Kynurenine aminotransferases are key enzymes for the synthesis of kynurenic acid (KYNA), an endogenous glutamate receptor antagonist. The study described here examined ontogenic changes of kynurenine aminotransferase I (KAT I) activity and its expression in the chicken retina. KAT I activity measured on embryonic day 16 (E16) was significantly higher than at all other stages (E12, P0 and P7). D...

Kynurenic acid (KYNA) can act as an endogenous modulator of excitatory neurotransmission and has been implicated in the pathogenesis of several neurological and psychiatric diseases. To evaluate its role in the brain, we disrupted the murine gene for kynurenine aminotransferase II (KAT II), the principal enzyme responsible for the synthesis of KYNA in the rat brain. mKat-2(-/-) mice showed no d...

High rates of fatty acid oxidation in the heart and subsequent inhibition of glucose oxidation contributes to the severity of myocardial ischemia. These adverse effects of fatty acids can be overcome by stimulating glucose oxidation, either directly or secondary to an inhibition of fatty acid oxidation. We recently demonstrated that trimetazidine stimulates glucose oxidation in the heart second...

Protein lysine acetylation plays an important role in the normal functioning of cells, including gene expression regulation, protein stability and metabolism regulation. Although large amounts of lysine acetylation sites have been identified via large-scale mass spectrometry or traditional experimental methods, the lysine (K)-acetyl-transferase (KAT) responsible for the acetylation of a given p...

Catalase and superoxide dismutase (SOD) activities of virulent and nonvirulent isolates of Staphylococcus aureus were compared. The mean value of catalase activity for intact cell suspensions was 2,773 +/- 1,049 Kat f units (Kat f is defined as the ratio of the velocity constant of catalase at 0 min to the protein content in grams per milliliter); that of nonvirulent isolates was 154 +/- 92 Kat...

We propose a general framework for the static analysis of programs based on Kleene algebra with tests (KAT). We show how KAT can be used to statically verify compliance with safety policies specified by security automata. We prove soundness and completeness over relational interpretations. We illustrate the method on an example involving the correctness of a device driver.

background and objective: molecular epidemiological studies have shown that certain genotypes of mycobacterium tuberculosis (mtb) are over-represented in limited geographical regions, suggesting of evolution of certain genotypes with increasing virulence and pathogenicity. beijing strain of mtb was initially described by its potential to cause outbreaks worldwide and its association with drug r...

KAT (Kleene Algebra with Tests) have proved to be useful for reasoning about programs in a partial correctness framework. We describe DRA (demonic Re nement Algebra), a variation of KAT for total correctness and illustrate its modeling and reasoning power with a number of applications and examples. TUCS Laboratory TUCS Learning and Reasoning Laboratory

Abnormal levels of kynurenic acid (KYNA) in the human brain are believed to be connected to several central nervous system (CNS) diseases, therefore compounds which affect the production of this crucial metabolite are of interest in CNS drug development. The majority of KYNA production is accounted for by kynurenine aminotransferase-2 (KAT-2) in the mammalian brain; hence this enzyme is one of ...

We describe an implementation of an interactive theorem prover for Kleene algebra with tests (KAT). The system is designed to reflect the natural style of reasoning with KAT that one finds in the literature. We illustrate its use with some examples.