Gamma-aminobutyric acid (GABA) is the major inhibitory neurotransmitter in the mammalian central nervous system and exerts its actions via both ionotropic (GABA(A)) channels and metabotropic (GABA(B)) receptors. GABA(A) channels are ubiquitously expressed in neuronal tissues, and in mature neurons modulate an inward chloride current resulting in neuronal inhibition due to membrane hyperpolariza...

Allele-specific DNA methylation (ASM) is well studied in imprinted domains, but this type of epigenetic asymmetry is actually found more commonly at non-imprinted loci, where the ASM is dictated not by parent-of-origin but instead by the local haplotype. We identified loci with strong ASM in human tissues from methylation-sensitive SNP array data. Two index regions (bisulfite PCR amplicons), on...

BACKGROUND Asthma is a chronic respiratory disease characterized by reversible airway obstruction with persistent airway inflammation and airway remodeling, which is associated with increased airway smooth muscle (ASM) mass. Vascular endothelial growth factor (VEGF) has been implicated in inflammatory and airway blood vessel remodeling in asthma. Recent evidence indicates that a deficiency of 1...

TO THE EDITOR: We thank Drs. Hershenson and Chung for their insightful comments regarding our recent paper on mitochondrial fragmentation and dysfunction in human airway smooth muscle (ASM) induced by cigarette smoke extract (CSE) (1). They raise the point that CSE and the concentrations used in cell studies may not precisely reflect what happens with inhaled cigarette smoke (CS) that actually ...

Abstract The leaky Abelian sandpile model (Leaky-ASM) is a growth in which $n$ grains of sand start at the origin $\mathbb{Z}^2$ and diffuse along vertices according to toppling rule. A site can topple if its amount above threshold. In each topple, sends some neighbor leaks portion $1-1/d$ sand. We compute limit shape as function $d$ symmetric case where an equal neighbor. converges circle $d\t...

For the t → W+b decay mode, an intensity-ratio equivalence-theorem for two Lorentzinvariant couplings is shown to be related to symmetries of tWb-transformations. Explicit tWb-transformations, A+ = M ASM , P ASM , B ASM relate the four standard model’s helicity amplitudes, ASM (λW+, λb), and the amplitudes A+ (λW+, λb) in the case of an additional tR → bL weak-moment of relative strength Λ+ = E...

We revisit the airway wall model of Lambert et. al. (Lambert RK, Wiggs BR, Kuwano K, Hogg JC, and Pare PD. J Appl Physiol 74: 2771-2781, 1993). We examine in detail the notion of a general airway bistability such that the airway lumen can suddenly decrease from a relatively open to a relatively closed condition without needing additional increase in active airway smooth muscle (ASM) tension dur...

While DNA methylation is usually thought to be symmetrical across both alleles, there are some notable exceptions. Genomic imprinting and X chromosome inactivation are two well-studied sources of allele-specific methylation (ASM), but recent research has indicated a more complex pattern in which genotypic variation can be associated with allelically-skewed DNA methylation in cis. Given the know...

Airway smooth muscle (ASM) growth contributes to the mechanism of airway hyperresponsiveness in asthma. Here we demonstrate that CD4+ T cells, central to chronic airway inflammation, drive ASM remodeling in experimental asthma. Adoptive transfer of CD4+ T cells from sensitized rats induced an increase in proliferation and inhibition of apoptosis of airway myocytes in naive recipients upon repea...

Several studies have reported the usefulness of the field-in-field (FIF) technique in breast radiotherapy. However, the methods for the FIF technique used in these studies vary. These methods were classified into three categories. We simulated a radiotherapy plan with each method and analyzed the outcomes. In the first method, a pair of subfields was added to each main field: the single pair of...