Browsing by Author "Friant S"

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    Combining data from consumers and traditional medicine practitioners to provide a more complete picture of Chinese bear bile markets
    (John Wiley and Sons Ltd on behalf of British Ecological Society, 2021-10-07) Hinsley A; Hu S; Chen H; Garshelis D; Hoffmann M; Lee TM; Moyle B; Qiu Y; Ruan X; Wan AKY; Zhou J; Milner-Gulland EJ; Friant S
    1. Understanding wildlife consumption is essential for the design and evaluation of effective conservation interventions to reduce illegal trade. This requires understanding both the consumers themselves and those who influence their behaviour. For example, in markets for wildlife-based medicines, both consumers and medical practitioners have a role in which products are consumed. 2. We used mixed methods to triangulate data on bear bile consumption from 3,646 members of the public, 80 pharmacy workers and 38 Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM) doctors in four provincial capital cities across China. Bear bile can be sold legally in packaged TCM products made from farmed bile, or sold illegally, often as raw gallbladders from wild bears. We interviewed medical practitioners, and surveyed the public using both direct questions (DQ) and the Unmatched Count Technique (UCT), an indirect method used to improve reporting of sensitive behaviours. We applied a ‘combined’ UCT-DQ analysis to produce a more robust consumption estimate. 3. In all, 140 (3.8%) survey respondents directly reported recent (<3 years) bile consumption, but the combined UCT-DQ estimate was 11.2%. In total, 14 survey respondents (0.4% sample and 10% recent consumers) self-reported recent wild bile consumption. Almost a quarter of doctors and half of pharmacy workers had ever prescribed bile. 4. Around half of doctors and over a quarter of pharmacy workers said that bear bile was the best medicine in certain situations. More than half of doctors and over a third of pharmacy workers thought wild bile was more effective than farmed, although we found no evidence of wild bile being formally prescribed. Consumers could name specific treatment uses of bile but almost half of recent consumers did not know the source of bile they had consumed. 5. We show that gathering perspectives from different wildlife market actors can generate a more complete picture of trade. In China, bile consumption may be limited by its specific TCM treatment uses, but whether practitioner views on the greater effectiveness of wild bile are passed to consumers must be investigated further. With potential overlap between farmed and wild consumption, any interventions to change these markets must carefully consider how both consumers and practitioners may react.
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    Yeast as a Model to Understand Actin-Mediated Cellular Functions in Mammals-Illustrated with Four Actin Cytoskeleton Proteins
    (MDPI (Basel, Switzerland), 2020-03-10) Akram Z; Ahmed I; Mack H; Kaur R; Silva RC; Castilho BA; Friant S; Sattlegger E; Munn AL
    The budding yeast Saccharomyces cerevisiae has an actin cytoskeleton that comprises a set of protein components analogous to those found in the actin cytoskeletons of higher eukaryotes. Furthermore, the actin cytoskeletons of S. cerevisiae and of higher eukaryotes have some similar physiological roles. The genetic tractability of budding yeast and the availability of a stable haploid cell type facilitates the application of molecular genetic approaches to assign functions to the various actin cytoskeleton components. This has provided information that is in general complementary to that provided by studies of the equivalent proteins of higher eukaryotes and hence has enabled a more complete view of the role of these proteins. Several human functional homologues of yeast actin effectors are implicated in diseases. A better understanding of the molecular mechanisms underpinning the functions of these proteins is critical to develop improved therapeutic strategies. In this article we chose as examples four evolutionarily conserved proteins that associate with the actin cytoskeleton: 1) yeast Hof1p/mammalian PSTPIP1, 2) yeast Rvs167p/mammalian BIN1, 3) yeast eEF1A/eEF1A1 and eEF1A2 and 4) yeast Yih1p/mammalian IMPACT. We compare the knowledge on the functions of these actin cytoskeleton-associated proteins that has arisen from studies of their homologues in yeast with information that has been obtained from in vivo studies using live animals or in vitro studies using cultured animal cell lines.