The vitamin D receptor (VDR) mediates the effects of the calcemic hormone 1alpha,25-dihydroxyvitamin D3 [1,25(OH)2D3]. We show that VDR also functions as a receptor for the secondary bile acid lithocholic acid (LCA), which is hepatotoxic and a potential enteric carcinogen. VDR is an order of magnitude more sensitive to LCA and its metabolites than are other nuclear receptors. Activation of VDR ...

Human T lymphocytes that express the T4 (CD4) cell-surface antigen play a central role in the regulation of immune responses . T4+ lymphocytes are, however, a functionally heterogeneous population of cells that can be subdivided by the mAb anti-2H4, into the T4', 2H4+ subset that induces suppressor activity of the T8+ suppressor T cells, and the T4+, 2H4T cell subset with helper function (1). B...

CETIOM, Centre de Grignon, Avenue Lucien-Brétignières, 78850 Thiverval-Grignon, France Abstract: In order to estimate the environmental impacts of first generation biofuels produced in France, a Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) was conducted in 2009 and published in the beginning of 2010. However, there have been discrepancies in the interpretation of the results of this study. Th...

Coronary blood flow control is not uniform along the vascular tree and particularly between the right coronary artery and the left anterior descending artery. Resting membrane potential that contributes largely to the vascular tone is mainly regulated by K(+) channels in coronary myocytes. In the present study, we hypothesized that right coronary artery (RCA) and left coronary artery (LCA) exhi...

Lung cancer (LCa) is one of the most common and deadly malignancies in elderly patients. During the course of the disease, these patients frequently present with lower respiratory tract infection. Therefore, this study aims to investigate the clinical features of lower respiratory tract infection in elderly LCa patients and evaluate the impact on overall survival rate. Clinical and laboratory d...

PURPOSE Leber congenital amaurosis (LCA) is the most severe form of inherited retinal dystrophy, and invariably leads to blindness. LCA is a genetically and clinically heterogenous disorder. Although more than nine genes have been found to be associated with LCA, they only account for about half of LCA cases. We performed a comprehensive mutational analysis on nine known genes in 20 unrelated p...

Nacrtak Environmentally sound technologies are a key to reduce resource use and environmental impact. The paper reviews the state of knowledge of an analysis tool, life cycle assessment (LCA), by addressing three issues: 1) methodological foundations of LCA, 2) lifecycle inven­ tory modeling, and 3) environmental performance indicators for wood supply systems. The study results in the following...

In assessments of the environmental impacts of waste management, life-cycle assessment (LCA) helps expanding the perspective beyond the waste management system. This is important, since the indirect environmental impacts caused by surrounding systems, such as energy and material production, often override the direct impacts of the waste management system itself. However, the applicability of LC...

Lipophilic bile acids are suggested to be involved in the endogenous expression of CYP3A4 in human and experimental animals as ligands of nuclear receptors. To verify the nuclear receptor specificity, the bile acid-mediated induction of CYP3A4 has been studied in vitro and in vivo in the present study. Lithocholic acid (LCA) strongly enhanced the activities of the CYP3A4 reporter gene, which co...

purpose : to evaluate the incidence of leber’s congenital amaurosis (lca) in low vision children referred to electrophysiology ward of farabi eye hospital , and review the clinical features of disease and electroretiongraphy (erg) test values to confirm the diagnosis and severity of the disease in iran . design: prospective observational case series methods : two-hundred and fifteen cases of lo...