Activation of a C. elegans Antennapedia homologue in migrating cells controls their direction of migration.

Anterior-posterior patterning in insects, vertebrates and nematodes involves members of conserved Antennapedia-class homeobox gene clusters (HOM-C) that are thought to give specific body regions their identities. The effects of these genes on region-specific body structures have been described extensively, particularly in Drosophila, but little is known about how HOM-C genes affect the behaviours of cells that migrate into their domains of function. In Caenorhabditis elegans, the Antennapedia-like HOM-C gene mab-5 not only specifies postembryonic fates of cells in a posterior body region, but also influences the migration of mesodermal and neural cells that move through this region. Here we show that as one neuroblast migrates into this posterior region, it switches on mab-5 gene expression; mab-5 then acts as a developmental switch to control the migratory behaviour of the neuroblast descendants. HOM-C genes can therefore not only direct region-specific patterns of cell division and differentiation, but can also act within migrating cells to programme region-specific migratory behaviour.     

Resistant orthogonal procrustes analysis

In this paper two alternative loss criteria for the least squares Procrustes problem are studied. These alternative criteria are based on the Huber function and on the more radical biweight function, which are designed to be resistant to outliers. Using iterative majorization it is shown how a convergent reweighted least squares algorithm can be developed. In asimulation study it turns out that the proposed methods perform well over a specific range of contamination. When a uniform dilation factor is included, mixed results are obtained. The methods also yield a set of weights that can be used for diagnostic purposes.     

Exocytotic fusion is activated by Rab3a peptides.

Studies of intracellular traffic in yeast and mammalian systems have implicated members of the Rab family of small GTP-binding proteins as regulators of membrane fusion. We have used the patch clamp technique to measure exocytotic fusion events directly and investigate the role of GTP-binding proteins in regulating exocytosis in mast cells. Intracellular perfusion of mast cells with GTP-gamma S is sufficient to trigger complete exocytotic degranulation in the absence of other intracellular messengers. Here we show that GTP is a potent inhibitor of GTP-gamma S-induced degranulation, indicating that sustained activation of a GTP-binding protein is sufficient for membrane fusion. We have found that synthetic oligopeptides, corresponding to part of the effector domain of Rab3a, stimulate complete exocytotic degranulation, similar to that induced by GTP-gamma S. The response is selective for Rab3a sequence and is strictly dependent on Mg2+ and ATP. This suggests that sustained activation of a Rab3 protein causes exocytotic fusion. The peptide response can be accelerated by GDP-beta S, suggesting that Rab3a peptides compete with endogenous Rab3 proteins for a binding site on a target effector protein, which causes fusion on activation.     

舰船·天安门·顶戴花翎——“‘洋务运动‘博物馆“东立面形象反思

通过对“洋务运动博物馆”东立面形象的反思 ,讨论了建筑形态设计中隐喻手法的运用 ;就此引申 ,探讨传统问题 ,指出正确理解传统与创新的四个方面。     

Influence of hydrochlorothiazide on the pain threshold and on the antinociceptive activity of morphine,in rats

Summary Hydrochlorothiazide, acutely injected in rats, has a weak analgesic activity per se and potentiates and prolongs the antinociceptive effect of morphine.This work was supported in part by grants from Consiglio Nazionale delle Ricerche, and by Ministero della Pubblica Istruzione, Roma.