We synthesized a potent new antitumor podophyllotoxin derivative (4ß-aminoalkyl-4'-O-demethyl-4-desoxypodophyllotoxin,' TOP-53) in our search for a drug that has strong activity against lung cancer and lung metastatic cancer. TOP-53 exhibited twice the inhibitory activity of etoposide (VI'-16) against topoisomerase II and induced DNA strand breaks but showed no inhibitory activity against tubu...

We determined whether supernumerary B chromosomes were nonrandomly distributed among major angiosperm lineages and among lineages within families, as well as the identity of lineages with unusually high B-chromosome frequencies (hot spots). The incidence of B chromosomes for each taxon was gathered from databases showing species with and without these chromosomes (among species with known chrom...

background: essential hypertension tends to a familial mode. its pattern of inheritance is heterogeneous, but the frequencies of different mode of inheritance vary in different populations. determining of the mode of inheritance in each family is the basic information that is needed for the risk estimation in those family members. determination of pattern of inheritance in families with at leas...

The study of benthic macroinvertebrate communities is one of the most common methods for assessing the effects of stresses on the biological conditions of aquatic ecosystems and water quality monitoring. This research was conducted to study the changes in the macroinvertebrate communities in the Shanbeh-Bazar River, Anzali International wetland and the effects of environmental factors. Sampling...

Asterids comprise 1/4-1/3 of all flowering plants and are classified in 10 orders and >100 families. The phylogeny of asterids is here explored with jackknife parsimony analysis of chloroplast DNA from 132 genera representing 103 families and all higher groups of asterids. Six different markers were used, three of the markers represent protein coding genes, rbcL, ndhF, and matK, and three other...

Apomixis in angiosperms is asexual reproduction from seed. Its importance to angiospermous evolution and biodiversity has been difficult to assess mainly because of insufficient taxonomic documentation. Thus, we assembled literature reporting apomixis occurrences among angiosperms and transferred the information to an internet database (http://www.apomixis.uni-goettingen.de). We then searched f...

Transposable elements (TEs) are the primary contributors to the genome bulk in many organisms and are major players in genome evolution. A clear and thorough understanding of the population dynamics of TEs is therefore essential for full comprehension of the eukaryotic genome evolution and function. Although TEs in Drosophila melanogaster have received much attention, population dynamics of mos...

This study documents the use of ethno-veterinary medicine to treat livestock in Nhema communal area in the Midlands province of Zimbabwe. This study employed oral interviews and detailed discussions with 69 smallholder farmers and 3 traditional healers. The local people use 23 plant species belonging to 16 families as ethno-veterinary remedies. Two plant families were particularly frequent in u...