Structural and mechanistic analysis of trans-3-chloroacrylic acid dehalogenase activity

The X-ray structure of a noncovalently modified trans-3-chloroacrylic acid dehalogenase with a substrate-homolog acetate bound in the active site has been determined to 1.7 Å resolution. Elucidation of catalytically important water is reported and multiple conformations of the catalytic residue αGlu52 are observed

Content analysis of nutritional information in paediatric oral health education leaflets

Background: The aim of this study was to determine if paediatric oral health education leaflets with a food and nutritional focus provide messages that are clear and consistent with the current Australian Dietary Guidelines and the Infant Feeding Guidelines. Methods: Forty-three leaflets aimed at parents were sourced from Australian state and territory Health Departments, oral health industry partners and commercial organisations, and a content analysis was performed. Recommendations on food and drink type, consumption frequency and general diet and nutrition advice were considered and cross-referenced with the Australian Dietary Guidelines and the Infant Feeding Guidelines to identify areas of consistency and discrepancy. Results: Twenty leaflets recommended reducing the consumption of sugary and/or acidic food, while 23 leaflets recommended reducing the consumption of sugary and/or acidic drinks. The majority of the leaflets advised water (n = 35) and milk (n = 23) to drink. Although 33 leaflets encouraged a healthy diet, seven of these did not specify what a healthy diet was. Twenty-eight leaflets provided early childhood-related (0-2 years) feeding advice. Confusing messages were found in nine leaflets, with ambiguous recommendations that were open to individual interpretation. Conclusions: There were some inconsistencies between the leaflets and the dietary and infant feeding guidelines in Australia; and across the leaflets, as not all important messages were included in any one leaflet. Government Health Departments and other relevant agencies should ensure that advisory messages regarding diet, particularly those with dental implications, are clear, complete and consistent across all dental educational leaflets. © 2017 The Author(s)

Review: The Journal of Dramaturgy, volume 22, issue 2

Contents include: Editor\u27s Note; Elliott Hayes Award Acceptance Speech From Denver to Gulu, With Thanks to Lynn Nottage; Learning to Speak American: A Writer\u27s Journey, Keynote Remarks Delivered at the Annual Conference of the Literary Managers and Dramturgs of the Americas, Alliance Theatre, Atlanta, GA June 28, 2012; Michael Mark Chemers\u27 Ghost Light: An Introductory Handbook for Dramaturgy; Creative Process in Theatrical Translation: An Interview with Adam Versenyi; Croisades in Quebec: On the Semiotics of Contemporary French Dramaturgie. Issue editors: Sydney Cheek-O\u27Donnell, Debra Cardona, Janine Sobeckhttps://soundideas.pugetsound.edu/lmdareview/1044/thumbnail.jp

Image-Based, Fiber Guiding Scaffolds: A Platform for Regenerating Tissue Interfaces

In the oral and craniofacial complex, tooth loss is the most commonly acquired disfiguring injury. Among the most formidable challenges of reconstructing tooth-supporting osseous defects in the oral cavity is the regeneration of functional multi-tissue complexes involving bone, ligament, and tooth cementum. Furthermore, periodontal multi-tissue engineering with spatiotemporal orientation of the periodontal ligament (PDL) remains the most challenging obstacle for restoration of physiological loading and homeostasis. We report on the ability of a hybrid computer-designed scaffold?developed utilizing computed tomography?to predictably facilitate the regeneration and integration of dental supporting tissues. Here, we provide the protocol for rapid prototyping, manufacture, surgical implantation, and evaluation of dual-architecture scaffolds for controlling fiber orientation and facilitating morphogenesis of bone-ligament complexes. In contrast to conventional single-system methods of fibrous tissue formation, our protocol supports rigorous control of multi-compartmental scaffold architecture using computational scaffold design and manufacturing by 3D printing, as well as the evaluation of newly regenerated tissue physiology for clinical implementation.Peer Reviewedhttps://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/140247/1/ten.tec.2013.0619.pd

Molecular Insights into Inhibition of the Methylated Histone-Plant Homeodomain Complexes by Calixarenes

Plant homeodomain (PHD) finger-containing proteins are implicated in fundamental biological processes, including transcriptional activation and repression, DNA damage repair, cell differentiation, and survival. The PHD finger functions as an epigenetic reader that binds to posttranslationally modified or unmodified histone H3 tails, recruiting catalytic writers and erasers and other components of the epigenetic machinery to chromatin. Despite the critical role of the histone-PHD interaction in normal and pathological processes, selective inhibitors of this association have not been well developed. Here we demonstrate that macrocyclic calixarenes can disrupt binding of PHD fingers to methylated lysine 4 of histone H3 in vitro and in vivo. The inhibitory activity relies on differences in binding affinities of the PHD fingers for H3K4me and the methylation state of the histone ligand, whereas the composition of the aromatic H3K4me-binding site of the PHD fingers appears to have no effect. Our approach provides a novel tool for studying the biological roles of methyllysine readers in epigenetic signaling

A highly-resolved food web for insect seed predators in a species-rich tropical forest

The top-down and indirect effects of insects on plant communities depend on patterns of host use, which are often poorly documented, particularly in species-rich tropical forests. At Barro Colorado Island, Panama, we compiled the first food web quantifying trophic interactions between the majority of co-occurring woody plant species and their internally-feeding insect seed predators. Our study is based on more than 200,000 fruits representing 478 plant species, associated with 369 insect species. Insect host-specificity was remarkably high: only 20% of seed predator species were associated with more than one plant species, while each tree species experienced seed predation from a median of two insect species. Phylogeny, but not plant traits, explained patterns of seed predator attack. These data suggest that seed predators are unlikely to mediate indirect interactions such as apparent competition between plant species, but are consistent with their proposed contribution to maintaining plant diversity via the Janzen-Connell mechanism

Evaluating soil resistance formulations in thermal-based two source energy balance (TSEB) model: Implications for heterogeneous semiarid and arid regions

Relatively small fluctuations in the surface energy balance and evapotranspiration in semiarid and arid regions can be indicative of significant changes to ecosystem health. Therefore, it is imperative to have approaches for monitoring surface fluxes in these regions. The remote sensing‐based two‐source energy balance (TSEB) model is a suitable method for flux estimation over sparsely vegetated semiarid and arid landscapes since it explicitly considers surface energy flux contributions from soil and vegetation. However, previous studies indicate that TSEB generally underestimates sensible heat flux (H) and hence overestimates latent heat flux (LE) or evapotranspiration for these regions unless soil resistance coefficients are modified based on additional ground information. In this study, TSEB is applied over semiarid and arid regions on three continents using the original soil resistance formulation with modified coefficients and a recently developed physically based soil resistance formulation. Model sensitivity analysis demonstrates the high sensitivity of TSEB with original soil resistance formulation to soil resistance coefficients, while TSEB with the new soil resistance formulation has relatively low sensitivity to uncertainties in all coefficients. The performance of TSEB using different soil resistance formulations is evaluated by comparing modeled H against eddy covariance measurements in six semiarid and arid study sites and ranking the error statistics. Our results indicate that incorporating the new soil resistance formulation into TSEB would enhance its utility in flux estimation over heterogeneous landscapes by obviating its reliance on semiempirical coefficients and thus provide more robust fluxes over sparsely vegetated regions without model calibration and/or parameter tuning.info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio

Topological and geometrical restrictions, free-boundary problems and self-gravitating fluids

Let (P1) be certain elliptic free-boundary problem on a Riemannian manifold (M,g). In this paper we study the restrictions on the topology and geometry of the fibres (the level sets) of the solutions f to (P1). We give a technique based on certain remarkable property of the fibres (the analytic representation property) for going from the initial PDE to a global analytical characterization of the fibres (the equilibrium partition condition). We study this analytical characterization and obtain several topological and geometrical properties that the fibres of the solutions must possess, depending on the topology of M and the metric tensor g. We apply these results to the classical problem in physics of classifying the equilibrium shapes of both Newtonian and relativistic static self-gravitating fluids. We also suggest a relationship with the isometries of a Riemannian manifold.Comment: 36 pages. In this new version the analytic representation hypothesis is proved. Please address all correspondence to D. Peralta-Sala