Uterine decidualization characterized by stromal cell proliferation and differentiation is critical to the establishment of pregnancy in many species. Progesterone is a key factor in regulating ...endometrial cell decidualization, however, the molecular basis involved in mediating the effects of progesterone during decidualization remains largely unknown. We report here that the DNA replication licensing factor MCM2, one of the conserved set of six-related proteins (MCM complex: MCM2–7) essential for eukaryotic DNA replication, is dynamically expressed in both proliferative and differentiated stromal cells during mouse periimplantation uterus. Applying PR-knockout mouse model and pharmacological strategy, we further found that the expression of Mcm2 is induced by progesterone action in the mouse uterine stroma. Employing a primary cell culture system, we further demonstrated that siRNA-mediated silencing of MCM2 arrests the cell cycle at G1–S transition during stromal cell proliferation. Moreover, the downregulation of Mcm2 could also compromise stromal cell differentiation. Collectively, our studies uncovered the role of a unique DNA replication licensing molecule MCM2 in mediating Progesterone-induced stromal cell decidualization in mouse uterus.
From post-diapause cysts of Artemia franciscana, we defined fourteen LEA (late embryogenesis abundant) and LEA-like genes, including four novel members (Afrlea1-5, Afrlea3-5, Afrlea3-like1 and ...Afrlea3-like2), which were classified into four groups: G1, G3, G3-like (LEA group3-like), and SMP-like (seed-maturation-protein-like), based on their conserved and diversified sequence motifs and amino acid compositions among bacteria, plants, and animals. We also validated six representative genes based on quantitative RT-PCR, including three LEA and two LEA3-like genes that are down-regulated when dehydrated cysts hatch to desiccation-intolerant larvae as well as one SMP-like gene that is slightly up-regulated. We further tested their responses to hypersaline stress for four representatives—one from each group—and found that the expression of Afrlea1-5 and Afrlea3-2 were inducible but not Afrlea3-like1 and Afrsmp-like. This result suggested that the LEA and LEA-like genes may play different roles in resistance to hypersaline stress.
Tubulin is the target for very widely used anti-tumor drugs, including
Vinca
alkaloids, taxanes, and epothilones, which are an important component of chemotherapy in breast cancer and other ...malignancies. Paclitaxel and other tubulin-targeting drugs bind to the β subunit of tubulin, which is a heterodimer of α and β subunits. β-Tubulin exists in the form of multiple isotypes, which are differentially expressed in normal and neoplastic cells and differ in their ability to bind to drugs. Among them, the βIII isotype is overexpressed in many aggressive and metastatic cancers and may serve as a prognostic marker in certain types of cancer. The underpinning mechanisms accounting for the overexpression of this isotype in cancer cells are unclear. To better understand the role of β-tubulin isotypes in cancer, we analyzed over 1000 clones from 90 breast cancer patients, sequencing their β-tubulin isotypes, in search of novel mutations. We have elucidated two putative emerging molecular subgroups of invasive breast cancer, each of which involve mutations in the βI-, βIIA-, or βIVB isotypes of tubulin that increase their structural, and possibly functional, resemblance to the βIII isotype. A unifying feature of the first of the two subgroups is the mutation of the highly reactive C239 residue of βI- or βIVB-tubulin to L239, R239, Y239, or P239, culminating in probable conversion of these isotypes from ROS-sensitive to ROS-resistant species. In the second subgroup, βI, βIIA, and βIVB have up to seven mutations to the corresponding residues in βIII-tubulin. Given that βIII-tubulin has emerged as a pro-survival factor, overexpression of this isotype may confer survival advantages to certain cancer cell types. In this mini-review, we bring attention to a novel mechanism by which cancer cells may undergo adaptive mutational changes involving alternate β-tubulin isotypes to make them acquire some of the pro-survival properties of βIII-tubulin. These “hybrid” tubulins, combining the sequences and/or properties of two wild-type tubulins (βIII and either βI, βIIA, or βIVB), are novel isotypes expressed solely in cancer cells and may contribute to the molecular understanding and stratification of invasive breast cancer and provide novel molecular targets for rational drug development.
Tubulin is the target for very widely used anti-tumor drugs, including Vinca alkaloids, taxanes, and epothilones, which are an important component of chemotherapy in breast cancer and other ...malignancies. Paclitaxel and other tubulin-targeting drugs bind to the beta subunit of tubulin, which is a heterodimer of alpha and beta subunits. beta-Tubulin exists in the form of multiple isotypes, which are differentially expressed in normal and neoplastic cells and differ in their ability to bind to drugs. Among them, the betaIII isotype is overexpressed in many aggressive and metastatic cancers and may serve as a prognostic marker in certain types of cancer. The underpinning mechanisms accounting for the overexpression of this isotype in cancer cells are unclear. To better understand the role of beta-tubulin isotypes in cancer, we analyzed over 1000 clones from 90 breast cancer patients, sequencing their beta-tubulin isotypes, in search of novel mutations. We have elucidated two putative emerging molecular subgroups of invasive breast cancer, each of which involve mutations in the betaI-, betaIIA-, or betaIVB isotypes of tubulin that increase their structural, and possibly functional, resemblance to the betaIII isotype. A unifying feature of the first of the two subgroups is the mutation of the highly reactive C239 residue of betaI- or betaIVB-tubulin to L239, R239, Y239, or P239, culminating in probable conversion of these isotypes from ROS-sensitive to ROS-resistant species. In the second subgroup, betaI, betaIIA, and betaIVB have up to seven mutations to the corresponding residues in betaIII-tubulin. Given that betaIII-tubulin has emerged as a pro-survival factor, overexpression of this isotype may confer survival advantages to certain cancer cell types. In this mini-review, we bring attention to a novel mechanism by which cancer cells may undergo adaptive mutational changes involving alternate beta-tubulin isotypes to make them acquire some of the pro-survival properties of betaIII-tubulin. These "hybrid" tubulins, combining the sequences and/or properties of two wild-type tubulins (betaIII and either betaI, betaIIA, or betaIVB), are novel isotypes expressed solely in cancer cells and may contribute to the molecular understanding and stratification of invasive breast cancer and provide novel molecular targets for rational drug development.
Abscisic acid (ABA) and Gibberellic acid (GA) play key roles in regulating seed dormancy and germination. First, when examining germination of different rice cultivars, we found that their ...germination timing and dormancy status are rather distinct, coupled with different GA/ABA ratio. Second, we studied genomic sequences of ABA and GA dormancy- and germination-associated genes in rice and discovered single nucleotide polymorphisms and insertions/deletions (Indels) in both coding and regulatory sequences. We aligned all these variations to the genome assemblies of 9311 and PA64s and demonstrated their relevance to seed dormancy both quantitatively and qualitatively based on gene expression data. Third, we surveyed and compared differentially expressed genes in dry seeds between 9311 and PA64s to show that these differentially expressed genes may play roles in seed dormancy and germination.
Birds play a vital role in the study of ecosystems and biodiversity. Accurate bird identification helps monitor biodiversity, understand the functions of ecosystems, and develop effective ...conservation strategies. However, previous bird sound recognition methods often relied on single features and overlooked the spatial information associated with these features, leading to low accuracy. Recognizing this gap, the present study proposed a bird sound recognition method that employs multiple convolutional neural-based networks and a transformer encoder to provide a reliable solution for identifying and classifying birds based on their unique sounds. We manually extracted various acoustic features as model inputs, and feature fusion was applied to obtain the final set of feature vectors. Feature fusion combines the deep features extracted by various networks, resulting in a more comprehensive feature set, thereby improving recognition accuracy. The multiple integrated acoustic features, such as mel frequency cepstral coefficients (MFCC), chroma features (Chroma) and Tonnetz features, were encoded by a transformer encoder. The transformer encoder effectively extracted the positional relationships between bird sound features, resulting in enhanced recognition accuracy. The experimental results demonstrated the exceptional performance of our method with an accuracy of 97.99%, a recall of 96.14%, an F1 score of 96.88% and a precision of 97.97% on the Birdsdata dataset. Furthermore, our method achieved an accuracy of 93.18%, a recall of 92.43%, an F1 score of 93.14% and a precision of 93.25% on the Cornell Bird Challenge 2020 (CBC) dataset.
Silicon is one of the most promising anode candidates for next-generation Li-ion batteries. Inert salt, acting as heat absorbent in magnesiothermic reduction, is playing a crucial role in scaled and ...economic derivation of Si from SiO
2
. Herein, the regulating effects of KCl and NaCl as heat absorbent on particle size, morphology and especially electrochemical behavior of obtained silicon are comparatively investigated. Although NaCl assists to get ultrafine nm-Si (~ 12.7 nm), inexpungible SiO
x
is accompanied, leading to lower reversible capacity (only 496.9 mAh g
−1
) and first coulombic efficiency (~ 48.7%). Comparatively, superior heat regulation of KCl facilitates to form uniform and well-crystalized Si nanoparticles (nano-Si
KCl
) with vital size domain (~ 54.6 nm) and reduced surface energy restrains redundant SiO
x
formation, thus obtaining improved reversible capacity (2201 mAh g
−1
) and cycling stability. After further carbon coating on nano-Si
KCl
, an excellent capacity retention of 89.4% over 300 cycles can be obtained by nano-Si
KCl
@C composite.
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