BACKGROUND AND AIMS Activins and inhibins are dimeric polypeptides that belong to the transforming growth factor beta (TGF-beta) superfamily and that bind to transmembrane receptors with serine/threonine kinase activity. The aim of this study was to characterise, in colon cancer cell lines and in normal and malignant human colon tissues, levels of expression of inhibin subunits that are involve...

Activin/Nodal growth factors control a broad range of biological processes, including early cell fate decisions, organogenesis and adult tissue homeostasis. Here, we provide an overview of the mechanisms by which the Activin/Nodal signalling pathway governs stem cell function in these different stages of development. We describe recent findings that associate Activin/Nodal signalling to patholo...

Activin A and related proteins (inhibins, follistatin [FS], follistatin-related gene [FLRG], endometrial bleeding associated factors [ebaf]) are involved in the complex mechanisms allowing the establishment and the maintenance of pregnancy. As a consequence of ovarian progesterone stimuli, activin A is expressed and secreted by the stromal endometrial cells, which locally induces the decidualiz...

BACKGROUND Activin B has been reported to promote the proliferation and migration of keratinocytes in vitro via the RhoA-JNK signaling pathway, whereas its in vivo role and mechanism in wound healing process has not yet been elucidated. PRINCIPAL FINDINGS In this study, we explored the potential mechanism by which activin B induces epithelial wound healing in mice. Recombinant lentiviral plas...

Nodal and Activin are morphogens of the TGFbeta superfamily of signaling molecules that direct differential cell fate decisions in a dose- and distance-dependent manner. During early embryonic development the Nodal/Activin pathway is responsible for the specification of mesoderm, endoderm, node, and mesendoderm. In contradiction to this drive towards cellular differentiation, the pathway also p...

A primary physiological function of follistatin is the binding and neutralization of activin, a transforming growth factor-beta family growth factor, and loss of function mutations are lethal. Despite the critical biological importance of follistatin's neutralization of activin, the structural basis of activin's binding to follistatin is poorly understood. The purposes of these studies were 1) ...

The objective of this study was to quantify the relative expression of inhibin alpha, inhibin/activin beta(A), beta(B), beta(C), follistatin, activin receptors and beta-glycan genes in placental tissue of term pre-eclamptic patients and controls to investigate if these genes are up-regulated in the placenta in pre-eclampsia. Seven women with pre-eclampsia symptoms were matched with 10 normal pr...

The aim of this study was to investigate whether GH and insulin-like growth factor I (IGF-I) are involved in preantral folliculogenesis and, if so, to clarify the relationship between GH/IGF-I and activin/follistatin (FS) systems in immature female mice. Ovaries were obtained from 11-day-old mice, and preantral follicles, 100-105 microm in diameter, were mechanically isolated and selected for c...

Most ovarian neoplasms arise from the ovarian surface epithelium (OSE), and multiple growth factors have been implicated to influence the transformation from OSE. The present study was performed to investigate the role of activin and transforming growth factor-beta (TGFbeta) in normal and neoplastic OSE cells. An immortalized OSE cell line (IOSE-29) was generated from normal OSE by transfecting...

Activin A has been reported to play a role in the progression of colorectal cancer. Because dietary fiber protects against colorectal cancer, we hypothesized that butyrate, a fermentation product of dietary fiber, may affect the expression of activin A in colon cancer cells. Semiquantitative RT-PCR demonstrated that the activin A gene was upregulated by sodium butyrate in the human colon cancer...