An age-dependent acceleration of apoptosis occurs in female germ cells (oocytes), and this requires communication between the oocyte and its surrounding somatic (cumulus) cells. Here we show in aged mice that ceramide is translocated from cumulus cells into the adjacent oocyte and induces germ cell apoptosis that can be prevented by sphingosine-1-phosphate. Trafficking of ceramide requires gap ...

Accumulating data clearly indicate that induction of apoptosis is an important event for chemoprevention of cancer by naturally occurring dietary agents. In mammalian cells, apoptosis has been divided into two major pathways: the extrinsic pathway, activated by pro-apoptotic receptor signals at the cellular surface; and the intrinsic pathway, which involves the disruption of mitochondrial membr...

A link between inflammation and cancer has long been suspected, but its molecular nature remained ill defined. A key player in inflammation is transcription factor NF-kappaB whose activity is triggered in response to infectious agents and proinflammatory cytokines via the IkappaB kinase (IKK) complex. Using a colitis-associated cancer model, we show that although deletion of IKKbeta in intestin...

Prophylactic approaches to graft versus host disease (GvHD) have employed both phenotypic reduction of T cells and selective elimination of host-primed donor T cells in vitro and in vivo. An additional approach to GvHD prophylaxis by functional depletion of apoptosis-sensitive donor T cells without host-specific sensitization ex vivo showed remarkable reduction in GHD incidence and severity. We...

Chemotherapy often causes damage to hematopoietic tissues, leading to acute bone marrow suppression and the long term development of leukemias. Niacin deficiency, which is common in cancer patients, causes dramatic genomic instability in bone marrow cells in an in vivo rat model. From a mechanistic perspective, niacin deficiency delays excision repair and causes double strand break accumulation...

As there are multiple factors causing hydrocephalus subsequent to intraventricular hemorrhage (IVH), it is difficult to achieve the best treatment effect using a single drug alone. In the present study, the protective effect of combination treatment with granulocyte-colony stimulating factor (G-CSF) and lithium chloride against hydrocephalus after IVH was investigated. A total of 130 adult male...

Although differences in the quality of oocytes derived from young gilts and adult sows are well documented, evidence concerning gametes of pre-pubertal and cycling gilts is scarce and inconsistent. The aim of this work was to establish whether sexual maturity of gilts affects the quality of their oocytes with the use of the brilliant cresyl blue (BCB) test, oocyte diameter and apoptosis. Ovaria...

background apoptosis or programmed cell death is an essential process for elimination of damaged cells. also, induction of apoptosis is fundamental for treating cancer. screening for agents that induce apoptosis in tumor cells help in the development of novel agents for cancer treatment. numerous studies suggest that the exposure of tumor cells to statins can lead to cell death via two separate...

A considerable amount of evidence indicates that Ras signaling contributes to the development of endometrial cancer. We previously demonstrated that endometrial cancer cells carrying oncogenic [(12)Val]K-ras were susceptible to apoptosis. The present study examined the role of K-and H-Ras in the induction of apoptosis using rat endometrial cells (RENT4 cells). We found that constitutively activ...