Oxalic acid is found in dietary sources (such as coffee, tea, and chocolate) or is produced by the intestinal microflora from metabolic precursors, like ascorbic acid. In the human intestine, oxalate may combine with calcium, sodium, magnesium, or potassium to form less soluble salts, which can cause pathological disorders such as hyperoxaluria, urolithiasis, and renal failure in humans. In thi...

Sphingomonas paucimobilis SYK-6 degrades ferulic acid to vanillin, and it is further metabolized through the protocatechuate 4,5-cleavage pathway. We obtained a Tn5 mutant of SYK-6, FA2, which was able to grow on vanillic acid but not on ferulic acid. A cosmid which complemented the growth deficiency of FA2 on ferulic acid was isolated. The 5.2-kb BamHI-EcoRI fragment in this cosmid conferred t...

Staphylococcus aureus is a major pathogen in the transmission of diseases from animals to humans and vice-versa.Various infections, such as mastitis in cattle, sheep and goats, as well as gastroenteritis due to food poisoning in humans are the most frequent problems caused by S. aureus. The bacteria also lead to severe economic losses in dairy industry. A major virulence facto...

Type 2 diabetes is a disease of metabolic dysregulation involving impaired uptake and utilization of glucose, altered lipid metabolism, accumulation of various lipid species in the circulation and in tissues, and disruption of metabolic signaling pathways that regulate insulin secretion from pancreatic islet -cells. Normal fuel homeostasis involves reciprocal regulation of glucose and lipid cat...

Aims—Rosiglitazone and fenofibrate, specific agonists of the peroxisome proliferator activated receptors-γ (PPARγ) and -α (PPARα), respectively, improve insulin sensitivity in diabetic animals and in patients with type 2 diabetes. Here we investigated how pre-diabetic Otsuka Long–Evans Tokushima Fatty (OLETF) rats fed with normal and high-fat diets respond to these PPAR agonists. Main methods—P...