Neisseria meningitidis causes cases of bacterial meningitis and sepsis. Factor H binding protein (FHbp) is a component of two licensed meningococcal serogroup B vaccines. FHbp recruits the complement regulator factor H (FH) to the bacterial surface, which inhibits the complement alternative pathway and promotes immune evasion. Binding of human FH impairs the protective antibody responses to FHb...

Leptospirosis is a zoonosis caused by pathogenic bacteria from the genus Leptospira. The disease represents a serious public health problem in underdeveloped tropical countries. Leptospires infect hosts through small abrasions in the skin or mucous membranes and they rapidly disseminate to target organs. The capacity of some pathogenic leptospiral strains to acquire the negative complement regu...

Cytokinesis is an essential step in neurogenesis, yet the mechanisms that control cytokinesis in the developing CNS are not well understood. The flathead ( fh) mutation in rat results in cytokinesis failure in neural progenitors followed by apoptosis and a dramatic reduction in CNS growth. Here we present evidence that the fh mutation is caused by a single base deletion in exon 1 of the gene en...

Factor H binding protein (FHbp) is a virulence factor used by meningococci to evade the host complement system. FHbp elicits bactericidal antibodies in humans and is part of two recently licensed vaccines. Using human complement Factor H (FH) transgenic mice, we previously showed that binding of FH decreased the protective antibody responses to FHbp vaccination. Therefore, in the present study ...

diabetes type 2 is a world wide spread disease with a multifactorial pathogenetic evolution. various factors like obesity, physical inactivity and poor lifestyle habits contribute to its development. the aim of this study was to verify if in young healthy sedentary male and female there is positive correlation between family history to type 2 diabetes and an increase in body weight and fat mass...

High density lipoproteins (HDLs; d= 1.063-1.21 g/ml) were isolated by ultracentrifugation and radiolabeled with '"In. The in vitro binding onto platelets from healthy volunteers (it=15) and patients (n=36) with heterozygous familial hypercholesterolemia (FH) was investigated. Binding was saturable and indicated high-affinity binding sites, which bound 1,882±361 ng protein of '"In-HDL/lC platele...

AIMS Familial hypercholesterolaemia (FH) is associated with increased risk of premature atherosclerosis and coronary artery disease (CAD). However, onset of clinically manifested CAD varies widely among patients with heterozygous FH, and we hypothesized that inflammatory mediators such as chemokines could contribute to atherogenesis in these patients. METHODS AND RESULTS We compared periphera...

Purpose Age-related macular degeneration (AMD) is a slowly progressing disease, and risk appears to be tied to an overactive complement system. We have previously demonstrated that mouse choroidal neovascularization (CNV) and smoke-induced ocular pathology can be reduced with an alternative pathway (AP) inhibitor fusion protein consisting of a complement receptor-2 fragment linked to the inhibi...

High density lipoproteins (HDLs; d = 1.063 - 1.21 g/ml) were isolated by ultracentrifugation and radiolabeled with 111In. The in vitro binding onto platelets from healthy volunteers (n = 15) and patients (n = 36) with heterozygous familial hypercholesterolemia (FH) was investigated. Binding was saturable and indicated high-affinity binding sites, which bound 1,882 +/- 361 ng protein of 111In-HD...

The gene encoding the Krebs cycle enzyme fumarate hydratase (FH) is mutated in hereditary leiomyomatosis and renal cell cancer (HLRCC). Loss of FH activity causes accumulation of intracellular fumarate, which can directly modify cysteine residues to form 2-succinocysteine through succination. We undertook a proteomic-based screen in cells and renal cysts from Fh1 (murine FH)-deficient mice and ...