The eye lenses of the Antarctic nototheniid fishes that inhabit the perennially freezing Antarctic seawater are transparent at -2 degrees C, whereas the cold-sensitive mammalian and tropical fish lenses display cold-induced cataract at 20 degrees C and 7 degrees C, respectively. No cold-cataract occurs in the giant Antarctic toothfish Dissostichus mawsoni lens when cooled to temperatures as low...

The interaction of the cationic carbocyanine dye Stains-all (1-ethyl-2-[3-(1-ethyl-naphthol[1,2-d]thiazolin-2-ylidene)-2- methylpropenyl]naphthol[1,2-d]thiazolium bromide) with the eye lens proteins crystallins has been studied. alpha- and gamma-crystallins do not bind the dye, while beta- and delta-crystallins do, consistent with the fact that the latter two proteins bind the calcium ion. beta...

Several mechanisms have been proposed for the way in which glucose and its metabolites cause cataract, retinopathy and other complications of diabetes, the most convincing being glycation. Glycation, the reaction of sugars with free amino groups of proteins, is one of a variety of non-enzymic post-translational modifications. The aim of the present study was to identify some of the most reactiv...

Nuclear cataract resulting from an overdose of selenite was characterized by a five-fold increase in nuclear urea-soluble protein. The origin of this urea-soluble protein was examined by two-dimensional electrophoresis, immunoblotting with monospecific antisera against rat lens crystallins, and tryptic mapping. Cataractous urea-soluble protein was primarily composed of insolubilized beta- and g...

In the development of multiple sclerosis (MS), (re)activation of infiltrating T cells by myelin-derived Ags is considered to be a crucial step. Previously, alpha B-crystallin has been shown to be an important myelin Ag to human T cells. Since alpha B-crystallin is an intracellular heat shock protein, the question arises at what stage, if any, during lesional development in MS this Ag becomes av...

A review of recent work upon lens proteins suggests that Morners concept of three soluble lens proteins may still be tenable. This conclusion is based upon consideration of physical and chemical studies. Ultracentrifugal investigations of alpha crystallin indicate that it is composed of a number of different-sized aggregates of subunits held together by noncovalent forces. Studies at various pH...

A novel ENU-induced mutation in the mouse leading to a nuclear and zonular opacity of the eye lens (Aey1) was mapped to chromosome 1 between the markers D1Mit303 and D1Mit332. On the basis of the chromosomal position, the gamma-crystallin encoding gene cluster (Cryg) and the betaA2-crystallin encoding gene Cryba2 were tested as candidate genes. An A --> T mutation destroys the start codon of th...

PURPOSE Studies have shown that proteasome inhibition protects lens epithelial cells (LECs) against interferon (IFN)-gamma-induced apoptosis. The present study was conducted to test the hypothesis that proteasome inhibition can protect lens cells against apoptosis by upregulating heat shock protein (HSP) expression. METHODS Murine lens epithelial alphaTN4-1 cells were treated with combination...

PURPOSE Our previous work identified 23 low molecular weight (<3.5 kDa) crystallin peptides in the urea-soluble fractions of normal young, normal aged, and aged cataract human lenses. We found that one of these crystallin fragments, betaA3/A1(102-117) peptide (SDAYHIERLMSFRPIC), that are present in aged and cataract lens, increased the scattering of light by beta- and gamma-crystallins and alco...