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Wolbachia is an extremely widespread bacterial endosymbiont of arthropods and nematodes that causes a variety of reproductive peculiarities. Parthenogenesis is one such peculiarity but it has been hypothesised t...
Dicer is an RNase III-ribonuclease that initiates the formation of small interfering RNAs as a defence against genomic parasites such as retrotransposons. Despite intensive characterization in mammalian specie...
For membrane proteins, lipids provide a structural framework and means to modulate function. Paired connexin hemichannels form the intercellular channels that compose gap junction plaques while unpaired hemich...
Mycoheterotrophic plants are considered to associate very specifically with fungi. Mycoheterotrophic orchids are mostly associated with ectomycorrhizal fungi in temperate regions, or with saprobes or parasites...
Membrane proteins form key nodes in mediating the cell's interaction with the surroundings, which is one of the main reasons why the majority of drug targets are membrane proteins.
Circadian clocks are internal daily time keeping mechanisms that allow organisms to anticipate daily changes in their environment and to organize their behavior and physiology in a coherent schedule. Although ...
Elastin-like polypeptides are synthetic biopolymers composed of a repeating pentapeptide 'VPGXG' sequence that are valuable for the simple non-chromatographic purification of recombinant proteins. In addition,...
N,N-Diethyl-3-methylbenzamide (deet) remains the gold standard for insect repellents. About 200 million people use it every year and over 8 billion doses have been applied over the past 50 years. Despite the w...
The Erratum to this article has been published in BMC Biology 2012 10:86
In insect classical conditioning, octopamine (the invertebrate counterpart of noradrenaline) or dopamine has been suggested to mediate reinforcing properties of appetitive or aversive unconditioned stimulus, r...
TATA-box-binding protein 2 (TBP2/TRF3) is a vertebrate-specific paralog of TBP that shares with TBP a highly conserved carboxy-terminal domain and the ability to bind the TATA box. TBP2 is highly expressed in ...
Several studies have shown that organ size, and the proliferation of tumor metastases, may be regulated by negative feedback loops in which autocrine secreted factors called chalones inhibit proliferation. How...
The ParaHox gene cluster is the evolutionary sister to the Hox cluster. Whilst the role of the Hox cluster in patterning the anterior-posterior axis of bilaterian animals is well established, and the organisat...
Karl Ernst Von Baer noted that species tend to show greater morphological divergence in later stages of development when compared to earlier stages. Darwin originally interpreted these observations via a selec...
Facioscapulohumeral muscular dystrophy (FSHD) is an autosomal dominant neuromuscular disorder associated with the partial deletion of integral numbers of 3.3 kb D4Z4 DNA repeats within the subtelomere of chrom...
Long terminal repeat (LTR) retrotransposons are a class of mobile genetic element capable of autonomous transposition via an RNA intermediate. Their large size and proliferative ability make them important con...
A response to Ziegler A, Faber C, Mueller S, Bartolomaeus T: Systematic comparison and reconstruction of sea urchin (Echinoidea) internal anatomy: a novel approach using magnetic resonance imaging. BMC Biol 2008,...
Adipose tissues serve not only as a store for energy in the form of lipid, but also as endocrine tissues that regulates metabolic activities of the organism by secreting various kinds of hormones. Peroxisome p...
Executive functions, learning and attention are imperative facets of cognitive performance, affected in many neuropsychiatric disorders. Recently, we have shown that recombinant human erythropoietin improves c...
As a result of the integration of molecular and morphological approaches for the reconstruction of phylogenies, and of the intertwining of developmental and evolutionary biology, further prospects are open for...
The p53 tumor suppressor and its related protein, p73, share a homologous DNA binding domain, and mouse genetics studies have suggested that they have overlapping as well as distinct biological functions. Both...
Evolutionary relationships among the 11 extant orders of insects that undergo complete metamorphosis, called Holometabola, remain either unresolved or contentious, but are extremely important as a context for ...
To survive and reproduce, animals must be able to modify their motor behavior in response to changes in the environment. We studied a complex behavior of Caenorhabditis elegans, male mating behavior, which provid...
Dispersal plays a key role in shaping biological and ecological processes such as the distribution of spatially-structured populations or the pace and scale of invasion. Here we have studied the relationship b...
Delta opioid peptide [D-ala2,D-leU5]enkephalin (DADLE) induces hibernation in summer ground squirrels, and enhances preservation and survival of isolated or transplanted lungs and hearts. In the present study,...
Synaptic plasticity associated with an important wave of gene transcription and protein synthesis underlies long-term memory processes. Calcium (Ca2+) plays an important role in a variety of neuronal functions an...
Aggressive behavior in animals is important for survival and reproduction. Identifying the underlying genes and environmental contexts that affect aggressive behavior is important for understanding the evoluti...
Marine molluscs, as is the case with most aquatic animals, rely heavily on olfactory cues for survival. In the mollusc Aplysia californica, mate-attraction is mediated by a blend of water-borne protein pheromones...
The beating or fanning movements of three pairs of maxilliped flagella in crabs and crayfish modify exhalent gill currents while drawing water over chemoreceptors on the head. They play an integral part both i...
Prions are self-perpetuating, infectious, aggregated proteins that are associated with several neurodegenerative diseases in mammals and heritable traits in yeast. Sup35p, the protein determinant of the yeast ...
Neuronal migration is a crucial process that allows neurons to reach their correct target location to allow the nervous system to function properly. AP-2α is a transcription factor essential for neural crest c...
We previously showed that mice lacking the high mobility group A1 gene (Hmga1-knockout mice) developed a type 2-like diabetic phenotype, in which cell-surface insulin receptors were dramatically reduced (below 10...
Nonsense-mediated decay is a mechanism that degrades mRNAs with a premature termination codon. That some exons have premature termination codons at fixation is paradoxical: why make a transcript if it is only ...
Antimicrobial peptides are found in all kingdoms of life. During the evolution of multicellular organisms, antimicrobial peptides were established as key elements of innate immunity. Most antimicrobial peptide...
Gene gain and subsequent retention or loss during evolution may be one of the underlying mechanisms involved in generating the diversity of metazoan nervous systems. However, the causal relationships acting th...
The expansion of genome sequencing projects has produced accumulating evidence for lateral transfer of genes between prokaryotic and eukaryotic genomes. However, it remains controversial whether these genes ar...
In Drosophila, all the 64 clonally derived spermatocytes differentiate in syncytium inside two somatic-origin cyst cells. They elongate to form slender spermatids, which are individualized and then released into ...
Allopolyploid speciation requires rapid evolutionary reconciliation of two diverged genomes and gene regulatory networks. Here we describe global patterns of gene expression accompanying genomic merger and dou...
The parathyroid calcium receptor determines parathyroid hormone secretion and the response of parathyroid hormone gene expression to serum Ca2+ in the parathyroid gland. Serum Ca2+ regulates parathyroid hormone g...
Immunological analyses of wild populations can increase our understanding of how vertebrate immune systems respond to 'natural' levels of exposure to diverse infections. A major recent advance in immunology ha...
The Thecostraca are arguably the most morphologically and biologically variable group within the Crustacea, including both suspension feeders (Cirripedia: Thoracica and Acrothoracica) and parasitic forms (Cirr...
In the fall, Eastern North American monarch butterflies (Danaus plexippus) undergo a magnificent long-range migration. In contrast to spring and summer butterflies, fall migrants are juvenile hormone deficient, w...
Ectomycorrhizae (ECM) are symbioses formed by polyphyletic assemblages of fungi (mostly Agaricomycetes) and plants (mostly Pinaceae and angiosperms in the rosid clade). Efforts to reconstruct the evolution of ...
Aphids possess bacteriocytes, which are cells specifically differentiated to harbour the obligate mutualist Buchnera aphidicola (γ-Proteobacteria). Buchnera has lost many of the genes that appear to be essential ...
Gut microbiota contribute to the health of their hosts, and alterations in the composition of this microbiota can lead to disease. Previously, we demonstrated that indigenous gut bacteria were required for the...
Sexual reproduction entails the encounter of the sexes and the multiplicity of rituals is parallel to the diversity of mating systems. Evolutionary mechanisms such as sexual selection and sexual conflict have ...
Microfossils are not only useful for elucidating biological macro- and microevolution but also the biogeochemical history of our planet. Pyritization is the most important and extensive mode of preservation of...
Current cell-based drug screening technologies utilize randomly integrated reporter genes to index transcriptional activity of an endogenous gene of interest. In this context, reporter expression is controlled...
In mammals, the members of the tripartite motif (TRIM) protein family are involved in various cellular processes including innate immunity against viral infection. Viruses exert strong selective pressures on t...
Rickettsia are intracellular symbionts of eukaryotes that are best known for infecting and causing serious diseases in humans and other mammals. All known vertebrate-associated Rickettsia are vectored by arthrop...
Protein bodies (PBs) are natural endoplasmic reticulum (ER) or vacuole plant-derived organelles that stably accumulate large amounts of storage proteins in seeds. The proline-rich N-terminal domain derived fro...
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