Effects of rotigotine on clinical symptoms, quality of life and sleep hygiene adequacy in haemodialysis-associated restless legs syndrome.

Background: Restless legs syndrome (RLS) is a neurological disorder characterised by bothersome symptoms associated with impaired quality of life and sleep hygiene. Rotigotine is a novel therapeutic alternative, although few studies have been published in patients on haemodialysis (HD) with RLS treated with rotigotine.

Objectives: 1.

Neuromuscular electrostimulation: a new therapeutic option to improve radio-cephalic arteriovenous fistula maturation in end-stage chronic kidney disease patients.

Background: Radio-cephalic arteriovenous fistula (RCAVF) is the gold standard vascular access for end-stage chronic kidney disease patients. Exercises after arteriovenous fistula (AVF) creation improve maturation. No articles are published regarding neuromuscular electrostimulation (NMES) in AVF maturation.

Clinical Utility of a New Predicting Score for Radiocephalic Arteriovenous Fistula Survival.

Background: Radiocephalic arteriovenous fistula (RC-AVF) is the recommended first choice for vascular access (VA). The CAVeAT scoring system was recently published (ipsilateral central venous catheter access, age >73 years, vein <2.2 mm, lower limb angioplasty, and absent intraoperative thrill).

The effect of neuromuscular electrical stimulation on muscle strength, functional capacity and body composition in haemodialysis patients.

Introduction: Haemodialysis (HD) patients are characterised by significant muscle loss. Recently, neuromuscular electrical stimulation (NMES) has emerged as a new therapeutic alternative to improve these patients' physical condition. To date, no studies on the effects of NMES on body composition in HD patients have been published.

Magnetic resonance spectroscopy and imaging on fresh human brain tumor biopsies at microscopic resolution.

The metabolic composition and concentration knowledge provided by magnetic resonance spectroscopy (MRS) liquid and high-resolution magic angle spinning spectroscopy (HR-MAS) has a relevant impact in clinical practice during magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) monitoring of human tumors. In addition, the combination of morphological and chemical information by MRI and MRS has been particularly useful for diagnosis and prognosis of tumor evolution. MRI spatial resolution reachable in human beings is limited for safety reasons and the demanding necessary conditions are only applicable on experimental model animals.

Development of a three-dimensional cell culture system based on microfluidics for nuclear magnetic resonance and optical monitoring.

A new microfluidic cell culture device compatible with real-time nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) is presented here. The intended application is the long-term monitoring of 3D cell cultures by several techniques. The system has been designed to fit inside commercially available NMR equipment to obtain maximum readout resolution when working with small samples.

Solution and crystal structures of a C-terminal fragment of the neuronal isoform of the polypyrimidine tract binding protein (nPTB).

The eukaryotic polypyrimidine tract binding protein (PTB) serves primarily as a regulator of alternative splicing of messenger RNA, but is also co-opted to other roles such as RNA localisation and translation initiation from internal ribosome entry sites. The neuronal paralogue of PTB (nPTB) is 75% identical in amino acid sequence with PTB. Although the two proteins have broadly similar RNA binding specificities and effects on RNA splicing, differential expression of PTB and nPTB can lead to the generation of alternatively spliced mRNAs.

Use of 1H and 31P HRMAS to evaluate the relationship between quantitative alterations in metabolite concentrations and tissue features in human brain tumour biopsies.

Quantitative multinuclear high-resolution magic angle spinning was performed in order to determine the tissue pH values of and the absolute metabolite concentrations in 33 samples of human brain tumour tissue. Metabolite concentrations were quantified by 1D (1)H and (31)P HRMAS using the electronic reference to in vivo concentrations (ERETIC) synthetic signal. (1)H-(1)H homonuclear and (1)H-(31)P heteronuclear correlation experiments enabled the direct assessment of the (1)H-(31)P spin systems for signals that suffered from overlapping in the 1D (1)H spectra, and linked the information present in the 1D (1)H and (31)P spectra.

Magnetic resonance microscopy contribution to interpret high-resolution magic angle spinning metabolomic data of human tumor tissue.

HRMAS NMR is considered a valuable technique to obtain detailed metabolic profile of unprocessed tissues. To properly interpret the HRMAS metabolomic results, detailed information of the actual state of the sample inside the rotor is needed. MRM (Magnetic Resonance Microscopy) was applied for obtaining structural and spatially localized metabolic information of the samples inside the HRMAS rotors.

NMR metabolic profile of human follicular fluid.

The environment of the oocyte during its in vivo maturation consists of follicular fluid (FF) and is surrounded by granulosa cells. The FF is derived from the sanguineous plasma and secretions, synthesised in the follicle wall, that contain a large variety of growth factors, cytokines, amino acids, and other metabolites. These metabolites are presumably involved in the physiology of the oocyte.

Structural insights into the GTPase domain of Escherichia coli MnmE protein.

The Escherichia coli MnmE protein is a 50-kDa multidomain GTPase involved in tRNA modification. Its homologues in eukaryotes are crucial for mitochondrial respiration and, thus, it is thought that the human protein might be involved in mitochondrial diseases. Unlike Ras, MnmE shows a high intrinsic GTPase activity and requires effective GTP hydrolysis, and not simply GTP binding, to be functionally active.

Snake venom disintegrins: evolution of structure and function.

Disintegrins represent a family of polypeptides present in the venoms of various vipers that selectively block the function of integrin receptors. Here, we review our current view and hypothesis on the emergence and the structural and functional diversification of disintegrins by accelerated evolution and the selective loss of disulfide bonds of duplicated genes. Research on disintegrins is relevant for understanding the biology of viper venom toxins, but also provides information on new structural determinants involved in integrin recognition that may be useful in basic and clinical research.

Conformation and concerted dynamics of the integrin-binding site and the C-terminal region of echistatin revealed by homonuclear NMR.

Echistatin is a potent antagonist of the integrins alpha(v)beta3, alpha5beta1 and alpha(IIb)beta3. Its full inhibitory activity depends on an RGD (Arg-Gly-Asp) motif expressed at the tip of the integrin-binding loop and on its C-terminal tail. Previous NMR structures of echistatin showed a poorly defined integrin-recognition sequence and an incomplete C-terminal tail, which left the molecular basis of the functional synergy between the RGD loop and the C-terminal region unresolved.

Ionic self-complementarity induces amyloid-like fibril formation in an isolated domain of a plant copper metallochaperone protein.

Background: Arabidopsis thaliana copper metallochaperone CCH is a functional homologue of yeast antioxidant ATX1, involved in cytosolic copper transport. In higher plants, CCH has to be transported to specialised cells through plasmodesmata, being the only metallochaperone reported to date that leaves the cell where it is synthesised. CCH has two different domains, the N-terminal domain conserved among other copper-metallochaperones and a C-terminal domain absent in all the identified non-plant metallochaperones.

The structural plasticity of the C terminus of p21Cip1 is a determinant for target protein recognition.

The cyclin-dependent kinase inhibitory protein p21(Cip1) might play multiple roles in cell-cycle regulation through interaction of its C-terminal domain with a defined set of cellular proteins such as proliferating cell nuclear antigen (PCNA), calmodulin (CaM), and the oncoprotein SET. p21(Cip1) could be described as an intrinsically unstructured protein in solution although the C-terminal domain adopts a well-defined extended conformation when bound to PCNA. However, the molecular mechanism of the interaction with CaM and the oncoprotein SET is not well understood, partly because of the lack of structural information.

NMR study of hexanucleotide d(CCGCGG)2 containing two triplet repeats of fragile X syndrome.

Long repeated stretches of d(CCG) and tri-nucleotide are crucial mutations that cause hereditary forms of mental retardation (fragile X-syndrome). Moreover, the alternating (CG) di-nucleotide is one of the candidates for Z-DNA conformation. Solution NMR structure of d(CCGCGG)(2) has been solved and is discussed.