Pharmacological modulation of autophagy as a novel potential target in the successful implementation of in vitro fertilization.

Autophagy is an important intracellular process to maintain homeostasis and studies have shown the key role of autophagy in modulating the functions of reproductive system. Alongside with it, the activation of autophagy has also been found to regulate a number of important processes involved in in vitro fertilization including degeneration of granulosa cells and oocyte defects in obese and aging women; apoptosis of oocytes during vitrification-warming; quality and viability of embryo; developmental competence and pre-implantation development of in vitro produced blastocysts; placental vascularization and fetal growth. The different mechanisms that may contribute in autophagy-mediated increase in developmental competence and pre-implantation development include decrease in endoplasmic reticulum (ER) stress, activation of poly(ADP-ribosyl)ation (PARP) and reduction in free radical production. The present review discusses the role of autophagy activation in increasing the efficiency of in vitro fertilization by modulating different aspects related to fertilization.

1-(4-Fluoro-phen-yl)-3-hydr-oxy-3-phenyl-prop-2-en-1-one.

In the crystal structure the title compound, C(15)H(11)FO(2), the molecule exists in the enol form. It is stabilized by an intra-molecular O-H⋯O hydrogen bond, in which the donor O-H and acceptor H⋯O distances are almost equal. The dihedral angle between the two benzene rings is 22.30 (4)°.

2-(4-tert-Butyl-phen-yl)-1H-imidazo[4,5-f][1,10]phenanthroline sesquihydrate.

In the title compound, C(23)H(20)N(4)·1.5H(2)O, the mean planes of the imidazo[4,5-f][1,10]phenanthroline system and the benzene ring make a dihedral angle of 21.76 (2)°. One water O atom lies on a twofold rotation axis. The organic mol-ecules and water mol-ecules are linked via N-H⋯O, O-H⋯N and O-H⋯O hydrogen bonds. Weak inter-molecular C-H⋯N hydrogen bonds and π-π stacking inter-actions between inversion-related phenanthroline rings complete the three-dimensional hydrogen-bonding network in the crystal structure. The stacking distance is short at 3.513 (2) Šand the perpendicular distance between the rings is 3.355 Å. The three methyl groups are disordered over two positions, with a site-occupancy ratio of 0.875 (14):0.125 (14).

3-[4-(Benz-yloxy)phen-yl]-1-(2-fur-yl)-3-hydroxy-prop-2-en-1-one.

In the crystal structure of the title compound, C(20)H(16)O(4), which is in the enol form, the central benzene ring makes dihedral angles of 63.42 (9) and 5.19 (10)° with the phenyl and furan rings, respectively. There is a short strong intra-molecular O-H⋯O hydrogen bond.

Conjugate of bovine hemoglobin and human serum albumin as a candidate for blood substitute: characteristics and effects on rats.

Conjugate of bovine hemoglobin (bHb) and human serum albumin (HSA) was prepared. The product was simply composed of 89.7% one-to-one Hb-HSA conjugate, 6.0% oligomer of Hb and HSA, 3.5% unconjugated HSA and 0.8% unconjugated Hb, with an average molecular weight of 157 kD. The physicochemical characteristics were determined. Effects of single replacement on blood pressure and long-term survival of rats with 30% and 60% acute blood loss were studied, in comparison with Ringer-lactate solution, stroma-free hemoglobin (SFHb), 5% HSA in Ringer-lactate, whole blood and no resuscitation fluid. Results showed that Hb-HSA conjugate maintained the mean arterial pressure of rats to initial level with no pressor effect. Long-term effects of the replacement fluids on 30% bleeding rats showed that, for the group infused with Hb-HSA conjugate, histology of five major organs, heart, kidney, liver, spleen and lung, were essentially normal, similar to that of whole blood, while obviously renal side-effects appeared in other groups. The efficacy of the conjugate was further demonstrated by the resuscitation of lethal hemorrhagic shock rats (60% acute blood loss) with 100% survival rate (followed for 14 days), the same result as whole blood. The Hb-HSA conjugate can thus be another candidate for blood substitute in emergency.

[Study on rhG-CSF modified with polyethylene glycol].

Monomethoxy Polyethylene Glycol(mPEG20000) was activated by N-hydroxysuccinimede and analyzed by infrared spectrum and hydrolysis kinetics. In order to propose the optimized reaction conditions of mono-PEGylated rhG-CSF, orthogonal design of the experiment was investigated. Ion exchange chromatography was used to separate and purify PEGylated rhG-CSF from unPEGylated rhG-CSF. The purity of mono-PEGylated rhG-CSF was analyzed by high performance liquid chromatography (HPLC) to be 97%.

Terahertz radiation from oscillating electrons in laser-induced wake fields.

Strong terahertz (1 THz= 10(12) Hz) radiation can be generated by the electron oscillation in fs-laser-induced wake fields. The interaction of a fs-laser pulse with a low-density plasma layer is studied in detail using numerical simulations. The spatial distribution and temporal evolution of terahertz electron current developed in a low-density plasma layer are presented, which enables us to calculate the intensity distribution of THz radiation. It is shown that laser and plasma parameters, such as laser intensity, pulse width, and background plasma density, are of key importance to the process. The optimum condition for wake-field excitation and terahertz emission is discussed upon the simulation results. Radiation peaked at 6.4 THz, with 900 fs duration and 9% bandwidth, can be generated in a plasma of density 5x 10(17) cm(-3) . It turns out that the maximum radiation intensity scales as n(3)(0) a(4)(0) when wake field is resonantly excited, where n(0) and a(0) are, respectively, the plasma density and the normalized field amplitude of the laser pulse.