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Biology subjects

Taki, K.

Publications and source records attributed to Taki, K..

3 recordsLinked to original sources

Proteomic profiling of bacterial extracellular vesicles for exploring ovarian cancer biomarkers

Extracellular vesicles (EVs) are present in body fluids and act as disease biomarkers. Emerging evidence has proven that EVs are released not only from mammalian cells but also from bacteria. Ovarian cancer has a dismal prognosis because of difficulties in early detection. This study aimed to identify bacterial EV (BEV) proteins associated with ovarian cancer. Fifteen patients with ovarian cancer or benign tumors were recruited, and EVs were isolated from the ascites. BEVs were recovered from seven in vitro-cultured strains of bacteria present in the vaginal microbiota, and LC-MS/MS analysis was performed. The detected peptide data were annotated to both human and bacterial references, and the human data showed that the profiles of cancer EVs were distinct from those of patients with benign tumors. As analyzed by bacterial proteins, P15636_Protease1 was found as the BEV-associated protein highly expressed in patients with cancer. To distinguish patients with cancer, the area under the curve was 0.88 (95% CI, 0.64-1.00). In addition, homology analysis showed that P15636_Protease1 is a unique protein only detected in bacteria. In this study, ovarian cancer-specific bacterial proteins were identified on EVs, and BEVs in bodily fluids are promising in the discovery of disease biomarkers.

cancer biology↗

Plasma membrane H+-ATPase activation increases global transcript levels and promotes the shoot growth of light-grown Arabidopsis seedlings.

(1) Plant cell growth require the elongation of cells mediated by cell wall remodelling and turgor pressure changes. The plasma membrane (PM) H+-ATPase facilitates both cell wall remodelling and turgor pressure changes, by acidifying the apoplast of cells, referred to as acid growth. The acid growth theory is mostly established on the auxin-induced activation of PM H+-ATPase in non-photosynthetic tissues. However, how PM H+-ATPase affect the growth in photosynthetic tissues of Arabidopsis remains unclear. (2) Here, a combination of transcriptomics and cis-regulatory element analysis was conducted to identify the impact of PM H+-ATPase on global transcript levels and the molecular mechanism downstream of the PM H+-ATPase. (3) The PM H+-ATPase activation increased transcript levels globally, especially cell wall modification-related genes. The transcript level changes were in PM H+-ATPase-dependent manner. Involvement of Ca2+ was suggested as CAMTA motif was enriched in the promoter of PM H+-ATPase-induced genes and cytosolic Ca2+ elevated upon PM H+-ATPase activation. (4) PM H+-ATPase activation in photosynthetic tissues promote the expression of cell wall modification enzymes and shoot growth, adding a novel perspective of photosynthesis-dependent PM H+-ATPase activation in photosynthetic tissues to the acid growth theory that has primarily based on findings from non-photosynthetic tissues.

plant biology↗

Efficacy of a novel SARS-CoV-2 detection kit without RNA extraction and purification

Rapid detection of SARS-CoV-2 is critical for the diagnosis of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) and preventing the spread of the virus. A novel "2019 Novel Coronavirus Detection Kit (nCoV-DK)" halves detection time by eliminating the steps of RNA extraction and purification. We evaluated concordance between the nCoV-DK and direct PCR. The virus was detected in 53/71 fresh samples by the direct method and 55/71 corresponding frozen samples by the nCoV-DK. The overall concordance rate of the virus detection between the two methods was 94.4% (95% CI, 86.2-98.4). Concordance rates were 95.2% (95% CI, 83.8-99.4), 95.5% (95% CI, 77.2-99.9), 85.7% (95% CI, 42.1-99.6) in nasopharyngeal swab, saliva, and sputum samples, respectively. These results indicate that the nCoV-DK effectively detects SARS-CoV-2 in all types of the samples including saliva, while reducing time required for detection, labor, and risk of human error.

microbiology↗