Search results for "CONSERVE"
showing 10 items of 127 documents
BvCOLD1: A novel aquaporin from sugar beet (Beta vulgarisL.) involved in boron homeostasis and abiotic stress
2018
Beta vulgaris (sugar beet) is one of the most important industrial crops. Screening of a cDNA library for sugar beet genes able to confer cold tolerance upon overexpression in yeast identified a novel aquaporin, which we named BvCOLD1. The amino acid sequence of BvCOLD1 indicated that an acidic protein (pI 5.18) is similar to tonoplast intrinsic protein aquaporins. RNA expression analysis indicated that BvCOLD1 is expressed in all sugar beet organs. Confocal microscopy of a green fluorescent protein-tagged version localized BvCOLD1 in the endoplasmic reticulum in yeast and in plant cells. Experiments in yeast showed that BvCOLD1 has an important role in transporting several molecules, among…
Molecular evolution of antioxidant and hypoxia response in long-lived, cancer-resistant blind mole rats: The Nrf2-Keap1 pathway.
2015
The Nrf2-Keap1 pathway is crucial for the cellular antioxidant and hypoxia response in vertebrates. Deciphering its modifications in hypoxia-adapted animals will help understand its functionality under environmental stress and possibly allow for knowledge transfer into biomedical research. The blind mole rat Spalax, a long-lived cancer-resistant rodent, lives in burrows underground and is adapted to severely hypoxic conditions. Here we have conducted a bioinformatical survey of Spalax core genes from the Nrf2-Keap1 pathway on the coding sequence level in comparison to other hypoxia-tolerant and -sensitive rodents. We find strong sequence conservation across all genes, illustrating the pathw…
Protein-protein interactions can be predicted using coiled coil co-evolution patterns
2016
AbstractProtein-protein interactions are sometimes mediated by coiled coil structures. The evolutionary conservation of interacting orthologs in different species, along with the presence or absence of coiled coils in them, may help in the prediction of interacting pairs. Here, we illustrate how the presence of coiled coils in a protein can be exploited as a potential indicator for its interaction with another protein with coiled coils. The prediction capability of our strategy improves when restricting our dataset to highly reliable, known protein-protein interactions. Our study of the co-evolution of coiled coils demonstrates that pairs of interacting proteins can be distinguished from no…
High Bacterial Agglutination Activity in a Single-CRD C-Type Lectin from Spodoptera exigua (Lepidoptera: Noctuidae)
2017
Lectins are carbohydrate-interacting proteins that play a pivotal role in multiple physiological and developmental aspects of all organisms. They can specifically interact with different bacterial and viral pathogens through carbohydrate-recognition domains (CRD). In addition, lectins are also of biotechnological interest because of their potential use as biosensors for capturing and identifying bacterial species. In this work, three C-type lectins from the Lepidoptera Spodoptera exigua were produced as recombinant proteins and their bacterial agglutination properties were characterized. The lowest protein concentration producing bacterial agglutination against a panel of different Gram+ an…
Ectodomain shedding of CD99 within highly conserved regions is mediated by the metalloprotease meprin β and promotes transendothelial cell migration.
2016
The adhesion molecule CD99 is essential for the transendothelial migration of leukocytes. In this study, we used biochemical and cellular assays to show that CD99 undergoes ectodomain shedding by the metalloprotease meprin β and subsequent intramembrane proteolysis by γ-secretase. The cleavage site in CD99 was identified by mass spectrometry within an acidic region highly conserved through different vertebrate species. This finding fits perfectly to the unique cleavage specificity of meprin β with a strong preference for aspartate residues and suggests coevolution of protease and substrate. We hypothesized that limited CD99 cleavage by meprin β would alter cellular transendothelial migratio…
Genomic structure and functional characterization of the human ADAM10 promoter
2005
The ADAM10 gene encodes a membrane-bound disintegrin-metalloproteinase, which, after overexpression in an Alzheimer disease (AD) mouse model, prevents amyloid pathology and improves long-term potentiation and memory. Because enhancing ADAM10 expression appears to be a reasonable approach for treatment of AD, we functionally analyzed the ADAM10 gene. Both human and mouse ADAM10 genes comprise approximately 160 kbp, are composed of 16 exons, and are evolutionarily highly conserved within 500 bp upstream of either translation initiation site. By using luciferase reporter assays, we demonstrate that nucleotides -2179 to -1 upstream of the human ADAM10 translation initiation site represent a fun…
A series of West European patients with severe cardiac and skeletal myopathy associated with a de novo R406W mutation in desmin.
2003
Desminopathy is a familial or sporadic cardiac and skeletal muscular dystrophy associated with mutations in desmin. We have previously characterized a de novo desmin R406W mutation in a patient of European origin with early onset muscle weakness in the lower extremities and atrioventricular conduction block requiring a permanent pacemaker. The disease relentlessly progressed resulting in severe incapacity within 5 years after onset. We have now identified three other patients with early onset rapidly progressive cardiac and skeletal myopathy caused by this same desmin R406W mutation. The mutation was present in each studied patient, but not in their parents or other unaffected family member…
De novo mutation in a male patient with Fabry disease: a case report
2014
Abstract Background Fabry disease is an X-linked inherited metabolic condition where the deficit of the α-galactosidase A enzyme, encoded by the GLA gene, leads to glycosphingolipid storage, mainly globotriaosylceramide. To date, more than 600 mutations have been identified in human GLA gene that are responsible for FD, including missense and nonsense mutations, small and large deletions. Such mutations are usually inherited, and cases of de novo onset occur rarely. Case presentation In this article we report an interesting case of a 44-year-old male patient suffering from a severe form of Fabry disease, with negative family history. The patient showed signs such as cornea verticillata, ang…
Oxygen binding properties of non-mammalian nerve globins
2006
Oxygen-binding globins occur in the nervous systems of both invertebrates and vertebrates. While the function of invertebrate nerve haemoglobins as oxygen stores that extend neural excitability under hypoxia has been convincingly demonstrated, the physiological role of vertebrate neuroglobins is less well understood. Here we provide a detailed analysis of the oxygenation characteristics of nerve haemoglobins from an annelid (Aphrodite aculeata), a nemertean (Cerebratulus lacteus) and a bivalve (Spisula solidissima) and of neuroglobin from zebrafish (Danio rerio). The functional differences have been related to haem coordination: the haem is pentacoordinate (as in human haemoglobin and myogl…
Neuroglobin and cytoglobin: fresh blood to the vertebrate globin family
2002
Neuroglobin and cytoglobin are two recently discovered members of the vertebrate globin family. Both are intracellular proteins endowed with hexacoordinated heme-Fe atoms, in their ferrous and ferric forms, and display O2 affinities comparable with that of myoglobin. Neuroglobin, which is predominantly expressed in nerve cells, is thought to protect neurons from hypoxic–ischemic injury. It is of ancient evolutionary origin, and is homologous to nerve globins of invertebrates. Cytoglobin is expressed in many different tissues, although at varying levels. It shares common ancestry with myoglobin, and can be traced to early vertebrate evolution. The physiological roles of neuroglobin and cytog…