The vacuolar protein sorting (vps) system in the filamentous fungus Aspergillus oryzae, which has unique cell polarity and the ability to secrete large amounts of proteins, was evaluated by using mutants that missort vacuolar proteins into the medium. Vacuolar carboxypeptidase Y (CPY) fused with enhanced green fluorescent protein (EGFP) was used as a vacuolar marker. Twenty dfc (dim EGFP fluore...

Proteins evolve through two primary mechanisms: substitution, where mutations alter a protein's amino-acid sequence, and insertions and deletions (indels), where amino acids are either added to or removed from the sequence. Protein structure has been shown to influence the rate at which substitutions accumulate across sites in proteins, but whether structure similarly constrains the occurrence ...

In adult rat atrial myocytes, muscarinic acetylcholine (ACh)-sensitive K(+) current activated by a saturating concentration of adenosine (I(K(ACh),(Ado))) via A(1) receptors (A(1)Rs) amounts to only 30% of the current activated by a saturating concentration of ACh (I(K(ACh),(ACh))) via muscarinic M(2) receptors. The half-time of activation of I(K(ACh),(Ado)) on a rapid exposure to agonist was a...

Vaccination is the most efficient prophylaxis against a variety of infectious diseases. New vaccination strategies rely on the incorporation of effective adjuvants, which stimulate the innate immune response and, in turn, activate the adaptive immune response. It is well established that flagellin induces inflammatory responses through the activation of antigen-presenting cells (APCs). In order...

The utility of promoter fragments isolated from the 5'-flanking region of endogenous mammalian genes to drive transgene expression in vivo is often limited by low expression levels. In this study, a bigenic system was established that allows constitutive overexpression of transgenes in a tissue-specific fashion in transgenic mice in a time- and cost-effective fashion. A modified floxed expressi...

The aggregation of the 37-residue protein, islet amyloid polypeptide (IAPP), as either insoluble amyloid or as small oligomers, appears to play a direct role in the death of pancreatic beta-islet cells in type II diabetes. While IAPP has been known to be the primary component of type II diabetes amyloid, the molecular interactions responsible for this aggregation have not been identified. To id...

Agrobacterium tumefaciens-mediated transformation for edible mushrooms has been previously established. However, the enhancement of heterologous protein production and the expression of multi-target genes remains a challenge. In this study, heterologous protein expression in the enoki mushroom Flammulina velutipes was notably enhanced using 2A peptide-mediated cleavage to co-express multiple co...

Monacolin K is a secondary metabolite synthesized by polyketide synthases (PKS) from Monascus. The monacolin K biosynthetic gene cluster, mokA-mokI, has been characterized in Monascus pilosus. The mokH gene encoding Zn(II)2Cys6 binuclear DNA binding protein is assumed to be an activator for monacolin K production. In this study, the mokH gene was cloned and driven by the glyceraldehyde-3-phosph...

BACKGROUND A challenge in age research is the absence of short-lived vertebrate model organisms. The turquoise killifish Nothobranchius furzeri has an exceptionally short lifespan of 4-10 months depending on the strain. Thus, it possesses the shortest known maximum lifespan of a vertebrate species that can be bred in captivity. RESULTS Here we show the successful introduction of DNA and RNA m...

Plants are constantly exposed to a wide range of environmental stresses, but evolved complicated adaptive and defense mechanisms which allow them to survive in unfavorable conditions. These mechanisms protect and defend plants by using different immune receptors located either at the cell surface or in the cytoplasmic compartment. Lectins or carbohydrate-binding proteins are widespread in the p...