An analysis of subdomain orientation, conformational change and disorder in relation to crystal packing of aspartic proteinases.

The analysis reported here describes detailed structural studies of endothiapepsin (the aspartic proteinase from Endothia parasitica), with and without bound inhibitors, and human pepsin 3b. Comparison of multiple crystal structures of members of the aspartic proteinase family has revealed small but significant differences in domain orientation in different crystal forms. In this paper, it is shown that these differences in domain orientation do not necessarily correlate with the presence or absence of bound inhibitors, but appear to stem at least partly from crystal contacts mediated by sulfate ions. However, since the same inherent flexibility of the structure is observed for other enzymes in this family such as human pepsin, the native structure of which is also reported here, the observed domain movements may well have implications for the mechanism of catalysis.

Giant eagle syndrome with pseudoarthrosis and peripheral facial palsy. / Síndrome de Eagle con pseudoartrosis y parálisis facial periférica.

TITLE: Síndrome de Eagle con pseudoartrosis y parálisis facial periférica.

6-Carboxymethyl genistein: a novel selective oestrogen receptor modulator (SERM) with unique, differential effects on the vasculature, bone and uterus.

The novel genistein (G) derivative, 6-carboxymethyl genistein (CG) was evaluated for its biological properties in comparison with G. Both compounds showed oestrogenic activity in vitro and in vivo. On the other hand G and CG differed in the following parameters: (i) only CG displayed mixed agonist-antagonist activity for oestrogen receptor (ER) alpha in transactivation assays and (ii) only CG was capable of attenuating oestrogen (E(2))-induced proliferation in vascular smooth muscle cells and of inhibiting oestrogen-induced creatine kinase (CK) specific activity in rat tissues. On the other hand only G enhanced the stimulatory effect on CK specific activity in the uterus. In comparison to the selective oestrogen receptor modulator (SERM) raloxifene (RAL), CG showed the same selectivity profile as RAL in blocking the CK response to E(2) in tissues derived from both immature and ovariectomized female rats. Molecular modelling of CG bound to the ligand binding domain (LBD) of ERbeta predicts that the 6-carboxymethyl group of CG almost fits the binding cavity. On the other hand, molecular modelling of CG bound to the LBD of ERalpha suggests that the carboxyl group of CG may perturb the end of Helix 11, eliciting a severe backbone change for Leu 525, and consequently induces a conformational change which could position Helix 12 in an antagonist conformation. This model supports the experimental findings that CG can act as a mixed agonist-antagonist when E(2) is bound to its receptors. Collectively, our findings suggest that CG can be considered a novel SERM with unique effects on the vasculature, bone and uterus.

Somatotropin as measured by a two-site time-resolved immunofluorometric assay.

To date, many of the current criteria for diagnosis of somatotropin (growth hormone, GH) deficiency have been based upon measurement of this hormone by competitive radioimmunoassay (RIA) with use of polyclonal antibodies. In recent years, however, the development of hybridoma technology has led to the generation of various monoclonal antibodies (Mabs) to GH with different affinities and epitope specificities. Subsequently, these reagents have been used in the development of noncompetitive two-site immunometric assays (e.g., immunoradiometric assay; IRMA). In general, the values obtained for serum GH by IRMA have been lower than those obtained by RIA, because of the epitope-specificity profile of the Mabs in the IRMA. Attempting to obtain GH values numerically similar to those by RIA, we used a combination of Mabs to GH in developing and evaluating a two-site time-resolved immunofluorometric assay (IFMA) based on the streptavidin-biotin interaction. Fluorescence is proportional to concentration of analyte and is linearly related to concentration over the range 0.3 to 40 micrograms/L. The assay was satisfactory with respect to sensitivity, accuracy, and precision (CV less than 10% over the entire working range). In addition, the concentration of GH was determined by the IFMA and a competitive RIA in serum obtained from GH deficient and acromegalic patients. The pairing of antibodies in the IFMA gave numerical values that agreed well with those by RIA (r = 0.97; n = 100).

An evaluation of ontology exchange languages for bioinformatics.

Ontologies are specifications of the concepts in a given field, and of the relationships among those concepts. The development of ontologies for molecular-biology information and the sharing of those ontologies within the bioinformatics community are central problems in bioinformatics. If the bioinformatics community is to share ontologies effectively, ontologies must be exchanged in a form that uses standardized syntax and semantics. This paper reports on an effort among the authors to evaluate alternative ontology-exchange languages, and to recommend one or more languages for use within the larger bioinformatics community. The study selected a set of candidate languages, and defined a set of capabilities that the ideal ontology-exchange language should satisfy. The study scored the languages according to the degree to which they satisfied each capability. In addition, the authors performed several ontology-exchange experiments with the two languages that received the highest scores: OML and Ontolingua. The result of those experiments, and the main conclusion of this study, was that the frame-based semantic model of Ontolingua is preferable to the conceptual graph model of OML, but that the XML-based syntax of OML is preferable to the Lisp-based syntax of Ontolingua.