Progesterone Prevents Traumatic Brain Injury-Induced Intestinal Nuclear Factor kappa B Activation and Proinflammatory Cytokines Expression in Male Rats

We have previously shown that traumatic brain injury (TBI) can induce an upregulation of nuclear factor kappa B (NF-κB) and proinflammatory cytokines in the gut, which play an important role in the pathogenesis of acute gut mucosal injury mediated by inflammation. In this work, we investigated whether progesterone administration modulated intestinal NF-κB activity and proinflammatory cytokines expression after TBI in male rats. As a result, we found that administration of progesterone following TBI could decrease NF-κB binding activity, NF-κB p65 protein expression, and concentrations of interleukin-1β (IL-1β), and tumor necrosis factor-α (TNF-α) in the gut. TBI-induced damages of gut structure were ameliorated after progesterone injections. The results of the present study suggest that the therapeutic benefit of post-TBI progesterone injections might be due to its inhibitory effects on intestinal NF-κB activation and proinflammatory cytokines expression

Insights into the Coupling of Duplication Events and Macroevolution from an Age Profile of Animal Transmembrane Gene Families

The evolution of new gene families subsequent to gene duplication may be coupled to the fluctuation of population and environment variables. Based upon that, we presented a systematic analysis of the animal transmembrane gene duplication events on a macroevolutionary scale by integrating the palaeontology repository. The age of duplication events was calculated by maximum likelihood method, and the age distribution was estimated by density histogram and normal kernel density estimation. We showed that the density of the duplicates displays a positive correlation with the estimates of maximum number of cell types of common ancestors, and the oxidation events played a key role in the major transitions of this density trace. Next, we focused on the Phanerozoic phase, during which more macroevolution data are available. The pulse mass extinction timepoints coincide with the local peaks of the age distribution, suggesting that the transmembrane gene duplicates fixed frequently when the environment changed dramatically. Moreover, a 61-million-year cycle is the most possible cycle in this phase by spectral analysis, which is consistent with the cycles recently detected in biodiversity. Our data thus elucidate a strong coupling of duplication events and macroevolution; furthermore, our method also provides a new way to address these questions

2-Meth­oxy-4-methyl-1-[1-(phenyl­sulfon­yl)propan-2-yl]benzene

The title mol­ecule, C17H20O3S, displays a U-shaped structure; the two benzene rings are nearly parallel and partially overlapped to each other, the dihedral angle and centroid-to-centroid distance being 15.0 (2)° and 3.723 (2) Å. In the crystal, weak inter­molecular C—H⋯O hydrogen bonds link the mol­ecules, forming supra­molecular chains running along the a axis

A proteome map of primary cultured rat Schwann cells

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>Schwann cells (SCs) are the principal glial cells of the peripheral nervous system with a wide range of biological functions. SCs play a key role in peripheral nerve regeneration and are involved in several hereditary peripheral neuropathies. The objective of this study was to gain new insight into the whole protein composition of SCs.</p> <p>Results</p> <p>Two-dimensional liquid chromatography coupled with tandem mass spectrometry (2D LC-MS/MS) was performed to identify the protein expressions in primary cultured SCs of rats. We identified a total of 1,232 proteins, which were categorized into 20 functional classes. We also used quantitative real time RT-PCR and Western blot analysis to validate some of proteomics-identified proteins.</p> <p>Conclusion</p> <p>We showed for the first time the proteome map of SCs. Our data could serve as a reference library to provide basic information for understanding SC biology.</p