protein engineering but also for practical purposes such as potential cleaning agents, food additives, and dehairing agents. Recently, we isolated many alkalophilic actinomycetes as in our previous paper.X) One of the interesting alkalophilic actinomycetes, Nocardiopsis dassonvillei subsp. prasina OPC-210, produced two types of alkaline serine proteases (NDP-I and NDP-II). We have already repor...

Native tryptophanyl-tRNA synthetase purified from Escherichia coli B has on each identical subunit a single thiol group which rapidly forms a mixed disulfide with a thionitrobenzoate moiety of 5,5'-dithiobis(2-nitrobenzoic acid). The reaction and the concomitant inactivation of the enzyme are both reversible by reductive removal of the thionitrobenzoate with dithiothreitol. Iodoacetamide and N-...

A mutant human lysozyme C77A, in which Cys-77 is replaced with Ala, was secreted by Saccharomyces cerevisiae as two proteins (C77A-a and C77A-b) with different specific activities. A peptide fragment from Val93 to Ala108 was obtained from C77A-a by pepsin digestion, and examined by fast atom bombardment mass spectrometry and amino acid analysis. The results showed that glutathione was attached ...

chemotherapy of viral diseases. Numerous efforts have been made to obtain direct anti-viral activity, with a large number of compounds against viruses grown in tissue cul ture or chick embryo or with diseases produced experi mentally in laboratory animals. @ Aromatic diamidines (4) and several 1 ,4-dioxyquinoxa lines (21) were effective against the viruses of the lympho granuloma and psittacosi...

Axons freshly dissected from living specimens of the tropical squid Dorytheutis plei have a calcium content of 68 mumol/kg of axoplasm. Fibers stimulated at 100 impulses/s in 100 mM Ca seawater increase their Ca content by 150 mumol/kg.min; axons placed in 3 Ca (choline) seawater increase their Ca content by 12 mumol/kg.min. Axons loaded with 0.2--1.5 mmol Ca/kg of axoplasm extruded Ca with a h...

We have isolated and characterized an N-benzoyl-Val-Gly-Arg-p-nitroanilide-specific protease gene, designated prtH, from Bacteroides forsythus ATCC 43037. Nucleotide sequencing of the DNA insert from the clone (hereafter referred to as clone FST) revealed that the protease activity corresponded to an open reading frame consisting of 1,272 bp coding for a 47.8-kDa protein. When plasmid pFST was ...

The condensation of retinene(1) with opsin to form rhodopsin is optimal at pH about 6, a pH which favors the condensation of retinene(1) with sulfhydryl rather than with amino groups. The synthesis of rhodopsin, though unaffected by the less powerful sulfhydryl reagents, monoiodoacetic acid and its amide, is inhibited completely by p-chloromercuribenzoate (PCMB). This inhibition is reversed in ...

The effect of verapamil on insulin secretion in the presence of IBMX was studied in B cells in pancreatic monolayer cultures of the neonatal rat using a perifusion system. For the initial three days, B cells were exposed to a medium of either 5.5 or 11.1 mM glucose and 10 microM iodoacetic acid (IAA) after which they were exposed to a medium of either 5.5 or 11.1mM glucose until day 7. Insulin ...