The REACH (Registration, Evaluation, Authorization and restriction of Chemicals) and BPR (Biocide Product Regulation) regulations strongly promote the use of non-animal testing techniques to evaluate chemical risk. This has renewed the interest towards alternative methods such as QSAR in the regulatory context. The assessment of Bioconcentration Factor (BCF) required by these regulations is exp...

The adrenergic system (utilizing norepinephrine, NE, as a neurotransmitter) is implicated in hippocampusbased learning and memory, in addition to its well known peripheral actions mediated by the sympathetic nervous system. We have produced a strain of mice in which the gene coding for the enzyme dopamine betahydroxylase (Dbh), which catalyzes the synthesis of NE from dopamine, has been disrupt...

Adrenergic hormones are essential for early heart development. To gain insight into understanding how these hormones influence heart development, we evaluated genomic expression changes in embryonic hearts from adrenergic-deficient and wild-type control mice. To perform this study, we used a mouse model with targeted disruption of the Dopamine β-hydroxylase (Dbh) gene, whose product is responsi...

Attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) is a common disorder of the school-age population. ADHD is familial, and genetic studies estimate heritability at 80%-90%. The aim of the present study was to investigate the association between the genetic type and alleles for the dopamine beta-hydroxylase (DBH) gene in Korean children with ADHD. The sample consisted of 142 ADHD children and 139 ...

BACKGROUND Elevated circulating norepinephrine (NE) has been implicated in causing the profound beta-adrenergic receptor (betaAR) downregulation and receptor uncoupling that are characteristic of end-stage human dilated cardiomyopathy, a process mediated in part by increased levels of beta-adrenergic receptor kinase (betaARK1). To explore whether chronic sustained NE stimulation is a primary st...

Sustained attention is modulated by the neurotransmitter noradrenaline. The balance of dopamine and noradrenaline in the cortex is controlled by the DBH gene. The principal variant in this gene is a C/T change at position -1021, and the T allele at this locus is hypothesised to result in a slower rate of dopamine to noradrenaline conversion than the C allele. Two hundred participants who were g...

This chapter presents Gertrude, a methodology for business process modeling. Gertrude uses Object Orientation, and conjugates it with Activity Based Costing. The methodology is simple, easy to use and understand, and concise. It accounts for what-if analysis, and variation in the perception of the firm. It can serve as enabler for a BPR process, or monitor a continuous improvement in the produc...

The phorbol ester, 12-O-tetradecanoylphorbol-13-acetate (TPA), enhances transcription of many eukaryotic genes, including that for dopamine b-hydroxylase (DBH). In the present study, we report identification and characterization of a novel sequence motif residing in the 5*-flanking region of the human DBH gene, which mediates transcriptional induction by TPA. Deletional analyses indicated the p...

OBJECTIVE To study the association of Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD) and polymorphism in the dopamine beta hydroxylase (DBH) gene in Indian ADHD cases. SUBJECTS Forty one ADHD cases were diagnosed as per the DSM-IV-TR criteria and evaluated by Conners Parents and Teachers Rating Scale and Wechslers Intelligence Scale for Children. METHODS Genomic DNA was amplified for exon ...

Background—Elevated circulating norepinephrine (NE) has been implicated in causing the profound b-adrenergic receptor (bAR) downregulation and receptor uncoupling that are characteristic of end-stage human dilated cardiomyopathy, a process mediated in part by increased levels of b-adrenergic receptor kinase (bARK1). To explore whether chronic sustained NE stimulation is a primary stimulus that ...