Fluorescent Antimicrobial Peptides Based on Nile Red: Effect of Conjugation Site and Chemistry on Wash-Free Staining of Bacteria.

Fluorescent probes for bacterial detection can be obtained by conjugating antimicrobial peptides with fluorescent dyes. However, little is known about the effect of the conjugation site and linker chemistry on staining efficiency. We synthesized three conjugates of the antimicrobial peptide ubiquicidin with the environmentally sensitive fluorophore Nile Red that differed by the attachment site and the chemical composition of the linker.

Observation of the decay.

Using proton-proton collision data corresponding to an integrated luminosity of collected by the CMS experiment at , the decay is observed for the first time, with a statistical significance exceeding 5 standard deviations. The relative branching fraction, with respect to the decay, is measured to be , where the first uncertainty is statistical, the second is systematic, and the third is related to the uncertainties in and .

Hetero-Diels-Alder and CuAAC Click Reactions for Fluorine-18 Labeling of Peptides: Automation and Comparative Study of the Two Methods.

Radiolabeled peptides are valuable tools for diagnosis or therapies; they are often radiofluorinated using an indirect approach based on an F-18 prosthetic group. Herein, we are reporting our results on the F-18 radiolabeling of three peptides using two different methods based on click reactions. The first one used the well-known CuAAC reaction, and the second one is based on our recently reported hetero-Diels-Alder (HDA) using a dithioesters (thia-Diels-Alder) reaction.

Rational Design of Cyanine-Based Fluorogenic Dimers to Reduce Nonspecific Interactions with Albumin and Lipid Bilayers: Application to Highly Sensitive Imaging of GPCRs in Living Cells.

Fluorogenic dimers with polarity-sensitive folding are powerful probes for live-cell bioimaging. They switch on their fluorescence only after interacting with their targets, thus leading to a high signal-to-noise ratio in wash-free bioimaging. We previously reported the first near-infrared fluorogenic dimers derived from cyanine 5.

Benchmarking AlphaFold-Generated Structures of Chemokine-Chemokine Receptor Complexes.

AlphaFold and AlphaFold-Multimer have become two essential tools for the modeling of unknown structures of proteins and protein complexes. In this work, we extensively benchmarked the quality of chemokine-chemokine receptor structures generated by AlphaFold-Multimer against experimentally determined structures. Our analysis considered both the global quality of the model, as well as key structural features for chemokine recognition.

Search for exotic decays of the Higgs boson to a pair of pseudoscalars in the and final states.

A search for exotic decays of the Higgs boson () with a mass of 125 to a pair of light pseudoscalars is performed in final states where one pseudoscalar decays to two quarks and the other to a pair of muons or leptons. A data sample of proton-proton collisions at corresponding to an integrated luminosity of 138 recorded with the CMS detector is analyzed. No statistically significant excess is observed over the standard model backgrounds.

Ethaverine and Papaverine Target Cyclin-Dependent Kinase 5 and Inhibit Lung Cancer Cell Proliferation and Migration.

CDK5 kinase plays a central role in the regulation of neuronal functions, and its hyperactivation has been associated with neurodegenerative pathologies and more recently with several human cancers, in particular lung cancer. However, ATP-competitive inhibitors targeting CDK5 are poorly selective and suffer limitations, calling for new classes of inhibitors. In a screen for allosteric modulators of CDK5, we identified ethaverine and closely related derivative papaverine and showed that they inhibit cell proliferation and migration of non small cell lung cancer cell lines.

Multitarget μ-Opioid Receptor Agonists─Neuropeptide FF Receptor Antagonists Induce Potent Antinociception with Reduced Adverse Side Effects.

The design of bifunctional compounds is a promising approach toward the development of strong analgesics with reduced side effects. We here report the optimization of the previously published lead peptide , which contains opioid receptor agonist and neuropeptide FF receptor antagonist pharmacophores and is shown to induce potent antinociception and reduced side effects. We evaluated the novel hybrid peptides for their activity at MOP, NPFFR1, and NPFFR2 and selected four of them () for assessment of their acute antinociceptive activity in mice.

Nickel(II)-Catalyzed Formal [3+2] Cycloadditions between Indoles and Donor-Acceptor Cyclopropanes.

This article describes the development of a nickel-catalyzed regio- and diastereoselective formal [3+2] cycloaddition between -substituted indoles and donor-acceptor cyclopropanes to synthesize cyclopenta[]indoles. Optimized reaction conditions provide the desired nitrogen-containing cycloadducts in up to 93% yield and 8.6:1 with complete regioselectivity.

Drug upgrade: A complete methodology from old drug to new chemical entities using Nematic Protein Organization Technique.

Drug repurposing is used to propose new therapeutic perspectives. Here, we introduce "Drug Upgrade", that is, characterizing the mode of action of an old drug to generate new chemical entities and new therapeutics. We proposed a novel methodology covering target identification to pharmacology validation.

Enhancing c-Si Solar Cell Efficiency in the UV Region: Photophysical Insights into the Use of Eu Complexes for Down-Shifting Layer Applications.

[Eu(DPIQC)] (where DPIQC = 3-(diphenyl phosphoryl)-1-isoquinolinecarboxylate), a luminescent europium complex with antenna ligands, has been carefully embedded within a polyvinyl butyral (PVB) matrix and the resulting material was used to prepare films used as luminescent down-shifting layers (LDSLs) for crystalline Si-based solar cells. The films were characterized using photoluminescence spectroscopy, atomic force spectroscopy (AFM), UV-Vis spectroscopy, and fluorescence microscopy. The AFM analysis shows films with low surface roughness, while fluorescence microscopy revealed that the Eu complex embedded in PVB assumed a spheroidal configuration, a morphology especially beneficial for optical applications.

Measurement of the top quark mass using a profile likelihood approach with the lepton + jets final states in proton-proton collisions at .

The mass of the top quark is measured in 36.3 of LHC proton-proton collision data collected with the CMS detector at . The measurement uses a sample of top quark pair candidate events containing one isolated electron or muon and at least four jets in the final state.

A search for decays of the Higgs boson to invisible particles in events with a top-antitop quark pair or a vector boson in proton-proton collisions at .

A search for decays to invisible particles of Higgs bosons produced in association with a top-antitop quark pair or a vector boson, which both decay to a fully hadronic final state, has been performed using proton-proton collision data collected at by the CMS experiment at the LHC, corresponding to an integrated luminosity of 138. The 95% confidence level upper limit set on the branching fraction of the 125 Higgs boson to invisible particles, , is 0.54 (0.

Awake prone positioning in acute hypoxaemic respiratory failure: An international expert guidance.

Background: Awake prone positioning (APP) of non-intubated patients with acute hypoxaemic respiratory failure (AHRF) has been inconsistently adopted into routine care of patients with COVID-19, likely due to apparent conflicting evidence from recent trials. This short guideline aims to provide evidence-based recommendations for the use of APP in various clinical scenarios.

Methods: An international multidisciplinary panel, assembled for their expertise and representativeness, and supported by a methodologist, performed a systematic literature search, summarized the available evidence derived from randomized clinical trials, and developed recommendations using GRADE (Grading of Recommendations, Assessment, Development, and Evaluation) methodology.

Arbuscular mycorrhizal fungi impact the production of alkannin/shikonin and their derivatives in Tausch. grown in semi-hydroponic and pot cultivation systems.

Introduction: Tausch. is a medicinal plant well-known to produce important therapeutic compounds, such as alkannin/shikonin and their derivatives (A/Sd). It associates with arbuscular mycorrhizal fungi (AMF), which are known, amongst others beneficial effects, to modulate the plant secondary metabolites (SMs) biosynthesis.

Measurements of jet multiplicity and jet transverse momentum in multijet events in proton-proton collisions at .

Multijet events at large transverse momentum () are measured at using data recorded with the CMS detector at the LHC, corresponding to an integrated luminosity of . The multiplicity of jets with that are produced in association with a high- dijet system is measured in various ranges of the of the jet with the highest transverse momentum and as a function of the azimuthal angle difference between the two highest jets in the dijet system. The differential production cross sections are measured as a function of the transverse momenta of the four highest jets.

Azimuthal correlations in Z +jets events in proton-proton collisions at .

The production of Z bosons associated with jets is measured in collisions at with data recorded with the CMS experiment at the LHC corresponding to an integrated luminosity of 36.3. The multiplicity of jets with transverse momentum is measured for different regions of the Z boson's , from lower than 10 to higher than 100.

Measurements of the Higgs boson production cross section and couplings in the W boson pair decay channel in proton-proton collisions at .

Production cross sections of the standard model Higgs boson decaying to a pair of W bosons are measured in proton-proton collisions at a center-of-mass energy of 13. The analysis targets Higgs bosons produced via gluon fusion, vector boson fusion, and in association with a W or Z boson. Candidate events are required to have at least two charged leptons and moderate missing transverse momentum, targeting events with at least one leptonically decaying W boson originating from the Higgs boson.

Measurement of the mass dependence of the transverse momentum of lepton pairs in Drell-Yan production in proton-proton collisions at .

The double differential cross sections of the Drell-Yan lepton pair (, dielectron or dimuon) production are measured as functions of the invariant mass , transverse momentum , and . The observable, derived from angular measurements of the leptons and highly correlated with , is used to probe the low- region in a complementary way. Dilepton masses up to 1 are investigated.

CMS pythia 8 colour reconnection tunes based on underlying-event data.

New sets of parameter tunes for two of the colour reconnection models, quantum chromodynamics-inspired and gluon-move, implemented in the pythia  8 event generator, are obtained based on the default CMS pythia  8 underlying-event tune, CP5. Measurements sensitive to the underlying event performed by the CMS experiment at centre-of-mass energies and 13, and by the CDF experiment at 1.96 are used to constrain the parameters of colour reconnection models and multiple-parton interactions simultaneously.

P2X7-Receptor Pathway Involvement in the Anti-Inflammatory Activity of Medicinal Plants.

Medicinal plants used in European folk medicine attached to Lamiales, Gentianales or Asterales orders are used to treat inflammatory disorders. Many targets have been identified but to date, implication of purinergic receptor P2X7 activation has not yet been investigated. We managed to evaluate the protective effect on P2X7 activation by plant extracts used as anti-inflammatory in European folk medicine by the YO-PRO-1 uptake dye in vitro bioassay.

Measurement of the differential production cross section as a function of the jet mass and extraction of the top quark mass in hadronic decays of boosted top quarks.

A measurement of the jet mass distribution in hadronic decays of Lorentz-boosted top quarks is presented. The measurement is performed in the lepton + jets channel of top quark pair production () events, where the lepton is an electron or muon. The products of the hadronic top quark decay are reconstructed using a single large-radius jet with transverse momentum greater than 400.

Search for light Higgs bosons from supersymmetric cascade decays in collisions at .

A search is reported for pairs of light Higgs bosons () produced in supersymmetric cascade decays in final states with small missing transverse momentum. A data set of LHC collisions collected with the CMS detector at and corresponding to an integrated luminosity of 138 is used. The search targets events where both bosons decay into pairs that are reconstructed as large-radius jets using substructure techniques.