WENXI GAO^1,2,#, QIANQIAN MA^3,#, CHENYU TANG^2,#, YUELI ZHAN⁴, YINONG DUAN², HUIHUA NI^5,*, YUNZHAO XU^5,6,*

BIOCELL, Vol.44, No.4, pp. 597-605, 2020, DOI:10.32604/biocell.2020.011328

Abstract Cervical cancer (CESC) is one of the most common cancers and affects the female genital tract. Consistent HPV infection status has been determined to be a vital cause of tumorigenesis. HPV infection may induce changes to the immune system and limit the host’s immune response. Immunotherapy is therefore essential to improving the overall survival of both locally advanced and recurrent CESC patients. Using 304 relevant samples from TCGA, we assessed immune cell function in CESC patients to better understand the status of both tumor micro-environment cells and immune cells in CESC. Functional enrichment analysis, pathway enrichment analysis, and PPI network… More >

ALI RAZA^1,7,#,*, ABU BAKR UMER FAROOQ^2,#, WAQAR AHMAD KHAN³, AHSAN IQBAL⁴, SADETTIN ÇELİK⁵, MAHWISH ALI⁶, RAO SOHAIL AHMAD KHAN^1,*

BIOCELL, Vol.44, No.4, pp. 769-776, 2020, DOI:10.32604/biocell.2020.010207

Abstract Randomly amplified polymorphic DNA (RAPD) is a tremendously convenient approach used to discriminate between Brassica species owing to its accuracy and speed. RAPD primers generate adequate genetic information that can be used in the primer-marker system. In this work, twenty RAPD-PCR based markers were executed to generate polymorphic data, like polymorphic information content (PIC), mean resolving power (MRP), resolving power (RP), effective multiplex ratio (EMR), and marker index (MI) for the first time and genetic distance among and between six Brassica species were calculated. Our results indicated that 20 primers produced a total of 231 scored band and generated 87%… More >

XIAOLIN ZHU^1,3, XIAOHONG WEI^1,3,*, BAOQIANG WANG^2,3, XIAN WANG², MINGJUN ZHANG⁴

BIOCELL, Vol.44, No.4, pp. 777-803, 2020, DOI:10.32604/biocell.2020.010153

Abstract AP2/ERE-type transcription factors, as a type of plant-specific transcription factors, play a key role in plant biotic and abiotic stress. Meanwhile, they have been studied in many plants, but rarely in tomatoes. In this study, we performed a genome-wide analysis of the SlAP2/ERF gene family of tomato, and finally identified 29 SlAP2/ERF genes and divided them into different subfamilies. At the same time, its basic physical and chemical properties were analyzed. We also constructed phylogenetic trees with 30 Arabidopsis AP2/ERF proteins and 28 potatoes AP2/ERF proteins to ensure conservative homology between them. In addition, we mapped 29 SlAP2/ERF transcription factors… More >

AFRAH ALKHURIJI¹, ATEKAH ABDULLAH MOHAMMED ALRAQIBAH¹, AMAAL AWAD ALHARBI¹, ZENEB BABAY², FATIMAH BASIL AL-MUKAYNIZI³, ARWA ALTHOMALI³, SONYA S. ABDEL-RAZEQ⁴, ARJUMAND S. WARSY⁵

BIOCELL, Vol.44, No.4, pp. 613-621, 2020, DOI:10.32604/biocell.2020.09652

Abstract Methylenetetrahydrofolate reductase (MTHFR) deficiency is the most common genetic cause of hyperhomocysteinemia, which has been implicated in the etiology of recurrent spontaneous abortion (RSA). This study was designed to investigate the association between two single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNP) (rs1801133 [C677T] and rs1801131 [A1298C]) in the MTHFR gene and RSA, in Saudis. These two SNPs were selected as these polymorphisms have a different effect on the activity and stability of the enzyme, and significantly diverse effects have been reported in relation to the association with RSA. Ethical approval was acquired from the IRB at King Saud University (KKUH), Saudi Arabia, and… More >

YUE CHEN¹, ZHITING TANG², MIAO YU¹, RUI ZHANG^1,*, XINXIN DONG¹, LIANQUN CAO¹

BIOCELL, Vol.44, No.4, pp. 513-524, 2020, DOI:10.32604/biocell.2020.09422

Abstract Preoperative chemoradiation therapy (CRT) is becoming the standard treatment for patients with locally advanced rectal cancer. However, individual differences in response to treatment range from a complete response to complete resistance. Predicting the tumor response to radiotherapy may improve the efficacy of radiotherapy. This review mainly summarizes recent studies about the molecular biomarkers that can predict the response to radiotherapy in rectal cancer. These studies have indicated that the molecular markers involved in the response to radiotherapy mainly include genes related to radiosensitivity, cancer stem cell-related markers, non-coding RNAs (ncRNAs), single-nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) and gene methylation, and other factors including… More >

VIVEK KUMAR, VISHNU AGARWAL^*

BIOCELL, Vol.44, No.4, pp. 461-467, 2020, DOI:10.32604/biocell.2020.011090

Abstract The world is facing a new healthcare crisis with the rise and spread of novel coronavirus since December 2019. Also known as Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome Corona Virus-2 (SARS-CoV-2), the disease associated with SARSCoV-2 is even called COVID-19. The infection is said to have originated from the bat community and transmitted to humans through an intermediate host (yet unknown) in Wuhan, in the Hubei region of China. COVID-19 is having a pulverizing impact on the scientific community. As of August 13, 2020, the number of confirmed cases had reached up to 20,439,814 and the death toll to 744,385, affecting more… More >

MEI LAN^#, JINGFENG HU^#, HONGLI YANG, LIQIN ZHANG, XUEZHONG XU, JIANGMING HE^*

BIOCELL, Vol.44, No.4, pp. 751-767, 2020, DOI:10.32604/biocell.2020.012954

Abstract Clubroot of Chinese cabbage (Brassica rapa L. ssp. pekinensis), caused by the obligate parasite Plasmodiophora brassicae, accounts for serious yield losses. The aim of our study was to explore the phytohormone levels and metabolome changes in the roots of resistant and susceptible B. rapa genotypes at a late stage of infection, i.e., 28 days post-infection. Both genotypes showed decreased auxin levels after P. brassicae infection except for indole-3-acetic acid. Overall, the susceptible genotype had higher auxin and cytokinin levels after infection, with the exception of trans-zeatin and 3- indolebutyric acid as compared to the resistant genotype. Jasmonic acid levels declined… More >

REN FANG^#, WEIXIONG HUANG^#, JINYAN YAO, XING LONG, JI ZHANG, SHUANGYUN ZHOU, BIAO DENG, WENZHONG TANG, ZHENYU AN^*

BIOCELL, Vol.44, No.4, pp. 737-750, 2020, DOI:10.32604/biocell.2020.012933

Abstract Annona squamosa is a multipurpose fruit tree employed in nutritional, medicinal, and industrial fields. Its fruit is significantly enriched in sugars, making it an excellent species to study sugar accumulation in fruit. However, the scarcity of genomic resources hinders genetic studies in this species. This study aimed at generating large-scale genomic resources in A. squamosa and deciphering the molecular basis of its high sugar content. Herein, we sequenced and characterized the full-length transcriptome of A. squamosa fruit using PacBio Iso-seq. In addition, we analyzed the changes in sugar content over five fruit growth and ripening stages, and we applied RNA-sequencing… More >

ZHIHUI WANG¹, YE YUAN^2,*

BIOCELL, Vol.44, No.4, pp. 731-736, 2020, DOI:10.32604/biocell.2020.010575

Abstract Glyphosate is a non-selective broad-spectrum herbicide that blocks plant growth by inhibiting 5- Enolpyruvylshikimate-3-phosphate synthase (EPSPS), a key enzyme of the shikimate pathway in microorganisms and plants. The full-length epsps cDNA sequence (paepsps, Genebank: KY860582.1) was cloned and characterized for the first time from Phragmites australis. The full-length cDNA of paepsps was 1308 bp encoding a polypeptide of 435 amino acids. The bioinformatic analyses showed that PaEPSPS has highly homologous with EPSPS from other plants. RT-PCR analysis of paepsps expression indicated that the gene expressed in leaves, stems, and roots, with higher expression in leaves. The expression of the paepsps… More >

YANJUAN LIAO^1,#, DONGLING YU^2,#, XIAOFANG QIN¹, JINMEI WU¹, HUI WEI¹, HUI LI¹, XIANGYING MA^1,*, ZAIYIN HUANG^1,*

BIOCELL, Vol.44, No.4, pp. 703-711, 2020, DOI:10.32604/biocell.2020.012047

Abstract Despite the great potential of photosynthetic microbes in the production of renewable fuels, value-adding chemicals, and water treatment, etc., commercial utilization of them is significantly hindered by the lack of techniques to accurately monitor the thermodynamic and kinetic characteristics of the In-situ growth of microbes under controlled light illumination for optimal cultivation. Herein, we demonstrated that a newly developed highly sensitive photo-microcalorimetric system successfully captured the impacts of the light wavelength and strength on the thermodynamic and kinetic parameters of the In-situ growth of Rhodopseudomonas palustris, a representative photosynthetic microorganism. To our best knowledge, this is the first time that… More >