The evolution of the melanocortin receptors (MCRs) is linked to the evolution of adrenocorticotrophic hormone (ACTH), the melanocyte-stimulating hormones (MSHs), and their common precursor pro-opiomelanocortin (POMC). The origin of the MCRs and POMC appears to be grounded in the early radiation of the ancestral protochordates. During the genome duplications that have occurred during the evoluti...

The melanocortin receptors (MCRs) are a gene family in the rhodopsin class of G protein-coupled receptors. Based on the analysis of several metazoan genome databases it appears that the MCRs are only found in chordates. The presence of five genes in the family (i.e., mc1r, mc2r, mc3r, mc4r, mc5r) in representatives of the tetrapods indicates that the gene family is the result of two genome dupl...

In this study a multicomponent reaction involving carbohydrate derivatives as the main component in order to prepare a new library of polyhydroxy compounds incorporating pyrimidine-fused heterocycles (PFHs) is introduced. A set of polyhydroxy functionalized PFHs were synthesized using multicomponent reactions of sugar (glucose, galactose, arabinose and lactose), barbituric acid and amines. Also...

We consider plane laminar ames with multicomponent transport and complex chemistry. The governing equations are derived from the kinetic theory of gases by using the classical isobaric approximation. An arbitrary number of reversible chemical reactions and temperature dependent species speciic heats are considered in the model. The most general form for multicomponent transport uxes given by th...

Two multicomponent reactions, the Ugi and Passerini reactions, are accelerated by the use of aqueous solutions. The rate enhancements compared to those by organic solvents can approach 300-fold. Reactions performed in water offer another advantage that products are often insoluble, permitting direct isolation by precipitation. The methods were applied to the preparation of three small combinato...

We analyze thermonuclear and pycnonuclear fusion reactions in dense matter containing atomic nuclei of different types. We extend a phenomenological expression for the reaction rate, proposed recently by Gasques et al. [11] for the one-component plasma of nuclei, to the multi-component plasma. The expression contains several fit parameters which we adjust to reproduce the best microscopic calcu...