Search results for "biophysics"
showing 10 items of 3515 documents
Effects of magnesium deprivation on development and biomineralization in the sea urchin Arbacia lixula
2019
Echinoderms have an extensive endoskeleton composed of magnesian calcite and occluded matrix proteins. As biomineralization in sea urchin larvae is sensitive to the Magnesium:Calcium ratio of seawater, we investigated the effects of magnesium deprivation on development and skeletogenesis in the sea urchin Arbacia lixula. We focused on the localization of the skeletogenic cells (primary mesenchyme cells) and the spatial expression of associated genes. Embryos reared in Mg-free seawater exhibited developmental delay from 6-h post-fertilization and at 24 h embryos showed complete lack of biomineral formation. Larvae (48–72 h) exhibited severe skeleton malformations. Fluorescent labelling revea…
Firming of fruit tissues by vacuum infusion of pectin methylesterase: Visualisation of enzyme action
2008
; Apple pieces were vacuum-impregnated with either a pectin methylesterase (PME) and calcium solution or with water prior to pasteurization. Pasteurized apple pieces impregnated with PME and calcium showed a significantly higher firmness. Moreover, solid state C-13 NMR spectroscopy of apple cell wall residues revealed an increase of their molecular rigidity. Exogenous PME addition involved a decrease from 82% to 45% of apple pectin degree of methyl-esterification. Microscopic observations of apple slices immunolabelled with antibodies specific for pectins showed that (i) demethyl-esterification was more intense in the cell wall region lining intercellular spaces (demonstrating a key role f…
The fungal elicitor cryptogein induces cell wall modifications on tobacco cell suspension
2000
Upon addition of the fungal elicitor cryptogein, suspension cells of tobacco (Nicotiana tabacum cv. Xanthi) aggregated in clusters. Cytochemical experiments indicated that elicited cells displayed fibrillar expansions of pectin along the primary cell wall. Immunocytochemical detection of pectin epitopes indicated that the fibrillar material surrounding the treated cells was mostly composed of low methylated galacturonan sequences, but the use of the cationic probe did not reveal the presence of negatively charged carboxyl groups: the presence of important amounts of calcium ions in these pectic fibrillar expansions accounts for these observations. These data indicate that tobacco cells trea…
Anhydrobiosis: Inside yeast cells
2018
International audience; Under natural conditions yeast cells as well as other microorganisms are regularly subjected to the influence of severe drought, which leads to their serious dehydration. The dry seasons are then changed by rains and there is a restoration of normal water potential inside the cells. To survive such seasonal changes a lot of vegetative microbial cells, which belong to various genera and species, may be able to enter into a state of anhydrobiosis, in which their metabolism is temporarily and reversibly suspended or delayed. This evolutionarily developed adaptation to extreme conditions of the environment is widely used for practical goals - for conservation of microorg…
The Plant Inorganic Pyrophosphatase Does Not Transport K+ in Vacuole Membrane Vesicles Multilabeled with Fluorescent Probes for H+, K+, and Membrane …
1995
Abstract It has been claimed that the inorganic pyrophosphatase (PPase) of the plant vacuolar membrane transports K+ in addition to H+ in intact vacuoles (Davies, J. M., Poole, R. J., Rea, P. A., and Sanders, D.(1992) Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. U. S. A. 89, 11701-11705). Since this was not confirmed using the purified and reconstituted PPase consisting of a 75-kDa polypeptide (Sato, M. H., Kasahara, M., Ishii, N., Homareda, H., Matsui, H., and Yoshida, M. (1994) J. Biol. Chem. 269, 6725-6728), these authors proposed that K+ transport by the PPase is dependent on its association with other membrane components lost during purification. We have examined the hypothesis of K+ translocation by the PP…
Impact loading history modulates hip fracture load and location : A finite element simulation study of the proximal femur in female athletes
2018
Sideways falls impose high stress on the thin superolateral cortical bone of the femoral neck, the region regarded as a fracture-prone region of the hip. Exercise training is a natural mode of mechanical loading to make bone more robust. Exercise-induced adaptation of cortical bone along the femoral neck has been previously demonstrated. However, it is unknown whether this adaption modulates hip fracture behavior. The purpose of this study was to investigate the influence of specific exercise loading history on fall-induced hip fracture behavior by estimating fracture load and location with proximal femur finite element (FE) models created from magnetic resonance images (MRI) of 111 women w…
Self-assembled multivalent (SAMul) ligand systems with enhanced stability in the presence of human serum
2019
Self-assembled cationic micelles are an attractive platform for binding biologically-relevant polyanions such as heparin. This has potential applications in coagulation control, where a synthetic heparin rescue agent could be a useful replacement for protamine, which is in current clinical use. However, micelles can have low stability in human serum and unacceptable toxicity profiles. This paper reports the optimi- sation of self-assembled multivalent (SAMul) arrays of amphiphilic ligands to bind heparin in competitive conditions. Specifically, modification of the hydrophobic unit kinetically stabilises the self-assembled nanostructures, preventing loss of binding ability in the presence of…
Effect of high hydrostatic pressure on extraction of B-phycoerythrin from Porphyridium cruentum: Use of confocal microscopy and image processing
2019
International audience; The aim of the study was to extract B-phycoerythrin from Porphyridium cruentum while preserving its structure. The high hydrostatic pressure treatments were chosen as extraction technology. Different methods have been used to observe the effects of the treatment: spectrophotometry and confocal laser scanning microscopy followed by image processing analysis. Image processing led to the generation of masks used for the identification of three clusters: intra, extra and intercellular. All methods showed that high hydrostatic pressure treatments between 50 and 500 MPa failed to extract B-phycoerythrin from Porphyridium cruentum cells. The fluorescence emission was negati…
Photoexcitation of the P4480 State Induces a Secondary Photocycle That Potentially Desensitizes Channelrhodopsin-2
2018
Channelrhodopsins (ChRs) are light-gated cation channels. In spite of their wide use to activate neurons with light, the photocurrents of ChRs rapidly decay in intensity under both continuous illum...
Phospholipase activities associated with the tonoplast from Acer pseudoplatanus cells: identification of a phospholipase A1 activity
1995
In higher plants, the lipolytic enzymes and their physiological functions are not well characterized [1]. Most reports demonstrated that phospholipid catabolism in plants is achieved by the concerted actions of membrane-bound enzymes including phospholipase D, phosphatidate phosphatase, lipolytic acyl hydrolases and lipoxygenases [1,2]. With the exception of the phospholipase D, the literature on plant phospholipases is still very limited. We previously reported that tonoplast from Acer pseudoplatanus cells contains small amounts of phosphatidc acid and lysophospholipids, which were produced together with free fatty acids, particularly after addition of Ca2+[3]. These data suggested the pos…