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Jang, H.

Publications and source records attributed to Jang, H..

4 recordsLinked to original sources

Calotropis gigantea extract induces apoptosis through extrinsic/intrinsic pathways and upregulation of reactive oxygen species in non-small-cell lung cancer cells

BackgroundCalotropis gigantea (CG) plant grows in Asia and tropical Africa. However, the precise mechanisms of its anticancer effects have not yet been examined in human non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) cells, A549 and NCI-H1299 cells.\n\nPurposeThis study was focused on the anti-cancer effects of CG extract on non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) cells.\n\nMethodsThe cytotoxic effects of CG extract on NSCLC, A549 and NCI-H1299 cells, were detected by MTS assay, microscope and DAPI staining. Apoptosis was determined by annexin V-FITC/PI staining, cell cycle analysis, western blotting, quantitative polymerase chain reaction, and JC-1 staining.\n\nResultsFirst, CG showed significant dose-dependent cytotoxicity in NSCLC, A549, and NCI-H1299 cells. In addition to induction of caspase-8 processing, CG induced apoptosis by upregulating mRNA expression levels of extrinsic pathway molecules such as Fas, Fas ligand (FasL), Fas-associated protein with death domain (FADD) and death receptor 5 (DR5). Also, mitochondrial membrane potential (MMP) was collapsed, and intrinsic pathway molecules such as poly (ADP-ribose) polymerase (PARP), caspase-3, and caspase-9 were processed by CG. Moreover, reactive oxygen species (ROS) were generated in a CG dose-dependent manner, and inhibition of ROS by NAC, ROS scavenger, recovered A549 and NCI-H1299 cell viability.\n\nConclusionThese results indicate that CG causes apoptosis by activating the extrinsic and intrinsic pathways and generating ROS in NSCLC cells. These results suggest that CG can be used as a lung cancer therapeutic agent.

cancer biology

MMOD-induced structural changes of hydroxylase in soluble methane monooxygenase

Soluble methane monooxygenase in methanotrophs converts methane to methanol under ambient conditions1-3. The maximum catalytic activity of hydroxylase (MMOH) is achieved via interplay of its regulatory protein (MMOB) and reductase4-6. An additional auxiliary protein, MMOD, is believed to function as an inhibitor of the catalytic activity of MMOH; however, the mechanism of its action remains unknown7,8. Herein, we report the crystal structure of MMOH-MMOD complex from Methylosinus sporium strain 5 (2.6 [A]), which illustrates that two molecules of MMOD associate symmetrically with the canyon region of MMOH in a manner similar to MMOB, indicating that MMOD competes with MMOB for MMOH recognition. Further, MMOD binding disrupts the geometry of the di-iron centre and opens the substrate access channel. Notably, the electron density of 1,6-hexanediol at the substrate access channel mimics products of sMMO in hydrocarbon oxidation. The crystal structure of MMOH-MMOD unravels the inhibitory mechanism by which MMOD suppresses the MMOH catalytic activity, and reveals how hydrocarbon substrates/products access to the di-iron centre.

biochemistry

Alterations in neurovascular coupling following acute traumatic brain injury

Traumatic brain injury (TBI) is a leading cause of mortality and disability worldwide. A challenge for diagnosing and assessing the severity of TBI, however, is that quantitative biomarkers are lacking. We explored potential functional indicators for TBI by noninvasively monitoring sensory-evoked electrical and hemodynamic activity using a novel hybrid optical and electrophysiological measurement approach. By combining diffuse correlation spectroscopy with co-localized electrophysiological measurements in a mouse model of TBI, we observed concomitant alterations in somatosensory-evoked cerebral blood flow and electrical potentials following controlled cortical impact. Injury acutely reduced the amplitude of stimulus-evoked responses, which mostly recovered to baseline values within 30 min; intertrial variability for these parameters was also acutely altered. The kinetics of recovery, however, varied among specific components of the evoked waveforms, and we observed strong correlations between the two measurement modalities for only a select subset of waveform parameters. Overall, our results identify a novel set of potential biomarkers for TBI and demonstrate the utility of combined, noninvasive optical and electrophysiological measurements for detecting injury-induced abnormalities in neurovascular reactivity.

neuroscience

EMHP: An accurate automated hole masking algorithm for single-particle cryo-EM image processing

1. Introduction 1. Introduction 2. Software Package Overview 3. Conclusions Funding References The recent surge in popularity of single-particle cryo-EM as a tool for molecular structure determination alongside advances in software that have reduced the computational infrastructure needed to process single-particle datasets (Kimanius et al, 2016) have created the need for a more streamlined suite of tools to locally facilitate initial data treatment and make processing more attainable at the workstation level.\n\nCurrent technical limitations inherent to the process of structure determination via single-particle cryo-EM require collecting very large data sets - often several thousands of images. This task is facilitated by automated imaging software, however downstream preprocessing steps such as quality asses ...

bioinformatics