A protein kinase is a kinase enzyme that modifies other proteins by chemically adding phosphate groups to them. Phosphorylation results in a functional change of the target protein by changing enzyme activity, cellular location, or association with other proteins; the human genome contains about 500 protein kinase genes and they constitute about 2% of all human genes. Protein kinases are found in bacteria and plants. Up to 30% of all human proteins may be modified by kinase activity, kinases are known to regulate the majority of cellular pathways those involved in signal transduction; the chemical activity of a kinase involves removing a phosphate group from ATP and covalently attaching it to one of three amino acids that have a free hydroxyl group. Most kinases act on both serine and threonine, others act on tyrosine, a number act on all three. There are protein kinases that phosphorylate other amino acids, including histidine kinases that phosphorylate histidine residues; because protein kinases have profound effects on a cell, their activity is regulated.
Kinases are turned on or off by phosphorylation, by binding of activator proteins or inhibitor proteins, or small molecules, or by controlling their location in the cell relative to their substrates. The catalytic subunits of many protein kinases are conserved, several structures have been solved. Eukaryotic protein kinases are enzymes that belong to a extensive family of proteins that share a conserved catalytic core. There are a number of conserved regions in the catalytic domain of protein kinases. In the N-terminal extremity of the catalytic domain there is a glycine-rich stretch of residues in the vicinity of a lysine amino acid, shown to be involved in ATP binding. In the central part of the catalytic domain, there is a conserved aspartic acid, important for the catalytic activity of the enzyme. Serine/threonine protein kinases phosphorylate the OH group of threonine. Activity of these protein kinases can be regulated by specific events, as well as numerous chemical signals, including cAMP/cGMP, Ca2+/calmodulin.
One important group of protein kinases are the MAP kinases. Important subgroups are the kinases of the ERK subfamily activated by mitogenic signals, the stress-activated protein kinases JNK and p38. While MAP kinases are serine/threonine-specific, they are activated by combined phosphorylation on serine/threonine and tyrosine residues. Activity of MAP kinases is restricted by a number of protein phosphatases, which remove the phosphate groups that are added to specific serine or threonine residues of the kinase and are required to maintain the kinase in an active conformation. Two major factors influence activity of MAP kinases: a) signals that activate transmembrane receptors and proteins associated with them b) signals that inactivate the phosphatases that restrict a given MAP kinase; such signals include oxidant stress. Tyrosine-specific protein kinases phosphorylate tyrosine amino acid residues, like serine/threonine-specific kinases are used in signal transduction, they act as growth factor receptors and in downstream signaling from growth factors.
These kinases consist of a transmembrane receptor with a tyrosine kinase domain protruding into the cytoplasm. They play an important role in regulating cell division, cellular differentiation, morphogenesis. More than 50 receptor tyrosine kinases are known in mammals; the extracellular domain serves as the ligand-binding part of the molecule. It can be a separate unit, attached to the rest of the receptor by a disulfide bond; the same mechanism can be used to bind two receptors together to form a homo- or heterodimer. The transmembrane element is a single α helix; the intracellular or cytoplasmic domain is responsible for the kinase activity, as well as several regulatory functions. Ligand binding causes two reactions: Dimerization of two monomeric receptor kinases or stabilization of a loose dimer. Many ligands of receptor tyrosine kinases are multivalent; some tyrosine receptor kinases can form heterodimers with other similar but not identical kinases of the same subfamily, allowing a varied response to the extracellular signal.
Trans-autophosphorylation of the kinase. The autophosphorylation causes the two subdomains of the intrinsic kinase to shift, opening the kinase domain for ATP binding. In the inactive form, the kinase subdomains are aligned so that ATP cannot reach the catalytic center of the kinase; when several amino acids suitable for phosphorylation are present in the kinase domain, the activity of the kinase can increase with the number of phosphorylated amino acids. The active tyrosine kinase phosphorylates specific target proteins, which are enzymes themselves. An important target is the ras protein signal-transduction chain. Tyrosine kinases recruited to a
Leroy Thompson is a former fullback/linebacker in the Arena Football League for 13 years. He has played for the Albany / Indiana Firebirds, the New Orleans VooDoo and the Columbus Destroyers, he played college football at Delaware State University where he was a first team Division I-AA All-American and holds all quarterback sack records. Played with the Philadelphia Eagles of the NFL in 1996 and with the Toronto Argonauts of the CFL in 1994. Thompson attended Delaware State University where he was a two-time All Mid-Eastern Athletic Conference selection. During his junior season, he recorded a school record 16 sacks, five sacks in one game against North Carolina A&T, a school record; as a senior, Thompson earned First Team Division I-AA Kodak All-America honors as he led the team with 89 tackles and 11 sacks. Leroy's 30 career sacks rate third all-time for the Hornets. Thompson played an astounding thirteen seasons in the AFL, is considered one of the leagues all-time greatest linebacker/fullbacks.
Playing for the Albany / Indiana Firebirds, New Orleans VooDoo, the Columbus Destroyers. His best statistical season came in 2000 while playing for the Firebirds, rushing the ball 59 times for 191 yards and 14 touchdowns. Defensively, his best season came in 2002 tallying 16 tackles and five sacks including 37 rushes for 117 yards and 10 touchdowns, his efforts were rewarded that season by being named First Team All-Arena FB/LB, the AFL's Ford Tough Man of the Year. Thompson was a participant in the 2007 ArenaBowl as a member of the National Conference Champion, Columbus Destroyers, won an ArenaBowl Championship in 1999 with the Albany Firebirds; when he retired in 2008, he was only one of six AFL players who had rushed for over 1,000 career yards. He led his team in rushing six of his 13 seasons in the League, while being in the Top 10 overall in that same category five out of those 13 seasons. Thompson was invited by the San Diego Chargers in the 2015 training camp to work as the assistant to defensive line coach Don Johnson through the Bill Walsh NFL Minority Coaches Internship Program.
In 2012 and 2013, Thompson was a member of Chuck Pagano's Indianapolis Colts coaching staff through the same program. Pagano states, he was a member of the Philadelphia Eagles coaching staff in the 2011 training camp where he served as assistant coach under former defensive line coach Jim Washburn. He coached on the college level as an assistant coach at Wesley College and Lincoln University. While at Lincoln, he helped the second-year program win two more games than the previous season, working with a defensive unit that shaved nearly two touchdowns per game off of its points allowed. In 2013, Thompson was named the defensive line coach for the Pittsburgh Power. In 2018, Thompson became the defensive line coach for the Atlanta Legends of the newly-formed Alliance of American Football. Thompson played the role of Philadelphia Eagles defensive end Carl "Big Daddy" Hairston in the Vince Papale movie Invincible
Achill Island in County Mayo is the largest of the Irish isles, is situated off the west coast of Ireland. It has a population of 2,700, its area is 148 km2. Achill is attached to the mainland by Michael Davitt Bridge, between the villages of Gob an Choire and Poll Raithní. A bridge was first completed here in 1887, replaced by another structure in 1949, subsequently replaced with the current bridge, completed in 2008. Other centres of population include the villages of Keel, Dumha Éige, Dún Ibhir, The Valley and Dugort; the parish's main Gaelic football pitch and secondary school are on the mainland at Poll Raithní. Early human settlements are believed to have been established on Achill around 3000 BC. A paddle dating from this period was found at the crannóg near Dookinella; the island is 87% peat bog. It is believed; the island would have been forest until the Neolithic people began crop cultivation. Settlement increased during the Iron Age, the dispersal of small promontory forts around the coast indicate the warlike nature of the times.
Megalithic tombs and forts can be seen along the Atlantic Drive and on Achillbeg. Achill Island lies in the Barony of Burrishoole, in the territory of ancient Umhall, that encompassed an area extending from the County Galway/Mayo border to Achill Head; the hereditary chieftains of Umhall were the O'Malleys, recorded in the area in 814 AD when they repelled an onslaught by the Vikings in Clew Bay. The Anglo-Norman invasion of Connacht in 1235 AD saw the territory of Umhall taken over by the Butlers and by the de Burgos; the Butler Lordship of Burrishoole continued into the late 14th century when Thomas le Botiller was recorded as being in possession of Akkyll and Owyll. In the 17th and 18th centuries, there was much migration to Achill from other parts of Ireland Ulster, due to the political and religious turmoil of the time. For a while there were two different dialects of Irish being spoken on Achill; this led to many townlands being recorded as having two names during the 1824 Ordnance Survey, some maps today give different names for the same place.
Achill Irish still has many traces of Ulster Irish. Carrickkildavnet Castle is a 15th-century tower house associated with the O'Malley Clan, who were once a ruling family of Achill. Grace O' Malley, or Granuaile, the most famous of the O'Malleys, was born on Clare Island around 1530, her father was the chieftain of the barony of Murrisk. The O'Malleys were a powerful seafaring family. Grace gained fame as a sea captain and pirate, she is reputed to have met with Queen Elizabeth I in 1593. She is buried in the O'Malley family tomb on Clare Island. One of Achill's most famous historical sites is ` the Colony' at Dugort. In 1831 the Church of Ireland Reverend Edward Nangle founded a proselytising mission at Dugort; the Mission included cottages, an orphanage, an infirmary and a guesthouse. The Colony gave rise to mixed assessments during the Great Famine when charges of'souperism' were leveled against Edward Nangle. For forty years Edward Nangle edited a newspaper called the Achill Missionary Herald and Western Witness, printed in Achill.
Nangle. Expanded his mission into Mweelin in west Achill where a school, rectory, cottages and a training school were built. Edward's wife Eliza suffered poor health in Achill and died in 1852; the Achill Mission began to decline after Nangle was moved from Achill and was closed in the 1880s. When Edward Nangle died in 1883 there were opposing views on his legacy. In 1894, the Westport - Newport railway line was extended to Achill Sound; the railway station is now a hostel. The train provided a great service to Achill, but it is said to have fulfilled an ancient prophecy. Brian Rua O' Cearbhain had prophesied that'carts on iron wheels' would carry bodies into Achill on their first and last journey. In 1894, the first train on the Achill railway carried the bodies of victims of the Clew Bay Drowning; this tragedy occurred. They had been going to meet the steamer; the Kirkintilloch Fire in 1937 fulfilled the second part of the prophecy when the bodies of ten victims were carried by rail to Achill. While it was not the last train, the railway would close just two weeks later.
These people had died in a fire in a bothy in Kirkintilloch. This term referred to the temporary accommodation provided for those who went to Scotland to pick potatoes, a migratory pattern, established in the early nineteenth century. Kildamhnait on the south-east coast of Achill is named after St. Damhnait, or Dymphna, who founded a church there in the 16th century. There is a holy well just outside the graveyard; the present church was built in the 1700s and the graveyard contains memorials to the victims of two of Achill's greatest tragedies, the Kirchintilloch Fire and the Clew Bay Drowning. In 1852, Dr. John McHale, Archbishop of Tuam purchased land in Bunnacurry which became the location of a Franciscan Monastery which, for many years provided an education for local children; the building of the monastery was marked by a conflict between the followers of the Achill Mission colony and those building the monastery. The dispute is known in the island folklore
Professor G. Ram Reddy is renowned architect of Distance Education and the father of open learning in India. Early Childhood Prof. Ram Reddy was born in a small village, called Mylaram in Karimnagar district of Telangana in 1929, his father Kishta Reddy and his mother Kanthamma had no education. Primary education Like most villages in India, Mylaram had an elementary school, so Ram Reddy was sent to Karimnagar town for his schooling, it was here he said, that for the first time he discovered that books other than school textbooks and newspapers existed. He became a voracious reader and a good student, the first student from his village to have passed this exam.. College Education In 1949 he came to Hyderabad and joined the famous Nizam College in Osmania University. Coming from an Urdu medium, rural school, he was struggling to adjust to the urban culture and an English medium college. By 1953 Ram Reddy completed his intermediate and BA in 1955, he become a lecturer in Nalgonda. In 1957, at the age of 28, he left for London to study at the London School of Economics and Political Science.
Early days as a Teacher at Osmania University In 1959, when he returned from London, he joined as a lecturer in Public Administration in Arts College. He soon became a popular teacher. Vice-Chancellor, Osmania University In 1977, when the position of a vice-chancellor of Osmania University fell vacant, Prof. Ram Reddy, a favorite of the teachers and staff became an ideal choice. At the age of 48, he was one of the youngest Vice-Chancellors of his time and the first teacher/ professor to head Osmania University; this was the late seventies, a period right after the emergency when university campuses were turbulent and filled with student protests. During this time, Prof. Ram Reddy became known for his ability to manage student protests without involving police, his accessibility and democratic values endeared him to many. Setting up the first Open University in India: During Prof. Ram Reddy’s term as Vice Chancellor of Osmania University, the first Open University in the world, the UKOU was being established.
Prof. Ram Reddy saw an immense possibility for the open university in India, his dream was to establish distance education. Painstakingly he impressed on the politicians and civil servants of that time about the potential of the experiment, he succeeded in convincing them and in 1982 set up the first open university in India, the Andhra Pradesh Open University in Hyderabad. Setting up the National Open University In March 1985, Prof. Ram Reddy was invited by the Government of India to prepare a blueprint for setting up a National Open University, he joined as a chief consultant, Officer on Special Duty, in July–September that year a report was submitted to K. C. Pant, the minister for Human Resources. Speaking on the floor of the House while piloting the IGNOU bill, K. C. Pant remarked, “Now we have for this university as Officer on Special Duty, doing all work relating to the establishment of this university, Dr. Ram Reddy, an eminent educationist, responsible for the establishment of the Andhra Pradesh Open University.
We have now brought him over for the National Open University. And if I may so, there is nobody else in the country who has his experience in this particular field… Therefore, all of us, I think, should feel quite safe in entrusting the beginning of this university to him”. On August 20, 1985, the Upper House passed the bill to establish the Indira Gandhi National Open University. September 1985, IGNOU was established and Prof. Ram Reddy was appointed as the founder Vice-Chancellor. On 19 November 1985, the foundation stone for IGNOU was laid by Prime Minister, Rajiv Gandhi His ability to establish good relations with politicians and civil servants helped overcome the challenges in setting up a new university in a short period of time, he helped establish study centers in different states. Students who did not have access to traditional institutions of higher education began to join the open university. Soon distance education caught the attention of not only the nation but the world. On the International Scene: Prof. Ram Reddy began to gain recognition on the international scene.
He was elected as the first Secretary General of the Association of Asian Open Universities and was an active member of the International Council for Distance Education. As India’s prominent open learning expert, he was invited to be involved in the establishment of the Commonwealth of Learning, and was invited to join COL as its first Vice-President in 1989. As the vice-president of Commonwealth of Learning in Vancouver, his main concern in this assignment was to facilitate exchange of teaching material and experience in building the open university system. But overall he was not a happy man away from India, so when the government of India invited him to come back as the chairman of UGC, he left his lucrative and leisurely job and took up the task of heading the UGC. Chairman, University Grants Commission Upon his return to India in 1991 as chairman UGC, he had many issues ahead of him: relevance and quality in education, he had many ideas to improve the working of the UGC. He felt the only way to make the UGC more responsive was to decentralise it and set up regional centers.
As chairman of UGC he piloted the establishment of the National Assessment and Accreditation Council to promote quality assurance in higher education in India. His last trip to London Prof. Ram Reddy received many academic honours and awards throughout his life time for his contribution to distance education In June 1995
Annie MacDonald Langstaff was a Canadian law student, legal activist, supporter of women's suffrage and an early woman aviator. Born in Ontario in 1887, she graduated from Prescott High School and married in 1904, her husband abandoned her, leaving her a single mother. Moving to Montreal in 1906, she began working as a stenographer in the law office of Samuel William Jacobs, who encouraged her to study law. Finding no barriers to her admission, Langstaff enrolled at McGill University in 1911, graduating three years as a Bachelor of Civil Law, yet on applying to the Bar of Montreal to practice, she was refused the right to take the examination. When Langstaff petitioned the Superior Court for a Writ Of Mandamus to compel the bar to admit her as she met all statutory requirements, the court upheld the bar's decision based upon the fact that she neither had her husband's permission to attend law school, nor to become a lawyer; as her husband had abandoned her and her child and she did not know where he was, she was unable to obtain his permission.
The refusal led to feminists in support of women's suffrage embracing her cause. She became active in the fight for enfranchisement of women in Quebec, while continuing her fight to become a barrister. In 1915 she filed an appeal with the Court of King's Bench, which ruled against her, claiming that her recourse was to petition the legislature, since they had enacted the statute defining who could become a lawyer. Langstaff was supported in her quest by her employer. Preparing an amendment to the Bar Act, Jacobs argued for the admission of women to the bar before the National Assembly of Quebec in 1915. Numerous attempts were made to change the law, without success. In 1940, when women in Quebec won the right to vote, the decision was used as leverage to change the law excluding women from practicing law; the next year, joined by Leona Bell and Elizabeth C. Monk, Langstaff pleaded with the Quebec Bar Association to support their right to practice; the bar agreed to allow women to enter the profession, if the legislature approved, which they subsequently did on 29 April 1941.
Because of a prerequisite for lawyers admitted to the bar to have obtained a bachelor of arts degree, Langstaff was not admitted to the bar in her lifetime. She wrote Canada's first French-English/English-French law dictionary in 1937, she was posthumously admitted to the Montreal Bar in 2006. Annie MacDonald was born on 6 June 1887 in Alexandria, Glengarry Township, Ontario, to Clara Angela and Archibald B. MacDonald, her father was a teacher an insurance agent, both of her parents were Catholic. Annie was the oldest sibling in a family of five other children: John, Alice Phyllis Muriel "Phyllis", Mary Jane and Eileen. By 1891, the family was living in Prescott, where MacDonald attended Catholic grammar schools and graduated from high school. On 21 November 1904 in Prescott, MacDonald married Gilbert Samuel Langstaff, a carpenter, with whom she had a daughter, Mary Andrea Langstaff, on 28 April 1906. Soon after their marriage and her husband separated, her husband migrated in 1905 to New York City, with another woman whom he claimed to have married in 1904.
In 1906, Langstaff moved to Montreal, Quebec, to work for the law firm of Jacobs and Garneau, as a stenographer for the head partner Samuel William Jacobs, KC. Her family moved to Quebec, where her father worked as a customs collector in Saint-Hyacinthe. Langstaff had an affinity for the law and within a few years was performing much of the company incorporation work for Jacobs. With his encouragement in 1911, she wrote to McGill University's Faculty of Law inquiring if she could be admitted. Frederick P. Walton, dean of the faculty, responded that no woman had asked for admission before, while he was unsure of whether his colleagues would approve, she should begin attending lectures. Langstaff graduated in 1914 with a Bachelor of Civil Law, as first in her class in both criminal and company law, finishing fourth overall with first-class honours; that year, she became the first woman to serve as a court stenographer in the June Special Session of the Montreal Criminal Court. Langstaff applied to sit for the preliminary bar examination but despite her law degree was refused by the Bar of Montreal.
The preliminary examination was open to male students before they began their studies, but anticipating that she might encounter difficulty, Langstaff had not applied until after she had received her degree. In January 1915, she petitioned the Superior Court for a Writ Of Mandamus. With Jacobs acting as her counsellor, she asked the court to grant her the right to take the examination, as she met all the statutory qualifications. At issue were two primary questions: whether a woman was admissible at all, whether as a married woman, Langstaff was admissible as either a law student or lawyer, since her husband had not given his consent. A good deal of the court proceedings focused on the fact that Langstaff was raising her daughter as a single mother and that she did not know the whereabouts of her husband. In his ruling, Justice Henri-Césaire Saint-Pierre denied her request stating that to allow her to practice law without her husband's consent would be a "direct infringement upon public order and a manifest violation of the law of good morals and public decency".
After Saint-Pierre's comments had been publicized in newspapers throughout the United States and Canada, the issue became a cause célèbre for those involved in the struggle for women's suffrage. Professor Carrie Derick and the Montreal Local Council of Women staged demonstrations protesting the decision. Langstaff was invited regularl
The Cape May County Park & Zoo in Cape May Court House, New Jersey, provides free year-round admission to a collection of more than 550 animals representing 250 species in 85 acres of exhibits. The zoo is located at 707 Route 9 North, in the center of Cape May County's Central Park, together the zoo and the park cover about 220 acres; the zoo began operation in 1978. Its principal exhibit areas are a 57-acre African Savanna, a free-flight aviary, a reptile collection. In addition to the Zoo and Park Central, there is Park East, Park North and Park South; the zoo is open every day except for weather permitting. The hours of operation are from 10:00 am until 3:30pm in the winter and 10:00am until 4:30pm in the summer. Time changes occur with Daylight Savings; the zoo has a train ride and carousel. The train can take visitors all around the zoo; the carousel has zoo animals for riding seats unlike the traditional horses on most carousels. Cape May County Zoological Society/ZooFriends, a 5013 non-profit NJ corporation, is the official Support Organization of the Cape May County Park & Zoo.
Since 1986 the Society has continuously provided the private sector funding needed to develop new exhibits, improve facilities, purchase zoo equipment and make acquisitions for the animal collection. The Society makes significant contributions to conservation and endeavors to encourage the community's interest and enjoyment of the Zoo. In 1942, a 40 acres area of wooded land a plantation owned by the Matthews family, was donated to Cape May County; the area housed the 4-H fair. In 1967, the Cape May Park Commission was established to maintain the county's parks; the land donated in 1942 became Park Central, which increased in size to 200 acres. In 1978, the Cape May County Park & Zoo was created within Park Central. In the February 5–6, 2010 North American blizzard, the enclosure of the bald eagle habitat was destroyed by the heavy snow fall, it has since been rebuilt. The Walter Trettin Snow Leopard Habitat was completed in 2016; the zoo was voted the 13th best zoo in the world and the 5th best zoo in the United States in TripAdvisor's Traveler's Choice 2015.
TripAdvisor named the zoo the 3rd best in the nation in 2012. The zoo is accredited by the Association of Zoos and Aquariums, participates in a number of its species survival programs. In particular, a Mountain Bongo Antelope from the zoo's collection was sent to the Mt. Kenya World Heritage Site in 2004 to join a captive breeding population intended to reestablish a wild population in future generations. On May 10, 2010, the Cape May County Zoo welcomed two snow leopard cubs born to parents Himani and Vijay, they are the first snow leopard cubs born at the zoo and the first cubs for mother ‘Himani’. Only eleven snow leopards were survived last year in the United States; the two male cubs and Sabu are part of the Association of Zoos & Aquariums Species Survival Plan Program. The mission of an AZA SSP Program is to cooperatively manage specific, threatened or endangered species populations within AZA-accredited Zoos and Aquariums. Kaba now resides at the Seneca Park Zoo in Rochester and Sabu is at the Brookfield Zoo in Chicago.
Official website Zoological Society website