Journal of Applied Biomedicine, 2010 (vol. 8), issue 3
Reviews
Cell cycle and Alzheimer's disease: studies in non-neuronal cells
Natividad de las Cuevas, Úrsula Muñoz, Fernando Bartolomé, Noemí Esteras, Carolina Alquezar, Ángeles Martín-Requero
J Appl Biomed 8:121-130, 2010 | DOI: 10.2478/v10136-009-0015-7 
The most common cause of dementia in the elderly is Alzheimer disease (AD). In Europe, AD is a leading cause of death. The prevalence of this disease in developed countries is increasing because of very significant shifts in life expectancy and demographic parameters. AD is characterized by progressive cognitive impairment, resulting from dysfunction and degeneration of neurons in the limbic and cortical regions of the brain. Two prominent abnormalities in the affected brain regions are extracellular deposits of β-amyloid, and intracellular aggregates of tau protein in neurofibrillary tangles. The role of these features in AD pathogenesis and...
Streptococcus pneumoniae: from molecular biology to host-pathogen interactions
Pedro García, Miriam Moscoso, Violeta Rodríguez-Cerrato, José Yuste, Ernesto García
J Appl Biomed 8:131-140, 2010 | DOI: 10.2478/v10136-009-0016-6
Streptococcus pneumoniae is the main cause of community acquired pneumonia and also produces meningitis, bacteremia, and otitis media, among others. Worldwide, these infections are the cause of substantial morbidity and mortality. Many different virulence factors have been described and most of them are surface-located macromolecules, namely, the capsular polysaccharide and various pneumococcal proteins. Cell wall hydrolases (CWHs) specifically cleave covalent bonds of the peptidoglycan and associated polymers: most CWHs are choline-binding proteins (CBPs) and are among the most well-known surface proteins. Pneumococcal CBPs have been investigated...
Nucleolin, a major conserved multifunctional nucleolar phosphoprotein of proliferating cells
Francisco Javier Medina, Fernando González-Camacho, Ana Isabel Manzano, Antonio Manrique, Raúl Herranz
J Appl Biomed 8:141-150, 2010 | DOI: 10.2478/v10136-009-0017-5
Nucleolin is the major nucleolar protein of animal, plant and yeast proliferating cells. It is enriched in the most soluble nuclear or nucleolar protein extract, containing ribonucleoproteins, from which it has been purified. It has a tripartite structure in which each domain accounts for different functions. Despite its multifunctionality, the best characterized role of nucleolin is in the primary cleavage of pre-rRNA, an early step of ribosome biogenesis. In the nucleolus of proliferating cells, nucleolin is mostly located in the dense fibrillar component, following a vectorial pattern, from the periphery of fibrillar centers outwards. This pattern...
Voyage of RepA protein from plasmid DNA replication through amyloid aggregation towards synthetic biology
Rafael Giraldo, María Elena Fernández-Tresguerres
J Appl Biomed 8:151-158, 2010 | DOI: 10.2478/v10136-009-0018-4
DNA replication of plasmids in Gram-negative bacteria has been an object of study at CIB-CSIC for nearly 30 years. We have been focused on the enterobacterial antibiotic resistance factor R1 (1981-1992) and the pPS10 replicon from the phytopathogen Pseudomonas savastanoi (since 1984). Our group has used multidisciplinary (genetic, biochemical and biophysical-structural) approaches to unravel the molecular mechanism for the activation of RepA. Rep-type plasmidic proteins are either transcriptional repressors or replication initiators/inhibitors, depending on their association state (dimers vs. monomers) and targeting of alternative (operator...
Membrane-active peptides as anti-infectious agents
Luis Rivas, Juan Román Luque-Ortega, María Fernández-Reyes, David Andreu
J Appl Biomed 8:159-167, 2010 | DOI: 10.2478/v10136-009-0019-3
The lipid components of pathogen cell membranes have been considered as a poor pharmacological target, due to their universal distribution and apparent homogeneity throughout living organisms. Among the rare exceptions to this view one could mention polyene antibiotics such as amphotericin, or peptide antibiotics such as the polymyxins and the gramicidins. In the last two decades, however, the above notion has been challenged by two main lines of discovery; first, natural antimicrobial peptides (AMPs) that kill pathogens by interaction with phospholipids and membrane permeabilization, and secondly, cell-penetrating peptides (CPPs), capable of introducing...
Involvement of the TGF-β superfamily signalling pathway in hereditary haemorrhagic telangiectasia
Carmelo Bernabéu, Francisco Javier Blanco, Carmen Langa, Eva María Garrido-Martin, Luisa María Botella
J Appl Biomed 8:169-177, 2010 | DOI: 10.2478/v10136-009-0020-x
Hereditary haemorrhagic telangiectasia (HHT) is a vascular hereditary autosomic dominant disease associated with epistaxis, telangiectases, gastrointestinal haemorrhages and arteriovenous malformations in lung, liver and brain. It affects 1-2 in 10,000 people. There are at least three different genes mutated in HHT, ENG, ACVRL1 and MADH4 that encode endoglin, activin receptor-like kinase (ALK1) and Smad4 proteins, respectively. These proteins are involved in the transforming growth factor (TGF)-β superfamily signalling pathway of vascular endothelial cells. Mutations in ENG (HHT1) and ACVRL1 (HHT2) account for more...