Modifying the 5′‐Cap for Click Reactions of Eukaryotic mRNA and To Tune Translation Efficiency in Living Cells

The 5′‐cap is a hallmark of eukaryotic mRNAs and plays fundamental roles in RNA metabolism, ranging from quality control to export and translation. Modifying the 5′‐cap may thus enable modulation of the underlying processes and investigation or tuning of several biological functions. A straightforward approach is presented for the efficient production of a range of N7‐modified caps based on the highly promiscuous methyltransferase Ecm1. We show that these, as well as N²‐modified 5′‐caps, can be used to tune translation of the respective mRNAs both in vitro and in cells. Appropriate modifications allow subsequent bioorthogonal chemistry, as demonstrated by intracellular live‐cell labeling of a target mRNA. The efficient and versatile N7 manipulation of the mRNA cap makes mRNAs amenable to both modulation of their biological function and intracellular labeling, and represents a valuable addition to the chemical biology toolbox.     

Toxic and essential metals determination in commercial seafood: Paracentrotus lividus by ICP-MS

Toxic and essential metals content was determined by inductively coupled plasma mass spectrometry in commercial sea urchins samples from the Mediterranean Sea and Pacific Ocean. Results show that Chilean samples have the highest values of Cd, As, Ni, Cr and V; Spanish samples have the maximum Hg content while Sicilian samples have the lowest content of toxic metals. The toxic metal traces were compared with the limits of European Community (EC) No. 1881/2006 for bivalve molluscs. All samples exceed Pb and Cd limit levels; regarding Hg levels, only Sicilian and Sardinian samples have Hg content below the EC limits. The dietary intake of toxic and essential elements was evaluated for an adult. Furthermore, our study highlights a correlation between the toxic elements content and the marine environmental conditions of the places of origin even though only the generic FAO fishing area is specified.     

Chalk it up to experience: using chalkboard paint to create mathematical manipulatives

In this article, we give two examples of creating portable chalkboards using chalkboard paint for students to use during cooperative learning. This provides a creative method for professors to facilitate active learning in the undergraduate mathematics classroom.     

Cubic Bridgeless Graphs and Braces

There are many long-standing open problems on cubic bridgeless graphs, for instance, Jaeger’s directed cycle double cover conjecture. On the other hand, many structural properties of braces have been recently discovered. In this work, we bijectively map the cubic bridgeless graphs to braces which we call the hexagon graphs, and explore the structure of hexagon graphs. We show that hexagon graphs are braces that can be generated from the ladder on 8 vertices using two types of McCuaig’s augmentations. In addition, we present a reformulation of Jaeger’s directed cycle double cover conjecture in the class of hexagon graphs.     

The swap graph of the finite soluble groups

A graph is reflexive if the second largest eigenvalue of its adjacency matrix is less than or equal to 2. In this paper, we characterize trees whose line graphs are reflexive. It turns out that these trees can be of arbitrary order—they can have either a unique vertex of arbitrary degree or pendant paths of arbitrary lengths, or both. Since the reflexive line graphs are Salem graphs, we also relate some of our results to the Salem (graph) numbers.     

The influence of a beta-electron withdrawing substituent in aldol reactions of methylketone boron enolates

We wish to describe here that good levels of substrate-based, 1,5-syn-stereocontrol could be achieved in the boron-mediated aldol reactions of beta-trichloromethyl methylketones with achiral aldehydes, independent of the nature of the beta-alkoxy protecting group.     

Catalytic oxidation of imines based on methyltrioxorhenium/urea hydrogen peroxide: a mild and easy chemo- and regioselective entry to nitrones

[reaction: see text] The first successful catalytic oxidation procedure for the chemoselective conversion of imines to nitrones is reported. The reaction is general, high yielding, and user and environmentally friendly, and furnishes a solution to the yet unanswered issue of regioselective access to nitrones by oxidation of nitrogen derivatives.     

Simultaneous detection of L-glutamate and nitric oxide from adherently growing cells at known distance using disk shaped dual electrodes

An ex vivo system for simultaneous detection of nitric oxide (NO) and L-glutamate using integrated dual 250 microm platinum disk electrodes modified individually with suitable sensing chemistries has been developed. One of the sensors was coated with an electrocatalytic layer of Ni tetrasulfonate phthalocyanine tetrasodium salt (Ni-TSPc) covered by second layer of Nafion, which stabilises on the one hand the primary oxidation product NO(+) and prevents interferences from negatively charged compounds such as NO(2)(-). For glutamate determination, the second electrode was modified with a crosslinked redox hydrogel consisting of Os complex modified poly(vinylimidazol), glutamate oxidase and peroxidase. A manual x-y-z micromanipulator on top of an inverted optical microscope was used to position the dual electrode sensor at a defined distance of 5 microm from a cell population under visual control. C6 glioma cells were stimulated simultaneously with bradykinin or VEGF to release NO while KCl was used to invoke glutamate release. For evaluation of the glutamate sensors, in some experiments HN10 cells were used. To investigate the sensitivity and reliability of the system, several drugs were applied to the cells, e.g. Ca(2+)-channel inhibitors for testing Ca(2+)-dependence of the release of NO and glutamate, rotenone for inducing oxidative stress and glutamate antagonists for analysing glutamate release. With these drugs the NO and glutamate release was modulated in a similar way then expected from previously described systems or even in-vivo measurements. We therefore conclude that our system is suitable to analyse stress-induced mechanisms in cell lines.     

Reproducible SERRS from structured gold surfaces

Metallic substrates with ordered spherical cavities have been shown to be very effective for surface-enhanced Raman scattering (SERS) and can be fabricated reproducibly using electrodeposition. The sensitivity of detection is increased by several orders of magnitude by using surface-enhanced resonance Raman scattering (SERRS). In this report we demonstrate SERRS for the first time on electrodeposited gold films templated with colloidal spheres and demonstrate the reproducibility of the response. We also obtain a direct comparison between SERRS and SERS by choosing two dyes, Cy5 and Cy3, which are similar in structure but differ in their excitation maxima, such that one is resonant and the other non-resonant with our laser excitation. As expected, the resonant enhancement is found to be of the order of 10(3) over and above that for SERS. The net SERRS enhancements are shown to be of the order of 10(9). We also find that the resonant enhancement profile of the different peaks for the chromophore follows the plasmonic resonance absorption spectrum obtained for the structured surface.