AIMS To assess whether a reduction in intensity of signal observed using an alkaline phosphatase labelled oligodeoxynucleotide probe could be explained on the basis of procedural steps rather than reduced sensitivity. METHOD Signal intensity was assessed on in situ hybridisation for pro-opiomelanocortin (POMC) mRNA in rat pituitary and for somatostatin mRNA in human pancreas and in northern b...

To the Editor: We found the recent report by Liu et al1 using transcript profiling to examine genes regulated by insulin growth factor-1 interesting because of the biological and technological issues it raises. We applaud the efforts of the investigators to begin to address critically important and often neglected areas of microarray technology such as specificity and reproducibility. However, ...

The Australian Gonococcal Surveillance Programme (AGSP) monitors the antibiotic susceptibility of Neisseria gonorrhoeae isolated in all states and territories. In 2006 the in vitro susceptibility of 3,850 isolates of gonococci from public and private sector sources was determined by standardised methods. Different antibiotic susceptibility patterns were again seen in the various jurisdictions a...

In this paper we aim to create a reference data collection of Northern blot results and demonstrate how such a collection can enable a quantitative comparison of modern expression profiling techniques, a central component of functional genomics studies. Historically, Northern blots were the de facto standard for determining RNA transcript levels. However, driven by the demand for analysis of la...

In bacteria, small non-coding RNAs (sRNAs) are critical regulators of cellular adaptation to changes in metabolism, physiology, or the external environment. In the last decade, more than 2000 of sRNA families have been reported in the Rfam database and have been shown to exert various regulatory functions in bacterial transcription and translation. However, little is known about sRNAs and their...

Fas/CD95 is a key regulator of apoptotic signaling, which is crucial for the maintenance of homeostasis in peripheral lymphoid organs. TDAG51 has been shown to play critical roles in the up-regulation of Fas gene expression and T-cell apoptosis in vitro. In order to identify the role of TDAG51 in vivo, we generated TDAG51-deficient (TDAG51-/-) mice. Northern blotting revealed no expression of T...

DNA chip technology enables simultaneous examination of how approximately 6,200 Saccharomyces cerevisiae gene transcript levels, representing the entire genome, respond to environmental change. By using chips bearing oligonucleotide arrays, we show that, after exposure to the alkylating agent methyl methanesulfonate, approximately 325 gene transcript levels are increased and approximately 76 ar...

In RNA nanotechnology, construction of nanoparticles involves conjugation of functionalities, cross-linking of modules, labeling of RNA subunits, and chemical modification of nucleotides. Efficiency and sensitivity are important for the RNA labeling, which also can be used as probes in microarrays, Northern blotting, and gel-shift assays. Here, we describe a method for fluorescence labeling of ...

Tissue-type transglutaminase (tTG, EC 2.3.2.13) has been implicated in various disease paradigms including neurodegenerative disease. In these studies, tTG induction after traumatic brain injury was studied using a rat cortical impact model. Using western blots, two forms of tTG protein expression were identified--an approximately 79-kDa primary form (tTG-L) and a less abundant approximately 70...

The filamentous fungus Neurospora crassa produces three types of spores by using different developmental pathways: macroconidiation, microconidiation, and sexual spore (ascospore) formation. Several genes of unknown function have been cloned by virtue of their expression during macroconidiation but not during mycelial growth (con genes). It had been postulated that expression of the con genes w...