Sexual dimorphism of mouse complement component 5 (C5) was detected by isoelectric focusing of desialated ethylenediamine tetraacetic acid (EDTA)-plasma on agarose gel, followed by immunofixation with anti-mouse C5. Male plasma displayed two C5 bands, basic and acidic, while female plasma had only a basic C5 band. In all mouse strains tested except C5-deficient strains, the identical patterns o...

When grown in the appropriate medium, several yeast species produce pectinases able to degrade pectic substances. It is mainly exocellular endopolygalacturonases that break pectins or pectate down by hydrolysis of alpha-1,4-glycosidic linkages in a random way. Biochemical characterisation of these enzymes has shown that they have an optimal pH in the acidic region and an optimal temperature bet...

The effects of acidic polysaccharides purified from Gastrodia rhizome on blood pressure and serum lipid levels in spontaneously hypertensive rats (SHR) fed a high-fat diet were investigated. Acidic polysaccharides were purified from crude polysaccharides by DEAE-Sepharose CL-6B. Thirty-six male SHR were randomly divided into three groups: Gastrodia rhizome crude polysaccharide (A), acidic polys...

Eosinophil granule major basic protein (MBP), a potent toxin for helminths and mammalian cells in vitro, is a single polypeptide chain rich in arginine. MBP has been localized on damaged helminths and tissues in hypersensitivity diseases including bronchial asthma. The MBP cDNA indicates that MBP is translated as a slightly acidic preproprotein with an acidic propart. To test the hypothesis tha...

prpc conversion to prpsc isoform is the main known cause for prion diseases including crutzfeldt-jakob, gerstmann-sträussler-sheinker syndrome and fatal familial insomnia in human. the precise mechanism underling this conversion is yet to be well understood. in the present work,  using the coordinate file of prpc (available on the protein data bank) as a starting structure, separate molecular d...

The inward Na+ current underlying the action potential in nerve is terminated by inactivation. The preceding report shows that deletions within the intracellular linker between domains III and IV remove inactivation, but mutation of conserved basic and paired acidic amino acids has little effect. Here we show that substitution of glutamine for three clustered hydrophobic amino acids, Ile-1488, ...

We quantified the number of glial fibrillary acidic protein immunoreactive (GFAP-IR) astrocytes in the CA1 and CA3 areas of the adult rat hippocampus. The dorsal and ventral regions of the hippocampus were taken into account to estimate the GFAP-IR cells using unbiased stereological techniques. Males had a higher number of GFAP-IR astrocytes in the CA3 area, whereas females had more in the CA1 ...

The amino acid composition of twice recrystallized pepsin (Worthington Biochemical Corporation) has been determined chromatographically on columns of Amberlite IR 120 resin. The results of the analyses obtained on four different preparations indicate a close agreement in their amino acid composition. Pepsin is unique in that it has a great predominance of acidic amino acids over basic ones. Mor...

We investigated whether the heart, like other mammalian organs, possesses internal clocks, and, if so, whether pressure overload-induced hypertrophy alters the clock mechanism. Clock genes are intrinsically maintained, as shown by rhythmic changes even in single cells. Clocks are believed to confer a selective advantage by priming the cell for the expected environmental stimulus. In this way, c...

A parameter is developed which relates the amino acid composition and subunit size of a protein to the degradative rate in vivo. This parameter was calculated for 11 rat liver proteins and a plot versus the half-lives of these proteins is linear and has a coefficient of correlation of -0.96. Evidence is presented which suggests that the density of excess acidic amino acids on the surface of the...