Cubilin is a high molecular weight multiligand receptor that mediates intestinal absorption of intrinsic factor-cobalamin and selective protein reabsorption in renal tubules. The genetic basis of selective intestinal cobalamin malabsorption with proteinuria was investigated in a canine model closely resembling human Imerslund-Gräsbeck syndrome caused by cubilin mutations. Canine CUBN cDNA was c...

Aims: Various studies have shown that plasma homocysteine (HCY) serum levels are elevated in actively drinking alcohol-dependent patients a during alcohol withdrawal, while rapidly declining during abstinence. Hyperhomocysteinemia has been associated not only with blood alcohol concentration (BAC), but also with deficiency of different B-vitamins, particularly folate, pyridoxine and cobalamin. ...

A 71-year-old woman was treated with radiotherapy for carcinoma of the cervix. Nine year later she was found at laparotomy to have a thickened narrow ileum. At the time she had an iron-deficiency anaemia and when this was treated the blood picture changed to that of a severe megaloblastic anaemia. This was due to cobalamin deficiency resulting from malabsorption of cobalamin by the damaged ileum.

Crystals of a cobalamin-binding domain (M(r) = 28,000) have been grown in polyethylene glycol 6000 at pH 7.5, starting from solutions of intact (M(r) = 133,000) cobalamin-dependent methionine synthase. The crystals are orthorhombic in space group P2(1)2(1)2(1), with cell dimensions a = 96.9 A, b = 55.4 A, c = 103.8 A. For two molecules per asymmetric unit, the calculated VM value is 2.45 A3/Da....

Hematological parameters, serum cobalamin and folate levels, and the concentrations of the functional markers plasma methylmalonic acid and total homocysteine were determined in 173 newborns and 46 infants at 6 weeks to see whether maternal smoking influences the hematological parameters and the vitamin status of the newborn. At birth, there was a strong inverse correlation between the number o...

Cobalamin is essentially required for growth by Euglena gracilis and shown to be converted to coenzyme forms promptly after feeding cyanocobalamin. Concentrations of coenzymes, methylcobalamin, and 5'-deoxyadenosylcobalamin, reached about 1 femtomole/10(6) cells 2 hours after feeding cyanocobalamin to cobalamin-limited cells. Cobalamins all were bound to proteins in Euglena cells and located in...