A Rare Association of Monosomy 18P Syndrome and Polyglandular Autoimmune Syndrome Type IIIA

We report a monosomy 18p syndrome in a male patient with polyglandular autoimmune syndrome (PAS) type IIIA. A 34-year-old mentally retarded diabetic male patient with short stature, wide earlaps, old-looking face, straight nasal bone, atrophic mouth, drooping cheeks, full teeth loss, and soft, weak and sparse white hair was admitted to the outpatient endocrinology clinic. Chromosome analysis of the patient revealed 46,XY,del(18)(p11.2). He was also diagnosed with autoimmune thyroiditis, primary hypothyroidism and diabetes mellitus type 1. We concluded that monosomy 18p syndrome may be associated with autoimmune diseases and if this is suspected, patients should be examined for an endocrine deficiency

High Resolution Structure of a Type Iv Pilin from the Metal Reducing Bacterium Shewanella Oneidensis

BACKGROUND: Type IV pili are widely expressed among Gram-negative bacteria, where they are involved in biofilm formation, serve in the transfer of DNA, motility and in the bacterial attachment to various surfaces. Type IV pili in Shewanella oneidensis are also supposed to play an important role in extracellular electron transfer by the attachment to sediments containing electron acceptors and potentially forming conductive nanowires. RESULTS: The potential nanowire type IV pilin Pil(Bac1) from S. oneidensis was characterized by a combination of complementary structural methods and the atomic structure was determined at a resolution of 1.67 Å by X-ray crystallography. Pil(Bac1) consists of one long N-terminal α-helix packed against four antiparallel β-strands, thus revealing the core fold of type IV pilins. In the crystal, Pil(Bac1) forms a parallel dimer with a sodium ion bound to one of the monomers. Interestingly, our Pil(Bac1) crystal structure reveals two unusual features compared to other type IVa pilins: an unusual position of the disulfide bridge and a straight α-helical section, which usually exhibits a pronounced kink. This straight helix leads to a distinct packing in a filament model of Pil(Bac1) based on an EM model of a Neisseria pilus. CONCLUSIONS: In this study we have described the first structure of a pilin from Shewanella oneidensis. The structure possesses features of the common type IV pilin core, but also exhibits significant variations in the α-helical part and the D-region. ELECTRONIC SUPPLEMENTARY MATERIAL: The online version of this article (doi:10.1186/s12900-015-0031-7) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users