No abstract

Bioactive coatings on VT1-0 commercially pure titanium were formed by the plasma electrolytic oxidation (PEO). A study of the morphological features of coatings was carried out using scanning electron microscopy. A composition of formed coatings was investigated using energy-dispersive spectroscopy and X-ray diffractometry analysis. It was shown that PEO-coatings have calcium phosphate in their composition, which increases the bioactivity of the surface layer. Electrochemical properties of the samples were studied by potentiondynamic polarization and electrochemical impedance spectroscopy in different physiological media: simulated body fluid and minimum essential medium. The data of electrochemical studies indicate more than 15 times decrease in the corrosion current density for the sample with coating (5.0 × 10−9 A/cm2) as compared to the bare titanium (7.7 × 10−8 A/cm2). The formed PEO-layers have elastoplastic properties close to human bone (12–30 GPa) and a lower friction coefficient in comparison with bare metal. The wettability of PEO-layers increased. The contact angle for formed coatings reduced by more than 60° in comparison with bare metal (from 73° for titanium to 8° for PEO-coating). Such an increase in surface hydrophilicity contributes to the greater biocompatibility of the formed coating in comparison with commercially pure titanium. PEO can be prospective as a method for improving titanium surface bioactivity.

No abstract

No abstract

No abstract

An increasing number of studies emphasize the role of non-coding variants in the development of hereditary diseases. However, the interpretation of such variants in clinical genetic testing still remains a critical challenge due to poor knowledge of their pathogenicity mechanisms. It was previously shown that variants in 5′-untranslated regions (5′UTRs) can lead to hereditary diseases due to disruption of upstream open reading frames (uORFs). Here, we performed a manual annotation of upstream translation initiation sites (TISs) in human disease-associated genes from the OMIM database and revealed ∼4.7 thousand of TISs related to uORFs. We compared our TISs with the previous studies and provided a list of ‘high confidence’ uORFs. Using a luciferase assay, we experimentally validated the translation of uORFs in the ETFDH, PAX9, MAST1, HTT, TTN,GLI2 and COL2A1 genes, as well as existence of N-terminal CDS extension in the ZIC2 gene. Besides, we created a tool to annotate the effects of genetic variants located in uORFs. We revealed the variants from the HGMD and ClinVar databases that disrupt uORFs and thereby could lead to Mendelian disorders. We also showed that the distribution of uORFs-affecting variants differs between pathogenic and population variants. Finally, drawing on manually curated data, we developed a machine-learning algorithm that allows us to predict the TISs in other human genes.

In case of using titanium alloys in equipment exposed to aggressive media (for example, sea water), it is necessary to take into account and, first of all, prevent the formation of a galvanic couple of titanium and another metal/alloy, which in most cases leads to the corrosion destruction of the latter. Another significant problem of using titanium is its low wear-resistance and poor tribological characteristics. To impart the necessary properties to titanium and its alloys, a composite coating was formed on the top of titanium. For the coating formation, a combination of the plasma electrolytic treatment and polymer spraying was used. The SEM, EDS and XRD analyses established morphological features, elemental and phase composition of the composite coatings. Contact angles and the wettability parameters of the composite coatings were investigated. An analysis of the data obtained showed that composite coatings have better protective properties than untreated material and base PEO coatings.

No abstract