ECG changes after non-cardiac surgery: a prospective observational study in intermediate-high risk patients.

Background: Efforts to mitigate the risk for perioperative cardiac events focus on both patient's and operation's risk and often include a preprocedural electrocardiogram (ECG). The merits of postprocedural ECG for detection of occult cardiac events occurring during surgery are unknown. We aim to explore the incidence of pre, and new postprocedural ECG pathologies in an intermediate-high risk population undergoing non-cardiac surgery.

SELENOPROTEIN O is a chloroplast protein involved in ROS scavenging and its absence increases dehydration tolerance in Arabidopsis thaliana.

The evolutionary conserved family of Selenoproteins performs redox-regulatory functions in bacteria, archaea and eukaryotes. Among them, members of the SELENOPROTEIN O (SELO) subfamily are located in mammalian and yeast mitochondria, but their functions are thus far enigmatic. Screening of T-DNA knockout mutants for resistance to the proline analogue thioproline (T4C), identified mutant alleles of the plant SELO homologue in Arabidopsis thaliana.

Bastard Breadfruit and other Cheap Provisions: Early Food Science for the Welfare of the Lower Orders.

Breadfruit is best known in connection with an infamously failed project: the 1789 mutiny against the Bounty, commanded by William Bligh. However, four years later, Bligh returned to the Pacific and fulfilled his commission, delivering breadfruit and other Pacific foods to Caribbean plantations. Placing these plant transfers in the emerg- ing sciences of food and nutrition in the eighteenth century, this essay examines the broader political project of what would much later be called 'the welfare state; which motivated British officials' interest in experimenting with novel ingredients and recipes to cheaply nourish a range of dependent populations in institutional settings.

Evolution of proline biosynthesis: enzymology, bioinformatics, genetics, and transcriptional regulation.

Proline is not only an essential component of proteins but it also has important roles in adaptation to osmotic and dehydration stresses, redox control, and apoptosis. Here, we review pathways of proline biosynthesis in the three domains of life. Pathway reconstruction from genome data for hundreds of eubacterial and dozens of archaeal and eukaryotic organisms revealed evolutionary conservation and variations of this pathway across different taxa.

SAR103168: a tyrosine kinase inhibitor with therapeutic potential in myeloid leukemias.

SAR103168, a tyrosine kinase inhibitor of the pyrido [2,3-d] pyridimidine subclass, inhibited the kinase activities of the entire Src kinase family, Abl kinase, angiogenic receptor kinases (vascular endothelial growth factor receptor [VEGFR] 1 and 2), Tie2, platelet derived growth factor (PDGF), fibroblast growth factor receptor (FGFR) 1 and 3, and epidermal growth factor receptor (EGFR). SAR103168 was a potent Src inhibitor, with 50% inhibitory concentration (IC50) = 0.65 ± 0.

The LysM receptor-like kinase LysM RLK1 is required to activate defense and abiotic-stress responses induced by overexpression of fungal chitinases in Arabidopsis plants.

Application of crab shell chitin or pentamer chitin oligosaccharide to Arabidopsis seedlings increased tolerance to salinity in wild-type but not in knockout mutants of the LysM Receptor-Like Kinase1 (CERK1/LysM RLK1) gene, known to play a critical role in signaling defense responses induced by exogenous chitin. Arabidopsis plants overexpressing the endochitinase chit36 and hexoaminidase excy1 genes from the fungus Trichoderma asperelleoides T203 showed increased tolerance to salinity, heavy-metal stresses, and Botrytis cinerea infection. Resistant lines, overexpressing fungal chitinases at different levels, were outcrossed to lysm rlk1 mutants.

Evaluating translocation gene fusions by SNP array data.

Somatic cell genetic alterations are a hallmark of tumor development and progression. Although various technologies have been developed and utilized to identify genetic aberrations, identifying genetic translocations at the chromosomal level is still a challenging task. High density SNP microarrays are useful to measure DNA copy number variation (CNV) across the genome.

Proline dehydrogenase: a key enzyme in controlling cellular homeostasis.

Proline dehydrogenase (ProDH), also called proline oxidase (POX), is a universal enzyme in living organisms. It catalyzes the oxidation of L-proline to delta1-pyrroline-5-carboxylate leading to the release of electrons, which can be transferred to either electron transfer systems or to molecular oxygen. ProDH is not only essential for proline catabolism but also plays key roles in providing energy, shuttling redox potential between cellular compartments and reactive oxygen species production.

Elevation of free proline and proline-rich protein levels by simultaneous manipulations of proline biosynthesis and degradation in plants.

Proline-rich proteins (PRP) are cell wall and plasma membrane-anchored factors involved in cell wall maintenance and its stress-induced fortification. Here we compare the synthesis of P5C as the proline (Pro) precursor in the cytosol and chloroplast by an introduced alien system and evaluate correlation between PRP synthesis and free Pro accumulation in plants. We developed a Pro over-producing system by generating transgenic tobacco plants overexpressing E.

Transcriptional control of aspartate kinase expression during darkness and sugar depletion in Arabidopsis: involvement of bZIP transcription factors.

Initial steps of aspartate-derived biosynthesis pathway (Asp pathway) producing Lys, Thr, Met and Ile are catalyzed by bifunctional (AK/HSD) and monofunctional (AK-lys) aspartate kinase (AK) enzymes. Here, we show that transcription of all AK genes is negatively regulated under darkness and low sugar conditions. By using yeast one-hybrid assays and complementary chromatin immunoprecipitation analyses in Arabidopsis cells, the bZIP transcription factors ABI5 and DPBF4 were identified, capable of interacting with the G-box-containing enhancer of AK/HSD1 promoter.

Microarray analysis and functional tests suggest the involvement of expansins in the early stages of symbiosis of the arbuscular mycorrhizal fungus Glomus intraradices on tomato (Solanum lycopersicum).

Arbuscular mycorrhizal (AM) symbiosis occurs between fungi of the phylum Glomeromycota and most terrestrial plants. However, little is known about the molecular symbiotic signalling between AM fungi (AMFs) and non-leguminous plant species. We sought to further elucidate the molecular events occurring in tomato, a non-leguminous host plant, during the early, pre-symbiotic stage of AM symbiosis, i.

Induced production of antifungal naphthoquinones in the pitchers of the carnivorous plant Nepenthes khasiana.

Nepenthes spp. are carnivorous plants that have developed insect capturing traps, evolved by specific modification of the leaf tips, and are able to utilize insect degradation products as nutritional precursors. A chitin-induced antifungal ability, based on the production and secretion to the trap liquid of droserone and 5-O-methyldroserone, is described here.

Unraveling delta1-pyrroline-5-carboxylate-proline cycle in plants by uncoupled expression of proline oxidation enzymes.

The two-step oxidation of proline in all eukaryotes is performed at the inner mitochondrial membrane by the consecutive action of proline dehydrogenase (ProDH) that produces Delta(1)-pyrroline-5-carboxylate (P5C) and P5C dehydrogenase (P5CDH) that oxidizes P5C to glutamate. This catabolic route is down-regulated in plants during osmotic stress, allowing free Pro accumulation. We show here that overexpression of MsProDH in tobacco and Arabidopsis or impairment of P5C oxidation in the Arabidopsis p5cdh mutant did not change the cellular Pro to P5C ratio under ambient and osmotic stress conditions, indicating that P5C excess was reduced to Pro in a mitochondrial-cytosolic cycle.

Effects of indomethacin-loaded nanocapsules in experimental models of inflammation in rats.

Background And Purpose: The effects of systemic treatment with indomethacin-loaded nanocapsules (IndOH-NC) were compared with those of free indomethacin (IndOH) in rat models of acute and chronic oedema.

Experimental Approach: The following models of inflammation were employed: carrageenan-induced acute oedema (measured between 30 min and 4 h), sub-chronic oedema induced by complete Freund's adjuvant (CFA) (determined between 2 h and 72 h), and CFA-induced arthritis (oedema measured between 14 and 21 days).

Key Results: IndOH or IndOH-NC produced equal inhibition of carrageenan-elicited oedema.

Source localization of temporal lobe epilepsy using PCA-LORETA analysis on ictal EEG recordings.

Localizing the source of an epileptic seizure using noninvasive EEG suffers from inaccuracies produced by other generators not related to the epileptic source. The authors isolated the ictal epileptic activity, and applied a source localization algorithm to identify its estimated location. Ten ictal EEG scalp recordings from five different patients were analyzed.

Elucidation of Septoria tritici x Wheat Interactions Using GUS-Expressing Isolates.

ABSTRACT Isolate ISR398 of Septoria tritici (which produces none to few pycnidia on the wheat cv. Seri 82 and high coverage on cv. Shafir) and isolate ISR8036 (which is virulent on both cultivars) were genetically cotrans-formed using the selectable marker gene hph, which confers resistance to hygromycin B (hygB), and the reporter gene uidA, encoding beta-glucuronidase (GUS).

Isolation and characterization of chitinase genes from pitchers of the carnivorous plant Nepenthes khasiana.

The genus Nepenthes represents carnivorous plants with pitcher traps capable of efficient prey capture and digestion. The possible involvement of plant chitinases in this process was studied in Nepenthes khasiana. Two different types of endochitinases were identified in the liquid of closed traps exhibiting substrate specificity for either long chitin polymers or N-acetylglucosamine (GlcNAc) oligomers.

Segmental duplications containing tandem repeated genes encoding putative deubiquitinating enzymes.

Both inter- and intra-chromosomal segmental duplications are known occurred in human genome during evolution. Few cases of such segments involving functional genes have been reported. While searching for the human orthologs of murine hematopoietic deubiquitinating enzymes (DUBs), we identified four clusters of DUB-like genes on chromosome 4p15 and chromosome 8p22-23 that are over 90% identical to each other at the DNA level.

Human T helper (Th) cell lineage commitment is not directly linked to the secretion of IFN-gamma or IL-4: characterization of Th cells isolated by FACS based on IFN-gamma and IL-4 secretion.

Upon activation in vitro, only a fraction of the bulk human T helper cell cultures secret the hallmark Th1/2 cytokines (IFN-gamma for Th1 and IL-4 for Th2, respectively). It is uncertain whether these IFN-gamma-/IL-4- cells are differentiated Th1 or Th2 cells. Here, we have characterized live IFN-gamma+, IL-4+ and IFN-gamma-/IL-4- cells isolated from Th cell cultures treated under Th1 or Th2 polarizing conditions by employing affinity matrix capture technology.

Cell-cycle-dependent resistance to Bacillus thuringiensis Cry1C toxin in Sf9 cells.

The Sf9 cell line, derived from the moth Spodoptera frugiperda, is highly and specifically sensitive to the Bacillus thuringiensis Cry1C toxin. Upon exposure to Cry1C, ionic pores are formed in the plasma membrane leading to cell swelling and death. Here, we describe a unique transient tolerance to Cry1C of dividing cells, which allowed completion of the division process in the presence of Cry1C.

Responsive modes of Medicago sativa proline dehydrogenase genes during salt stress and recovery dictate free proline accumulation.

Free proline accumulation is an innate response of many plants to osmotic stress. To characterize transcriptional regulation of the key proline cycle enzymes in alfalfa (Medicago sativa), two proline dehydrogenase (MsPDH) genes and a partial sequence of Delta (1) -pyrroline-5-carboxylate dehydrogenase (MsP5CDH) gene were identified and cloned. The two MsPDH genes share a high nucleotide sequence homology and a similar exon/intron structure.

Prediction of IFN-gamma regulated gene transcription.

IFN-gamma, a cytokine promoting cell-mediated immunity and antiviral effects, regulates the expression of a large set of genes involved in the immune response. Based on logistic regression, an in silico model for predicting IFN-gamma regulated transcription has been developed by scoring the transcription factor binding sites on the putative promoters of regulated versus not regulated genes derived from the microarray data of IFN-gamma treated human macrophages. The model effectively discriminates the transcription factor binding sites that confer responsiveness to IFN-gamma from those that do not.

Genome-wide prediction and analysis of function-specific transcription factor binding sites.

DNA-binding transcription factors play a central role in transcription regulation, and the annotation of transcription-factor binding sites in upstream regions of human genes is essential for building a genome-wide regulatory network. We describe methodology to accurately predict the transcription-factor binding sites in the proximal-promoter region of function-specific genes. In order to increase the accuracy of transcription factor binding-site prediction, we rely on recent genome sequence data, known transcription factor binding-site matrices, and Gene Ontology biological-function-based gene classification.