Tachyplesin I is a cationic peptide isolated from hemocytes of the horseshoe crab and its anti-tumor activity has been demonstrated in several tumor cells. However, there is limited information providing the global effects and mechanisms of tachyplesin I on glioblastoma multiforme (GBM). Here, by using two complementary proteomic strategies (2D-DIGE and dimethyl isotope labeling-based shotgun proteomics), we explored the effect of tachyplesin I on the proteome of gliomaspheres, a three-dimensional growth model formed by a GBM cell line U251. In total, the expression levels of 192 proteins were found to be significantly altered by tachyplesin I treatment. Gene ontology (GO) analysis revealed that many of them were cytoskeleton proteins and lysosomal acid hydrolases, and the mostly altered biological process was related to cellular metabolism, especially glycolysis. Moreover, we built protein–protein interaction network of these proteins and suggested the important role of DNA topoisomerase 2-alpha (TOP2A) in the signal-transduction cascade of tachyplesin I. In conclusion, we propose that tachyplesin I might down-regulate cathepsins in lysosomes and up-regulate TOP2A to inhibit migration and promote apoptosis in glioma, thus contribute to its anti-tumor function. Our results suggest tachyplesin I is a potential candidate for treatment of glioma.

An increasing number of microorganisms are being identified as pathogens for diseases in macroalgae, but the species composition of bacteria related to Caulerpa lentillifera, fresh edible green macroalgae worldwide, remains largely unclear. The bacterial communities associated with C. lentillifera were investigated by high-throughput 16S rDNA sequencing, and the bacterial diversities in washed and control groups were compared in this study. A total of 4,388 operational taxonomic units were obtained from all the samples, and the predominant prokaryotic phyla were Proteobacteria, Bacteroidetes, Planctomycetes, Cyanobacteria, Actinobacteria, Verrucomicrobia, Chloroflexi, and Acidobacteria in C. lentillifera. The bacterial diversity changed with seasons and showed an increasing trend of diversity with the rising temperature in C. lentillifera. There were slight reductions in the abundance and diversity of bacteria after washing with tap water for 2 h, indicating that only parts of the bacterial groups could be washed out, and hidden dangers in C. lentillifera still exist. Although the reduction in the abundance of some bacteria revealed a positive significance of washing C. lentillifera with tap water on food safety, more effective cleaning methods still need to be explored.

Tachyplesin I (TP I) is an antimicrobial peptide isolated from the hemocytes of the horseshoe crab. With the developments of DNA microarray technology, the genetic analysis of the toxic effect of TP I on embryo was originally considered in our recent study. Based on our microarray data of the embryonic samples of zebrafish treated with the different doses of TP I, we performed a series of statistical data analyses to explore the toxic effect of TP I at the genomic level. In this paper, we first employed the hexaMplot to illustrate the continuous variation of the gene expressions of the embryonic cells treated with the different doses of TP I. The probabilistic model-based Hough transform was used to classify these differentially coexpressed genes of TP I on the zebrafish embryos. As a result, three line rays supported with the corresponding 174 genes were detected in our analysis. Some biological processes of the featured genes, such as antigen processing, nuclear chromatin, and structural constituent of eye lens, were significantly filtered with the smallerPvalues.