No abstract available.

No abstract available.

No abstract available.
DNA* ; Vaccines, DNA*

BACKGROUND: Leptin secreted from adipose tissue activates not only its receptors expressed abundantly in the brain, including arcuate nucleus but the POMC neurons resulting in secretion of a-MSH. Activation of MC4R by a-MSH increases the energy expenditure and decreases the food intake, and promotes the sympathetic activity. METHODS: To analyze the biologic activity of a-MSH analogues, the rat MC3R DNA and human MC4R DNA were stably and independently expressed in CHO cell lines, and we performed the competitive receptor binding assay with [125I]NDP-MSH as a radioligand and cyclic AMP accumulation assay following treatment with different ligands. a-MSH (Ac-Ser-Tyr-Ser- Met-Glue-His-Phe-Arg-Trp-Gly-Lys-Val-NH2) and its analogue a-MSH-ND (Ac-Nle-Asp-His-Dphe- Arg-Trp-Lys-NH2) were synthesized by Genosys Biotechnologies, Inc. The HPLC purified samples for NMR experiments were dissolved in 90% HO/10% DO or 99.9% DO solutions at pH 7.0 with concentrations of 2 mM in 50 mM sodium phosphate buffer. The NMR spectra were acquired on a Bruker AMX-500 or DMX-600 spectrometer in quadrature detection mode equipped with a triple-resonance probe with an actively shielded pulsed field gradient coil. RESULTS: The preferential order of binding activity for MC3R was NDP-MSH > a-MSH-ND > [Nle4]-MSH with IC50 values (nM) being 0.367 +/- 0.074, 47.20 +/- 9.08 and 106.70 +/- 32.25, respectively. For MC4R, the same preferential order, NDP-MSH (0.566 +/- 0.194) > a-MSH-ND (6.70 +/- 1.07) > [Nle4]a-MSH (238.30 +/- 30.47), were obtained. In c-AMP generation assay, the potency order of peptides was NDP-MSH > a-MSH-ND > a-MSH at both MC3R and MCAR. Accumulated food intake of Sprague Dawley rats was low significantly for six hours after injection of a-MSH-ND into peritoneum. a-MSH forms a hair pin loop conformation, whereas a-MSH-ND, a linear form of MTII, prefers a type I B-turn comprising residues Asp5-His6-DPhe7-Arg8 in NMR study. CONCLUSION: we developed in vitro and in vivo bioassay system to evaluate the biologic activity of a-MSH analogues and we also showed that the type I B-turn structure of a-MSH-ND might enhance the binding activity to MC4R.
Adipose Tissue ; Animals ; Arcuate Nucleus ; Biological Assay ; Biotechnology ; Brain ; CHO Cells ; Chromatography, High Pressure Liquid ; Cricetinae ; Cyclic AMP ; Diabetes Mellitus* ; DNA ; Eating ; Energy Metabolism ; Hair ; Humans ; Hydrogen-Ion Concentration ; Inhibitory Concentration 50 ; Leptin* ; Ligands ; Neurons ; Peptides ; Peritoneum ; Pro-Opiomelanocortin ; Rats ; Rats, Sprague-Dawley ; Sodium

No abstract available.
Child* ; Humans

The authors have experienced a case of organic mental disorder with bilateral frontal lobe atrophy in. a 36-year-old man. He showed negative symptoms of schizophrenia such as anhedonia, social withdrawal, flat affect, poverty of thought.
Adult ; Anhedonia ; Atrophy* ; Neurocognitive Disorders ; Frontal Lobe* ; Humans ; Poverty ; Schizophrenia*

No abstract available.
Gonadotropin-Releasing Hormone* ; Humans

Pilomatrix carcinoma is an extremely rare tumor of hair matrix origin and its definite biological behavior of malignancy has remained inconclusive. We report a case of a huge pilomatrix carcinoma arising in the lateral neck skin from an elderly woman, who eventually
Female ; Humans

Poliovirus Sabin 1 strain has its own special features that make it a particularly attractive live recombinant mucosal vaccine vehicle. Sabin 1 cDNA was manipulated to have multiple cloning site and viral specific 3C-protease cutting site at the N-terminal end of the polyprotein, named RPS-vax system HIV-1 V3- and principal neutralizing domain (PND)-concatamers were successfully cloned into the multiple cloning site of the vector system and produced expected chimeric viruses by transfection of their RNA transcripts into HeLa cells. These chimeric viruses have shown to express introduced HIV-1 subgenome concatamers efficiently during their replication in the infected HeLa cells. Expressed proteins were confirmed to retain the wild type structures at least in parts. Replication capacity of the chimeric viruses was slightly lower than that of wild type Sabin 1 likely to be due to delay in processing steps during their replication. Differing from the virulent Mahoney vectors, the rec-Sabin 1 chimeric viruses maintained the foreign gene stably during the serial passages. These chimeric viruses have also shown to be able to induce specific humoral immunity to the introduced vaccine proteins when inoculated into the poliovirus receptor-expressing transgenic (Tg-PVR) mice. Antiserum obtained from the immunized transgenic mice showed to have neutralizing capacity to HIV-1 in vitro. These results strongly suggest that the chimeric viruses expressing HIV-1 vaccine epitopes can be used as a good live mucosal vaccine candidate against AIDS.
Animals ; Clone Cells ; Cloning, Organism ; DNA, Complementary ; Epitopes ; HeLa Cells ; HIV* ; HIV-1* ; Humans* ; Immunity, Humoral ; Mice ; Mice, Transgenic ; Poliovirus* ; RNA ; Serial Passage ; Transfection

No abstract available.
Korea* ; Maternal Death*