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Home >> Dictionary of Bioinformatics, Biochemistry, Biotechnology >>Broad Spectrum Antibodies - Burning Feet Syndrome


Bridges
A collection o hardware and software that connects networks that use similar protocols and topologies.

Bright-field microscope Light microscope in which the image is obtained by simple transmission of light through the object being viewed.

Broad-host-range plasmid A plasmid capable of replicating in a wide range of bacteria species.

Broad spectrum antibiotics Antibiotics that are active against a wide range of bacteria including both Gram-positive ad Gram-negative species. Examples of broad spectrum antibiotics include tetracycline and chloramphenicol.

Bromophenol blue A blue coloured dye that enables electrophoresis to be monitored

5-bromouracil (5-BU) An analog of thymine, which causes mutations in DNA. During replication, it is incorporated into DNA in place of thymine and readily pairs with guanine. As a consequence, an AT base pair is replaced by a GC base pair causing transition mutations.

Bronchitis, chronic Long-standing inflammation of the airways characterised by excess production of sputum with cough and obstruction of air flow. Cigarette smoking is the most common cause of chronic bronchitis.

Bronze diabetes Bronzed pigmentation of the skin that occurs in association with iron deposition in the pancreas that causes islet cell destruction and diabetes mellitus.

Broth A liquid culture medium for microorganisms.

Browser An application for processing documents written in HTML. it interprets the markup language to display formatted web pages.

Brucellosis A disease caused by infection with organisms of the genus Brucella.

Brunner’s glands Mucous glands present in the duodenum. Vagus and the gastrointestinal hormones such as secretin stimulate secretion from the Brunner’s glands.

Brush border Dense covering of microvilli on the surface of epithelial cells in the intestine and kidney, which increases the surface area of the cells and aids absorption.

Bruton’s disease See X-linked agammaglobulinaemia.

BSP test (bromsulphthalein test) A liver function test. The BSP test is useful in cases where there is liver damage without jaundice as in cirrhosis and chronic hepatitis. Following intravenous injection, BSP is bound to albumin and transported to the liver where it is conjugates and excreted by the bile. If liver function is impaired, excretion of BSP is slow.

BST See bovine somatotrophin.

Bt See Bascillus thuringiensis.

Bt plants Plants carrying the toxin-producing gene from Baillus thuringiensis which protects them from insects.

Bubble column fermenter A tall cylindrical bioreactor or fermentation vessel in which cells or microorganisms are suspended by rising air introduced at the base of the column.

Budding yeast A common name for baker’s yeast, Saccharomyces cerevisiae, which divides by budding off a smaller cell.

Buffer A system consisting of a conjugate acid-base pair that resists changes in pH.

Buffy coat Refers to the intermediate layer (comprising leucocytes) that is formed when blood is allowed to stand and measures taken to prevent clotting and it is centrifuged. The dense erythrocytes sink to the bottom and the top layer forms the plasma.

BSE See Bovine spongiform encephalopathy, proteinaceous infectious particle.

BSML (Bioinformatics Sequence Markup Language) Encodes biological sequence information and includes graphical representations of biologically meaningful objects such as sequences, genes, electrophoresis gels, and multiple alignments.

Bromocriptine A drug that acts on hormone-producing tumors and suppresses hormone production.

Buoyant density A measure of the ability of a substance to float in a solution containing CsCl or sucrose. The buoyant density is an index of the proportion of G-C base pairs; the greater the G-C content, higher is the buoyant density of the characteristic for each species.

Burkitt’s lymphoma Malignancy that is common in East Africa and New Guinea but rare in other parts of the world. Epstein Barr virus (EBV) has been implicated in the pathogenesis of this disease.

Burning feet syndrome A condition associated with neurological and mental disturbances observed I prisoners of World War II in Japan and Burma, which responded to calcium pantothenate.

Bursa of Fabricius A lymphoid organ of birds responsible for the maturation of B lymphocytes. The B cells are so called because of this organ. Mammals including humans lack a bursa and lymphoid tissues such as the tonsils, appendix, Peyer’s patches and lymphoid follicles are considered equivalent to the bursa.

Burst number The number of viral particles produced per cell after infection.

Byte Eight bits. A byte can have values that range from 0000000 (0) to 11111111 (225). A character (letter, numeral etc.) is enerally represented by one byte.

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