Background: Varicocele occurs in approximately 15% to 20% of the male population and it is the most common cause of poor semen parameters. It has been demonstrated that patients with varicocele have poor chromatin packing, DNA damage and nuclear anomalies than the healthy men. Therefore, the aim of this study was to evaluate sperm chromatin integrity and semen parameters in these patients after...

Protein disulfide isomerase (PDI) oxidizes, reduces, and isomerizes disulfide bonds, modulates redox responses, and chaperones proteins. The Arabidopsis thaliana genome contains 12 PDI genes, but little is known about their subcellular locations and functions. We demonstrate that PDI5 is expressed in endothelial cells about to undergo programmed cell death (PCD) in developing seeds. PDI5 intera...

When 10(-5) M carbachol was added to parotid tissue slices incubated in buffer containing Ca++, watery vacuoles were formed in the cells. The percent volume density of vacuoles, as measured from 0.5-micron sections, increased from 0.64 +/- 0.15 SE (n = 7) to 3.09 +/- 0.99 (n = 5) in 10 min and, finally, to 7.27 +/- 1.88 (n = 4) in 30 min. In electron micrographs, most of the vacuoles appeared t...

LINC complexes are evolutionarily conserved nuclear envelope bridges, physically connecting the nucleus to the peripheral cytoskeleton. They are pivotal for dynamic cellular and developmental processes, like nuclear migration, anchoring and positioning, meiotic chromosome movements and maintenance of cell polarity and nuclear shape. Active nuclear reshaping is a hallmark of mammalian sperm deve...