Gram-positive bacteria use peptides as auto-inducing (AI) signals to regulate the production of extracellular enzymes (e.g., proteases). ComX is an AI peptide, mostly known for its role in the regulation of bacterial competence and surfactant production in Bacillus subtilis. These two traits are regulated accordingly to the bacterial population size, thus classifying ComX as a quorum sensing si...

Results: In the HIV-infected cohort, 72% (216/298) were screened for colorectal cancer. Colonoscopy was utilized in 45% (98/216) of patients and fecal occult blood test (FOBT) in 44% (95/298). There was no difference between the prevalence of polyps between the HIV-infected and uninfected groups (18% vs. 22%, p=0.42). There was a trend that HIV-infected patients were more likely to have advance...

OBJECTIVES Recombinant activated factor VII (rFVIIa) is used in various surgical procedures to reduce the incidence of major blood loss and the need for re-exploration. Few clinical trials have investigated rFVIIa in cardiac surgery. The authors performed a meta-analysis focusing on the rate of stroke and surgical re-exploration. DESIGN Meta-analysis. SETTING Hospitals. PARTICIPANTS A tot...

Cancer of the cervix is associated with infection by certain types of human papillomavirus (HPV). The gene variants differ in immune responses and oncogenic potential. The E6 and E7 proteins encoded by high-risk HPV play a key role in cellular transformation. HPV-33 and HPV-58 types are highly prevalent among Chinese women. To study the gene intratypic variations, polymorphisms and positive sel...

Dysregulated p53 expression has been implicated as a major contributor to numerous tumorigenesis. Single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) within the functional consequence of the novel p53 promoter region remains obscure. Herein, we aimed to establish the extent of genetic variability within the promoter region of p53 gene as well as their association with leiomyoma susceptibility. Women were di...

Intricate homeostatic mechanisms have been implicated in maintaining the blood glucose concentration over a narrow physiological range. The brain, as well as the peripheral organs such as pancreas, liver, and gastrointestinal tract, is able to sense the nutritional state and secretes specific hormones to maintain metabolic homeostasis. All of these cells contain a high-Km glucose-phosphorylatin...

m To IIIthe absorption we&km a, expressed in cm.‘. of a 2940 nm infrared radiation through ndcmxctions of human and porcine lenses. m Human lens nuclei from extracapsulwly cataract pmcedures and porcine lens from freshly enucleakd porcine eyes were crycat in IO, 15 and 30 pm sccdons. The crymctions were placed on micmsopc slides and covered by cover slips, whose edgs were painted with unmloured...

In this work we describe the implementation of a 216processor Beowulf cluster with switched gigabit Ethernet networking. This design includes the use of a 8-CPU high performance midrange computer with 8 gigabit ports as a cluster head, a design that limits I/O contention. We have been developing applications software for bioinformatics research in protein folding, as well as the MoBiDiCK system...

Multifrequency polarimetric observations made with the Very Long Baseline Array of the quasar 3C 216 reveal the presence of Faraday rotation measures (RMs) in excess of 2000 rad m−2, in the source rest frame, in the arc of emission located at ∼ 140 mas from the core. Rotation measures in the range −300 – +300 rad m−2 are detected in the inner 5 mas (∼ 30 parsecs). While the rotation measure nea...