Ligand

is absorbed rapidly into the pulmonary venous circulation. It then enters the arterial circulation and moves quickly to the brain. Nicotine diffuses readily into brain tissue, where it binds to nicotinic acetylcholine receptors (nAChRs), which are ligand-gated ion channels. When a cholinergic agonist binds to the outside of the channel, the channel opens, allowing the entry of cations, including sodium and calcium. These cations further activate voltage-dependent calcium channels, allowing…

Summary: Neurodegeneration is a collective term characterized by structural and functional loss of neurons which is a gradual and progressive process. Various neurodegenerative diseases like Alzheimer’s disease, Parkinson’s disease, Huntington’s disease, etc. have been described by many biomarkers that are unusual in comparison to their baseline levels in the brain regions. Out of all the diseases, Alzheimer’s disease is the most prevailing disease in older patients with an average age greater…

Cudratricusxanthone A (CTXA), one of the xanthone, was isolated from Cudrania tricuspidata Bureau, and its anti-inflammatory, hepatoprotective, anti-proliferative activites has been studied in vitro; however its effects on osteoclast differentiation have not been demonstrated. In this study, CTXA was found to suppress RANKL-induced osteoclastogenesis, actin ring formation, and bone resorption in RAW 264.7 cell lines and mouse bone marrow monocytes (BMMs). CTXA significantly inhibited the…

Direct Polycondensation The direct polycondensation has 3 main steps: 1. Removal of water. 2. Polycondensation of oligomer. 3. Melt condensation that makes PLA with high molecular weight. Direct polycondensation of lactic acid is the modest reaction that forms lactide simultaneously by the decomposition processes and it is not used for the large production of PLA [19-22]. Back in the days, the direct polycondensation was assumed as the reaction that produces inadequate polymers with low…

Figure 2. The proteomic organization of three subfamilies of Smads (Co-Smad, R-Smad and I-Smad) and organization of a Smad MH1 domain with DNA. (A) All Smads information taken from PDB entry Smad>UniProt Gene list of Smads. The conserved N-terminal MH1 domain is in red, linker region in dark blue and the C-terminal MH2 domain in deep yellow. In the linker region the red PXS/TP (or S/TP) indicates the potential phosphorylation site for MAPKs ERK1/2, and the square indicates the PY…

Micro-fracture consolidation can be treated with bone remodeling, and the adaptation of skeleton is applied to “calcium homeostasis” and to mechanical use. The bone remodeling involves the bone resorption regarding to osteoclasts and bone formation relating to osteoblasts. Regular bone-related diseases including “bone-metastasized cancers”, Paget’s disease, multiple myeloma, and osteoporosis are caused by the disproportion between the resorption and formation processes. The increased…

1. Introduction: Squamous cell carcinoma of the head and neck (SCCHN) can be ranked as the sixth leading cancer by incidence worldwide (1,2). Every year, there are more than 550,000 patients diagnosed with head and neck cancers worldwide and around 300,000 related deaths (3). Squamous cell carcinomas represent 90% of cases and mostly arise from the epithelial lining of the oral cavity, oropharynx, larynx, and hypopharynx. SCCHN can be divided into three stages: early stage (I/II), locally…

In such scenario, activation energy could be lost if the neighboring rhodopsin, the one not associated with Gtα would be excited by a photon. However, this loss could be prevented if asymmetric rhodopsin activation exists. In fact, ligand induced allosteric modulation between receptor protomers within the dimer has been demonstrated for other GPCRs. Thus, conformational changes induced by a photon in the rhodopsin monomer that does not physically interact with Gtα would induce structural…

Sexual selection has long been recognized as a powerful evolutionary process having important consequences on reproductive behaviour, morphology, and fitness (Birkhead and Pizzari, 2002). Sexual selection research has often focused on pre-copulatory mate choice; however, the discovery of female promiscuity and polyandry has lead to the realization that mate choice continues to operate after copulation (Birkhead and Pizzari, 2002). For males, it is obvious that promiscuity has evolved to increase…

Yeast Expression System for Glycoengineering Yeast expression system is an alternative to prokaryotic and higher eukaryotic expression system since it offers the attributes of speedy growth, ease to manipulate genes and low costing media like for microbes along with post translational modification and secretory expression like in higher eukaryotes. An increasing number of yeast strains are available for protein expression that are said to increase the yield of the protein, improves the…