Polycyclic tetramate macrolactam (PTM) natural products are produced by actinomycetes and other bacteria. PTMs are often bioactive, and the simplicity of their biosynthetic clusters make them attractive for bioengineering. Clifednamide-type PTMs from Streptomyces sp. strain JV178 contain a distinctive ketone group, suggesting the existence of a novel PTM oxidizing enzyme. Here, we report the ne...

Posttranslational modifications (PTMs) are chemical alterations that are critical to protein conformation and activation states. Despite their functional importance and reported involvement in many diseases, evolutionary analyses have produced enigmatic results because only weak or no selective pressures have been attributed to many types of PTMs. In a large-scale analysis of 16,836 PTM positio...

BACKGROUND Pretibial myxedema (PTM) is an uncommon dermopathy associated with autoimmune thyroid diseases. Now it is thought to be autoimmune and its treatment with glucocorticoid is helpful. However, it has not been evaluated. METHODS A prospective randomized controlled trial was performed in 110 patients with PTM to evaluate the efficacy and safety of triamcinolone acetonide with intralesio...

The role of breathing and deep inspirations (DI) in modulating airway hyperresponsiveness remains poorly understood. In particular, DIs are potent bronchodilators of constricted airways in nonasthmatic subjects but not in asthmatic subjects. Additionally, length fluctuations (mimicking DIs) have been shown to reduce mean contractile force when applied to airway smooth muscle (ASM) cells and tis...

Scaffold proteins are crucial regulators of many key signaling pathways that function by interacting with multiple members of a signaling pathway and tethering them into complexes. We recently identified novel scaffold proteins that respectively regulate p53 and ERK pathways in gastrointestinal tumors. ArhGAP30 is a member of the RhoGAP family that are known to regulate Rho GTPases and thereby ...

Over the last two decades significant research efforts and resources have been devoted to identifying mycobacterial proteins of value to diagnostic assays and vaccine formulations. These scientific endeavors were often preceded by first identifying a target population of proteins, for example cytoplasmic, cell envelope, or extracellular. However, many of these endeavors have overlooked the post...

The Polynomial Texture Map framework (PTM) extends the simple model of image formation from the Lambertian variant of Photometric Stereo (PST) to more general reflectances and to more complex-shaped surfaces. It forms an alternative method for apprehending object colour, albedo, and surface normals. Here we consider solving such a model in a robust version, not to date attempted for PTM, with t...

The pressure-volume (P-V) characteristics of the lung microcirculation are important determinants of the pattern of pulmonary perfusion and of red and white cell transit times. Using diffuse light scattering, we measured capillary P-V loops in seven excised perfused dog lobes at four lung volumes, from functional residual capacity (FRC) to total lung capacity (TLC), over a wide range of vascula...

Streptomyces are Gram-positive bacteria that occupy diverse ecological niches including host-associations with animals and plants. Members of this genus are known for their overwhelming repertoire of natural products, which has been exploited for almost a century as a source of medicines and agrochemicals. Notwithstanding intense scientific and commercial interest in Streptomyces natural produc...

Background: Colchicine is a chemical mutagen that has been widely used to increase the viability of plant. Most people North Central Timor (TTU) Regency still depend on local agricultural products, so one crops cultivated during rainy season corn. This study aimed determine maize seeds in and appropriate concentration colchicine germination. Methods: this research an experimental method gives t...