Assembling the pieces

Assembling the pieces

Assembling the pieces.

Transition metals function as cofactors in specific proteins, catalyzing electron exchange reactions, binding substrates and stabilizing protein structure. Studies of human diseases and of model organisms have defined many of the molecular details of metal uptake, trafficking, and excretion. The current challenge is to integrate these details into a systematic view of metal content, speciation,...

Visualizing Mu transposition: assembling the puzzle pieces.

Mobile genetic elements, once a curiosity of maize genetics, are now known to be remarkably prevalent in the genomes of organisms ranging from pathogenic bacteria to humans. The varied consequences of these elements include the alteration of gene expression and the spread of drug resistance genes among bacteria. Additionally, many viruses and bacteriophages that covalently integrate their own g...

Exfoliation syndrome: assembling the puzzle pieces.

PURPOSE To summarize various topics and the cutting edge approaches to refine XFS pathogenesis that were discussed at the 21st annual Glaucoma Foundation Think Tank meeting in New York City, Sept. 19-20, 2014. METHODS The highlights of three categories of talks on cutting edge research in the field were summarized. RESULTS Exfoliation syndrome (XFS) is a systemic disorder with a substantial...

Assembling pieces of the centromere epigenetics puzzle

The centromere is a key region for cell division where the kinetochore assembles, recognizes and attaches to microtubules so that each sister chromatid can segregate to each daughter cell. The centromeric chromatin is a unique rigid chromatin state promoted by the presence of the histone H3 variant CENP-A, in which epigenetic histone modifications of both heterochromatin or euchromatin states a...