Liza Merly

University of Miami | UM · Division of Marine Biology & Fisheries

Serum proteins found in the blood have been used as diagnostic markers in both human and animal medicine. Evaluating proteins in the blood of sharks may be a valuable way to assess shark health. The purpose of this study was to perform serum protein electrophoresis from non-lethal blood samples of wild sharks and establish baseline values for six s...

Bacteria are known to have explicit roles within the microbiomes of host tissues, therefore examining these communities may prove useful in assessing host health and responses to environmental change. The present study contributes to the emerging, yet understudied, field of microbiome research in elasmobranchs. We provide a screening of the cultura...

Reported here are the relationships among morphological (i.e., body condition) and biochemical (i.e., plasma concentrations of triglycerides, cholesterol, free fatty acids, and ketone bodies and ketone body ratios) parameters related to energy storage and use, as well as the variation of such parameters, for 107 free-ranging nurse sharks Ginglymost...

Serum protein electrophoresis (EPH) is used to assess relative concentrations of blood proteins in clinical and biological studies. Serum EPH fractions have been determined for elasmobranchs using mammalian albumin, alpha 1-, alpha 2-, beta-, and gamma-globulin fractions, and have been deemed fractions 1 through 5, respectively. However, serum EPH...

The popular murine macrophage cell line, RAW 264.7, is often used to initially screen natural products for bioactivity and to predict their potential effect in vivo or on primary cells. The cell line response is considered to reflect the potential human de novo response, and is used to evaluate the effective bioactivity of the product. Here, we com...

Abstract The erosion and breakdown of cartilage is generally recognized to be an integral manifestation of arthritic disease, which is often accompanied by the development and progression of inflammation associated with it. Commercial shark cartilage (SC) is a popular dietary supplement taken for the prevention and/or control of chronic disease, in...

Previous studies have shown that extracts of shark cartilage induce a cytokine response in human leukocytes, but the nature of the bioactive component(s) is unknown. Extracts treated with proteases lost 80% of their cytokine-inducing property, suggesting that the active component(s) was likely a complex protein. The aim of the present study was to...

The immune system is composed of innate and adaptive mechanisms. Innate immune responses are significantly modulated by immunomodulatory factors that act through the induction of specific patterns of cytokine production in responding cells. Human leukocytes have been shown to respond to substance(s) present in acid extracts of commercial shark cart...

Shark cartilage extracts were examined for induction of cytokines and chemokines in human peripheral blood leukocytes. Primary leukocyte cultures were exposed to a variety of aqueous and organic extracts prepared from several commercial brands of shark cartilage. From all commercial sources of shark cartilage tested the acid extracts induced higher...