Data on metabolic profile of insulin-degrading enzyme knockout mice

Insulin-degrading enzyme (IDE) degrades and inactivates bioactive peptides such as insulin. As insulin is a master regulator of glucose homeostasis, lack of IDE is expected to have a profound impact on both insulin and glucose levels. This article shares data on glucose and insulin homeostasis of control, heterozygous and knockout mice for Ide after 18 weeks of a normal chow diet. This data article is related to a research article entitled “Knockout of insulin-degrading enzyme leads to mice testicular morphological changes and impaired sperm quality” (Meneses et al., 2019).This work was supported by FEDER funds POCI - COMPETE 2020 , Portugal: Project POCI-01-0145-FEDER-007491 ; and by “ Fundação para a Ciência e a Tecnologia ” – FCT to MJM ( PD/BD/114256/2016 ); TRD ( SFRH/BD/109284/2015 ); PFO ( PTDC/BBB-BQB/1368/2014 ; IFCT2015); MPM ( PTDC/DTP-EPI/0207/2012 ; PTDC/BIM-MET/2115/2014 ); MGA ( PTDC/BIM-MET/4712/2014 ; IFCT2015); iNOVA4Health ( UID/Multi/04462/2013 ); and UMIB ( PEst-OE/SAU/UI0215/2014 )

A new thiocyanoacetamide (2-cyano-2-p-nitrophenyl-N-benzylthioamide) reduces doxorubicin-induced in vitro toxicity in Sertoli cells by decreasing apoptosis and autophagy

Despite conflicting data on doxorubicin (DOX) reproductive toxicity, its chemotherapeutic potential sustains its use to treat different types of cancer. This work was designed to study the protective effect of a newly synthesized thiocyanoacetamide (TA), in comparison with selenium (Se), against doxorubicin-induced in vitro toxicity in rat Sertoli cells (SCs). DOX was administered alone or in combination with Se or TA. The possible protective role of increased concentrations of TA (0.25, 0.5 and 1 mM) or Se (12, 25 and 50 mu M) on SCs was tested against 1 mu M of DOX. From this screening, only the least toxic doses of TA and Se were used for further analysis. DOX cytotoxicity, as well as its impact on SCs viability, mitochondria) membrane potential (Delta Psi(m)), oxidative stress biomarkers, apoptosis and autophagy were assessed. Our results showed that DOX exerted its cytotoxic effect through a significant increase in cell death. DOX-mediated cell death was not related to autophagy nor to an overproduction of reactive oxygen species. It was rather due to apoptosis, as shown by the increased number of apoptotic cells and increased activity of caspase-3, or due to necrosis, as shown by the increase in lactate dehydrogenase (LDH) extracellular activity. Still, Bax and Bcl-2 protein expression levels, as well as Delta Psi(m) were not altered by the different treatments. Some individual doses of Se or TA induced a significant toxicity in SCs, however, when combined with DOX, there was a decrease in cell death, LDH extracellular activity, number of apoptotic cells and caspase-3 activity. Overall, our results indicate that DOX-mediated apoptosis in cultured SCs can possibly be averted through its association with specific doses of Se or TA. Nevertheless, TA showed a higher efficiency than Se in reducing DOX-induced toxicity in SCs by decreasing not only apoptosis, but also necrosis and autophagy. (C) 2019 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved

Contribution of microscopy for understanding the mechanism of action against trypanosomatids

Transmission electron microscopy (TEM) has proved to be a useful tool to study the ultrastructural alterations and the target organelles of new antitrypanosomatid drugs. Thus, it has been observed that sesquiterpene lactones induce diverse ultrastructural alterations in both T. cruzi and Leishmania spp., such as cytoplasmic vacuolization, appearance of multilamellar structures, condensation of nuclear DNA, and, in some cases, an important accumulation of lipid vacuoles. This accumulation could be related to apoptotic events. Some of the sesquiterpene lactones (e.g., psilostachyin) have also been demonstrated to cause an intense mitochondrial swelling accompanied by a visible kinetoplast deformation as well as the appearance of multivesicular bodies. This mitochondrial swelling could be related to the generation of oxidative stress and associated to alterations in the ergosterol metabolism. The appearance of multilamellar structures and multiple kinetoplasts and flagella induced by the sesquiterpene lactone psilostachyin C indicates that this compound would act at the parasite cell cycle level, in an intermediate stage between kinetoplast segregation and nuclear division. In turn, the diterpene lactone icetexane has proved to induce the external membrane budding on T. cruzi together with an apparent disorganization of the pericellar cytoskeleton. Thus, ultrastructural TEM studies allow elucidating the possible mechanisms and the subsequent identification of molecular targets for the action of natural compounds on trypanosomatids.Fil: Lozano, Esteban Sebastián. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas. Centro Científico Tecnológico Conicet - Mendoza. Instituto de Medicina y Biología Experimental de Cuyo; ArgentinaFil: Spina Zapata, Renata María. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas. Centro Científico Tecnológico Conicet - Mendoza. Instituto de Histología y Embriología de Mendoza Dr. Mario H. Burgos. Universidad Nacional de Cuyo. Facultad de Ciencias Médicas. Instituto de Histología y Embriología de Mendoza Dr. Mario H. Burgos; ArgentinaFil: Barrera, Patricia Andrea. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas. Centro Científico Tecnológico Conicet - Mendoza. Instituto de Histología y Embriología de Mendoza Dr. Mario H. Burgos. Universidad Nacional de Cuyo. Facultad de Ciencias Médicas. Instituto de Histología y Embriología de Mendoza Dr. Mario H. Burgos; ArgentinaFil: Tonn, Carlos Eugenio. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas. Centro Científico Tecnológico Conicet - San Luis. Instituto de Investigaciones en Tecnología Química. Universidad Nacional de San Luis. Facultad de Química, Bioquímica y Farmacia. Instituto de Investigaciones en Tecnología Química; ArgentinaFil: Sosa Escudero, Miguel Angel. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas. Centro Científico Tecnológico Conicet - Mendoza. Instituto de Histología y Embriología de Mendoza Dr. Mario H. Burgos. Universidad Nacional de Cuyo. Facultad de Ciencias Médicas. Instituto de Histología y Embriología de Mendoza Dr. Mario H. Burgos; Argentin

Very rapid long-distance sea crossing by a migratory bird

Landbirds undertaking within-continent migrations have the possibility to stop en route, but most long-distance migrants must also undertake large non-stop sea crossings, the length of which can vary greatly. For shorebirds migrating from Iceland to West Africa, the shortest route would involve one of the longest continuous sea crossings while alternative, mostly overland, routes are available. Using geolocators to track the migration of Icelandic whimbrels (Numenius phaeopus), we show that they can complete a round-trip of 11,000 km making two non-stop sea crossings and flying at speeds of up to 24 m s-1; the fastest recorded for shorebirds flying over the ocean. Although wind support could reduce flight energetic costs, whimbrels faced headwinds up to twice their ground speed, indicating that unfavourable and potentially fatal weather conditions are not uncommon. Such apparently high risk migrations might be more common than previously thought, with potential fitness gains outweighing the costs

Tartrate-resistant acid phosphate as biomarker of bone turnover over the lifespan and different physiologic stages in sheep

Currently, the best resources for assessment of bone tissue using imaging techniques are expensive and available in few medical facilities, thus serum or urinary bone turnover biomarkers could be useful as early indicators of prognosis. However, there is a wide range of variability in bone turnover markers due to several factors, such as different ages and metabolic stages, thus it is important to have as much data published on the subject as possible. The aim of this study was therefore to generate a reference range for alkaline phosphatase (ALP) and tartrate-resistant acid phosphatase (TRAP) and validate the already published data.National Council for Scientific and Technological Development (CNPq - Brazil) PhD scholarship 202248/2015–1.info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio

Quantum gravity effects in Myers-Perry space-times

We study quantum gravity effects for Myers-Perry black holes assuming that the leading contributions arise from the renormalization group evolution of Newton's coupling. Provided that gravity weakens following the asymptotic safety conjecture, we find that quantum effects lift a degeneracy of higher-dimensional black holes, and dominate over kinematical ones induced by rotation, particularly for small black hole mass, large angular momentum, and higher space-time dimensionality. Quantum-corrected space-times display inner and outer horizons, and show the existence of a black hole of smallest mass in any dimension. Ultra-spinning solutions no longer persist. Thermodynamic properties including temperature, specific heat, the Komar integrals, and aspects of black hole mechanics are studied as well. Observing a softening of the ring singularity, we also discuss the validity of classical energy conditions

Measurement of the inclusive and dijet cross-sections of b-jets in pp collisions at sqrt(s) = 7 TeV with the ATLAS detector

The inclusive and dijet production cross-sections have been measured for jets containing b-hadrons (b-jets) in proton-proton collisions at a centre-of-mass energy of sqrt(s) = 7 TeV, using the ATLAS detector at the LHC. The measurements use data corresponding to an integrated luminosity of 34 pb^-1. The b-jets are identified using either a lifetime-based method, where secondary decay vertices of b-hadrons in jets are reconstructed using information from the tracking detectors, or a muon-based method where the presence of a muon is used to identify semileptonic decays of b-hadrons inside jets. The inclusive b-jet cross-section is measured as a function of transverse momentum in the range 20 < pT < 400 GeV and rapidity in the range |y| < 2.1. The bbbar-dijet cross-section is measured as a function of the dijet invariant mass in the range 110 < m_jj < 760 GeV, the azimuthal angle difference between the two jets and the angular variable chi in two dijet mass regions. The results are compared with next-to-leading-order QCD predictions. Good agreement is observed between the measured cross-sections and the predictions obtained using POWHEG + Pythia. MC@NLO + Herwig shows good agreement with the measured bbbar-dijet cross-section. However, it does not reproduce the measured inclusive cross-section well, particularly for central b-jets with large transverse momenta.Comment: 10 pages plus author list (21 pages total), 8 figures, 1 table, final version published in European Physical Journal