Secondary Metabolites of Marine Microbes: From Natural Products Chemistry to Chemical Ecology

Marine natural products (MNPs) exhibit a wide range of pharmaceutically relevant bioactivities, including antibiotic, antiviral, anticancer, or anti-inflammatory properties. Besides marine macroorganisms such as sponges, algae, or corals, specifically marine bacteria and fungi have shown to produce novel secondary metabolites (SMs) with unique and diverse chemical structures that may hold the key for the development of novel drugs or drug leads. Apart from highlighting their potential benefit to humankind, this review is focusing on the manifold functions of SMs in the marine ecosystem. For example, potent MNPs have the ability to exile predators and competing organisms, act as attractants for mating purposes, or serve as dye for the expulsion or attraction of other organisms. A large compilation of literature on the role of MNPs in marine ecology is available, and several reviews evaluated the function of MNPs for the aforementioned topics. Therefore, we focused the second part of this review on the importance of bioactive compounds from crustose coralline algae (CCA) and their role during coral settlement, a topic that has received less attention. It has been shown that certain SMs derived from CCA and their associated bacteria are able to induce attachment and/or metamorphosis of many benthic invertebrate larvae, including globally threatened reef-building scleractinian corals. This review provides an overview on bioactivities of MNPs from marine microbes and their potential use in medicine as well as on the latest findings of the chemical ecology and settlement process of scleractinian corals and other invertebrate larvae

Maxillofacial Prosthesis

Session: Face Change

Phenotypes developed in secretin receptor-null mice indicated a role for secretin in regulating renal water reabsorption

Aquaporin 2 (AQP2) is responsible for regulating the concentration of urine in the collecting tubules of the kidney under the control of vasopressin (Vp). Studies using Vp-deficient Brattleboro rats, however, indicated the existence of substantial Vp-independent mechanisms for membrane insertion, as well as transcriptional regulation, of this water channel. The Vp-independent mechanism(s) is clinically relevant to patients with X-linked nephrogenic diabetes insipidus (NDI) by therapeutically bypassing the dysfunctional Vp receptor. On the basis of studies with secretin receptor-null (SCTR -/-) mice, we report here for the first time that mutation of the SCTR gene could lead to mild polydipsia and polyuria. Additionally, SCTR -/- mice were shown to have reduced renal expression of AQP2 and AQP4, as well as altered glomerular and tubular morphology, suggesting possible disturbances in the filtration and/or water reabsorption process in these animals. By using SCTR-/- mice as controls and comparing them with wild-type animals, we performed both in vivo and in vitro studies that demonstrated a role for secretin in stimulating (i) AQP2 translocation from intracellular vesicles to the plasma membrane in renal medullary tubules and (ii) expression of this water channel under hyperosmotic conditions. The present study therefore provides information for at least one of the Vp-independent mechanisms that modulate the process of renal water reabsorption. Future investigations in this direction should be important in developing therapeutic means for treating NDI patients. Copyright © 2007, American Society for Microbiology. All Rights Reserved.link_to_OA_fulltex

Surgical navigation for implant-supported ear prosthesis manufactured by CAD/CAM technology

Concurrent Session - SESSION VIII: Digital Impact on Facial Prosthetic and RehabilitationThe 4th International Conference on Advanced Digital Technology in Head and Neck Reconstruction, Freiburg, Germany, 5-8 May 2011

Breast cancer in Hong Kong, Southern China: The population-based, ten-year analysis of epidemiological characteristics, stage-specific, cancer-specific, & disease-free survival in breast cancer patients: 1997–2006

Poster Session 3: Epidemiology, Risk, and Prevention: Epidemiology - Population Studies: no. P3-07-32This journal suppl. entitled: Thirty-Seventh Annual CTRC-AACR San Antonio Breast Cancer Symposium; December 9-13, 2014; San Antonio, TXBACKGROUND: Breast cancer is the most common cancer and second leading cause of cancer death among women, after lung cancer in Asia. The age-standardized incidence rates of breast cancer in Hong Kong is 61.0 per 100,000 women, after Singapore and Taiwan. With such increase, it would be important to better understand breast cancer to guide health care professionals and health policy makers to plan clinical management. However, to date such information is still under-reported, this study provide a comprehensive ten-year analyses of breast cancer in Hong Kong. METHODS: A retrospective study on population database over 10-year obtained from Hong Kong Cancer Registry was performed. A total of 20,290 female breast cancers’ medical records, diagnosed between January 1, 1997 and December 31, 2006, were reviewed. Descriptive statistics were employed to describe the epidemiological, clinical, and diagnostic data. The prognostic information for diagnostic and pathological data of relative survival (RS) was estimated using the maximum likelihood approach with program Strel in STATA; while the overall survival (OS), cancer-specific survival (CSS) & disease-free survival (DFS) were estimated by the Kaplan-Meier method with SPSS. Chi-squared test and Student's t-test were employed to compare variables in the two 5-year-periods of 1997-2001 and 2002-2006, with plotted RS curves for diagnostic and pathological data between these two 5-year-periods. RESULTS: 18,110 invasive breast cancer medical records in 1997-2006 were eligible for analysis, after 2,180 cases were excluding due to incomplete data. The ages at diagnosis ranged from 16 to 105; and median age was 51 years old. There was a drop from 14.1% in 1997-2001 to only 10.6% in 2002-2006 for those were diagnosed with breast cancer at age 39 years & younger. 26.2%, 55.2%, 13.0%, & 5.6% in 1997-2001, versus 30.1%, 46.4%, 16.9%, & 6.6% in 2002-2006 had tumor staging of stages I, II, III, and IV cancers at diagnosis, respectively. In ten-year period, the 5-year OS, RS, CSS, & DFS for the whole cohort were 80.6%, 85.6%, 87.1%, & 90.5%, respectively. The 5-year tumor stage-specific RS were 97.8%, 90.4%, 70.4%, & 21.4% for stages I, II, III, & IV, respectively. Between the two time periods, all the stage-specific RS improved by about 1%, 4%, 6% & 2% for stages I, II, III, & IV, respectively. There were 2,670 (14.7%) triple negative cases in 1997-2006, the ER-positive, PR-positive, & HER2-positive cancers increased from 66.1%, 52.6%, & 25.5% in 1997-2001 to 72.0%, 57.1%, & 29.4% in 2002-2006, respectively. DISCUSSION: Comprehensive analyses of breast cancer with population database from the Hong Kong Cancer Registry were performed to provide detailed information of a baseline study cohort in Southern China for comparative studies with other Asian regions.link_to_OA_fulltex