Poly-γ-glutamic acid (γ-PGA) is a promising microbial polymer with potential applications in industry, agriculture and medicine. The use of high γ-PGA-producing strains is an effective approach to improve productivity of γ-PGA. In this study, we developed a mutant, F3-178, from Bacillus subtilis GXA-28 using genome shuffling. The morphological characteristics of F3-178 and GXA-28 were not ident...

We demonstrate herein that the well documented hyperresponsiveness to erythropoietin (Epo) of Ba/F3 cells expressing C-terminal truncated erythropoietin receptors (EpoRs) is contingent on these cells being in fetal calf serum (FCS). In the absence of FCS, their Epo-induced proliferation is far poorer than Ba/F3 cells expressing wild-type (WT) EpoRs. This hyporesponsiveness in the absence of ser...

PGC-1α, a major metabolic regulator of gluconeogenesis and lipogenesis, is strongly induced to coactivate Hepatitis B virus (HBV) gene expression in the liver of fasting mice. We found that 8-Br-cAMP and glucocorticoids synergistically induce PGC-1α and its downstream targets, including PEPCK and G6Pase. Also, HBV core promoter activity was synergistically enhanced by 8-Br-cAMP and glucocortico...

Dysfunctions of ubiquitin-proteasome system and toxicity of dopamine have been known as the key mechanisms in the pathogenesis of Parkinson's disease (PD) and proteasome inhibitors are widely used in experimental models of PD to reproduce cell death of dopaminergic neurons. In the present study, immortalized human neural stem cells (HB1.F3, F3) and those transfected with human aromatic acid dec...

Haveria spp. accumulate flavonol sulfate esters whose biosynthesis i s catalyzed by a number of position-specific flavonol sulfotransferases. Although the accumulation of sulfated flavonols appears to be tissue specific and developmentally regulated and to vary among related species, little i s known about the mechanism of regulation controlling the synthesis of these metabolites. In the presen...

Tachyzoite forms of Toxoplasma gondii were subjected to a sequential organic solvent extraction, which allows fractionation of membrane components according to their degrees of hydrophobicity, yielding three fractions named F1 (most hydrophobic) to F3 (least hydrophobic). Fractions F2 (80.85% specificity and 86.95% sensitivity) and F3 (89.36% specificity and 93.61% sensitivity) gave the best re...

Haveria spp. accumulate flavonol sulfate esters whose biosynthesis i s catalyzed by a number of position-specific flavonol sulfotransferases. Although the accumulation of sulfated flavonols appears to be tissue specific and developmentally regulated and to vary among related species, little i s known about the mechanism of regulation controlling the synthesis of these metabolites. In the presen...

A 35 KDa protein referred to as F3 was purified from the seeds of Borreria hispida by precipitation with 80% ammonium sulphate and gel filtration on Sephadex G-100 column. RP-HPLC analysis of protein fraction (F3) on an analytical C-18 column produced a single peak, detected at 220 nm. F3 showed an apparent molecular weight of 35 KDa by SDS PAGE and MALDI-TOF-MS analyses. Peptide mass fingerpri...

Using modular quotients of linear groups deened over the Eisenstein ring Z!], we construct innnite families of nite regular or chiral polytopes of types f3; 3; 6g, f3; 6; 3g and f6; 3; 6g.

Neural stem cells and progenitor cells migrate selectively to tumor loci in vivo. We exploited the tumor-tropic properties of HB1.F3.C1 cells, an immortalized cell line derived from human fetal telencephalon, to deliver the cDNA encoding a secreted form of rabbit carboxylesterase (rCE) to disseminated neuroblastoma tumors in mice. This enzyme activates the prodrug CPT-11 more efficiently than d...