Body modification

Summary

Body modification (or body alteration) is the deliberate altering of the human anatomy or human physical appearance. In its broadest definition it includes skin tattooing, socially acceptable decoration (e.g., common ear piercing in many societies), and religious rites of passage (e.g., circumcision in a number of cultures), as well as the modern primitive movement. Body modification is performed for a large variety of reasons, including aesthetics, sexual enhancement, rites of passage, religious beliefs, to display group membership or affiliation, in remembrance of lived experience, traditional symbolism such as axis mundi and mythology, to create body art, for shock value, and as self-expression, among other reasons. What counts as "body modification" varies in cultures. In western cultures, the cutting or removal of one's hair is not usually considered body modification. Body modification can be contrasted with body adornment by defining body modification as "the physical alteration of the physical body [...] can be temporary or permanent, although most are permanent and modify the body forever". "Disfigurement" and "mutilation" (regardless of any appreciation this always applies objectively whenever a bodily function is gravely diminished or lost) are terms used by opponents of body modification to describe certain types of modifications, especially non-consensual ones. Those terms are used fairly uncontroversially to describe the victims of torture, who have endured damage to ears, eyes, feet, genitalia, hands, noses, teeth, and/or tongues, including amputation, burning, flagellation, piercing, skinning, and wheeling. Some invasive procedures that modify human genitals are performed with the informed consent of the patient, using anesthesia or sterilised surgical tools The phrase "genital mutilation" is sometimes used to describe procedures that individuals are forced to undergo castration, male circumcision, and female genital mutilation in this way.

Official source

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Body_modification

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Novel systems biology approaches for design and analysis of palmitoylation networks reveal its regulatory effects on protein stability, activity and localization

Tiziano Dallavilla

Communication and environment sensing are fundamental for the regulation of the majority of the cellular functions. In cells there are dedicated networks that are responsible for signalling, which gives the ability to the cell of sensing the external and internal environment allowing rapid response and adaptation to changes and stress events. A major component of these networks are post translational modifications. Their attachment to proteins in response to a change in the surrounding conditions can have very drastic consequences on modified proteins. Since post translational modification can heavily influence the cellular fate it is essential to identify these modifications and to understand their functioning, to better comprehend how cells respond to environments changes and different types of stress events to which they are continuously subjected. In this work we analyse a type of modification called S-palmitoylation, which is recently emerging as signalling/regulatory modification. S-Palmitoylation, or more generally âacylationâ, is the addition of an acyl chain to the SH-group of a cysteine via a thioester bond. This type of modification has a big impact at the cellular level. In different studies about palmitoylated proteins, functional consequences are observed at the cellular level, like altered signalling capacity, activity modulation, regulation of protein stability and localization. Palmitoylation was studied using a mathematical modelling approach. Based on experimental data we developed models of the palmitoylation process of different proteins. Using a bottom up approach we first investigated the consequences of protein palmitoylation on the endoplasmic reticulum chaperone calnexin, to better understand the consequences of palmitoylation at the protein level. Following the same approach we investigated the effects of palmitoylation on DHHC6, a palmitoyltransferase that is responsible for palmitoylation of calnexin, which itself undergoes palmitoylation from the palmitoyltransferase DHHC16. In the last part of the project we focused on the study of palmitoylation at the network level. For this purpose we reconstructed the palmitoylation cascade of calnexin, including in the model all the proteins involved in the palmitoylation process of this protein. This network of palmitoylation allowed us to investigate the dynamics of palmitoylation at the network level, focusing in the characterization of those mechanisms that are responsible for regulation of palmitoylation on different substrates. This work provides an unprecedented level of understanding of palmitoylation dynamics, both at the protein and network level. Moreover all the models and the tools for model analysis used in this work have been developed keeping in mind the final goal of reconstructing the entire palmitoylation network. Thanks to the approach we chose for modelling, the calnexin network model developed during this project can be easily expanded to include other portions of the palmitoylation networks. Similarly the tools developed for model analysis can be easily adapted to work on post-translational modification assays and analysis of biological functions from the smaller to the larger scales.

EPFL2017

With the global nanotechnology market growing rapidly, nanomaterials are being increasingly released into aquatic environments, where they can undergo modifications and sedimentation, which will put benthic organisms at risk. Of particular interest is the study of nanomaterial effects on periphyton, a community of auto- and heterotrophic microorganisms embedded in an extracellular polymer matrix that covers submerged surfaces in aquatic ecosystems. Although periphyton assumes important functions in ecosystems, like primary production, little information is available on its sensitivity to nanomaterials and how these might be transferred to higher trophic levels in food webs. In the present thesis, effects of short- and long-term exposures to citrate-coated silver nanoparticles (AgNP, 35 nm) and silver ions (Ag+, dosed as AgNO3) were assessed on periphyton in microcosm studies for periods between 2 hours and 21 days. After exposure, primary production, secondary production, photosynthetic yield, microbial respiration and potential extracellular enzyme activity were measured. Moreover, addition of an aquatic snail, Physa acuta, feeding on periphyton allowed the assessment of effects of AgNP on an aquatic herbivore and trophic transfer efficiency. Contaminated (AgNP and AgNO3) and uncontaminated periphyton was offered to snails in a 5-day experiment to determine silver uptake and the mortality, feeding rate and reproduction of the snails. Our findings show that all endpoints measured in periphyton were affected by both AgNP and AgNO3 during short-term exposure, but AgNO3 was more toxic on a total silver mass basis than AgNP. Concentrations causing a 50% reduction in the different endpoints (EC50) ranged from 17 to 83 µM AgNP and from 2 to 4 µM AgNO3. Exposure of periphyton in the presence of silver ion ligands to complex Ag+ (ca. 1% of total silver in AgNP suspensions) prevented AgNP toxicity to most endpoints, confirming that the observed toxic effects were caused by the bioavailable Ag+. An exception was the extracellular enzyme leucine aminopeptidase, which was directly affected by AgNP. Concentrations of AgNP and AgNO3 that caused low toxicity during short-term exposure also caused effects on periphyton functions upon long-term exposure, with algae and bacteria being differently affected. Periphyton exposed to 10 µM AgNP for 21 days showed a 63% decrease in primary production and a 246% increase in bacterial secondary production per unit of total periphyton biomass. The community composition exposed to AgNP or AgNO3 differed from that of the control and also from each other. Furthermore, AgNP-exposed communities were more tolerant to subsequent AgNP exposure. Trophic transfer of silver from contaminated periphyton to snails occurred efficiently, independently of the silver form. Feeding rate of snails on AgNO3-exposed communities was 50% lower than on controls, and disturbance of digestion was evident upon feeding on both AgNP- and AgNO3-exposed communities. No changes in the mortality or egg production of the snails were observed. However, the hatching success of eggs from snails that fed on contaminated periphyton was reduced by more than 79%, and 28-day old embryos showed malformations. Overall, this study clearly identified damaging effects of AgNP on periphyton, with consequent indirect impacts on a consumer, trophic relationships and stream ecosystem processes.

EPFL2015

Palmitoylation, pathogens and their host

Françoise Gisou van der Goot Grunberg, Sanja Blaskovic, Mathieu Blanc

S-Palmitoylation, the only reversible post-translational lipid modification, confers unique biochemical and functional properties to proteins. Although it has long been known that viral proteins are palmitoylated, recent studies reveal that this modification plays a critical role for pathogens of all kinds and at multiple steps of their life cycle. The present review examines the involvement of S-palmitoylation in infection by viruses, bacteria and parasites and illustrates how pathogens have evolved to manipulate the host palmitoylation machinery.

2013

Novel systems biology approaches for design and analysis of palmitoylation networks reveal its regulatory effects on protein stability, activity and localization

Tiziano Dallavilla

EPFL2017

EPFL2015