GB virus B (GBV-B) is closely related to hepatitis C virus (HCV), infects small non-human primates, and is thus a valuable surrogate for studying HCV. Despite significant differences, the 5' nontranslated RNAs (NTRs) of these viruses fold into four similar structured domains (I-IV), with domains II-III-IV comprising the viral internal ribosomal entry site (IRES). We previously reported the in v...

Cholinergic basal forebrain neurons (CBFN) expressing the low-affinity neurotrophin receptor p75 (p75(NTR)) were previously selectively labeled in vivo with carbocyanine 3 (Cy3)-tagged anti-p75(NTR), but the applied 192IgG-conjugates recognized p75(NTR) only in rat. The antibody ME 20.4 raised against human p75(NTR) had been shown to cross-react with the receptor in monkey, raccoon, sheep, cat,...

Clinical and experimental studies have demonstrated some negative effect of hypertension on bone mineral density. The aim of this study was to evaluate bone healing and trabecular bone area (TBA) in spontaneously hypertensive rats (SHR), a well-established model of essential hypertension, when compared to normotensive rats (NTR). A critical-size defect was surgically created in the right tibia ...

Structure prediction of the 5' non-translated region (NTR) of four iflavirus RNAs revealed two types of potential internal ribosome entry site (IRES), which are discriminated by size and level of complexity, in this group of viruses. In contrast to the intergenic IRES of dicistroviruses, the potential 5' IRES structures of iflaviruses do not have pseudoknots. To test the activity of one of thes...

The DEAH-box NTPase Prp43 and its cofactors Ntr1 and Ntr2 form the NTR complex and are required for disassembling intron-lariat spliceosomes (ILS) and defective earlier spliceosomes. However, the Prp43 binding site in the spliceosome and its target(s) are unknown. We show that Prp43 fused to Ntr1's G-patch motif (Prp43_Ntr1GP) is as efficient as the NTR in ILS disassembly, yielding identical di...

The role of nerve growth factor (NGF) and of the neurotrophin receptor p75 (p75(NTR)) in programmed cell death was investigated in the retina and the spinal cord of mouse embryos. Large numbers of cells express p75(NTR) in and along the developing optic nerve and in the mantle zone of the spinal cord. In embryos carrying deletions in the ngf or the p75(NTR) gene, cell death was reduced in the r...

The invasive nature of cancers in general, and malignant gliomas in particular, is a major clinical problem rendering tumors incurable by conventional therapies. Using a novel invasive glioma mouse model established by serial in vivo selection, we identified the p75 neurotrophin receptor (p75(NTR)) as a critical regulator of glioma invasion. Through a series of functional, biochemical, and clin...

The cytoplasmic juxtamembrane region of the p75 neurotrophin receptor (p75(NTR)) has been found to be necessary and sufficient to initiate neural cell death. The region was named "Chopper" to distinguish it from CD95-like death domains. A 29-amino acid peptide corresponding to the Chopper region induced caspase- and calpain-mediated death in a variety of neural and non-neural cell types and was...

The mean of a random distribution chosen from a Neutral to the Right (NTR) prior can be represented as the exponential functional of an Increasing Additive Process. This fact is exploited in order to give sufficient conditions for the existence of the mean of a NTR prior and for the absolute continuity of its probability distribution. Moreover, expressions for its moments, of any order, are pro...

The ability to visualize reporter gene expression in vivo has revolutionized all facets of biologic investigation and none more so than imaging applications in oncology. Near-infrared reporter gene imaging may facilitate more accurate evaluation of chemotherapeutic response in preclinical models of orthotopic and metastatic cancers. We report the development of a cell permeable, quenched squari...