BACKGROUND Oxidative liver injury occurring with methotrexate restricts its use in the desired dose. Therefore, whether or not thiamine and thiamine pyrophosphate, whose antioxidant activity is known, have protective effects on oxidative liver injury generated with methotrexate was comparatively researched in rats using biochemical and histopathological approaches. MATERIAL/METHODS Thiamine p...

There are three varieties of cartilage-hyaline, elastic, and fibrocartilage. Hyaline cartilage is the precursor of bone. In the adult it is mainly found at bone ends, forming the load-bearing surface of synovial joints. Extra-articular fibrocartilages such as those of the trachea and ribs often calcify with advancing age. Articular cartilage, however, usually remains free from mineral deposits....

The social amoeba Dictyostelium discoideum was instrumental in the discovery and early characterization of inositol pyrophosphates, a class of molecules possessing highly-energetic pyrophosphate bonds. Inositol pyrophosphates regulate diverse biological processes and are attracting attention due to their ability to control energy metabolism and insulin signalling. However, inositol pyrophosphat...

Stable analogs of bacterial transferase MraY substrate or product with a pyrophosphate surrogate in their structure are described. β-ketophosphonates were designed as pyrophosphate bioisosteres and were investigated as UDP-GlcNAc mimics. The developed strategy allows introduction of structural diversity at a late stage of the synthesis. The biological activity of the synthesized compounds was e...

Pyrophosphate anions play key roles in various biological and chemical processes. During the last few years, many exciting results have emerged regarding the development of fluorescent and colorimetric sensors for this biologically important species. In this review, we will cover the fluorescent and colorimetric chemosensors developed for the detection of pyrophosphate (PPi) since 2010.

The sequencing, cloning, and expression of the pfp gene from Dictyoglomus thermophilum, which consists of 1,041 bp and encodes a pyrophosphate-dependent phosphofructokinase, are described. A phylogenetic analysis indicates that the enzyme is closely related to the pyrophosphate-dependent enzyme from Thermoproteus tenax. The recombinant and native enzymes share a high degree of similarity for mo...

The arginyl-tRNA ligase of Neurosporo has been purified 1,800-fold. The purified preparation catalyzed the esterification of 140 /Imoles of arginine to tRNA per hour per mg of protein at 35”. Polyacrylamide gel electrophoresis revealed a single major band from which the enzyme was estimated to be 95% homogeneous. The apparent molecular weight of the enzyme is about 85,000 as determined by sodiu...

Bisphosphonates (BPs) are pyrophosphate analogs. They are widely used against enhanced bone-resorption in various diseases. Nitrogen-containing BPs (N-BPs) exhibit strong anti-bone-resorptive effects but have inflammatory and necrotic side effects. The non-nitrogen-containing BPs (non-N-BPs) etidronate and clodronate lack such side effects, but their anti-bone-resorptive effects are weak. In mi...

OBJECTIVES Pyrophosphate arthropathy has been linked to diverse clinical subtypes. The two most common are: acute synovitis (pseudogout) and chronic pyrophosphate arthropathy ("pseudo-osteoarthritis"). We have conducted a study to examine whether these are overlapping syndromes. METHODS We reviewed all synovial fluid (SF) analyses performed in our laboratory from January 1988 to May 1997 to d...

fenugreek (trigonella foenum-graecum l.) has a long and respected history of medicinal uses in middle east and persian medicine. the hypocholesterolaemic and hypoglycaemic effects of fenugreek were attributed to its major steroidal sapogenin, diosgenin and its major alkaloid, trigonelline. the knowledge of diosgenin and trigonelline biosynthesis is derived from studies of cholesterol and nicoti...