Maor Bar-Peled

Abstract Nasal epithelia are amongst the first lines of defense against airway infections. Development of a robust ex vivo nasal epithelia model will enable further mechanistic study of pathogen-upper airway interaction. While the current human nasal epithelia models are limited by their availability and ethical constraints, there is a lack of a robust mouse nasal epithelia model. Here, we developed a functional mouse primary nasal epithelia (MNE) model in an air-liquid interface (ALI).

The rare branched-chain sugar apiose, once thought to only be present in the plant kingdom, was found in two bacterial species: Geminicoccus roseus and Xanthomonas pisi. Glycans with apiose residues were detected in aqueous methanol-soluble fractions as well as in the insoluble pellet fraction of X. pisi.

An exopolysaccharide, produced during the late stage of stationary growth phase, was discovered and purified from the culture medium of Bacillus cereus, Bacillus anthracis, and Bacillus thuringiensis when strains were grown in a defined nutrient medium that induces biofilm. Two-dimensional NMR structural characterization of the polysaccharide, named pzX, revealed that it is composed of an unusual three amino-sugar sequence repeat of [-3)XylNAc4OAc(α1–3)GlcNAcA4OAc(α1-3)XylNAc(α1-] .