Life Sciences Commons^™

On Head Lice And Social Interaction In Archaic Andean Coastal Populations, Bernardo Arriaza, Vivien Standen, Karl Reinhard, Aduto Araújo, Jörg Heukelbach, Katharina Dittmar

Karl Reinhard Publications

Archaic mummies from northern Chile were examined for the presence of Pediculus humanus capitis. The excellent preservation of mummies and louse nits/eggs permitted a study of the degree of head lice infestation. We studied 63 Chinchorro mummies (ca. 5000–3000 years B.P.) from the Arica-Camarones coast. An area of 2 cm × 2 cm on each mummy’s head was systematically inspected for louse nits/eggs. Hairs with nits/eggs and lice were collected and analyzed using optic and scanning electronic microscopy. About 79% (50/63) of the mummies resulted positive for pediculosis, with an average of 2.1 nits/ eggs/cm2 per positive individual. Microscopic …

Plasma Antibodies To Oral Bacteria And Risk Of Pancreatic Cancer In A Large European Prospective Cohort Study, Dominique S. Michaud, Jacques Izard, Charlotte S. Wilhelm-Benartzi, Doo-Ho You, Verena A. Grote, Anne Tjønneland, Christina C. Dahm, Kim Overvad, Mazda Jenab, Veronika Fedirko, Marie Christine Boutron-Ruault, Françoise Clavel- Chapelon, Antoine Racine, Rudolf Kaaks, Heiner Boeing, Jana Foerster, Antonia Trichopoulou, Pagona Lagiou, Dimitrios Trichopoulos, Carlotta Sacerdote, Sabina Sieri, Domenico Palli, Rosario Tumino, Salvatore Panico, Peter Siersema, Petra Hm Peeters, Eiliv Lund, Aurelio Barricarte, José-María Huerta, Esther Molina-Montes, Miren Dorronsoro, J. Ramón Quirós, Eric J. Duell, Weimin Ye, Malin Sund, Björn Lindkvist, Dorthe Johansen, Kay-Tee Khaw, Nick Wareham, Ruth C. Travis, Paolo Vineis, H. Bas Bueno-De-Mesquita, Elio Riboli

Department of Food Science and Technology: Faculty Publications

Objective: Examine the relationship between antibodies to 25 oral bacteria and pancreatic cancer risk in a prospective cohort study.

Design: We measured antibodies to oral bacteria in prediagnosis blood samples from 405 pancreatic cancer cases and 416 matched controls, nested within the European Prospective Investigation into Cancer and Nutrition study (EPIC). Analyses were conducted using conditional logistic regression and additionally adjusted for smoking status and body mass index.

Results: Individuals with high levels of antibodies against Porphyromonas gingivalis ATTC 53978, a pathogenic periodontal bacteria, had a 2-fold higher risk of pancreatic cancer than individuals lower levels of …

Caveolins And Njks Influence Brain Endothelial Permeability After Juvenile Tbi, David Olufemi Ajao

Loma Linda University Electronic Theses, Dissertations & Projects

Disruption of blood-brain barrier (BBB) is a key secondary event that exacerbates brain damage following traumatic brain injury (TBI). BBB disruption is particularly damaging to the developing brain – which is highly vulnerable to various stress stimuli, resulting in increased brain swelling, disrupted cerebral blood flow (CBF) autoregulation, long-term disabilities and death following TBI in young demographic. Unsurprisingly, BBB disruption and the resultant cerebral edema have emerged as therapeutic targets in juvenile TBI. It is therefore important to understand the molecular players and mechanisms involved in TBI-induced BBB disruption in the juvenile brain. To this end, the endothelial caveolins and …

A Process Similar To Autophagy Is Associated With Cytocidal Chloroquine Resistance In Plasmodium Falciparum, David Gaviria, Michelle F. Paguio, Lindsey B. Turnbull, Asako Tan, Amila Siriwardana, Debasish Ghosh, Michael T. Ferdig, Anthony P. Sinai, Paul D. Roepe

Microbiology, Immunology, and Molecular Genetics Faculty Publications

Resistance to the cytostatic activity of the antimalarial drug chloroquine (CQ) is becoming well understood, however, resistance to cytocidal effects of CQ is largely unexplored. We find that PfCRT mutations that almost fully recapitulate P. falciparum cytostatic CQ resistance (CQR(CS)) as quantified by CQ IC50 shift, account for only 10-20% of cytocidal CQR (CQR(CC)) as quantified by CQ LD50 shift. Quantitative trait loci (QTL) analysis of the progeny of a chloroquine sensitive (CQS; strain HB3)×chloroquine resistant (CQR; strain Dd2) genetic cross identifies distinct genetic architectures for CQR(CS) vs CQR(CC) phenotypes, including identification of novel interacting chromosomal loci that influence CQ …

Evidence For Finely-Regulated Asynchronous Growth Of Toxoplasma Gondii Cysts Based On Data-Driven Model Selection, Adam M. Sullivan, Xiaopeng Zhao, Yasuhiro Suzuki, Eri Ochiai, Stephen Crutcher, Michael A. Gilchrist

Microbiology, Immunology, and Molecular Genetics Faculty Publications

Toxoplasma gondii establishes a chronic infection by forming cysts preferentially in the brain. This chronic infection is one of the most common parasitic infections in humans and can be reactivated to develop life-threatening toxoplasmic encephalitis in immunocompromised patients. Host-pathogen interactions during the chronic infection include growth of the cysts and their removal by both natural rupture and elimination by the immune system. Analyzing these interactions is important for understanding the pathogenesis of this common infection. We developed a differential equation framework of cyst growth and employed Akaike Information Criteria (AIC) to determine the growth and removal functions that best describe …

Epigenetic Dominance Of Prion Conformers, Eri Saijo, Hae-Eun Kang, Jifeng Bian, Kristi G. Bowling, Shawn Browning, Sehun Kim, Nora Hunter, Glenn C. Telling

Microbiology, Immunology, and Molecular Genetics Faculty Publications

Although they share certain biological properties with nucleic acid based infectious agents, prions, the causative agents of invariably fatal, transmissible neurodegenerative disorders such as bovine spongiform encephalopathy, sheep scrapie, and human Creutzfeldt Jakob disease, propagate by conformational templating of host encoded proteins. Once thought to be unique to these diseases, this mechanism is now recognized as a ubiquitous means of information transfer in biological systems, including other protein misfolding disorders such as those causing Alzheimer's and Parkinson's diseases. To address the poorly understood mechanism by which host prion protein (PrP) primary structures interact with distinct prion conformations to influence pathogenesis, …

Probiotics: Finding The Right Regulatory Balance, Diane E. Hoffmann, Claire M. Fraser-Liggett, Frank B. Palumbo, Jacques Ravel, Karen H. Rothenberg, Virginia Rowthorn

Faculty Scholarship

Some products marketed as drugs should be excused from Phase I trials, but safety and efficacy claims for dietary supplements should be more tightly regulated.

Membrane Vesicles Nucleate Mineralo-Organic Nanoparticles And Induce Carbonate Apatite Precipitation In Human Body Fluids, Cheng-Yeu Wu, Jan Martel, Wei-Yun Cheng, Chao-Chih He, David M. Ojcius, John Ding-E. Young

All Dugoni School of Dentistry Faculty Articles

Recent studies indicate that membrane vesicles (MVs) secreted by various cells are associated with human diseases, including arthritis, atherosclerosis, cancer, and chronic kidney disease. The possibility that MVs may induce the formation of mineralo-organic nanoparticles (NPs) and ectopic calcification has not been investigated so far. Here, we isolated MVs ranging in size between 20 and 400 nm from human serum and FBS using ultracentrifugation and sucrose gradient centrifugation. The MV preparations consisted of phospholipid-bound vesicles containing the serum proteins albumin, fetuin-A, and apolipoprotein A1; the mineralization-associated enzyme alkaline phosphatase; and the exosome proteins TNFR1 and CD63. Notably, we observed that …

Involvement Of Reactive Oxygen Species In A Feed-Forward Mechanism Of Na/K-Atpase Mediated Signaling, Yanling Yan, Anna P. Shapiro, Steven Haller, Vinal Katragadda, Lijun Liu, Jiang Tian, Venkatesha Basrur, Deepak Malhotra, Zi-Jian Xie, Nader G. Abraham, Joseph I. Shapiro Md, Jiang Liu

Biochemistry and Microbiology

Cardiotonic steroids (such as ouabain) signaling through Na/K-ATPase regulate sodium reabsorption in the renal proximal tubule. We report here that reactive oxygen species are required to initiate ouabain-stimulated Na/K-ATPase·c-Src signaling. Pretreatment with the antioxidant N-acetyl-L-cysteine prevented ouabain-stimulated Na/K-ATPase·c-Src signaling, protein carbonylation, redistribution of Na/K-ATPase and sodium/proton exchanger isoform 3, and inhibition of active transepithelial ²²Na⁺ transport. Disruption of the Na/K-ATPase·c-Src signaling complex attenuated ouabain-stimulated protein carbonylation. Ouabain-stimulated protein carbonylation is reversed after removal of ouabain, and this reversibility is largely independent of de novo protein synthesis and degradation by either the lysosome or the proteasome pathways. Furthermore, …

Mycological Study For A Management Plan Of A Neotropical Show Cave (Brazil), Erika Linzi Silva Taylor, Maria Aparecida De Resende Stoianoff, Rodrigo Lopes Ferreira

International Journal of Speleology

Caves are stable environments with characteristics favoring the development of microorganisms. The allocthonous input of organic matter and microbes into the warm Neotropical caves may favor the development of filamentous fungi, including pathogenic species. Histoplasma capsulatum is a pathogenic species commonly found in caves and associated with bat and bird guano. Many Brazilian caves have been historically visited due to scenic and religious tourism. The objective of this study was to perform a microbiology study for a management plan of a show cave in Brazil, focusing on the presence and distribution of pathogenic and opportunistic fungi in the cave. Statistics …

Identification Of Leptospira Interrogans Phospholipase C As A Novel Virulence Factor Responsible For Intracellular Free Calcium Ion Elevation During Macrophage Death, Jing-Fang Zhao, Hong-Hu Chen, David M. Ojcius, Xin Zhao, Dexter Sun, Yu-Mei Ge, Lin-Li Zheng, Xu'ai Lin, Lan-Juan Li, Jie Yan

All Dugoni School of Dentistry Faculty Articles

Background: Leptospira-induced macrophage death has been confirmed to play a crucial role in pathogenesis of leptospirosis, a worldwide zoonotic infectious disease. Intracellular free Ca²⁺ concentration ([Ca²⁺]i) elevation induced by infection can cause cell death, but [Ca²⁺]i changes and high [Ca²⁺]i-induced death of macrophages due to infection of Leptospira have not been previously reported.

Methodology/Principal Findings: We first used a Ca²⁺-specific fluorescence probe to confirm that the infection of L. interrogans strain Lai triggered a significant increase of [Ca²⁺]i in mouse J774A.1 or human THP-1 macrophages. Laser confocal microscopic examination …

Tossing The Coin For Half Life, William L. Romine

Biological Sciences Faculty Publications

No abstract provided.

A Miniaturised Spectrometer Device For The Detection Of Nitrogen Dioxide In An Urban Environment, Brian Devine

Doctoral

Monitoring of air pollutants, such as Nitrogen Dioxide (NO2), that are toxic or environmentally damaging is a key metric for environmental protection agencies worldwide. There is a constant need to develop new technologies and methodologies that provide real-time, low cost pollution measurements over a broad range of sampling sites, particularly in urban and industrial areas. Typically, detection of pollutants in urban environments is performed using a variety of techniques, many of which are expensive, require complex setups and are in fixed locations. The novel system presented in this thesis is designed for portable, low cost and in-situ detection of pollutants …

High Dose, Variable Length, N-Acetylcysteine (Hinac) Therapy For Late-Presenting Acetaminophen Poisoning, Jessica K. Eygnor Do, Suprina Dorai Md, Philip W. Moore Do, J Ward Donovan Md, Keith K. Burkhart Md

Department of Emergency Medicine

No abstract provided.

Small Molecule Antagonists Of Melanopsin-Mediated Phototransduction, Kenneth A. Jones, Megumi Hatori, Ludovic S. Mure, Jayne R. Bramley, Roman Artymyshyn, Sang-Phyo Hong, Mohammad Marzabadi, Huailing Zhong, Jeffrey Sprouse, Quansheng Zhu, Andrew T. E. Hartwick, Patricia J. Sollars, Gary E. Pickard, Satchidananda Panda

School of Veterinary and Biomedical Sciences: Faculty Publications

Melanopsin, expressed in a subset of retinal ganglion cells, mediates behavioral adaptation to ambient light and other non-image forming photic responses. This has raised the possibility that pharmacological manipulation of melanopsin can modulate several CNS responses including photophobia, sleep, circadian rhythms and neuroendocrine function. Here we describe the identification of a potent synthetic melanopsin antagonist with in vivo activity. Novel sulfonamide compounds inhibiting melanopsin (opsinamides) compete with retinal binding to melanopsin and inhibit its function without affecting rod/cone mediated responses. In vivo administration of opsinamides to mice specifically and reversibly modified melanopsin-dependent light responses including the pupillary light reflex and …

Synthesis And Antiproliferative Activities Of Quebecol And Its Analogs, Kasiviswanadharaju Pericherla, Amir Nasrolahi Shirazi, V. Kameshwara Rao, Rakesh Tiwari, Nicholas Dasilva, Kellen Mccaffrey, Yousef A. Beni, Antonio González- Sarrías, Navindra P. Seeram, Keykavous Parang, Anil Kumar

Pharmacy Faculty Articles and Research

Simple and efficient synthesis of quebecol and a number of its analogs was accomplished in five steps. The synthesized compounds were evaluated for antiproliferative activities against human cervix adenocarcinoma (HeLa), human ovarian carcinoma (SK-OV-3), human colon carcinoma (HT-29), and human breast adenocarcinoma (MCF-7) cancer cell lines. Among all the compounds, 7c, 7d, 7f, and 8f exhibited antiproliferative activities against four tested cell lines with inhibition over 80% at 75 mu M after 72 h, whereas, compound 7b and 7g were more selective towards MCF-7 cell line. The IC50 values for compounds 7c, 7d, and 7f were 85.1 mu M, 78.7 …

Cholinergic Enhancement Of Brain Activation In Mild Cognitive Impairment During Episodic Memory Encoding, Shannon L. Risacher, Yang Wang, Heather A. Wishart, Laura A. Rabin, Laura A. Flashman, Brenna C. Mcdonald, John D. West, Robert B. Santulli, Andrew J. Saykin

Publications and Research

Objective: To determine the physiological impact of treatment with donepezil (Aricept) on neural circuitry supporting episodic memory encoding in patients with amnestic mild cognitive impairment (MCI) using functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI).

Methods: Eighteen patients with MCI and 20 age-matched healthy controls (HC) were scanned twice while performing an event-related verbal episodic encoding task. MCI participants were scanned before treatment and after approximately 3 months on donepezil; HCwere untreated but rescanned at the same interval.Voxel-level analyses assessed treatment effects on activation profiles in MCI patients relative to retest changes in non-treated HC. Changes in task-related connectivity in medial temporal circuitry …

Transient And Selective Suppression Of Neural Activity With Infrared Light, Michael W. Jenkins, Hui Lu, Jeffrey M. Mcmanus, Hillel J. Chiel

Faculty Scholarship

Analysis and control of neural circuitry requires the ability to selectively activate or inhibit neurons. Previous work showed that infrared laser light selectively excited neural activity in endogenous unmyelinated and myelinated axons. However, inhibition of neuronal firing with infrared light was only observed in limited cases, is not well understood and was not precisely controlled. Using an experimentally tractable unmyelinated preparation for detailed investigation and a myelinated preparation for validation, we report that it is possible to selectively and transiently inhibit electrically- initiated axonal activation, as well as to both block or enhance the propagation of action potentials of specific …

How Studies Of Human Sex Ratios At Birth May Lead To The Understanding Of Several Forms Of Pathology, William H. James

Human Biology Open Access Pre-Prints

This paper deals with the problem of the causes of the variation of sex ratio (proportion male) at birth. This problem is common to a number of areas in biology and medicine e.g. obstetrics, neurology/psychiatry, parasitology, virology, oncology and teratology. It is established that there are significantly biased, but unexplained, sex ratios in each of these fields. Yet workers in them (with the possible exception of virology) have regarded the problem as a minor loose end, irrelevant to the field’s major problems. However, as far as I know, no-one has previously noted that unexplained biased sex ratios occur, and thus …

Aspirin And Low-Molecular Weight Heparin Combination Therapy Effectively Prevents Recurrent Miscarriage In Hyperhomocysteinemic Women., Pratip Chakraborty, Sayani Banerjee, Piyali Saha, Shyam Sundar Nandi, Sunita Sharma, Sourendra K. Goswami, Baidyanath Chakravarty, Syed N. Kabir

Journal Articles: Cellular & Integrative Physiology

The management of recurrent pregnancy loss (RPL) still remains a great challenge, and women with polycystic ovarian syndrome (PCOS) are at a greater risk for spontaneous abortion. Treatment with low-molecular-weight heparin (LMWH) has become an accepted treatment option for women with RPL; however, the subgroup of women, who are likely to respond to LMWH, has not been precisely identified. The present study evaluated the efficacy of LMWH with reference to PCOS and associated metabolic phenotypes including hyperhomocysteinemia (HHcy), insulin resistance (IR) and obesity. This prospective observational study was conducted at Institute of Reproductive Medicine, Kolkata, India. A total of 967 …

The Science (And Pseudoscience) Of Dna Profiling, Dan E. Krane

Biological Sciences Faculty Publications

No abstract provided.

Maternal Genital Tract Colonisation By Group-B Streptococcus: A Hospital Based Study, Nida Najmi, Rozina Sikandar, Nadeem F. Zuberi, Imtiaz Jehan

Department of Obstetrics & Gynaecology

Objectives: To determine the prevalence of Group B Streptococcus genital tract infection in pregnant women and to determine the risk factors for its colonisation.
Methods: The cross-sectional study was conducted at the Aga Khan University Hospital, Karachi and Sobhraj Hospital, Karachi, from May to August 2007. Pregnant women at 35-37 weeks gestation attending antenatal clinic at these hospitals constituted the study population. Based on stratified sampling, 405 patients were recruited. High vaginal swabs of these patients were taken in order to calculate the prevalence of infection at each hospital. Logistic regression was used to evaluate the risk factor association. SPSS …

Fecal Transplantation Does Not Transfer Either Susceptibility Or Resistance To Food Borne Listeriosis In C57bl/6 And Balb/C/By Mice, Tanya Myers-Morales, Kate M. Bussell, Sarah E. F. D'Orazio

Microbiology, Immunology, and Molecular Genetics Faculty Publications

The composition of the intestinal microbiota has wide reaching effects on the health of an individual, including the development of protective innate immune responses. In this report, a fecal transplantation approach was used to determine whether resistance to food borne listeriosis was dependent on the murine gut microbiota. Transplantation of BALB/c/By feces did not increase the susceptibility of C57BL/6 mice to Listeria monocytogenes infection. Likewise, transplantation of C57BL/6 fecal matter did not enhance the resistance of BALB/c/By mice. Thus, intestinal microbiota composition is not a key factor that confers either susceptibility or resistance to food borne listeriosis in mice.

2013 Annual Meeting Program

Journal of the South Carolina Academy of Science

No abstract provided.

Modulation Of Bax/Bak Dependent Apoptosis By Sirtuin 3 And Mitochondrial Permeability Transition By Sirtuin 4, Manish Verma

Graduate School of Biomedical Sciences Theses and Dissertations

Mitochondria are dynamic organelles that regulate a myriad of cellular functions, including energy production and metabolic regulation. Mitochondria are also a critical regulator of cell death signaling cascades modulating both apoptotic and necrotic cell death. However, what determines which cell death pathway is activated is still unclear. The mitochondrial/intrinsic pathway of apoptosis is dependent on the activation of pro-apoptotic proteins, Bax and Bak, which induce mitochondrial outer membrane permeabilization (MOMP). Once the integrity of outer mitochondrial membrane (OMM) is compromised, pro-apoptotic intermembrane space proteins like cytochrome c, Smac/Diablo, Omi/HtrA2 and AIF are released into the cytoplasm, which activates the post-mitochondrial …

Effects Of Prior Acute Exercise On Circulating Cytokine Concentration Responses To A High-Fat Meal, Josef Brandauer, Rian Q. Landers-Ramos, Nathan T. Jenkins, Espen E. Spangenburg, James M. Hagberg, Steven J. Prior

Health Sciences Faculty Publications

High-fat meal consumption alters the circulating cytokine profile and contributes to cardiometabolic diseases. A prior bout of exercise can ameliorate the triglyceride response to a high-fat meal, but the interactive effects of exercise and high-fat meals on cytokines that mediate cardiometabolic risk are not fully understood. We investigated the effects of prior exercise on the responses of circulating tumor necrosis factor-a (TNF-a), interleukin-6 (IL-6), IL-8, leptin, retinol-binding protein 4 (RBP4), vascular endothelial growth factor (VEGF), basic fibroblast growth factor (bFGF), placental growth factor (PlGF), and soluble fms-like tyrosine kinase-1 (sFlt-1) to a high-fat meal. Ten healthy men were studied before …

Network Dynamics Of Visual Naming, Christopher R. Conner

Dissertations and Theses (Open Access)

Recognition and naming of objects and actions are fundamental components of language. They involve several different systems working in coordination to accomplish a complex behavior. During visual naming, sensory and semantic processing are carried out by dedicated cortical substrates in the temporal and occipital lobes, while response selection and articulatory planning are handled by prefrontal cortex. Despite decades of research using lesion analysis, functional MRI and electro-encephalography, the precise dynamics involved remain unknown due to the inadequate spatio-temporal resolution of these methodologies. Of particular interest is the organization of semantic knowledge and the degree of serial and parallel organization of …

T-Cell Treatments For Solid And Hematological Tumors, Drew C. Deniger

Dissertations and Theses (Open Access)

Cell-based therapies have demonstrated potency and efficacy as cancer treatment modalities. T cells can be dichotomized by their T cell receptor (TCR) complexes where alpha/beta T cells (95% of T cells) and gamma/delta T cells (+T cells proliferated to clinically significant numbers and ROR1⁺ tumor cells were effectively targeted and killed by both ROR1-specific CAR⁺ T cell populations, although ROR1RCD137 were superior to ROR1RCD28 in clearance of leukemia xenografts in vivo. The second specific aim focused on generating bi-specific CD19-specific CAR⁺ gamma/delta T cells with polyclonal TCRgamma/delta repertoire on CD19⁺ artificial antigen presenting cells (aAPC). …

Bioengineering The Expression Of Active Recombinant Human Cathepsin G, Enteropeptidase, Neutrophil Elastase, And C-Reactive Protein In Yeast, Eliot T. Smith

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

The yeasts Pichia pastoris and Kluyveromyces lactis were used to express several recombinant human proteins for further biochemical characterization. Two substitution variants of recombinant human enteropeptidase light chain (rhEPL) were engineered to modify the extended substrate specificity of this serine protease. Both were secreted as active enzymes in excess of 1.7 mg/L in P. pastoris fermentation broth. The substitution variant rhEPL R96Q showed significantly reduced specificities for the preferred substrate sequences DDDDK and DDDDR; however, the rhEPL Y174R variant displayed improved specificities for these substrate sequences relative to all other reported variants of this enzyme. The neutrophil serine proteases human …

Regulating Rsma Expression In Pseudomonas Aeruginosa, Sean D. Stacey

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Pseudomonas aeruginosa, a Gram-negative bacillus, commonly infects immunocompromised individuals and uses a variety of virulence factors to persist in these hosts. The posttranscriptional regulator, RsmA, plays a role in the expression of many virulence factors in P. aeruginosa. RsmA up regulates virulence factors used in colonizing hosts. However, regulation of rsmA is not well elucidated. Transposon mutagenesis was performed on P. aeruginosa containing a transcriptional rsmA-lacZ fusion to answer this question. Mutants were screened via β-galactosidase assay and transposon insertions identified via arbitrary PCR. A probable MFS transporter, we named mtpX, was one significant transposon mutant identified. …