BACKGROUND Programmed cell death or apoptosis is an essential process for tissue homeostasis. Hepatocyte apoptosis is a common mechanism to many forms of liver disease. This study was undertaken to test the role of ILK in hepatocyte survival and response to injury using a Jo-2-induced apoptosis model. METHODS For survival experiments, ILK KO and WT mice received a single intraperitoneal injec...

ASPP2 is a key protein in regulating apoptosis both in p53-dependent and-independent pathways. The C-terminal part of ASPP2 contains four ankyrin repeats and an SH3 domain (Ank-SH3) that mediate the interactions of ASPP2 with apoptosis related proteins such as p53, Bcl-2 and the p65 subunit of NFκB. p53 core domain (p53CD) binds the n-src loop and the RT loop of ASPP2 SH3. ASPP2 contains a diso...

The antiinf lammatory action of aspirin generally has been attributed to direct inhibition of cyclooxygenases (COX-1 and COX-2), but additional mechanisms are likely at work. These include aspirin’s inhibition of NFkB translocation to the nucleus as well as the capacity of salicylates to uncouple oxidative phosphorylation (i.e., deplete ATP). At clinically relevant doses, salicylates cause cell...

Transformed cells from 80 to 85% of human cancers display measureable levels of active TERT, the reverse transcriptase subunit of telomerase which is essential for growth and survival of these cells. It is well known that the TERT promoter is transcriptionally silenced in development soon after stem cells loose stemness and differentitae. Although interesting from the point of view of regenerat...

Cardiac trauma has been recognized as a complication associated with blunt chest trauma involving coronary artery injury, myocardium contusion and myocardial rupture. Secondary cardiac injuries after trauma supposed to be a critical factor in trauma patients, but the mechanism is not fully explored. Overproduction of TNF-alpha had been reported in multiple trauma animals, this induces oxidative...

Adalimumab is a humanised monoclonal antibody against tumour necrosis factor-alpha (TNF-α), with proven efficacy in several autoimmune diseases. We report the development of sarcoidosis with cutaneous and pulmonary involvement in a 37-year old white Irish male with refractory Crohn's disease of 13-years, commenced on maintenance therapy with adalimumab for 2 years following surgery and unsucces...

Renal involvement in multiple myeloma (MM), which accounts for about 10% of all haematological malignancies, is not uncommon. Immunoglobulin A (IgA) nephropathy and IgA lambda myeloma with mesangial proliferative glomerulonephritis (GN) have been reported [1]. An interaction between mesangial cells and IgA as well as IgG immune complexes provides a possible mechanism for glomerular injury in Ig...

Neprilysin (NPL) is a wrinkle-inducing membrane bound elastase that expressed abundantly in UV-exposed and aged dermal fibroblasts (JBC2010). The overexpression of NPL essentially associated with enhanced epithelial-mesenchymal cytokine interactions (EMCI) mainly via IL-1α which has distinct potential to stimulate the expression by human (HDFs)(BJ2012). over-expression also accelerates wrinkle ...