The developing hippocampus of both males and females is exposed to high levels of the gonadal steroid estradiol. The impact of this estradiol exposure on developing hippocampal neurons is essentially unknown. In the rat, the newborn hippocampus is relatively insensitive to excitotoxic brain injury, which in adults is associated with the release of amino acids, in particular glutamate, resulting...

D-Serine is an important signaling molecule throughout the central nervous system, acting as an N-methyl-D-aspartate (NMDA) receptor coagonist. This study investigated the D-serine modulation of non-NMDA ionotropic glutamate receptors expressed by inner retinal neurons. We first identified that the degradation of endogenous retinal D-serine, by application of D-amino acid oxidase, caused an enh...

5-Hydroxytryptamine (5-HT) is involved in mammalian thermoregulation of the preoptic anterior hypothalamus (PO/AH), but the underlying molecular mechanisms are not fully understood. In this study, we investigated the influence of 5-HT and agonists and antagonists of the 5-HT1A, 5-HT2A, 5-HT3 and 5-HT7 receptors on voltage-gated calcium currents in the PO/AH slice with the whole-cell patch clamp...

The role of crosstalk between the Smad and the MAPK signaling pathways in activin-, transforming growth factor-β (TGF-β)-, hydroxyurea (HU) - and butyrate-dependent erythroid differentiation of K562 leukemic cells was studied. Treatment with all four inducers caused transient phosphorylation of Smad2/3 and MAPK proteins including ERK, p38 and JNK. Use of specific inhibitors of p38, ERK and JNK ...

Injection of Caenorhabditis elegans polyA RNA into Xenopus laevis oocytes led to the expression of neurotransmitter receptors that generated some unique responses, including ionotropic alpha-amino-3-hydroxy-5-methyl-4-isoxazolepropionic acid receptors as well as receptors that coupled to G proteins, such as those to octopamine, norepinephrine, and angiotensin, which activated the oocyte's own p...

The preparation of N-[(2-bromo-5-hydroxy-4-methoxyphenyl)methyl]-N-[(4hydroxyphenyl)methyl]formamide (5) and 2-bromo-5-hydroxy-α-[(4-hydroxyphenyl)methyl]-4-methoxypropaneamide (10) is reported.

Liquid chromatography-tandem mass spectrometry (LC-MS/MS) method was used for simultaneous quantification of tolterodine and its metabolite 5-hydroxy methyl tolterodine in rat plasma. Tolterodine-d6 and 5-hydroxy methyl tolterodine-d14 were used as internal standards (IS). Chromatographic separation was performed on Ascentis Express RP amide (50 mm×4.6 mm, 2.7 μm) column with an isocratic mobil...

The biosynthesis of monensin by Streptomyces cinnamonensis was studied by using (14)C-labeled glucose, acetate, propionate, butyrate, and methionine. The results indicated that the antibiotic is synthesized from five acetate, seven propionate, and one butyrate molecules. The o-methyl group of monensin is derived from methionine, whereas the terminal hydroxymethyl group is incorporated from acet...

DT-diaphorase catalysed the reduction of 1,4-naphthoquinones with hydroxy, methyl, methoxy and glutathionyl substituents at the expense of reducing equivalents from NADPH. The initial rates of quinone reduction did not correlate with either the half-wave reduction potential (E1/2) value (determined by h.p.l.c. with electrochemical detection against an Ag/AgCl reference electrode) or the partiti...

The synthesis of methyl butyrate and octyl acetate through immobilized Rhizopus oryzae NRRL 3562 lipase mediated transesterification was studied under solvent-free conditions. The effect of different transesterification variables, namely, molarity of alcohol, reaction time, temperature, agitation, addition of water, and enzyme amount on molar conversion (%) was investigated. A maximum molar con...