The effect of TACO_1-299, the N-terminal truncation of TACO, on phorbol 12-myristate 13-acetate (PMA)-induced U937 cell adhesion was investigated. Full-length TACO and several truncations were overexpressed in U937 cells. The effects of the expressed proteins on U937 cell adhesion mediated by PMA-induced differentiation were observed by fluorescence microscopy. The results show that the overexpression of TACO_1-299 inhibits cell adhesion while overexpressions of the other proteins do not have this effect. The actin-binding capability of TACO_1-299 was investigated and the results show that TACO_1-299 lacks the ability of TACO to bind F-actin. The inhibitive effect of TACO_1-299, the functional domain of TACO, suggests that TACO may play a role in cell differentiation mediating adhesion of monoblastic leukemia cells.

SecA is the essential component of the signal-peptide dependent translocation pathway in Escherichia coli (E.coli). The structure and function of SecA must be known to understand the molecular mechanism of preprotein translocation. The high flexibility of SecA causes a dynamic conformational heterogeneity which presents a barrier to the growth of crystals of high diffraction quality. Electron microscopy was used to resolve the macromolecular structure of SecA in solution by negative staining and single particle analysis at a resolution of 2.9 nm. The structure of E. coli SecA is similar to the dimeric form of Bacilius subtilis SecA and is 10 nm×10 nm×5 nm in size.

Trichosanthin (TCS) is a plant toxin with ribosome-inactivating activity. TCS can be internalized by the host cells and then attacks the ribosomes resulting in cell death. However, the manner for endocytic uptake of TCS is not well understood. The present work investigates the endocytosis pathway of TCS in human choriocarcinoma cells. The different endocytic mechanisms are interfered by potassium depletion, cholesterol-extraction/addition, or treatments of various drugs. The experiments detect their effects on the TCS-uptake. The results show that a large portion of the TCS can be internalized by clathrin-dependent, as well as by clathrin-independent but cholesterol-dependent endocytosis in human choriocarcinoma cells.