Cofilin/ ADF proteins are adjoined to the membrane during the phagosome formation. They regulate the polymerization of actin filaments around the Dictostelium phagosome. Nevertheless, these proteins are also involved in the internalization of the parasite Listeria monocytogenes. A cognin-like protein is also recruited to the membrane in the presence of 3-oxo-C12-HSL. This membrane protein intervenes in cell aggregation thanks to its disulfide isomerase activity, which creates temporary covalent links with membrane proteins of the other cells. Some data demonstrate that some sponge-associated bacteria possess proteins with eukaryotic protein-protein interaction domains. The cognin-like protein may intervene in the capture of these bacteria. 3-oxo-C12-HSL seems to stimulate the de novo protein expression as well as the recruitment of proteins involved in the internalization of bacteria and further in the first step of the endocytosis/ phagocytosis process. Indeed, the over-expression of lysosomal VATPase, early recruited to the phagosomes via tubular lysosomes to establish the hostile acidic environment, suggests that 3oxo-C12-HSL promotes the phagocytosis process in the sponge cells. In the same way, the phagocytosis activity is stimulated in response to 3-oxo-C12-HSL in immune cells of higher vertebrates. This increase of activity due to this molecule may correspond to an ancestral mechanism conserved in the evolution. The 3-oxo-C12-HSL effects on the plant M. truncatula also lead to a modification of the expression of cytoskeletal protein such as a tubulin and a cofilin/ADF protein. To conclude, 3-oxo-C12-HSL may participate in the control of the immune and apoptotic S. domuncula systems. This takeover does not presume of the destiny of bacteria in the eukaryotic cells: taking advantage like in pathological contexts or long-lasting installation like in symbiosis. But the sponge may perceive this signal as a molecular evidence of the bacterial presence/density and may then trigger the first steps of bacterial endocytosis and detoxification mechanism in order to control its bacterioflora. Indeed, this mechanism may lead the sponge to react to the multiplication of the inhabiting bacteria in order to regulate the population. This secreted 3-oxo-C12-HSL is the first molecule demonstrating a paracrine inter-kingdom action in the sponge and in a non-pathological context. These results open up a new perspective in the understanding of the mechanism of regulation of sponge/bacterium relationships. Lectins are carbohydrate binding proteins unrelated to immunoglobulins that display no enzymatic activity towards the recognized sugars. They are responsible for deciphering the glyco codes playing a central role in various biological events such as infections and cell communication and growth. The above cited features elect these proteins as useful tools in bioscience and biomedicine.

Microscopic examinations of the histological sections of unwounded skin indicated the minimal changes in the collagen morphology in terms of collagen type, size and distribution and orientations. Vertically oriented red/yellow birefringent fibers were seen in un-wounded skin on day 10. Similar findings of occurrence of randomly oriented collagen fibers have also been reported from the earlier studies as a way to resist different mechanical/shearing forces. The microscopic images of the histological sections of un-illuminated control on days 5 and 10 post-wounding indicated the presence of thin weakly birefringent green and yellow fibers localized in papillary dermis of the regenerating tissue. On day 30 post-wounding, localization of yellow birefringent fibers were seen till mid dermis indicating the progression of healing. However, on day 45 and 60 post-wounding, yellow fibers were replaced by more bright red birefringent type I collagen. More interestingly, newly formed collagen fibers were vertically oriented in addition to parallel orientations. An exact explanation for the occurrence of vertically oriented collagen fibers in the regenerated skin is not clearly known. Single exposure of the optimum laser dose had significantly influenced the collagen content which was evident by the occurrence of both thick and thin fibers in papillary and mid dermal layers even on day 5 postwounding. In addition, brightly birefringent red fibers was prominently present in histological sections of the optimum laser treated animals on days 10, 30, 45 and 60 post-wounding clearly indicating the simulative effect of visible red light on collagen synthesis. On day 30 post-wounding, the type I collagen localized mainly in mid and deep dermal layers of the regenerated skin indicating the succession of healing under the influence of HeNe laser. Further, image analysis was performed for histological sections to quantify the total collagen deposited during the progression of healing. This was necessitated by the fact that histological assessments were qualitative and the prognostic potential of in vivo autofluorescence could only be tested with quantitative assessments through gold standard measurments. In the present study, since spectral discrimination of type I and III collagen were not performed, the results of image analysis of the histological sections were represented as total collagen, yellow and red fibers ) facilitating quantitative relationship between the two optical techniques. Wounded animals exposed to optimum dose of the red laser light displayed 5.70%, 5.90%, 1.73%, 1.43% and 1.09% fold increase in total collagen compared to un-illuminated control as reflected by the image analysis of Picro-Sirius stained histological sections. The microscopic images of the histological sections in RGB color space is firstly converted into HIS color scale through the “TissueQuant” software.

After cycles of mutagenesis and selection, the accumulated library of function-retained and functionlost. Based on the functional landscape of the amino acid residues in EcFbFP variants, crucial sites that determine EcFbFP function can be categorized into three groups. The first group is located on the direct interaction site of the FMN molecule for facilitating binding, the second group is located on turns and loops of the protein where conformational changes may occur, and the third group is located at spatially clustered residues near the Glu56-Lys97 salt bridges. Taken together, this approach allows the analysis of thousands of mutations with functional phenotype correlation by single highthroughput sequencing. Detailed analysis of the amino acid substitutions in variants of FR and FL libraries provided a landscape of the effect of each mutation on the EcFbFP function. All the variants in the FR library were considered to have non-deleterious mutations. On the other hand, each variant in the FL library contains both mutations that have non-deleterious effect and those that cause loss of function, because the variants in FR library were generated by repeated random mutagenesis of FR variant DNAs obtained from each cycle. The number of mutation occurrences in amino acid sequences of variants was 329 and 563 in the FR and FL libraries, respectively. Among those, 304 amino acid substitutions were detected in both libraries, which were tolerant to the loss of function. A total of 259 unique mutations were identified from the variants in the FL library, which were expected to be crucial amino acid residues responsible for the EcFbFP function. In total, the accumulated mutations indicate that each amino acid residue in EcFbFP has an average of 108 mutations; however, the pattern of enriched mutations differ so that some residues are enriched with FR mutations and some residues are enriched with FL mutations. To analyze this difference in the mutation enrichment pattern, we quantitatively compared the mutation frequency of each amino acid residue in FR and FL variants. The ratio of FL mutations over total mutations in each residue was calculated. In this study, the ratio of enrichment of FL mutations is referred to as the positional effect. The resulting heatmap of the positional effect indicates that positions tolerant to the deleterious effect on the protein function have a value close to zero and positions sensitive to the deleterious effect on the protein function have a value close to one. To further analyze the functionally sensitive positions, we used the 15 FMN-binding sites identified from previous study as a standard to determine the cutoff value for the most sensitive residues of EcFbFP. After applying the cutoff based on the positional effect, we determined 25 functionally sensitive residues, which included ten FMN-binding sites used in the standard.

In addition, miR-15b has been recently proposed as potential biomarker for colorectal cancer since it has been found upregulated in colorectal cancer patients, which suggests a relevant role of this miRNA in the progression of the disease. The determination of the circulating miRNAs is a non-invasive and relatively accessible method which could be useful in order to discriminate the responder and non-responder individuals during the treatment. Future work should be directed both to analyze the functional role of these molecules in the action of this agent, and to investigate their clinical value as potential molecular biomarkers. Acute coronary syndromes are a major cause of death worldwide. In emergency rooms, patients with chest pain and symptoms suggestive of ACS account for a large part of medical admissions. However, a wide spectrum of clinical presentations may be associated with cardiac ischemia. Hence, in these patients, rapid identification, risk stratification, and appropriate selection for early percutaneous coronary revascularization or coronary artery bypass grafting are crucial for prognosis. Recently, testing for high-sensitive cardiac troponin has been shown to be even more sensitive compared to conventional assays. However, designed to improve the detection of minimal myocardial injury and to minimize the number of unidentified ACS patients, high-sensitive assays show decreased specificity. Indeed, various cardiac and non-cardiac conditions including tachyarrhythmias, hypertensive episodes, congestive heart failure, pulmonary embolism, sepsis, and high intensity training have been associated with a rise in hs-cTnT. Thus, despite the ability of clearly ruling-out the likelihood of ACS in patients with chest pain, the increased number of individuals testing positive for troponin has hampered decision making in daily clinical practice. Particularly, the decision when to perform coronary angiography in individuals without obvious STsegment elevations remains challenging and calls for complementary rule-in parameters to identify those at particular risk of impending cardiac events. Accordingly, for the purpose of this study, CE comprise not only the conventional endpoints of subsequent myocardial infarction and cardiovascular death, but, by operational definition, also the need for coronary revascularization established by means of coronary angiography. Besides sensitive indicators of myocardial injury such as hearttype fatty acid-binding protein, markers of coronary plaque activation and/or instability appear most promising in such context. Several groups, including our own, have recently suggested myeloid-related protein 8/14, a marker of phagocyte activation highly expressed in coronary thrombi as a candidate marker for the early detection of atherothrombosis and ACS. Early indicators of coronary plaque instability also include pregnancy-associated plasma protein A.

While there is little data on systems involving plants and herbivorous insects, those involving plants and microbes have been studied extensively, leading to the development of a four phase ‘zigzag’ model. It is now understood that molecules known as pathogen-associated molecular patterns and effectors play key roles in the virulence of pathogens towards plants. The first phase of plant resistance is the basal defense, in which the pathogen’s PAMPs are recognized by the plant’s pattern recognition receptors, initiating PAMP-triggered immunity. This prompted the evolution of virulence effectors in pathogens to suppress PTI. As a result, plants evolved R genes that mediate specific pathogen resistance mechanisms in which the R protein acts as a receptor that recognizes the pathogen’s effectors, inducing effector-triggered immunity. Effector proteins are usually the products of virulence genes and can be regarded as virulence factors in pathogens and aphids. The relationship between the R and Avr genes is consistent with the gene-for-gene model. All of these findings are likely to be relevant in studies on the interactions of plants and insect herbivores because plants may well use similar defensive strategies to cope with the effects of herbivore attacks. Brown planthopper resistance was first reported in the Mudgo rice variety in 1969, and the first resistance gene, Bph1, was detected in the same variety in 1971. A total of 28 different brown planthopper resistance genes have since been identified in cultivated and wild rice species, all of which are located on specific regions of the rice chromosomes. Of these resistant genes, only the Bph14 gene has been isolated and characterized via a map-based cloning strategy. The Bph14 gene encodes a coiled-coil, nucleotide-binding, and leucine-rich repeat protein of the NB–LRR family that resembles the R proteins that contribute to plant resistance against disease-causing pathogens. Two other plant insect resistance genes, Mi-1.2 and Vat, have since been cloned; both likewise encode NB–LRR proteins. These three insect resistance genes originate from different plants but reveal similarities between the molecular mechanisms of insect and disease resistance. A receptor-like kinase gene OsLecRK was recently shown to be involved in basal defense response to brown planthopper attacks and may be a PRR that recognizes molecules secreted by these insects. Despite decades of investigation, the genetic basis of virulence in N. lugens remains to be identified. Genetic studies on this agriculturally important insect have been hindered by a lack of genome-wide linkage resources. However, it is known to exhibit considerable individual variation within biotypes. Crossing experiments using selected biotypes indicate that the virulence is continuously distributed in the offsprings and cannot be predicted using simple Mendelian models.