OBJECTIVE Cyclosporin A (CsA) and tacrolimus (FK506) are widely used as immunosuppressants. However, their use has been hampered by various adverse effects, such as acceleration of atherosclerosis. Interleukin (IL)-8, a chemotactic cytokine, plays an important role in pathogenesis of atherosclerosis. We thus investigated whether synthesis of IL-8 from primary human aortic smooth muscle cells is...

clostridium perfringens is an important cause of enteric diseases in both human and animals. the bacteria produce several toxins which play key roles in the pathogenesis of diseases and are classified into five toxin types, on the basis of the differential production of alpha, beta, epsilon and iota toxins. in this study a single pcr assay was developed and used for detection of cpb2 gene to id...

BACKGROUND Hepatic fibrosis, an outcome of chronic liver diseases, is characterized by an accumulation of collagen, which is produced by activated human intrahepatic fibroblasts (HIF). Transforming growth factor (TGF) β is an important inducer of fibrogenesis, in collaboration with other cytokines, such as interleukin (IL) 4. IL-4 is overexpressed in severe recurrent hepatitis C after liver tra...

Clostridium perfringens produces alpha-toxin, which is an important virulence factor in gas gangrene [1-3]. Alpha-toxin is hemolytic, dermonecrotic, and lethal. Furthermore, it has phospholipase C (PLC) and sphingomyelinase (SMase) activities [13]. The toxin has been shown to damage the membranes of various mammalian cells [1-3] as well as artificial membranes [4]. The structure of alpha-toxin ...

PURPOSE Although the clinical efficacy of cyclosporin A (CSA) in retinoblastoma (RB) has been attributed to multidrug resistance reversal activity, the authors hypothesized that CSA is also directly toxic to RB cells through inhibition of calcineurin (CN)/nuclear factor of activated T-cells (NFAT) signaling. METHODS Antiproliferative effects of CSA, PSC-833 (a CSA analogue that does not inhib...

Staphylococcus aureus alpha-toxin is a membrane-damaging exoprotein that oligomerizes to form transmembrane pores. Chemical modification of histidines with diethylpyrocarbonate has been shown to reduce the hemolytic activity of alpha-toxin, suggesting that one or more of the histidine residues is important for toxin function. To individually assess the functional importance of each of the four ...

A novel gene that regulates the alpha-toxin (plc), kappa-toxin (colA), and theta;-toxin (pfoA) genes was identified using toxin-negative mutant strains of Clostridium perfringens. The cloned 3.2-kb fragment contained the virX gene encoding a 51-amino acid polypeptide of unknown function that seemed to be responsible for the activation of toxin genes. The virX knock out mutant of wild-type strai...

McClatchy, J. K. (The University of Texas Southwestern Medical School, Dallas), and E. D. Rosenblum. Genetic recombination between alpha-toxin mutants of Staphylococcus aureus. J. Bacteriol. 92:580-583. 1966.-A demonstration of genetic recombination between Staphylococcus aureus nonhemolytic mutants was attempted by means of transduction. The results of two-point reciprocal transductions placed...

conclusions obtained data demonstrated that the designed assay is an accurate, easy, rapid, and cost-effective tool for detecting v. cholerae that can serve as an alternate to current bacteriological tests. background several epidemic and endemic cases have been reported involving vibrio cholerae (v. cholerae) as a causative organism in serious diarrheal diseases with high mortality. hence, qui...

Sodium butyrate, an erythroid differentiation inducer and a histone deacetylase inhibitor, increases G alpha(i2) levels in differentiating K562 cells. Here we show that sodium butyrate induces G alpha(i2) gene transcription via sequences at -50/-36 and -92/-85 in the G alpha(i2) gene promoter. Both sequences contain core sequence motif for Sp1 binding; electrophoretic mobility shift as well as ...