Project description:In chickens, embryonic development begins upon egg formation and lasts for 21 days of incubation until hatching. The CAM is an extraembryonic membrane that serves a critical role in acid-base balance, gaseous exchange, calcium solubilization, and antimicrobial protection. Comparative proteomic analyses of CAM at two developmental stages (ED12 and ED19), in comparison to the proteome of embryonic blood serum, revealed protein groups that are relatively or highly specific to the CAM. The specific CAM functions include gaseous exchange, Ca2+ transport, vasculature development, and protection against pathogen invasion. Overall, our results highlight the structure-function relationship of the CAM protein constituents that potentially could expand its biomedical applications.
Project description:HepG2-NTCP_HA:HBc cells stably express HBV core antigen. Treatment of these cells with CAM-A compounds (but not CAM-E) induces the abnormal nuclear aggregation of core leading to cell death via apoptosis in a time dependent manner. The goal of this project is to determine the transcriptomic modifications induced by CAM-A treatment in these cell lines at day 2 and day 3 post-treatment.
Project description:Effect of CaM overexpression on Arabidopsis transcriptome. Unlike animals, plants are immobile and cannot simply move away from unfavourable environments and thus have developed complex mechanisms to respond to and sense biotic and abiotic signals. These stimuli often lead to tightly controlled changes in cytoplasmic free calcium concentration [Ca2+]cyt termed "calcium signatures" which are thought to be, at least partly, responsible for the specificity of plant responses to the environment. However little is known about how exactly these calcium signatures are decoded into specific end-responses. Calmodulin (CaM) is the most well characterised Ca2+ binding protein and is the primary sensor of changing [Ca2+]. Upon binding Ca2+ CaM undergoes a conformational change allowing binding and activation of a wide variety of target proteins. In plants CaM exists in gene families encoding multiple isoforms. The expression of individual CaM genes can be differentially regulated and isoforms may be differentially localised. Furthermore specific isoforms can bind and activate different target proteins. These features of plant CaM allow the possibility of specificity during calcium signalling in response to specific stimuli. The effect of overexpression of four CaM protein isoforms on the Arabidopsis thaliana transcriptome will be investigated. Ten day old transgenic Arabidopsis seedlings (containing estradiol inducible CaM overexpression constructs) were induced for 9hrs in 5uM estradiol with appropriate water (0.025% DMSO) and empty vector controls.
