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Full-Text Articles in Biochemistry
Don't Sell Them Short, There's More To Bacterial Natural Products Than Antibiotics, Alison Clare Domzalski
Don't Sell Them Short, There's More To Bacterial Natural Products Than Antibiotics, Alison Clare Domzalski
Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects
Recent genomic studies of microbiomes have revealed an overwhelming number of biosynthetic genes of unknown function. Most of these “cryptic” biosynthetic genes are not expressed in laboratory monocultures of individual microbes. Thus, there remains tremendous untapped potential for natural products discovery. Here we employ mixed microbial culture (MMC) as a simple yet powerful approach to awaken cryptic biosynthetic gene clusters. Our preliminary studies demonstrated that arrays of metabolites could be induced in MMCs upon environmental cues, such as surface adhesion. Using this system, we have screened, identified, and isolated bioactive bacterial metabolites, which were characterized structurally and biologically. Of the …
Mass Spectrometry-Based Strategies In Protein Higher Order Structure Analysis: Fundamentals And Applications In Protein-Ligand Interactions, Xiaoran Liu
Arts & Sciences Electronic Theses and Dissertations
Protein ligand interaction is a fundamental question in biology and biochemistry, and many approaches including X-ray crystallography, nuclear magnetic resonance, cryogenic electron microscopy, mass spectroscopy (MS), infrared spectroscopy, circular dichroism, fluorescence spectroscopy and many others have been applied to address this question. Among these techniques, mass spectroscopy has the advantage of high throughput, low sample amount requirement, and mid-to-high spatial resolution. One of the MS-based approaches is protein footprinting, which utilizes labeling reagents to map the solvent accessible surface of the protein of interest thus deliver structural information. Irreversible labeling is represented by covalent labeling and radical labeling, in which …
Validation Of A Deployable Proteomic Assay For The Serological Screening Of Sexual Assault Samples, Catherine O'Sullivan Brown
Validation Of A Deployable Proteomic Assay For The Serological Screening Of Sexual Assault Samples, Catherine O'Sullivan Brown
Electronic Theses and Dissertations
Protein mass spectrometry (MS) has emerged as a technique to supplant traditional serological tests for body fluid identification. It was hypothesized that proteomic techniques would surpass the sensitivity and specificity of traditional serological techniques. An automated workflow coupled with protein MS has been developed for the confirmatory identification of five biological fluids. A developmental validation was completed, assessing parameters such as reproducibility, sensitivity, ion suppression, and limit of detection. Implementation was determined through tandem sample processing by MS, traditional serological tests, and standard DNA profiling methods. The MS approach offered superior detection limits while also providing true confirmatory results, producing …
Protein/Peptide Characterization Using Mass Spectrometry And Molecular Dynamics Simulations, Ahmad Kiani Karanji
Protein/Peptide Characterization Using Mass Spectrometry And Molecular Dynamics Simulations, Ahmad Kiani Karanji
Graduate Theses, Dissertations, and Problem Reports
Mass spectrometry (MS) based-techniques and molecular dynamics (MD) simulations have been used to characterize protein/peptide structure as well as their interactions with lipid vesicles and detergents. Chapter 1 introduces an introduction to the concepts and tools that were used in this work. In Chapter 2, the dominant gas-phase conformer of [M+3H]3+ ions of the model peptide Acetyl-PSSSSKSSSSKSSSSKSSSSK are examined with ion mobility spectrometry (IMS), gas-phase hydrogen deuterium exchange (HDX), and mass spectrometry (MS) techniques. This section furthers the development of a protein structural prediction tool by providing information about gas-phase ion conformers of two model peptides having different solution conformational …
Evaluating Methods Of Obtaining Male Pheromone From Hymenochirus Sp. Using Analytical Chemistry, Vincent Wing-Kun Leung
Evaluating Methods Of Obtaining Male Pheromone From Hymenochirus Sp. Using Analytical Chemistry, Vincent Wing-Kun Leung
University of the Pacific Theses and Dissertations
Male Hymenochirus sp. frogs are known to release pheromone that attracts females of the same species. Four methods for collecting secretions containing pheromone in Hymenochirus sp. were tested: norepinephrine injection, gonadotropin-releasing hormone injection, homogenization of gland tissue, and electrostimulation of the skin over the breeding gland area. The samples collected were analyzed using high-performance liquid chromatography (HPLC) and mass spectrometry. The HPLC chromatograph for the male norepinephrine sample contained a peak at 6.4 min that was not in the female norepinephrine sample HPLC chromatograph. The male norepinephrine sample mass spectrum had a peak of m/z 292.0 not in the female …
Bayesian Analytical Approaches For Metabolomics : A Novel Method For Molecular Structure-Informed Metabolite Interaction Modeling, A Novel Diagnostic Model For Differentiating Myocardial Infarction Type, And Approaches For Compound Identification Given Mass Spectrometry Data., Patrick J. Trainor
Electronic Theses and Dissertations
Metabolomics, the study of small molecules in biological systems, has enjoyed great success in enabling researchers to examine disease-associated metabolic dysregulation and has been utilized for the discovery biomarkers of disease and phenotypic states. In spite of recent technological advances in the analytical platforms utilized in metabolomics and the proliferation of tools for the analysis of metabolomics data, significant challenges in metabolomics data analyses remain. In this dissertation, we present three of these challenges and Bayesian methodological solutions for each. In the first part we develop a new methodology to serve a basis for making higher order inferences in metabolomics, …
Mapping Analyte-Signal Relations In Lc-Ms Based Untargeted Metabolomics, Nathaniel Guy Mahieu
Mapping Analyte-Signal Relations In Lc-Ms Based Untargeted Metabolomics, Nathaniel Guy Mahieu
Arts & Sciences Electronic Theses and Dissertations
The goal of untargeted metabolomics is to profile metabolism by measuring as many metabolites as possible. A major advantage of the untargeted approach is the detection of unexpected or unknown metabolites. These metabolites have chemical structures, metabolic pathways, or cellular functions that have not been previously described. Hence, they represent exciting opportunities to advance our understanding of biology. This beneficial approach, however, also adds considerable complexity to the analysis of metabolomics data - an individual signal cannot be readily identified as a unique metabolite. As such, a major challenge faced by the untargeted metabolomic workflow is extracting the analyte content …
Further Development Of Raman Spectroscopy For Body Fluid Investigation : Forensic Identification, Limit Of Detection, And Donor Characterization, Claire K. Muro
Further Development Of Raman Spectroscopy For Body Fluid Investigation : Forensic Identification, Limit Of Detection, And Donor Characterization, Claire K. Muro
Legacy Theses & Dissertations (2009 - 2024)
The challenges to forensic body fluid analysis have placed limitations on the type of information that investigators can acquire and how that information can be collected. In recent years, Raman spectroscopy has proven itself useful for characterizing body fluids. In 2008, a large-scale investigation was undertaken to explore the use of Raman spectroscopy as a means of identifying body fluids. This work resulted in multidimensional Raman spectroscopic signatures for the five main body fluids: semen, peripheral blood, saliva, vaginal fluid, and sweat. These studies were incredibly successful and created the foundation for years of continued research. Accordingly, the studies included …
Distinguishing Macrophage Activation States By Mass Spectrometry, Matthias Manfred Knust
Distinguishing Macrophage Activation States By Mass Spectrometry, Matthias Manfred Knust
Graduate Theses and Dissertations
Macrophages are versatile and highly adaptive cells that are involved in a wide range of physiological processes including host defense, homeostasis or regeneration, as well as pathogenesis. They react to their microenvironment, assuming various roles based on chemical and/or physical cues, and can reversibly shift between these so-called activation states. Concurrently, the technique of immunohistochemistry is used to gain spatial information on activated macrophages on tissue sections. The aim of this work was to find mass spectral biomarkers that allow the differentiation of activation states, and establish conditions that can be used in imaging mass spectrometry (IMS) experiments to investigate …
Investigation Into The Cellular Actions Of Carnosine And C-Peptide, Emma H. Gardner
Investigation Into The Cellular Actions Of Carnosine And C-Peptide, Emma H. Gardner
Theses, Dissertations and Capstones
Carnosine is a dipeptide composed of beta-alanine and histidine found exclusively in long-lived animal tissues. The cellular action of carnosine is still under extensive investigation; however, it has been proposed to have a role as an anti-oxidant and oxygen free radical scavenger, a physiological buffer, a heavy metal chelator, and has been implicated as an anti-aging agent.2,4 Our lab has been studying the interaction between carnosine and heme by analyzing both the effect carnosine has on the glycation of the heme containing protein cytochrome c and the interaction of carnosine with free hemin. We have observed that the addition …
Monitoring Ligand-Induced Nucleic Acid Conformational Changes Using Ion Mobility Spectrometry-Mass Spectrometry, Bill Kenneth Redick
Monitoring Ligand-Induced Nucleic Acid Conformational Changes Using Ion Mobility Spectrometry-Mass Spectrometry, Bill Kenneth Redick
Legacy Theses & Dissertations (2009 - 2024)
Three-dimensional structures of biopolymers frequently dictate the biological role those molecules play. As such, investigation into structure of nucleic acids can provide important information pertaining to how those nucleic acids work. Many nucleic acid species, especially single-stranded RNA, fold into unique structures that allow them to function properly. Metals, and other cationic species, are often bound to the nucleic acid to make folding into the proper structure more favorable by neutralizing the negative charge on the nucleic acid imparted by the phosphate group. This investigation explores tertiary structure of nucleic acids that have been folded in the presence of ligands …