Liver cirrhosis is the outcome of chronic liver injury. The current study aimed to investigate the therapeutic effect of undifferentiated mesenchymal stem cells versus in vitro partially differentiated mesenchymal stem cells on liver cirrhosis and hepatic encephalopathy. 50 adult male albino rats constituted the animal model and were divided into the following groups: control, thioacetamide, un...

Directed evolution is a powerful algorithm for engineering proteins to have novel and useful properties. However, we do not yet fully understand the characteristics of an evolvable system. In this chapter, we present examples where directed evolution has been used to enhance the performance of metalloenzymes, focusing first on ‘classical’ cases such as improving enzyme stability or expanding th...

Metallochaperones are metal-binding proteins designed to deliver the appropriate metal to a target protein. The metal is usually transferred between different proteins. In this study, we discovered that metal was transferred between the same subunit of a mutant nitrile hydratase (NHase). Various "activator proteins" mediate the trafficking of metal ions into NHases. We constructed fusion NHases...

Understanding how cells regulate and transport metal ions is an important goal in the field of bioinorganic chemistry, a frontier research area that resides at the interface of chemistry and biology. This Current Topic reviews recent advances from the authors' group in using single-molecule fluorescence imaging techniques to identify the mechanisms of metal homeostatic proteins, including metal...

Despite the association of eosinophils with wound-healing and fibrotic processes, their collagenolytic ability has been poorly defined. By using highly purified eosinophil preparations (greater than 95% eosinophils) obtained from guinea-pigs by peritoneal lavage, we have examined type-specific collagen degradation by eosinophils using sensitive detection methods. The results show that eosinophi...

The Raman spectrum (441.6 nm excitation) of protocatechuate 3,4dioxygenase (PCD) from Pseudmionas putida shows resonance enhanced bands at 1605, 1504, 1270, 858, and 830 cm-1 which are due to the p-hydroxyphenyl group of tyrosine coordinated to iron. In addition, we observe strong resonance enhanced bands at 592 and 524 cm-' and weak (presumably iron1igand)vibrations at 465, 423, and 371 cm-l. ...

The olefination of aldehydes constitutes a most valuable and widely adopted strategy for constructing carbon-carbon double bonds in organic chemistry. While various synthetic methods have been made available for this purpose, no biocatalysts are known to mediate this transformation. Reported herein is that engineered myoglobin variants can catalyze the olefination of aldehydes in the presence o...

Extracellular superoxide dismutase (EC-SOD) is a metalloprotein and functions as an antioxidant enzyme. In this study, we used lentiviral vectors to generate transgenic chickens that express the human EC-SOD gene. The recombinant lentiviruses were injected into the subgerminal cavity of freshly laid eggs. Subsequently, the embryos were incubated to hatch using phases II and III of the surrogate...