Stimulation of mature CD4 cells through the TCR induces cellular activation and expansion that are often followed by clonal elimination by a form of apoptosis termed activation-induced cell death. This process of CD4 cell apoptosis is generally thought to reflect clonal suicide and to be independent of other cell types. Here we show that during the response to the superantigen Staphylococcal en...

Background: Glaucoma is one of the most common causes of blindness and is usually associated with elevated intraocular pressure. In patients with primary open angle glau-coma the number of trabecular meshwork cells is decreased. Death of the trabecular meshwork cells may be a result of apoptosis. Objective: To investigate the aqueous humor levels of soluble Fas (sFas) and Fas-Ligand (sFasL) in ...

The Fas receptor rapidly induces apoptosis when activated by ligand binding or by cross-linking with anti-Fas antibody. The Fas ligand (FasL), a member of the tumor necrosis factor family of ligands, is a 40-kilodalton type II transmembrane protein which is cleaved to produce soluble ligand. Although the Fas-FasL interaction plays a critical role in peripheral T cell homeostasis and cytotoxic T...

Ellipticine, a cytotoxic plant alkaloid, is known to inhibit topoisomerase II. Here, we first report the molecular mechanism of ellipticine's apoptotic action in human breast MCF-7 cancer cells. Treatment of cells with ellipticine resulted in inhibition of growth, and G2/M phase arrest of the cell cycle. This effect was associated with a marked increase in the protein expression of p53 and, p21...

we have previously shown that the proliferative response of t cells to antigenic or mitogenic stimulus decreased with age and that caloric resection (cr) attenuated the age-related decline in proliferation and il-2 expression. because activation-induced apoptosis is known to regulate cell proliferation and eliminate the high number of activated cells during an immune response, it was of interes...