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In a previous report, a novel antibacterial peptide astacidin 1 (FKVQNQHGQVVKIFHH) was isolated from hemocyanin of the freshwater crayfish Pacifastacus leniusculus. In this study, the antifungal activity and mechanism of astacidin 1 were evaluated. Astacidin 1 exhibited antifungal activity against Candida albicans, Trichosporon beigelii, Malassezia furfur, and Trichophyton rubrum. Also, astacidin...
Deposition of insoluble amyloid plaques is one of the known hallmarks of Alzheimer's disease. Amyloid beta 1-42 is the main component in these plaques, and the soluble oligomers of this peptide are believed to contribute to synaptic degradation and dementia. Enzymatic hydrolysis of amyloid beta is important to keep its tissue concentration low to avoid oligomerization. We have employed four enzymes...
The variety of enzymes including serine proteases that possess fibrin(ogen)olytic and platelet modulating activity have been discovered in different snake venoms. In our work the fibrin(ogen)olytic and platelet modulating activity of a new protease from Echis multisquamatis snake venom was studied. It was shown that purified enzyme cleaved the ВβR42-A43 bond of fibrinogen during first contact with...
Overexpression of the aromatase enzyme CYP19 has been implicated in the onset of estrogen-dependent breast carcinogenesis. Obacunone, a natural compound present in citrus fruits, has been demonstrated for various biological activities including anti-cancer and anti-inflammatory properties. In the present study, we have isolated obacunone and obacunone glucoside (OG) from lemon seeds, then fractionated...
Compounds showing dual inhibition of thrombin and factor Xa (FXa) are the subject of great interest owing to their broader specificity for effective anticoagulation therapy against cardiovascular disorders. This is the first report on the functional characterization and assessment of therapeutic potential of a 4423.6 Da inhibitory peptide (Ruviprase) purified from Daboia russelii russelii venom. The...
We have carried out extended set of μs-scale explicit solvent MD simulations of all possible G-triplexes which can participate in folding pathways of the human telomeric quadruplex. Our study accumulates almost 60 μs of simulation data, which is by about three orders of magnitude larger sampling compared to the earlier simulations of human telomeric G-DNA triplexes. Starting structures were obtained...
The human platelet alloantigen (HPA)-1 system, the first cause of alloimmune thrombocytopenia in Caucasians, results from leucine-to-proline substitution (alleles 1a and 1b) of residue 33 in β3 subunit of the integrin αIIbβ3. A third variant with a valine (V33) has been described. Although leucine and valine share similar physicochemical properties, sera containing alloantibodies to the HPA-1a antigen...
Venomous and non-venomous snakes possess phospholipase A 2 (PLA 2 ) inhibitory proteins (PLIs) in their blood serum. This study shows the expression and biochemical and functional characterization of a recombinant alpha inhibitor from Bothrops alternatus snake, named rBaltMIP. Its expression was performed in Pichia pastoris heterologous system, resulting in an active recombinant protein...
Elevated levels of oxidized low density lipoprotein (oxLDL) are considered to be one of the major risk factors for atherosclerosis and cardiovascular morbidity. The early stages of atherosclerosis are initiated by the accumulation of oxLDL and the induction of toxic effects on endothelial cells, resulting in endothelial dysfunction. The aim of this study was to investigate how diphenyl diselenide...
To identify the sphingolipid and ceramide species and their quantitative differences between normotensive and hypertensive intraocular pressure states in DBA/2J mouse aqueous humor (AH).Normotensive and hypertensive AH was sampled from mice by paracentesis. Lipid extraction was performed using modifications of the Bligh and Dyer method. Protein concentration was estimated using the Bradford colorimetric...
To study Human epididymis protein 4 (HE4) surface fucosylation and to determine the effects and significance of Lewis y antigen on HE4-mediated invasion and metastasis of ovarian cancer cells, we investigated four types of ovarian cancer cells and found that six fucosylated antigens (Lewis y, Lewis x, Lewis a, Lewis b, sLewis a, and sLewis x) were identified on HE4 in ovarian cancer cells. Moreover,...
The endocannabinoid 2-arachidonoylglycerol (2-AG) can be considered a true agonist as it is able to activate human platelets stimulating arachidonic acid release, thromboxane B 2 formation and calcium intracellular elevation. Recently we have shown that 2-AG induces a rapid myosin light chain (MLC) phosphorylation/activation, early mediated by RhoA kinase (ROCK) signalling pathway and later...
Human paraoxonase 1 (h-PON1) is a Ca 2+ -dependent serum enzyme that catalyzes the hydrolysis of different types of substrates. The crystal structure of h-PON1 is not solved yet and the molecular details of how the enzyme catalyzes different types of reactions are not clear. Literature suggests that the amino acid residues at positions 192 and 115 are important for various hydrolytic activities...
A bi-functional fibrinolytic serine protease, Starase exhibiting thrombolytic potency was purified from hepatic caeca of Asterina pectinifera. Starase showed a single band of approximately 48 kDa by SDS-PAGE and fibrin zymography. The N-terminal sequence of Starase was AIPTEFDARTKKHNN, which does not match with any known fibrinolytic enzyme. Starase had optimum amidolytic activity at 50 °C and pH...
We cloned, overexpressed and purified Vibrio cholerae FtsZ protein for the first time. We used several complementary techniques to probe and compare the comparative assembly properties of recombinant Vibrio cholerae FtsZ (VcFtsZ) and Escherichia coli FtsZ (EcFtsZ). We observed that VcFtsZ polymerized at a slower rate than EcFtsZ and interestingly its polymerization was highly dependent on the presence...
Most bone-related diseases are characterized by excessive bone resorption by osteoclasts. Receptor activator of nuclear factor-kappa B (NF-κB) ligand (RANKL) has emerged as a major mediator of bone resorption, commonly associated with cancer and chronic inflammatory diseases. Thus inhibitors of RANKL signaling have a potential in preventing bone loss. In the present study, we investigated the ability...
Anatomic and physiological interactions between central serotonergic system and thyroid gland are well established. However, the effects of locally available serotonin on the thyroid functions are poorly known. Here, we first demonstrate the expression of serotonin transporter SERT and 5-HT2A receptor subtype in rat thyroid epithelial cell line FRT both at mRNA and protein levels. In order to investigate...
The proton pumping activity of bovine heart cytochrome c oxidase (CcO) is completely inhibited when all of the cardiolipin (CL) is removed from the enzyme to produce monomeric CcO containing only 11 subunits. Only dimeric enzyme containing all 13 subunits and 2–4 cardiolipin per CcO monomer exhibits a “normal” proton translocating stoichiometry of ∼1.0 H + per/e − when reconstituted...
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