Tissue-specific expression from a compound TATA-dependent and TATA-independent promoter

We have found that the mouse metallothionein-I (MT-I) gene promoter functions in an unusual, compound manner. It directs both TATA-dependent and TATA-independent modes of transcription in vivo. The TATA-dependent message is initiated at the previously characterized +1 transcription start site and is the predominant species in most tissues. In many cell types it is metal inducible. The TATA-independent initiation sites are distributed over the 160 bp upstream of the previously characterized +1 start site, and the RNA products are present in all tissues examined. Only in testis, however, do the TATA-independent transcripts predominate, accumulating to highest levels in pachytene-stage meiotic cells and early spermatids. Unlike the TATA-dependent +1 transcript, these RNAs are not induced by metal, even in cultured cells in which the +1 species is induced. Transfection studies of site-directed mutants show that destruction of the TATA element drastically alters the ratio of the two RNA classes in cells in which the +1 transcripts normally dominates. In TATA-minus mutants, the TATA-independent RNAs become the most prevalent, although they remain refractory to metal induction. Thus, the MT-I promoter utilizes two different types of core promoter function within a single cell population. The two different types of core promoter respond very differently to environmental stimuli, and the choice between them appears to be regulated in a tissue-specific fashion

Transforming Business Education: It’s about Time: a Systems Perspective on Incorporating Climate Change, Sustainability, and the Care for Our Common Future

In this paper we define the nature of the climate change problem and we analyze the task of getting human society to act quickly enough and appropriately to solve this global crisis. We show how our current citizen mental models keep us locked into fossil fuels and prevent us from acting. We demonstrate how simple system dynamics models provide the necessary insight, expand the boundaries of our mental models, and give us the understanding to redesign how our business and governing systems work. We suggest transforming business education using these insights as the key to appropriate climate change action and setting us on the road to a prosperous and sustainable future

South African Strategy: The Strategy of an International Pariah

South Africa\u27s apartheid policy has lost her a relationship with the West, particularly the United States, that might otherwise exist and has required that she develop new and imaginative solutions to her strategic problems

The Impact of DRGs on Social Workers in a University-Affiliated, Teaching Hospital System

The impact of DRGs on social workers in four social work departments located in one Northeast State was assessed by interviews with all social work staff and administrators. The impact of DRGs was determined to be substantial. Implications for social work education and practice are considered

Reported Self-Efficacy Among Participants Of Nutrition Services At A Local Food Bank And Resource Center In Rural North Carolina

This research explored a community-academic partnership and the feasibility of designing and implementing initiatives aimed to increase nutrition-related self-efficacy and ultimately food security among food-pantry clients in rural Appalachia. The study utilized a three-step, mixed-methods design for the purpose of identifying the client’s self-assessed level of self-efficacy and food security, as well as to measure their involvement in a local food bank’s nutrition-related programs. Of the 50 study participants, 39 were low to very low food security and 38% had been receiving food resources from the food bank for more than 2 years. Self-efficacy items based on clients' ability to plan ahead averaged a low self-efficacy score while those items based on client’s ability to make decisions in the moment averaged a high self-efficacy score. With these findings, it’s apparent that there is a need for nutrition-related interventions to focus on the importance of planning for the future. Clients with lower self-efficacy and food security ratings reported greater participation in nutrition services offered by the food bank, suggesting that services are reaching the population in most need. These findings call for future initiatives aimed at increasing the self-efficacy with measures of longer term efficacy and sustainability in improving food security

Prion propagation can occur in a prokaryote and requires the ClpB chaperone

Prions are self-propagating protein aggregates that are characteristically transmissible. In mammals, the PrP protein can form a prion that causes the fatal transmissible spongiform encephalopathies. Prions have also been uncovered in fungi, where they act as heritable, protein-based genetic elements. We previously showed that the yeast prion protein Sup35 can access the prion conformation in Escherichia coli. Here, we demonstrate that E. coli can propagate the Sup35 prion under conditions that do not permit its de novo formation. Furthermore, we show that propagation requires the disaggregase activity of the ClpB chaperone. Prion propagation in yeast requires Hsp104 (a ClpB ortholog), and prior studies have come to conflicting conclusions about ClpB's ability to participate in this process. Our demonstration of ClpB-dependent prion propagation in E. coli suggests that the cytoplasmic milieu in general and a molecular machine in particular are poised to support protein-based heredity in the bacterial domain of life. DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.7554/eLife.02949.00

Recent Decisions

Comments on recent decisions by William J. Harte, John A. Di Nardo, Donald A. Garrity, Nick J. Neiers, Arthur J. Perry, G. R. Blakey, Matthew T. Hogan, and John V. Reilly, Jr