In clinical trials, aldosterone antagonists decrease cardiovascular mortality and ischemia by unknown mechanisms. The steroid hormone aldosterone acts by binding to the mineralocorticoid receptor (MR), a ligand-activated transcription factor. In humans, aldosterone causes MR-dependent endothelial cell (EC) dysfunction and in animal models, aldosterone increases vascular macrophage infiltration ...

The genetic background of complex diseases is proposed to consist of several low-penetrance risk loci. Addressing this complexity likely requires both large sample size and simultaneous analysis of different predisposing variants. We investigated the role of four thrombosis genes: coagulation factor V (F5), intercellular adhesion molecule 1 (ICAM1), protein C (PROC), and thrombomodulin (THBD) i...

BACKGROUND Neuropathic rats created by spinal nerve ligation are known to show higher levels of p38, c-Jun NH2-terminal kinase, and extracellular signal-regulated kinase p44/42 (ERK 1/2) of the mitogen-activated protein kinases (MAPKs). The authors of this study aimed to understand the effect of ketamine on p38 MAPK and inflammatory responses, as well as its effect on the development of neuropa...

This study characterized human umbilical vein endothelial cell (HUVEC) adhesion, proliferation, and gene expression on bilayered polyelectrolyte coatings composed of an outermost layer of glycosaminoglycans (hyaluronan, heparin, or chondroitin sulfate), with an underlying layer of poly-L-lysine or chitosan. The proportion of cells that adhered to the various polyelectrolyte coatings after 1 and...

Flavour changing neutral decays of the top quark are know to be extremely suppressed in the SM. This is especially so for the top quark decay into the SM Higgs boson, whose rate is less than 10. However, it turns out that the decay modes t → c h, with h ≡ h, H, A any of the MSSM neutral Higgs bosons, can be much more gifted. In particular, the rate into the lightest CP-even Higgs boson h – whic...

We study the effects of a vector-like SU(2) doublet quarks as the fourth generation on Rb and Rc. By considering the constraint from the experimental data of forward-backward asymmetry, AFB and A c FB,as well as FCNC among light quarks, we show that there is an allowed region of parameters for Rb but not for Rc. ∗e-mail: [email protected] 1

In order to satisfy current FCNC and CP violation bounds, SUSY flavour structures cannot be generic. An interesting solution to these SUSY Flavour and CP Problems lies on the use of an SU(3) family symmetry which spontaneously breaks CP symmetry. Typical observables of such a model are electric dipole moments and LFV processes. In addition, these models can give contributions to CP violation in...