Hyperactive Neuroendocrine Secretion Causes Size, Feeding, and Metabolic Defects of C. elegans Bardet-Biedl Syndrome Mutants

Bardet-Biedl syndrome, BBS, is a rare autosomal recessive disorder with clinical presentations including polydactyly, retinopathy, hyperphagia, obesity, short stature, cognitive impairment, and developmental delays. Disruptions of BBS proteins in a variety of organisms impair cilia formation and function and the multi-organ defects of BBS have been attributed to deficiencies in various cilia-associated signaling pathways. In C. elegans, bbs genes are expressed exclusively in the sixty ciliated sensory neurons of these animals and bbs mutants exhibit sensory defects as well as body size, feeding, and metabolic abnormalities. Here we show that in contrast to many other cilia-defective mutants, C. elegans bbs mutants exhibit increased release of dense-core vesicles and organism-wide phenotypes associated with enhanced activities of insulin, neuropeptide, and biogenic amine signaling pathways. We show that the altered body size, feeding, and metabolic abnormalities of bbs mutants can be corrected to wild-type levels by abrogating the enhanced secretion of dense-core vesicles without concomitant correction of ciliary defects. These findings expand the role of BBS proteins to the regulation of dense-core-vesicle exocytosis and suggest that some features of Bardet-Biedl Syndrome may be caused by excessive neuroendocrine secretion

XPS analysis of the PC/PVDF interface modified by PMMA. Location of the PMMA at the interface

Polycarbonate (PC) and polyvinylidenefluoride (PVDF) are two immiscible polymers, which form two-phase polyblends with a weak interfacial adhesion and a high interfacial tension. This situation may be changed by the addition of polymethylmethacrylate (PMMA), which is miscible with PVDF and concentrates at the PVDF/PC interface. Location of PMMA at the PC/PVDF interface has been confirmed by XPS analysis, which shows that the interface enrichment in PMMA already takes place when only 10 wt% PMMA is premixed with PVDF

Miscibility of poly(vinylidene fluoride) and poly(methylmethacrylate-co-zinc polyacrylate) ionomers

A random copolymer of methyl methacrylate and 5.7 mol.% of acrylic acid has been neutralized by zinc cation to different extents in order to study the effect of zinc carboxylate pendant groups on the miscibility of poly(methyl methacrylate) (PMMA) and poly(vinylidene fluoride) (PVDF). The interaction parameter (χ) has been calculated from the experimental depression of the PVDF melting point. χ is minimum at zinc carboxylate content of 2.8 mol.%. The dynamic mechanical analysis of the PVDF-PMMA ionomer binary blends does not agree with the additivity rule of the properties, consistently with the phase morphology that changes with composition. Blends are indeed amorphous as long as the PVDF content does not exceed 40 wt.%, otherwise, semicrystalline PVDF coexists with an amorphous mixed PVDF/copolymer phase

Fabrication of bioinspired composite nanofiber membranes with robust superhydrophobicity for direct contact membrane distillation

The practical application of membrane distillation (MD) for water purification is hindered by the absence of desirable membranes that can fulfill the special requirements of the MD process. Compared to the membranes fabricated by other methods, nanofiber membranes produced by electrospinning are of great interest due to their high porosity, low tortuosity, large surface pore size, and high surface hydrophobicity. However, the stable performance of the nanofiber membranes in the MD process is still unsatisfactory. Inspired by the unique structure of the lotus leaf, this study aimed to develop a strategy to construct superhydrophobic composite nanofiber membranes with robust superhydrophobicity and high porosity suitable for use in MD. The newly developed membrane consists of a superhydrophobic silica-PVDF composite selective skin formed on a polyvinylidene fluoride (PVDF) porous nanofiber scaffold via electrospinning. This fabrication method could be easily scaled up due to its simple preparation procedures. The effects of silica diameter and concentration on membrane contact angle, sliding angle, and MD performance were investigated thoroughly. For the first time, the direct contact membrane distillation (DCMD) tests demonstrate that the newly developed membranes are able to present stable high performance over 50 h of testing time, and the superhydrophobic selective layer exhibits excellent durability in ultrasonic treatment and a continuous DCMD test. It is believed that this novel design strategy has great potential for MD membrane fabrication.NRF (Natl Research Foundation, S’pore)EDB (Economic Devt. Board, S’pore)Accepted versio