A role for specific collagen motifs during wound healing and inflammatory response of fibroblasts in the teleost fish gilthead seabream

Specific sites and sequences in collagen to which cells can attach, either directly or through protein intermediaries, were identified using Toolkits of 63-amino acid triple-helical peptides and specific shorter GXX′GEX″ motifs, which have different intrinsic affinity for integrins that mediate cell adhesion and migration. We have previously reported that collagen type I (COL-I) was able to prime in vitro the respiratory burst and induce a specific set of immune- and extracellular matrix-related molecules in phagocytes of the teleost fish gilthead seabream (Sparus aurata L.). It was also suggested that COL-I would provide an intermediate signal during the early inflammatory response in gilthead seabream. Since fibroblasts are highly involved in the initiation of wound repair and regeneration processes, in the present study SAF-1 cells (gilthead seabream fibroblasts) were used to identify the binding motifs in collagen by end-point and real-time cell adhesion assays using the collagen peptides and Toolkits. We identified the collagen motifs involved in the early magnesium-dependent adhesion of these cells. Furthermore, we found that peptides containing the GFOGER and GLOGEN motifs (where O is hydroxyproline) present high affinity for SAF-1 adhesion, expressed as both cell number and surface covering, while in cell suspensions, these motifs were also able to induce the expression of the genes encoding the proinflammatory molecules interleukin-1β and cyclooxygenase-2. These data suggest that specific collagen motifs are involved in the regulation of the inflammatory and healing responses of teleost fish

The medium on the stage: Trance and performance in nineteenth-century spiritualism

This is an Accepted Manuscript of an article published in Early Popular Visual Culture on 06 Sep 2011, available online: http://www.tandfonline.com/10.1080/17460654.2011.601166.While historians of spiritualism have been eager to focus on its political and social implications, less attention has been given to the fact that spirit communication was also a matter of visual spectacle. This article aims to analyse spiritualist séances as a form of spectacular entertainment. Relying on a wide array of spiritualist sources, it argues that séances were meant not only as moments of religious and scientific inquiry, but also as a brilliant amusement where theatrical effects embellished an exciting shared experience. The intermingling of religion and entertainment can thus be seen as one of the defining characteristics of the spiritualist experience. After sketching the history of the presence of spiritualist mediums on the stage and discussing the involvement of professionalism in mediumship, the article will then focus on the trance as a specific performance strategy. It will examine how the trance combined issues of automatism, theatricality and absorption, and contributed to the coexistence in spirit seances of spectacular features and claims of authenticity