Research into angiogenesis has contributed to progress in the fast-moving field of regenerative medicine. Designing coculture systems is deemed a helpful method to understand the dynamic interaction of various cells involved in the angiogenesis process. We investigated the juxtacrine and paracrine interaction between 3 different cells, namely rat marrow-derived mesenchymal stem cells (rMSCs), rat muscle-derived satellite cells (rSCs), and rat neonatal cardiomyocytes (rCMs), and endothelial cells (ECs) during angiogenesis process. In vitro Matrigel angiogenesis assay was performed whereby ECs were monocultured or cocultured with rMSCs, rSCs, and rCMs or their conditioned media (CM). In addition, in vivo Matrigel plug assay for angiogenesis was conducted to assess the angiogenic potential of the rCM-, rMSC-, and rSC-derived CM. Our results demonstrated that the rMSCs, rSCs, and rCMs elongated along the EC tubules, whereas the rMSCs formed tube-like structures with sprouting tip cells, leading to improved angiogenesis in the coculture system. Moreover, the rMSC-and rSC-derived CM significantly improved angiogenesis tube formation on Matrigel, accelerated EC chemotaxis, and increased the arteriolar density, vascularization index, and vascularization flow index in the Matrigel plug in vivo. Western blotting showed that rMSCs secreted a high level of vascular endothelial growth factor, basic fibroblast growth factor, and stromal-derived factor-1-alpha. Tie2 is also shed from rMSCs. This study demonstrated that stem cells interact with ECs in the juxtacrine and paracrine manner during angiogenesis, and marrow MSCs have superior angiogenic properties.

Using the x-ray structure of the glycerol 3-phosphate transporter (GlpT), we devised a model for the distantly related oxalate transporter, OxlT. The model accommodates all earlier biochemical information on OxlT, including the idea that Lys-355 lies on the permeation pathway, and predicts that Lys-355 and a second positive center, Arg-272, comprise the binding site for divalent oxalate. Study of R272K, R272A, and R272Q derivatives verifies that Arg-272 is essential, and comparisons with GlpT show that both anion transporters bind substrates within equivalent domains. In 22 single-cysteine variants in TM7 and TM8, topology as marked by accessibility to Oregon green maleimide is predicted by the model, with similar concordance for 52 positions probed earlier. The model also reconciles cross-linking of a cysteine pair placed near the periplasmic ends of TM2 and TM7, and retrospective study of TM2 and TM11 confirms that positions supporting disulfide trapping lie at a helical interface. Our work describes a pathway to the modeling of OxlT and other transporters in the major facilitator superfamily and outlines simple experimental tests to evaluate such proposals.anion-binding ͉ disulfide trapping ͉ major facilitator superfamily ͉ membrane protein ͉ permeation pathway O xlT, the oxalate͞formate antiporter of Oxalobacter formigenes (1, 2), belongs to the major facilitator superfamily (MFS), a large and diverse collection encompassing 30-40% of known transporters and permeases (www.biology.ucsd.edu͞ϳmsaier͞ transport). The main biochemical mechanisms associated with transporters (uniport, antiport, and symport) may be found within the MFS, whose individual members display a broad catalog of substrate specificity, including simple sugars and amino acids, intermediary metabolites, and even neurotransmitters (3). All members of the MFS share an architectural theme in which a central loop connects two groups of (typically) six transmembrane ␣-helices. Moreover, the superfamily as a whole is characterized by a short motif (GXXXDK͞R) at the cytoplasmic ends of TM2 and TM8 (3, 4), suggesting that these two six-helix clusters derived from a common ancestor; indeed, at times one finds a clear sequence homology between the N-and C-terminal domains (4, 5).Insight into the structure of MFS transporters is presently limited. Helix organization, symmetry, and connectivity were established first for OxlT, in work based on a low-resolution (6.5 Å) structure obtained by electron crystallography (6, 7). Subsequently, higher resolution (3.2-3.5 Å) was achieved by x-ray crystallography of two other MFS members from Escherichia coli, the H ϩ ͞lactose symporter (LacY) and the phosphate͞glycerol 3-phosphate antiporter (GlpT) (8, 9). These latter achievements have prompted several recent attempts to use LacY or GlpT as structural templates for models of other systems (10-13). With this in mind and to provide a detailed perspective to guide further work, we selected the GlpT structure as a template for derivation of a homology model of OxlT, ...

The concept analysis of empowerment showed some of the required conditions for the empowerment of older people with chronic diseases in nursing care, which have not been mentioned in the literature.

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ObjectivesResearchers have attempted to design various scoring systems to determine the severity and predict the outcome of critically ill patients. The present study aimed to evaluate the accuracy of SOFA score in predicting 1-month outcome of these patients in emergency department.MethodsThe present study is a prospective cross-sectional study of >18 year old non-trauma critically ill patients presented to EDs of 3 hospitals, Tehran, Iran, during October 2014 to October 2015. Baseline characteristics, SOFA score variables, and 1-month outcome of patients were recorded and screening performance characteristics of the score were calculated using STATA 11 software.Results140 patients with the mean age of 68.36 ± 18.62 years (18–95) were included (53.5% male). The most common complaints were decrease in level of consciousness (76.43%) and sepsis (60.0%), were the most frequent final diagnoses. Mean SOFA score of the patients was 7.13 ± 2.36 (minimum 2 and maximum 16). 72 (51.43%) patients died during the following 30 days and 16 (11.43%) patients were affected with multiple organ failure. Area under the ROC curve of SOFA score in predicting mortality of studied patients was 0.73 (95%CI: 0.65–0.81) (Fig. 2). Table 2 depicts screening performance characteristics of this scale in prediction of 1-month mortality in the best cut-off point of ≥7. At this cut-off point, sensitivity and specificity of SOFA in predicting 1-month mortality were 75% and 63.23%, respectively.ConclusionFindings of the present study showed that SOFA scoring system has fair accuracy in predicting 1-month mortality of critically ill patients. However, until a more reliable scoring system is developed, SOFA might be useful for narrative prediction of patient outcome considering its acceptable likelihood ratios.