BACKGROUND Inhibitors of nicotinamide phosphoribosyltransferase have recently been validated as therapeutic targets in leukemia, but the mechanism of leukemogenic transformation downstream of this enzyme is unclear. DESIGN AND METHODS Here, we evaluated whether nicotinamide phosphoribosyltransferase's effects on aberrant proliferation and survival of myeloid leukemic cells are dependent on si...

Histone variants seem to play a major role in gene expression regulation. In prostate cancer, H2A.Z and its acetylated form are implicated in oncogenes' upregulation. SIRT1, which may act either as tumor suppressor or oncogene, reduces H2A.Z levels in cardiomyocytes, via proteasome-mediated degradation, and this mechanism might be impaired in prostate cancer cells due to sirtuin 1 downregulatio...

Members of the sirtuin family of protein deacetylases support and promote longevity in diverse organisms and can extend life span when upregulated. Sirtuin pathways also modulate fundamental mechanisms in aging-related neurodegenerative diseases, including protein aggregation, stress responses, mitochondrial homeostasis, and inflammatory processes. In this minireview, we will discuss how progre...

Sirtuin 1 acts in various cell processes, deacetylating both chromatin and non-histone proteins, and its role in cancer and aging has long been studied and debated. Here we discuss another aspect of SirT1 biology, its function as a stem cell pluripotency and differentiation regulator. We evaluate the implications of these findings in sirtuin inhibition-based cancer treatment and in the applicat...

Protein-protein interaction networks are useful for studying human diseases and to look for possible health care through a holistic approach. Networks are playing an increasing and important role in the understanding of physiological processes such as homeostasis, signaling, spatial and temporal organizations, and pathological conditions. In this article we show the complex system of interactio...

The silent information regulator (SIR) genes (sirtuins) comprise a highly conserved family of proteins, with one or more sirtuins present in virtually all species from bacteria to mammals. In mammals seven sirtuin genes - SIRT1 to SIRT7 - have been identified. Emerging from research on the sirtuins is a growing appreciation that the sirtuins are a very complicated biological response system tha...

The ability to probe for catalytic activities of enzymes and to detect their abundance in complex biochemical contexts has traditionally relied on a combination of kinetic assays and techniques such as western blots that use expensive reagents such as antibodies. The ability to simultaneously detect activity and isolate a protein catalyst from a mixture is even more difficult and currently impo...

Protein-protein interaction networks are useful for studying human diseases and to look for possible health care through a holistic approach. Networks are playing an increasing and important role in the understanding of physiological processes such as homeostasis, signaling, spatial and temporal organizations, and pathological conditions. In this article we show the complex system of interactio...