Positively charged endogenous and exogenous organic compounds of diverse chemical structures are transported by polyspecific organic cation transporters (OCT). In two contributions to the May 2005 issue of Molecular Pharmacology, amino acid residues within the fourth and tenth transmembrane helices of rat OCT1 are described that contribute to cation and corticosterone binding. In a three-dimens...

It has long been known that some non-photosynthetic micro-organisms can grow on organic C, compounds as their sole source of energy and carbon. The means whereby such organisms grow has been the subject of speculation. It has been suggested (Bhat & Barker, 1948; van Niel, 1954) that they might couple the energy of oxidation of the organic substrate to the reduction of carbon dioxide and the syn...

Organic fertilizer regimens consisting of combinations of composts (yard waste, swine manure, or spent mushroom substrate) and liquid fertilizers (fishor plant-based) were evaluated against conventional hydroponic fertilizers in two experiments with greenhouse tomatoes grown in peat-based substrate. Crop yield and fruit quality were evaluated and several assays of substrate microbial activity a...

Hepatobiliary elimination of many organic anions is initiated by OATP1B1 (OATP2, LST-1, OATP-C), OATP1B3 (OATP8), and OATP2B1 (OATP-B), which are the predominant uptake transporters of human hepatocytes. Thereafter, the unidirectional efflux pump ABCC2 (multidrug resistance protein 2) mediates the transport of organic anions, including glutathione conjugates and glucuronosides, into bile. In th...

We investigated the effect of dissolved organic carbon (DOC) on hypolimnetic metabolism (accumulation of dissolved inorganic carbon (DIC) and methane (CH4)) in 21 lakes across a gradient of DOC concentrations (308 to 1540 !mol C L). The highly colored nature of the DOC in these lakes suggests it is mostly of terrestrial origin. Hypolimnetic methane accumulation was positively correlated with ep...

The organic fraction of municipal solid waste (OFMSW) usually contains high lignocellulosic and fatty fractions. These fractions are well-known to be a hard biodegradable substrate for biological treatments and its presence involves limitations on the performance of anaerobic processes. To avoid this, thermochemical pretreatments have been applied on the OFMSW coming from a full-scale mechanica...

Physical vapor deposition is commonly used to prepare organic glasses that serve as the active layers in light-emitting diodes, photovoltaics, and other devices. Recent work has shown that orienting the molecules in such organic semiconductors can significantly enhance device performance. We apply a high-throughput characterization scheme to investigate the effect of the substrate temperature (...

Forest land-use changes have long been suggested to profoundly affect soil microbial communities. However, how forest type conversion influences soil microbial properties remains unclear in Tibetan boreal forests. The aim of this study was to explore variations of soil microbial profiles in the surface organic layer and subsurface mineral soil among three contrasting forests (natural coniferous...