[Charles Robert Darwin: the great founder of scientific evolutionism].

Today, we celebrated 200 years since Charles Darwin, one of the world's most creative and influential thinkers, was born. And there happens to be the 150th anniversary of the publication of his famous book, On the Origin of Species. It is verified that On the Origin of Species is an immortal classic book and is still guiding the study of anagenesis in life science as the development of natural science from then on, and even though most of the ideas in the book are well-known at the present age. In the article, we recall the brilliance and predomination life of Darwin, a great sage with rich scientific achievements, review briefly the novel discoveries and theories after him in the field, and then elucidate the focal points and perspectiveas in near future study of evolution.

[The active expression of CenpB, a constitutive protein in the centromeres of chromosomes, in breast cancer tissues].

At present, a point that cell biologists and medicine scientists focus their close attention on is the mechanisms of cell proliferation and carceration. Breast cancer, one of the frequently occurring cancers, is often been studied intensively. Centromere constitutive molecules, related to various regulatory factors, play an important role in cell proliferation check point regulation. Cell cycle engine molecules, oncogenes, anti-oncogenes and other molecules conform a cell proliferation network. The basic courses of all tumors are associated to this network. However, there are still many problems to be resolved in the analyses of cancer related genes which cause tumors and tumor gene markers. In the current study, using Northern blot, 31 samples of breast cancer tissues and their normal (not cancerous) tissues a little far away from them in the same individuals showed that, in the majority of the tests (87.1%), the mRNA of centromere protein CenpB over expressed in breast cancer tissues, and moreover, tissue in situ hybridization also revealed that all of the CenpB-over-expressed cancer tissues, having identified with Northern blot, over expressed CenpB mRNA. Analyzing the same samples by means of Western blot, the result was highly consistent to the studies in the RNA level. A conclusion was drawn that the over expression of CenpB gene probably relates to malignant cell proliferation in breast gland. It has been testified by researchers that a few of CenpB homogenous proteins are co-operative, the loss of their genes resulting in chromosomes' separating abnormally and cell growth's slowing down. Having transfected HeLa (Tet-Off) cells with anti-sense Cenp in a previous experiment, we ever got a result that cellular duplicating time was prolonged for another 32.8 h, and together with the inhibition of centromere assembly, the mitotic index dropped sharply. In another research, we drew a conclusion that CenpG may be related to cancer, and its differential expressing probably relates to malignant cell proliferation. Combined with these researches, the results obtained from the current study are beneficial to further recognition of the mechanism of cancer.

Effects of anti-leukemia drug Harringtonine on the levels of centromere proteins and gene expression of CenpB in L1210 cells.

In this study, we investigated the effects of the anti-leukemia drug Harringtonine (HT) on the levels of centromere proteins and gene expression of centromere protein CenpB in L1210 cells. The intensity of centromere fluorescence, shown by indirect immunofluorescence staining, decreased with HT treatment. Western blot showed that the anti-centromere antibody (ACA) serum used in this study recognized 8 proteins with different molecular weights: 140, 80, 70, 56, 37, 34, 32 and 17 kD. The amounts of some of these proteins were reduced to different extents by HT treatment. The ACA antibodies that recognized the 17, 80 and 140 kD proteins in L1210 cells also cross-reacted with 3 proteins with similar molecular weights which are known to be CenpA, CenpB and CenpC, respectively. Northern and Dot blot analyses revealed that the level of CenpB mRNA in HT-treated cells was markedly lower than that in the untreated cells. These results suggest that HT may cause a decrease in the intracellular level of some centromere proteins, probably by inhibiting mRNA expression of corresponding genes. Moreover, it is possible that the cell-killing and appotosis-inducing effects of HT may be mediated by the inhibition of the expression of CenpB and other centromere protein genes.