mediated Smad and p38 MAPK Signaling in Vascular Smooth Muscle Cells Hui-xuan Li, Mei Han, Michel Bernier, Bin Zheng, Shao-guang Sun, Ming Su, Rui Zhang, Jian-ran Fu, Jin-kun Wen Department of Biochemistry and Molecular Biology, Key Laboratory of Neurobiology and Vascular Biology, China Administration of Education, Hebei Medical University, No. 361, Zhongshan East Road, Shijiazhuang, 050017, Ch...

Synthesis of adenosine triphosphate ATP, the ‘biological energy currency’, is accomplished by FoF1-ATP synthase. In the plasma membrane of Escherichia coli, proton-driven rotation of a ring of 10 c subunits in the Fo motor powers catalysis in the F1 motor. Although F1 uses 1201 stepping during ATP synthesis, models of Fo predict either an incremental rotation of c subunits in 361 steps or large...

We read carefully the very interesting article by Jones et al. (1), which appears in the latest issue of the Journal. To our surprise, we realized that, during the determination of opiates in blood, although the described derivatization procedure involves BSTFA, the authors use, for their qualitative and quantitative analysis, mass fragments that correspond to their pentafluoroderivatives and t...

We present high-quality J, H and Ks photometry of four Small Magellanic Cloud stellar clusters with intermediate ages in the 1–7 Gyr range (namely NGC 339, 361, 416 and 419) . We obtained deep Color-Magnitude Diagrams to study the evolved sequences and providing a detailed census of the Red Giant Branch (RGB), Asymptotic Giant Branch (AGB) and Carbon star populations in each cluster and their c...

Type I myosins are monomeric motors involved in a range of motile and sensory activities in different cell types. In simple unicellular eukaryotes, motor activity of class I myosins is regulated by phosphorylation of a conserved 'TEDS site' residue within the motor domain. The mechanism by which this phosphorylation event affects the cellular function of each myosin I remains unclear. The fissi...

The 827 amino acid yeast RAP1 protein interacts with DNA to regulate gene expression at numerous unrelated loci in the yeast genome. By a combination of amino, carboxy and internal deletions, we have defined an internal 235 amino acid fragment of the yeast RAP1 protein that can bind efficiently to the RAP1 binding site of the PGK Upstream Activation Sequence (UAS). This domain spans residues 36...

Caduet tablets are novel prescription drug that combines amlodipine besylate (AM) with atorvastatin calcium (AT). A spectrofluorimetric and an HPLC-fluorescence detection methods were developed for simultaneous determination of both drugs in tablets. In the spectrofluorimetric method, native fluorescence of AM and AT were measured in methanol at 442 and 369 nm upon excitation at 361 and 274 nm,...

Opportunistic invasive fungal infections, in particular due to Aspergillus fumigatus, are an increasing problem in hospitalized, immunocompromised patients [1-3]. Patients at risk are those with hematologic malignancies [4,5], bone marrow or solid organ transplant recipients [6,7], patients with chronic granulomatous disease [8] and AIDS patients [9]. These patient groups have in common severe ...