Background In vitro maturation (IVM) of human oocytes has acquired increasing attention in infertility treatment with great promise. This technique is an alternative conventional in vitro fertilization-embryo transfer (IVF-ET), and can be reduced the side effects of gonadotropin stimulation such as ovarian hyperstimulation (OHSS). Oocyte maturation is a complex process including cytoplasmic and...

A number of recent genomewide surveys have found numerous QTL for gene expression, often with intermediate to high heritability values. As a result, there is currently a great deal of interest in genetical genomics--that is, the combination of genomewide expression data and molecular marker data to elucidate the genetics of complex traits. To date, most genetical genomics studies have focused o...

The sequence of the 1173 nt 12S kinetoplast ribosomal RHA from TiPJ sfimarpa tarentolae was determined from the maxicircle DNA sequence, and the 5* and 3' ends localized by primer runoff and SI nuclease protection experiments. The gene was shown to be free of introns by SI nuclease analysis. A partial secondary structure model of the 12S RHA molecule is presented which is equivalent in certain ...

Background: Tumor microenvironment is an active factor participating in immunoregulation, thereby preventing immunosurveillance and limiting the efficacy of anticancer therapies. Hypoxia as a major characteristic of solid tumors causes the expression of Hypoxia-Inducible Factor-1α (HIF-1α). This is a transcription factor that mediates hypoxic responses of tumor cells and involves in the express...

The Boston Evening Transcript del Rubén Jacob (1939-2010)

The enzyme prostaglandin endoperoxide H synthase (PGHS) has a pivotal role in the prostanoid biosynthetic pathway because it catalyses the formation of prostaglandin H(2) (PGH(2)), the common precursor of prostanoids. Two PGHS isoforms have been reported, PGHS-1 and PGHS-2, which have 61% identity (at the amino acid level) and 73% similarity (at the nucleotide level) between the two human enzym...

L-Aspartase was purified from Bacillus subtilis, its N-terminal amino acid sequence was determined to construct a probe for the aspartase gene, and the gene (termed ansB) was cloned and sequenced. A second gene (termed ansA) was found upstream of the ansB gene and coded for L-asparaginase. These two genes were in an operon designated the ans operon, which is 80% cotransformed with the previousl...

Seven putative protease inhibitor (PPI) cDNAs, representing four protein families, were isolated from a grapefruit (Citrus paradisi Macf. Cv. Marsh) immature fruit flavedo cDNA library. Cloned open reading frames encoded proteins with similarity to, and protein signatures for: legume Kuntiz inhibitors (lkiL-1, lkiL-2, lkiL-3), potato trypsin inhibitor I (ptiIL-1), serpins (serpL-1), cystatins (...