VITAMINS
Online ISSN : 2424-080X
Print ISSN : 0006-386X
Volume 77, Issue 1
Displaying 1-24 of 24 articles from this issue
  • Yoshinori ITOKAWA
    Article type: Article
    2003 Volume 77 Issue 1 Pages 3-10
    Published: January 25, 2003
    Released on J-STAGE: December 26, 2017
    JOURNAL FREE ACCESS
    In 1960, the author started a thiamine research at Department of Hygiene, Faculty of Medicine, Kyoto University, under Professor Fujiwara's guidance. Allithiamine, a lipotropic derivative of thiamine, enters cells in direct proportion to dosage by passive diffusion and then is quickly converted to thiamine intracellularly. The author used allithiamine labeled with S^<35> on sulfur in the S-propyl group [TPD-S^<35>(outer)] and labeled with S^<35> on sulfur in the thiazole group [TPD-S^<35>(inner)]. It was found that allithiamine split in vivo at the -S-S- linkage into the thiamine portion and propylmercapto group. The thiamine part penetrated in large amount into the blood cells, while the majority of S^<35> from propylmercapto group was found in plasma after oral or parenteral administration of allithiamine. From 1967 to 1969, the author conducted some studies on nonenzymatic role of thiamine in nervous function with Professor J. R. Cooper at Yale University, U.S.A. and these results suggested that thiamine played an important role in the function of the sodium channel in nerve membranes. However, a hypothesis that thiamine triphosphate might play a role in this function could not be elucidated. The methodology which we adopted at that time was so primitive to clarify the problems. In 1979, the author was appointed as the professor and chiarman of Department of Hygiene, one of the field of social medicine, and the author had to include some researches with a tinge of social medicine into our research projects besides the biochemical studies. Amyotrophic lateral sclerosis was prevalent in the Muro district in Wakayama Prefecture and magnesium content in drinking water from this area was lower than water from the other districts in Japan. In 1962, we investigated thiamine metabolism of these patients and found that the patients had lost the ability to utilize thiamine. This finding drived me to start the another research project on the clarifica tion of relationship between thiamine and magnesium metabolism. Since then, variety of researches on two major fields, i.e. vitamins and minerals, had been carried out by our research group. The author would be very glad if this article could be helpful for young researchers to develop their future researches on vitamins by learning from our researches including unsuccessful ones, "Hanmenkyoshi" in Japanese.
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  • Haruhiko SAKURABA
    Article type: Article
    2003 Volume 77 Issue 1 Pages 11-23
    Published: January 25, 2003
    Released on J-STAGE: December 26, 2017
    JOURNAL FREE ACCESS
    Hyperthermophiles, a group of microorganisms whose optimum growth temperatures are above 80℃, have been isolated mainly from marine and continental volcanic environments. They are viewed as potential sources of extraordinarily stable biomolecules with applications in novel industrial processes. Most hyperthermophiles belong to the domain Archaea, the third domain of life, and are considered to be the most ancient of all extant life forms. Recent studies have revealed unusual energy metabolic processes in hyperthermophilic archaea, e.g. a modified Embden-Meyerhof pathway, that have not been observed so far in organisms belonging to the Bacteria and Eucarya domains. Several novel enzymes, e.g. ADP-dependent glucokinase and ADP-dependent phosphofructokinase, have been found to be involved in the modified Embden-Meyerhof pathway of the hyperthermophilic archaeon Pyrococcu furiosus. We cloned and sequenced the genes encoding the ADP-dependent glucokinases from P.furiosus and Thermococcus litoralis, a near relative of Pfuriosus. Their amino acid sequences did not show similarity with any ATP-dependent kinases that have been reported so far. On the other hand, the amino acid sequence of the P.furiosus enzyme showed a high degree of similarity (50%) with that renorted for the P.furiosus ADP-dependent phosphofructokinase. This suggests that these ADP-dependent kinases belong to a novel kinase family and might have evolved from a common origin. Recently, we have found that a novel bifunctional ADP-dependent glucokinase/phosphofructokinase is present in the hyperthermophilic archaeon Methanococcus jannaschii. The enzyme was proposed to be a common origin of the ADP-dependent glucokinase and phosphofructokinase from genome analysis. From an energy metabolic point of view, we have analyzed ATP-generation system in the P.furiosus glucogenesis and revealed that a novel regulation site for energy metabolism and a unique mode of ATP regeneration exist in the pathway of P.furiosus. The metabolic design observed in this microorganism might reflect the situation at an early stage of evolution. This review focuses mainly on the unique energy metabolism and related enzymes of P.furiosus and near relatives that have recently been observed.
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  • Yoshiyuki HAYAMA, Yasuki FUKUDA, Shigeyuki KAWAI, Wataru HASHIMOTO, Ko ...
    Article type: Article
    2003 Volume 77 Issue 1 Pages 25-26
    Published: January 25, 2003
    Released on J-STAGE: December 26, 2017
    JOURNAL FREE ACCESS
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  • [in Japanese], [in Japanese]
    Article type: Article
    2003 Volume 77 Issue 1 Pages 27-29
    Published: January 25, 2003
    Released on J-STAGE: December 26, 2017
    JOURNAL FREE ACCESS
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  • [in Japanese], [in Japanese]
    Article type: Article
    2003 Volume 77 Issue 1 Pages 29-31
    Published: January 25, 2003
    Released on J-STAGE: December 26, 2017
    JOURNAL FREE ACCESS
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  • [in Japanese], [in Japanese]
    Article type: Article
    2003 Volume 77 Issue 1 Pages 32-35
    Published: January 25, 2003
    Released on J-STAGE: December 26, 2017
    JOURNAL FREE ACCESS
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  • [in Japanese], [in Japanese]
    Article type: Article
    2003 Volume 77 Issue 1 Pages 37-39
    Published: January 25, 2003
    Released on J-STAGE: December 26, 2017
    JOURNAL FREE ACCESS
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  • [in Japanese]
    Article type: Article
    2003 Volume 77 Issue 1 Pages 41-42
    Published: January 25, 2003
    Released on J-STAGE: December 26, 2017
    JOURNAL FREE ACCESS
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  • [in Japanese]
    Article type: Article
    2003 Volume 77 Issue 1 Pages 42-44
    Published: January 25, 2003
    Released on J-STAGE: December 26, 2017
    JOURNAL FREE ACCESS
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  • [in Japanese]
    Article type: Article
    2003 Volume 77 Issue 1 Pages 44-45
    Published: January 25, 2003
    Released on J-STAGE: December 26, 2017
    JOURNAL FREE ACCESS
    Download PDF (271K)
  • [in Japanese]
    Article type: Article
    2003 Volume 77 Issue 1 Pages 45-46
    Published: January 25, 2003
    Released on J-STAGE: December 26, 2017
    JOURNAL FREE ACCESS
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  • [in Japanese]
    Article type: Article
    2003 Volume 77 Issue 1 Pages 46-47
    Published: January 25, 2003
    Released on J-STAGE: December 26, 2017
    JOURNAL FREE ACCESS
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  • [in Japanese]
    Article type: Article
    2003 Volume 77 Issue 1 Pages 49-
    Published: January 25, 2003
    Released on J-STAGE: December 26, 2017
    JOURNAL FREE ACCESS
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  • [in Japanese]
    Article type: Article
    2003 Volume 77 Issue 1 Pages 49-51
    Published: January 25, 2003
    Released on J-STAGE: December 26, 2017
    JOURNAL FREE ACCESS
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  • [in Japanese]
    Article type: Article
    2003 Volume 77 Issue 1 Pages 51-52
    Published: January 25, 2003
    Released on J-STAGE: December 26, 2017
    JOURNAL FREE ACCESS
    Download PDF (328K)
  • [in Japanese], [in Japanese], [in Japanese]
    Article type: Article
    2003 Volume 77 Issue 1 Pages 52-53
    Published: January 25, 2003
    Released on J-STAGE: December 26, 2017
    JOURNAL FREE ACCESS
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  • [in Japanese]
    Article type: Article
    2003 Volume 77 Issue 1 Pages 53-54
    Published: January 25, 2003
    Released on J-STAGE: December 26, 2017
    JOURNAL FREE ACCESS
    Download PDF (310K)
  • [in Japanese], [in Japanese]
    Article type: Article
    2003 Volume 77 Issue 1 Pages 54-55
    Published: January 25, 2003
    Released on J-STAGE: December 26, 2017
    JOURNAL FREE ACCESS
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  • [in Japanese]
    Article type: Article
    2003 Volume 77 Issue 1 Pages 55-56
    Published: January 25, 2003
    Released on J-STAGE: December 26, 2017
    JOURNAL FREE ACCESS
    Download PDF (311K)
  • [in Japanese]
    Article type: Article
    2003 Volume 77 Issue 1 Pages 56-
    Published: January 25, 2003
    Released on J-STAGE: December 26, 2017
    JOURNAL FREE ACCESS
    Download PDF (187K)
  • [in Japanese], [in Japanese], [in Japanese], [in Japanese], [in Japane ...
    Article type: Article
    2003 Volume 77 Issue 1 Pages 56-57
    Published: January 25, 2003
    Released on J-STAGE: December 26, 2017
    JOURNAL FREE ACCESS
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  • [in Japanese], [in Japanese], [in Japanese]
    Article type: Article
    2003 Volume 77 Issue 1 Pages 57-58
    Published: January 25, 2003
    Released on J-STAGE: December 26, 2017
    JOURNAL FREE ACCESS
    Download PDF (311K)
  • [in Japanese]
    Article type: Article
    2003 Volume 77 Issue 1 Pages 58-
    Published: January 25, 2003
    Released on J-STAGE: December 26, 2017
    JOURNAL FREE ACCESS
    Download PDF (186K)
  • [in Japanese]
    Article type: Article
    2003 Volume 77 Issue 1 Pages 58-59
    Published: January 25, 2003
    Released on J-STAGE: December 26, 2017
    JOURNAL FREE ACCESS
    Download PDF (270K)
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