The major role of liver glycogen is to supply glucose to the circulation in order to maintain normal blood glucose levels. In the muscle and liver, the accumulation and breakdown of glycogen are regulated by the reciprocal activities of glycogen phosphorylase and glycogen synthase. Glycogen phosphorylase catalyses the key step of glycogen degradation and its activity is inhibited by glucose and...

Tryptic peptides obtained from normal prothrombin have been compared with those obtained from prothrombin synthesized by cattle given the vitamin K antagonist dicumarol. Two peptides were found which contain vitamin K-dependent structures. These peptides contain residues 4 through 10 and residues 12 through 44, respectively. One of these (residues 4 through 10) has previously been shown to cont...

Adducts of 1,2-epoxy-3-butene (EB) with haemoglobin were monitored in 17 workers from the 1,3-butadiene (BD) production unit of a petrochemical plant and in nine referents employed at the same factory but not exposed to BD. The air concentrations of BD were determined using stationary and personal monitoring. The ambient level of exposure of the plant workers handling butadiene containers (samp...

The role of the tryptophan-metabolizing enzyme indoleamine 2,3-dioxygenase (IDO) in down-regulating human alloresponses has recently been controversially debated. We here demonstrate that human monocyte-derived dendritic cells (mDCs) can be endowed with sustained IDO competence in vitro by 48-hour activation with lipopolysaccharide (LPS) and interferon-gamma (IFN-gamma). IFN-gamma also amplifie...

Neutrophils play a central role in innate immunity and are rapidly recruited to sites of infection and injury. Neutrophil apoptosis is essential for the successful resolution of inflammation. Necrostatin-1 (Nec-1,methyl-thiohydantoin-tryptophan (MTH-Trp)), is a potent and specific inhibitor of necroptosis[1] (a newly identified type of cell death representing a form of programmed necrosis or re...