The rockefeller university

The mammalian circadian clock is built on a feedback loop in which PER and CRY proteins repress their own transcription. We found that in mouse liver nuclei all three PERs, both CRYs, and Casein Kinase-1 delta (CK1 delta) are present together in an similar to 1.9-MDa repressor assembly that quantitatively incorporates its CLOCK-BMAL1 transcription factor target. Prior to incorporation, CLOCK-BMAL1 exists in an similar to 750-kDa complex. Single-particle electron microscopy (EM) revealed nuclear PER complexes purified from mouse liver to be quasi-spherical similar to 40-nm structures. In the cytoplasm, PERs, CRYs, and CK1 delta were distributed into several complexes of similar to 0.9-1.1 MDa that appear to constitute an assembly pathway regulated by GAPVD1, a cytoplasmic trafficking factor. Single-particle EM of two purified cytoplasmic PER complexes revealed similar to 20-nmand similar to 25-nm structures, respectively, characterized by flexibly tethered globular domains. Our results define the macromolecular assemblies comprising the circadian feedback loop and provide an initial structural view of endogenous eukaryotic clock machinery.

Reported here is the synthesis of perfectly sequence defined, monodisperse diblock copolypeptides of hydrophilic elastin-like and hydrophobic resilin-like polypeptide blocks and characterization of their self-assembly as a function of structural parameters by light scattering, cryo-TEM, and small-angle neutron scattering. A subset of these diblock copolypeptides exhibit lower critical solution temperature and upper critical solution temperature phase behavior and self-assemble into spherical or cylindrical micelles. Their morphologies are dictated by their chain length, degree of hydrophilicity, and hydrophilic weight fraction of the ELP block. We find that (1) independent of the length of the corona-forming ELP block there is a minimum threshold in the length of the RLP block below which self-assembly does not occur, but that once that threshold is crossed, (2) the RLP block length is a unique molecular parameter to independently tune self-assembly and (3) increasing the hydrophobicity of the corona-forming ELP drives a transition from spherical to cylindrical morphology. Unlike the self-assembly of purely ELP-based block copolymers, the self-assembly of RLP ELPs can be understood by simple principles of polymer physics relating hydrophilic weight fraction and polymer polymer and polymer solvent interactions to micellar morphology, which is important as it provides a route for the de novo design of desired nanoscale morphologies from first principles.

The present paper is based on a recent success of the second-order stochastic fluctuation theory in describing time autocorrelations of equilibrium and nonequilibrium physical systems. In particular, it was shown to yield values of the related deterministic parameters of the Langevin equation for a Couette flow in a microscopic molecular dynamics model of a simple fluid. In this paper we find all the remaining constants of the stochastic dynamics, which then is simulated numerically and compared directly with the original physical system. By using these data, we study in detail the accuracy and precision of a second-order Langevin model for nonequilibrium physical systems theoretically and computationally. We find an intriguing relation between an applied external force and cumulants of the resulting flow fluctuations. This is characterized by a linear dependence of an athermal cumulant ratio, an apposite quantity introduced here. In addition, we discuss how the order of a given Langevin dynamics can be raised systematically by introducing colored noise.

Language acquisition in humans and song learning in songbirds naturally happen as a social learning experience, providing an excellent opportunity to reveal social motivation and reward mechanisms that boost sensorimotor learning. Our knowledge about the molecules and circuits that control these social mechanisms for vocal learning and language is limited. Here we propose a hypothesis of a role for oxytocin (OT) in the social motivation and evolution of vocal learning and language. Building upon existing evidence, we suggest specific neural pathways and mechanisms through which OT might modulate vocal learning circuits in specific developmental stages.

Obesity is associated with chronic, low-grade inflammation, which can disrupt homeostasis within tissue microenvironments. Given the correlation between obesity and relative risk of death from cancer, we investigated whether obesity-associated inflammation promotes metastatic progression. We demonstrate that obesity causes lung neutrophilia in otherwise normal mice, which is further exacerbated by the presence of a primary tumour. The increase in lung neutrophils translates to increased breast cancer metastasis to this site, in a GM-CSF- and IL5-dependent manner. Importantly, weight loss is sufficient to reverse this effect, and reduce serum levels of GM-CSF and IL5 in both mouse models and humans. Our data indicate that special consideration of the obese patient population is critical for effective management of cancer progression.

Hepatitis C virus (HCV) is unique among RNA viruses in its ability to establish chronic infection in the majority of exposed adults. HCV persists in the liver despite interferon (IFN)-stimulated gene (ISG) induction; robust induction actually predicts treatment failure and viral persistence. It is unclear which forms of HCV RNA are associated with ISG induction and IFN resistance during natural infections. To thoroughly delineate HCV RNA populations, we developed conditions that fully separate the strands of long double-stranded RNA (dsRNA) and allow the released RNAs to be quantified in reverse transcription/ polymerase chain reaction assays. These methods revealed that dsRNA, a pathogen-associated molecular pattern (PAMP), comprised 52% (standard deviation, 28%) of the HCV RNA in the livers of patients with chronic infection. HCV dsRNA was proportionally higher in patients with the unfavorable IL28B TT (rs12979860) genotype. Higher ratios of HCV double-stranded to single-stranded RNA (ssRNA) correlated positively with ISG induction. In Huh-7.5 cells, IFN treatment increased the total amount of HCV dsRNA through a process that required de novo viral RNA synthesis and shifted the ratio of viral dsRNA/ssRNA in favor of dsRNA. This shift was blocked by ribavirin (RBV), an antiviral drug that reduces relapse in HCV patients. Northern blotting established that HCV dsRNA contained genome-length minus strands. Conclusion: HCV dsRNA is the predominant form in the HCV-infected liver and has features of both a PAMP and a genomic reservoir. Interferon treatment increased rather than decreased HCV dsRNA. This unexpected finding suggests that HCV produces dsRNA in response to IFN, potentially to antagonize antiviral defenses.

ATP-binding cassette (ABC) is a family of transporters that facilitates the translocation of substrates across cell membrane using its ATPase subunit. These transporters have key roles in multidrug resistance, lipid homeostasis, antigen processing, immunity, cell proliferation and hematopoiesis. Some ABC transporters are selectively expressed on megakaryocyte progenitor, megakaryocyte and its cellular fragment platelet. However, the role of ABC transporters in hemostasis and thrombosis were not well explored until recently. Studies of both human genetic diseases and genetically-manipulated animal models have greatly improved our understanding of ABC transporters in regulating hematopoiesis particularly megakaryopoiesis and/or platelet activity. Human genome wide association studies (GWAS) have also unraveled the association between ABC transporters and thrombopoiesis in general population. Therefore, this review aims to summarize the recent advances in our understanding of how ABC transporters regulate megakaryopoiesis and platelet activity, the underlining mechanisms and their association with atherosclerosis and atherothrombosis. Last, the emerging therapeutic targets to slow down atherosclerosis development and prevent atherothrombosis via ABC transporters or downstream pathways will also be discussed. (C) 2017 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Searches are presented for heavy gauge bosons decaying into a top and a bottom quark in data collected by the CMS experiment at root s = 13TeV that correspond to an integrated luminosity of 2.2 and 2.6 fb 1 in the leptonic and hadronic analyses, respectively. Two final states are analyzed, one containing a single electron, or muon, and missing transverse momentum, and the other containing multiple jets and no electrons or muons. No evidence is found for a right-handed W' boson (W'(R)) and the combined analyses exclude at 95% confidence level W'(R) with masses below 2.4TeV if M-W'R >> M-vR (mass of the right-handed neutrino), and below 2.6TeV if M-W'R < M-vR. The results provide the most stringent limits for right-handed W' bosons in the top and bottom quark decay channel.

Non-syndromic craniosynostosis (NSC) is a frequent congenital malformation in which one or more cranial sutures fuse prematurely. Mutations causing rare syndromic craniosynostoses in humans and engineered mouse models commonly increase signaling of the Wnt, bone morphogenetic protein (BMP), or Ras/ERK pathways, converging on shared nuclear targets that promote bone formation. In contrast, the genetics of NSC is largely unexplored. More than 95% of NSC is sporadic, suggesting a role for de novo mutations. Exome sequencing of 291 parent-offspring trios with midline NSC revealed 15 probands with heterozygous damaging de novo mutations in 12 negative regulators of Wnt, BMP, and Ras/ERK signaling (10.9-fold enrichment, P = 2.4 x 10(-11)). SMAD6 had 4 de novo and 14 transmitted mutations; no other gene had more than 1. Four familial NSC kindreds had mutations in genes previously implicated in syndromic disease. Collectively, these mutations contribute to 10% of probands. Mutations are predominantly loss-of-function, implicating haploinsufficiency as a frequent mechanism. A common risk variant near BMP2 increased the penetrance of SMAD6 mutations and was overtransmitted to patients with de novo mutations in other genes in these pathways, supporting a frequent two-locus pathogenesis. These findings implicate new genes in NSC and demonstrate related pathophysiology of common non-syndromic and rare syndromic craniosynostoses. These findings have implications for diagnosis, risk of recurrence, and risk of adverse neurodevelopmental outcomes. Finally, the use of pathways identified in rare syndromic disease to find genes accounting for non-syndromic cases may prove broadly relevant to understanding other congenital disorders featuring high locus heterogeneity.

Light-field microscopy (LFM) is a scalable approach for volumetric Ca2+ imaging with high volumetric acquisition rates (up to 100 Hz). Although the technology has enabled whole-brain Ca2+ imaging in semi-transparent specimens, tissue scattering has limited its application in the rodent brain. We introduce seeded iterative demixing (SID), a computational source-extraction technique that extends LFM to the mammalian cortex. SID can capture neuronal dynamics in vivo within a volume of 900 x 900 x 260 mm located as deep as 380 mm in the mouse cortex or hippocampus at a 30-Hz volume rate while discriminating signals from neurons as close as 20 mm apart, at a computational cost three orders of magnitude less than that of frame-by-frame image reconstruction. We expect that the simplicity and scalability of LFM, coupled with the performance of SID, will open up a range of applications including closed-loop experiments.