Report of the 24th Meeting on Signal Transduction 2021

The annual meeting “Signal Transduction—Receptors, Mediators and Genes” of the Signal Transduction Society (STS) is an interdisciplinary conference which is open to all scientists sharing a common interest in the elucidation of the signaling pathways mediating physiological or pathological processes in the health and disease of humans, animals, plants, fungi, prokaryotes, and protists. The 24th meeting on signal transduction was held from 15 to 17 November 2021 in Weimar, Germany. As usual, keynote presentations by invited scientists introduced the respective workshops, and were followed by speakers chosen from the submitted abstracts. A special workshop focused on “Target Identification and Interaction”. Ample time was reserved for the discussion of the presented data during the workshops. Unfortunately, due to restrictions owing to the SARS-CoV-2 pandemic, the poster sessions—and thus intensive scientific discussions at the posters—were not possible. In this report, we provide a concise summary of the various workshops and further aspects of the scientific program.     

The 2nd Alpine Winter Conference on Medicinal and Synthetic Chemistry

The second biannual Alpine Winter Conference on Medicinal and Synthetic Chemistry (short: Alpine Winter Conference) took place January 19–23, 2020, in St. Anton in western Austria. There were roughly 180 attendees from around the globe, making this mid-sized conference particularly conducive to networking and exchanging ideas over the course of four and a half days. This report summarizes the key events and presentations given by researchers working in both industry and academia.     

Review of Interflam'85

The International Conference Interflam'85 was held at the University of Surrey, Guildford, UK, on 26–8 March 1985. This third conference in the Interflam series was set up with the specific aim to bring together the 1985 state of the art of fire science and to show particularly how this information can be put to practical use in the saving of lives. Over 45 speakers, each specialists in their own field of work, some 15 different countries contributed papers. Dr Peter Allender, formerly of Metro-Cammell and now with John Allen Associates, has seen the Conference both from the lecturing platform and from the audience. He has been invited to give his views about Interflam'85.     

The intercalation of layered structures

The experimental details of the weight, thickness and conductivity increases that occur during intercalation are discussed in terms of a crack propagation theory. This assumes that peripheral penetration occurs in every space of a layered structure. The penetration is then treated as a crack which either does not propagate or propagates in one of four ways. Those ways are uniform velocity, or increasing velocity which may or may not become catastrophic, or an initial velocity that falls to zero. Intercalation is the subsequent filling of the crack and examples are used to illustrate all four modes of propagation. A qualitative explanation of staging is also presented. Finally, industrial applications of intercalation are discussed and the behavior of other layered structures than graphite is described. Much of the stimulation for my work has come from the many discussions that I have had with others over the years since the first Carbon Conference I attended in 1957. After my learned paper on intercalation, one from the audience asked whether intercalation could occur through the end basal planes of graphite. That was Sherwood Seeley, research director of Dixon Crucible Company. I later did show that Br₂ would not diffuse through the basal planes of well ordered graphite. Well, in order to continue that rough and tumble process, I will describe some of my recent work that takes my theory of ordering beyond the charge density waves mentioned in the citation.     

Cell Death by Entosis: Triggers,Molecular Mechanisms and Clinical Significance

Entosis—a homotypic insertion of one cell into another, resulting in a death of the invading cell—has been described in many reports, but crucial aspects of its molecular mechanisms and clinical significance still remain controversial. While actomyosin contractility of the invading cell is very well established as a driving force in the initial phase, and autophagy induced in the outer cell is determined as the main mechanism of degradation of the inner cell, many details remain unresolved. The multitude of triggering factors and crisscrossing molecular pathways described in entosis regulation make interpretations difficult. The question of the physiological role of entosis also remains unanswered. In this review, we summarize the knowledge of molecular mechanisms and clinical data concerning entosis accumulated so far, highlighting both coherent explanations and controversies.     

Analytical chain to monitor vegetable oil hydrogenation

Three analyses were automated to monitor a laboratory continuous hydrogenator. Attenuated total reflectance infrared was used to followtrans isomer formation, refractive index for iodine value change and gas liquid chromatography for fatty acid composition. The instant response of the infrared spectrometer was confirmed by the later responses of the refractometer and gas chromatograph. All 3 operations were used to follow the progress of batch, continuous or semicontinuous hydrogenation. Presented at the 32nd Pittsburgh Conference on Analytical Chemistry and Applied Spectroscopy, Atlantic City, NJ, Abstract #743, March 12, 1981.     

Ensemble of Template-Free and Template-Based Classifiers for Protein Secondary Structure Prediction

Protein secondary structures are important in many biological processes and applications. Due to advances in sequencing methods, there are many proteins sequenced, but fewer proteins with secondary structures defined by laboratory methods. With the development of computer technology, computational methods have (started to) become the most important methodologies for predicting secondary structures. We evaluated two different approaches to this problem—driven by the recent results obtained by computational methods in this task—(i) template-free classifiers, based on machine learning techniques; and (ii) template-based classifiers, based on searching tools. Both approaches are formed by different sub-classifiers—six for template-free and two for template-based, each with a specific view of the protein. Our results show that these ensembles improve the results of each approach individually.     

Hot Topics in Silicon Chemistry

The symposium “Silicones and Silicone-Modified Materials VI” was hosted by the American Chemical Society (ACS) during the 243 ^rd National Meeting & Exposition in San Diego, California, USA (March 25 ?29, 2012). At this “Silicones VI” symposium, I circulated a blank notepad and I then asked the members of the audience for responses to the question “What are the three hot topics in silicon chemistry in March 2012?” These responses are given herein along with a brief discussion of how they may guide us in our future teaching, research and service.     

Assembled Catalysts—Just Interesting, or Maybe Important?

A lecture held in Honor of Professor Sir John Meurig Thomas on the occasion of his 70th birthday RSC symposium “Perspectives and prospects in catalytic science” at the Royal Institution, London, 3–5 September, 2002. It is beyond doubt that catalysts have had a major influence on the technological development of the world over the last 150 years or so. In this very building, where today we honor Professor Sir John Meurig Thomas, some spectacular advances were made not only in the distant past, by the likes of Faraday and Davy, but also in the more recent past (and dare I say present) by Professor Thomas himself. The in situ studies of catalysts in action, allowing the creation of a basis for rational design, being one of the many shining examples [1]. When working here myself, one of the “Leitmotifs” of Sir John was to ask (his often all-too-exuberant junior colleagues): “It may be interesting, but is it important?” To answer, “It is important, because I find it interesting”, did not cut much ice, so in this spirit, I will be aiming to convince you that assembled catalysts are not just interesting, but also important.     

Plant_SNP_TATA_Z-Tester: A Web Service That Unequivocally Estimates the Impact of Proximal Promoter Mutations on Plant Gene Expression

Synthetic targeted optimization of plant promoters is becoming a part of progress in mainstream postgenomic agriculture along with hybridization of cultivated plants with wild congeners, as well as marker-assisted breeding. Therefore, here, for the first time, we compiled all the experimental data—on mutational effects in plant proximal promoters on gene expression—that we could find in PubMed. Some of these datasets cast doubt on both the existence and the uniqueness of the sought solution, which could unequivocally estimate effects of proximal promoter mutation on gene expression when plants are grown under various environmental conditions during their development. This means that the inverse problem under study is ill-posed. Furthermore, we found experimental data on in vitro interchangeability of plant and human TATA-binding proteins allowing the application of Tikhonov’s regularization, making this problem well-posed. Within these frameworks, we created our Web service Plant_SNP_TATA_Z-tester and then determined the limits of its applicability using those data that cast doubt on both the existence and the uniqueness of the sought solution. We confirmed that the effects (of proximal promoter mutations on gene expression) predicted by Plant_SNP_TATA_Z-tester correlate statistically significantly with all the experimental data under study. Lastly, we exemplified an application of Plant_SNP_TATA_Z-tester to agriculturally valuable mutations in plant promoters.     

On Book Prizes

This is the third in an ongoing series of articles entitled ENDPIECE. The idea behind this series is to have a place where the Editor-in-Chief of the journal SILICON can reflect on some aspects of silicon (Si) the element and on some aspects of its applications in the modern world. Hopefully, the collection of articles will build and it will show just how broad the field of silicon-based materials and silicon-based technologies is. Indeed this broadness is reflected in the growing content of the journal SILICON since its introduction in 2009. While there are (and have been) many successful silicon chemistry symposia held around the world, in the mid 1990s a group of us felt that a symposium was much needed where the focus would be on materials and systems that contained the siloxane bond (Si-0). We now believe that the evidence strongly supports our position on this matter. The Silicones and Silicone-Modified Materials symposia have typically run for four full days of oral presentations and an evening (or an afternoon) of poster presentations at various American Chemical Society national meetings since 1998. At the symposia, the publisher Springer have kindly given book prizes to the students with the best poster presentations. Students from the University of Massachusetts at Amherst, MA, USA and from the Texas A&M University, TX, USA have been the awardees to date and are recognized herein.     

Electrochemical synthesis of erythrosin from fluorescein

Paper presented at the Eleventh Conference of the Indian Council of Chemists held at Bihar University, Bihar, India, during 12–14 March 1993.     

Publication Sponsored by the Society's Working Party on Water Usage

Following the formation of a Working Party on Water Usage announced in the November issue of SDC News , a number of abstracts has been collected dealing with various aspects of water economy. The abstracts, totalling about 400, have been classified according to the contents of the original papers - Water Consumption Data (reducing consumption), Reuse of Water and Modification of Processes, and Effluent Constituents and Treatment. Some of the papers abstracted refer to more than one of these aspects so that abstracts may appear more than once under the various classifications. The first group of abstracts concerns economies in the use of water and appears in the current issue of the Journal. This group will be followed in subsequent issues by those relating to water recirculation. A series of short articles has been prepared by members of the Working Party together with two invited outside contributors dealing with the practicalities of water usage and these appear in the current issue of the Journal. It must be appreciated that the Working Party on Water Usage was formed with a high proportion of practical people concerned with dyeing and finishing on a day-to-day basis and who represent various sections of the industry, so that many facets of water management can be brought into focus. Perhaps, inevitably, there will be points of similarity, even overlap of ideas and practical advice, but it is believed that the articles will prove of value, reflecting the individual viewpoints of thoroughly experienced practitioners. Contributions from industry will be warmly welcomed, for we take the view that ‘water economy’ is an industry-wide matter of great concern and that dissemination of information can only be beneficial and will contribute to a more efficient dyeing and finishing industry. The members of the Working Party trust that these contributions will be informative, thought-provoking and, above all, practical, and will enable dyeworks' managers to attempt to offset increased water charges by using less of a natural resource which has belatedly and for various reasons come to be regarded as very valuable.     

The Seventh International Congress on Catalysis

Abstract

The Seventh International Congress on Catalysis was held in the Keio Plaza Hotel, Tokyo, June 30-July 4, 1980. The proceedings were copublished in 1981 by Kodanaha Ltd., Tokyo and Elsevier, Amsterdam. The proceedings will include the plenary lectures (5), contributed papers (104), abstracts of communications (64), and the discussion of contributed papers. It is unfortunate for those who did not attend that discussion of the communications could also be included. The communications were an excellent innovation and, it may be hoped, a new tradition for future Congresses. They had a later acceptance date than contributed papers and were limited in length to 20% of that allowed for regular papers (10 pages). All communications were presented on the opening day of the Congress. Because they were brief and, in many cases, were research progress reports, the discussion was lively.     

Slaying (Yet Again) the Brain-Eating Zombie Called the “Isochore Theory”: A Segmentation Algorithm Used to “Confirm” the Existence of Isochores Creates “Isochores” Where None Exist

The isochore theory, which was proposed more than 40 years ago, depicts the mammalian genome as a mosaic of long, homogeneous regions that are characterized by their guanine and cytosine (GC) content. The human genome, for instance, was claimed to consist of five compositionally distinct isochore families. The isochore theory, in all its reincarnations, has been repeatedly falsified in the literature, yet isochore proponents have persistently resurrected it by either redefining isochores or by proposing alternative means of testing the theory. Here, I deal with the latest attempt to salvage this seemingly immortal zombie—a sequence segmentation method called isoSegmenter, which was claimed to “identify” isochores while at the same time disregarding the main characteristic attribute of isochores—compositional homogeneity. I used a series of controlled, randomly generated simulated sequences as a benchmark to study the performance of isoSegmenter. The main advantage of using simulated sequences is that, unlike real data, the exact start and stop point of any isochore or homogeneous compositional domain is known. Based on three key performance metrics—sensitivity, precision, and Jaccard similarity index—isoSegmenter was found to be vastly inferior to isoPlotter, a segmentation algorithm with no user input. Moreover, isoSegmenter identified isochores where none exist and failed to identify compositionally homogeneous sequences that were shorter than 100−200 kb. Will this zillionth refutation of “isochores” ensure a final and permanent entombment of the isochore theory? This author is not holding his breath.     

Functionalized Hydrogels for Cartilage Repair: The Value of Secretome-Instructive Signaling

Cartilage repair has been a challenge in the medical field for many years. Although treatments that alleviate pain and injury are available, none can effectively regenerate the cartilage. Currently, regenerative medicine and tissue engineering are among the developed strategies to treat cartilage injury. The use of stem cells, associated or not with scaffolds, has shown potential in cartilage regeneration. However, it is currently known that the effect of stem cells occurs mainly through the secretion of paracrine factors that act on local cells. In this review, we will address the use of the secretome—a set of bioactive factors (soluble factors and extracellular vesicles) secreted by the cells—of mesenchymal stem cells as a treatment for cartilage regeneration. We will also discuss methodologies for priming the secretome to enhance the chondroregenerative potential. In addition, considering the difficulty of delivering therapies to the injured cartilage site, we will address works that use hydrogels functionalized with growth factors and secretome components. We aim to show that secretome-functionalized hydrogels can be an exciting approach to cell-free cartilage repair therapy.     

Pregnancy-Related Extracellular Vesicles Revisited

Extracellular vesicles (EVs) are small vesicles ranging from 20–200 nm to 10 μm in diameter that are discharged and taken in by many different types of cells. Depending on the nature and quantity of their content—which generally includes proteins, lipids as well as microRNAs (miRNAs), messenger-RNA (mRNA), and DNA—these particles can bring about functional modifications in the receiving cells. During pregnancy, placenta and/or fetal-derived EVs have recently been isolated, eliciting interest in discovering their clinical significance. To date, various studies have associated variations in the circulating levels of maternal and fetal EVs and their contents, with complications including gestational diabetes and preeclampsia, ultimately leading to adverse pregnancy outcomes. Furthermore, EVs have also been identified as messengers and important players in viral infections during pregnancy, as well as in various congenital malformations. Their presence can be detected in the maternal blood from the first trimester and their level increases towards term, thus acting as liquid biopsies that give invaluable insight into the status of the feto-placental unit. However, their exact roles in the metabolic and vascular adaptations associated with physiological and pathological pregnancy is still under investigation. Analyzing peer-reviewed journal articles available in online databases, the purpose of this review is to synthesize current knowledge regarding the utility of quantification of pregnancy related EVs in general and placental EVs in particular as non-invasive evidence of placental dysfunction and adverse pregnancy outcomes, and to develop the current understanding of these particles and their applicability in clinical practice.     

Glyceride structure of vegetable oils by countercurrent distribution. IV. Cocoa butter

Summary Cocoa butter has been fractionated by countercurrent distribution between pentane-hexane and furfural-uitroethane solvent phases with the application of 1,100 transfer stages. Except for a small percentage of trisaturates and linoleic acid-containing triglycerides, oleic acid occurs at least once in each glyceride molecule. Cocoa butter is composed principally of mono-oleins: oleodistearin, 22%; oleopalmitostearin, 41%; and oleodipalmitin, 12%. Whereas the latter glyceride is not permitted under a pure even pattern, the low trisaturate content is not consistent with a random pattern. Cocoa butter follows neither a random nor an even pattern of glyceride structure. Presented at Pittsburgh Conference on Analytical Chemistry and Applied Spectroscopy. Exposition of Modern Laboratory Equipment, Pittsburgh, Pa., March 3, 1958. This paper reports research undertaken in cooperation with the Quartermaster Food and Container Institute for the Armed Forces, QM. Research and Engineering Command, U. S. Army, and has been assigned number 991 in the series of papers approved for publication. The views or conclusions contained in this report are those of the authors. They are not to be construed as necessarily reflecting the views or indorsement of the Department of Defense. This is a laboratory of the Northern Utilization Research and Development Divison, Agricultural Research Service, U. S. Department of Agriculture.     

The Seventh International Congress on Catalysis

The Seventh International Congress on Catalysis was held in the Keio Plaza Hotel, Tokyo, June 30-July 4, 1980. The proceedings were copublished in 1981 by Kodanaha Ltd., Tokyo and Elsevier, Amsterdam. The proceedings will include the plenary lectures (5), contributed papers (104), abstracts of communications (64), and the discussion of contributed papers. It is unfortunate for those who did not attend that discussion of the communications could also be included. The communications were an excellent innovation and, it may be hoped, a new tradition for future Congresses. They had a later acceptance date than contributed papers and were limited in length to 20% of that allowed for regular papers (10 pages). All communications were presented on the opening day of the Congress. Because they were brief and, in many cases, were research progress reports, the discussion was lively.     

Detection of miRNA as Non-Invasive Biomarkers of Colorectal Cancer

Colorectal Cancer (CRC) is one of the deadliest cancers—ranking as the fourth most common cause of cancer-related deaths in the world. It is such a deadly disease because it is largely asymptomatic until the latter stages—oftentimes when the cancer has metastasized. Thus, a huge emphasis of cancer treatment is placed on early detection. Currently, there is a lack of a noninvasive, reliable, and cost-effective screening method for CRC. In recent years, microRNA (miRNA) diagnostic markers have been suggested as a viable new screening method for CRC. miRNAs play an important role in carcinogenesis, and has been observed to be dysregulated in many cancers including CRC. This review examines the diagnostic potential of circulatory and fecal miRNA markers in relation to CRC, as well as current techniques to detect them.