31 December 2016
One of the most remarkable features of immune systems through many species is the capacity of phagocytes to produce diverse form of oxidizing agents in order to destruct invaders [...]
The paper presents a study leading to a new acute toxicity test on embryonic and juvenile organisms of the great pond snail (Lymnaea stagnalis Linnaeus). Sulfuric acid, nitric acid, and ammonium hydroxide were used as waterborne toxicants in laborato...
Adiponectin enhances insulin sensitivity, which improves cognition in mammals. How adiponectin affects the mechanism’s underlying cognition, however, remains unknown. We hypothesized that experiments using the pond snail Lymnaea stagnalis, whic...
Benzophenone-3 (BP-3) is a lipophilic organic compound that occurs naturally in flower pigments. Since it adsorbs ultraviolet (UV) radiation in the UVA and UVB regions, it is one of the most common UV filters found in sunscreen and cosmetic products....
Intense species-specific locomotion changes the behavioural and cognitive states of various vertebrates and invertebrates. However, whether and how reproductive behaviour is affected by previous increased motor activity remains largely unknown. We ad...
The ubiquitous presence of plastics represents a global threat for all ecosystems and human health. In this study, we evaluated, in vitro and in vivo, the genotoxic potential of different concentrations of polystyrene microplastics (PS-MPs) and their...
Retinoic acid, the active metabolite of Vitamin A, is important for the appropriate development of the nervous system (e.g., neurite outgrowth) as well as for cognition (e.g., memory formation) in the adult brain. We have shown that many of the effec...
Leishmania tarentolae (LEXSY) system is an inexpensive and effective expression approach for various research and medical purposes. The stated advantages of this system are the possibility of obtaining the soluble product in the cytoplasm, a high pro...
Monoamine neurotransmitters play a critical role in the development and function of the nervous system. In this study, we investigated the impact of parental serotonin (5-HT) modulation on the monoamine balance in the identified apical neurons of Lym...
Conditioned taste aversion (CTA) in mammals has several specific characteristics: (1) emergence of a negative symptom in subjects due to selective association with a taste-related stimulus, (2) robust long-term memory that is resistant to extinction...
21 December 2014
A growing body of evidences indicates the rise in pharmaceutical contamination of aquatic ecosystems [...]
In nature, all plants live with microbes, which can directly affect their host plants’ physiology and metabolism, as well as their interacting partners, such as herbivores. However, to what extent the microbiota shapes the adaptive evolution to...
A nano-flow high-resolution screening platform, featuring a parallel chip-based microfluidic bioassay and mass spectrometry coupled to nano-liquid chromatography, was applied to screen animal venoms for nicotinic acetylcholine receptor like (nAChR) a...
Glufosinate-ammonium (GLA), an organophosphate herbicide, is released at high concentrations in the environment, leading to concerns over its potential genotoxic effects. However, few articles are available in the literature reporting the possible ce...
To test the hypothesis that a sleep-like quiescent state enhances memory consolidation in the pond snail Lymnaea stagnalis, we interposed a period in which snails experienced either a quiescent, sleeping state or an active, non-sleeping state followi...
Food deprivation activates forkhead box O (FOXO), a transcription factor downstream of insulin receptors. In the pond snail Lymnaea stagnalis, insulin signaling and food deprivation improve memory consolidation following conditioned taste aversion (C...
Cercariae of Plagiorchis spp. are frequently reported in European freshwater snails, but their true diversity is difficult to estimate due to subtle differences in morphology. We molecularly characterized 67 isolates of Plagiorchis cercariae collecte...
Lymnaea stagnalis learns and remembers to avoid certain foods when their ingestion is followed by sickness. This rapid, taste-specific, and long-lasting aversion—known as the Garcia effect—can be formed by exposing snails to a novel taste...
A series of 14 new analogs of α-conotoxin PnIA Conus pennaceus was synthesized and tested for binding to the human α7 nicotinic acetylcholine receptor (nAChR) and acetylcholine-binding proteins (AChBP) Lymnaea stagnalis and Aplysia californica. Based...
Retinoic acid (RA) is the biologically active metabolite of vitamin A and has become a well-established factor that induces neurite outgrowth and regeneration in both vertebrates and invertebrates. However, the underlying regulatory mechanisms that m...
For a small library of natural products from marine sponges and ascidians, in silico docking to the Lymnaea stagnalis acetylcholine-binding protein (AChBP), a model for the ligand-binding domains of nicotinic acetylcholine receptors (nAChRs), was ca...
Cholines acylated with unsaturated fatty acids are a recently discovered family of endogenous lipids. However, the data on the biological activity of acylcholines remain very limited. We hypothesized that acylcholines containing residues of arachidon...
Nicotinic acetylcholine receptors (nAChRs) fulfill a variety of functions making identification and analysis of nAChR subtypes a challenging task. Traditional instruments for nAChR research are d-tubocurarine, snake venom protein α-bungarotoxin (α-Bg...
Lynx1, membrane-bound protein co-localized with the nicotinic acetylcholine receptors (nAChRs) and regulates their function, is a three-finger protein (TFP) made of three β-structural loops, similarly to snake venom α-neurotoxin TFPs. Sinc...