPAC), have been solved, and they show a high degree of similarity.

HLA-A26 is a risk factor for Behçet's disease ocular lesions.

Background: How HLA-A26 modulates Behçet's disease (BD) ocular lesions such as iridocyclitis and retinochorioiditis has not been scrutinized.

Methods: Ministry of Health, Labour and Welfare of Japan provided us a database of BD patients who were registered from 2003 to 2014. We selected patients who satisfied International Criteria for BD and whose data for HLA-A26 was available.

The influence of HLA-B51 on clinical manifestations among Japanese patients with Behçet's disease: A nationwide survey.

To scrutinize the influence of HLA-B51 to each clinical manifestation of patients with Behçet's disease (BD) using a database of the Ministry of Health, Labour and Welfare of Japan. The database of newly registered patients with BD was obtained from the Japanese Ministry of Health, Labour and Welfare. Patients who met International Criteria for Behçet's Disease (ICBD) and had data for HLA-B51 were selected and analyzed.

Chemical synthesis of a two-domain scorpion toxin LaIT2 and its single-domain analogs to elucidate structural factors important for insecticidal and antimicrobial activities.

Scorpion venom contains various bioactive peptides. Among them, peptides having two different structural domains constitute a toxin family known as β-KTx or scorpine-like peptides. These peptides consist of an α-helical structure in the N-terminal region and a cysteine-stabilized structure in the C-terminal region.

Stretching of single DNA molecules caused by accelerating flow on a microchip.

DNA elongation induced by fluidic stress was investigated on a microfluidic chip composed of a large inlet pool and a narrow channel. Through single-DNA observation with fluorescence microscopy, the manner of stretching of individual T4 DNA molecules (166 kbp) was monitored near the area of accelerating flow with narrowing streamlines. The results showed that the DNA long-axis length increased in a sigmoidal manner depending on the magnitude of flow acceleration, or shear, along the DNA chain.