BACKGROUND Microalgae have the potential to rapidly accumulate lipids of high interest for the food, cosmetics, pharmaceutical and energy (e.g. biodiesel) industries. However, current lipid extraction methods show efficiency limitation and until now, extraction protocols have not been fully optimized for specific lipid compounds. The present study thus presents a novel lipid extraction method, ...

It is important to obtain structure-activity relationship (SAR) data across cationic lipids for the self-assembly and non-viral intracellular delivery of siRNA. The aims of this work are to carry out a SAR study on the efficiency of asymmetrical N,N-diacyl spermines in siRNA delivery and EGFP reporter gene silencing, with comparisons to selected mixtures composed of symmetrical N,N-diacyl sperm...

Successful replication of the intracellular parasite Toxoplasma gondii within its parasitophorous vacuole necessitates a substantial increase in membrane mass. The possible diversion and metabolism of host cell lipids and lipid precursors by Toxoplasma was therefore investigated using radioisotopic and fluorophore-conjugated compounds. Confocal microscopic analyses demonstrated that Toxoplasma ...

Fatty acids are taken up by cells and incorporated into complex lipids such as neutral lipids and glycerophospholipids. Glycerophospholipids are major constituents of cellular membranes. More than 1000 molecular species of glycerophospholipids differ in their polar head groups and fatty acid compositions. They are related to cellular functions and diseases and have been well analyzed by mass sp...

Our aims were i) to determine which lipids colocalize with newly synthesized apolipoprotein (apo) B in the lumen of the rough endoplasmic reticulum (RER), and thus may play a role in the stabilization and/or translocation of this protein; and ii) to determine the intracellular sites of assembly of lipids into very low density lipoprotein (VLDL). In order to do this, we have developed a new meth...

Background Several studies have presented morphological, biochemical and histopathological changes in the paraspinal skeletal muscle of patients with adolescent idiopathic scoliosis (AIS). Some abnormalities have been demonstrated such as an increased amount of type I fibers in the concavity and the decreased number of type II in the convexity, an increase in the intracellular concentration of ...

Plant positive strand RNA viruses are intracellular infectious agents that take advantage of cellular lipids and membranes to support replication and protect viral RNA from degradation by host antiviral responses. In this review, we discuss how Tomato bushy stunt virus (TBSV) co-opts lipid transfer proteins and modulates lipid metabolism and transport to facilitate the assembly of the membrane-...

Extracellular vesicles (EVs) are important players in the communication between different kinds of cells by delivering their content, consisting types RNA, proteins, bioactive lipids, or signaling nucleotides, into target cells. Several EVs distinguished: (1) exosomes with sizes from 30 to 150 nm originate endosomal pathway and form intracellular multivesicular bodies (MVBs), which fuse plasma ...

We investigated the capacity for phenotypic plasticity of skeletal muscle from Varanus exanthematicus, the savannah monitor lizard. Iliofibularis muscle from one leg of each lizard was electrically stimulated for 8 weeks. Both stimulated and contralateral control muscles were collected and processed for electron microscopy. We used stereological analysis of muscle cross-sections to quantify the...

An important early step in atherosclerosis is binding of apolipoprotein B-100 (apoB-100)– containing lipoproteins (VLDL, IDL, and LDL) to the proteoglycan component of the extracellular matrix of the arterial intima.1,2 When oxidative agents or enzymes attack the proteoglycan-bound lipoproteins, they become oxidatively modified, and when various intimal proteases or lipases hydrolyze them, they...