Delta-like 4 (DLL4), a membrane-bound ligand belonging to the Notch signaling family, plays a fundamental role in vascular development and angiogenesis. We identified a conserved microRNA family, miR-30, which targets DLL4. Overexpression of miR-30b in endothelial cells led to increased vessel number and length in an in vitro model of sprouting angiogenesis. Microinjection of miR-30 mimics into...

Delta-like 4 (DLL4), a membrane-bound ligand belonging to the Notch signaling family, plays a fundamental role in vascular development and angiogenesis. We identified a conserved microRNA family, miR-30, which targets DLL4. Overexpression of miR-30b in endothelial cells led to increased vessel number and length in an in vitro model of sprouting angiogenesis. Microinjection of miR-30 mimics into...

BACKGROUND Oxidative injury to retinal pigment epithelium (RPE) and retinal photoreceptors has been linked to a number of retinal diseases, including age-related macular degeneration (AMD). Reactive oxygen species (ROS)-mediated gene expression has been extensively studied at transcriptional levels. Also, the post-transcriptional control of gene expression at the level of translational regulati...

OBJECTIVE MicroRNAs (miRNAs) play an important role in the pathogenesis of autoimmune diseases such as primary Sjögren's syndrome (pSS). This study is the first to investigate miRNA expression patterns in purified T and B lymphocytes from patients with pSS using a high-throughput quantitative PCR (qPCR) approach. METHODS Two independent cohorts of both patients with pSS and controls, one for ...

thermoplastic polyurethane (tpu)/clay nanocomposites were prepared via a melt-compounding method using ester type tpu and two different modified organoclays (cloisite 30b and cloisite 15a) in different contents. the effects of the chemical structure and content of the nanoclays on the thermal degradation and mechanical properties of tpu were also investigated. the effect of structural modificat...

good dispersion of nano-particles in polymer matrices is a crucial parameter in determining the final properties of polymer nanocomposites. in this work, the distributions of cloisite 30b, cloisite 10a and cloisite 93a in ptmeg, popular polyols in the polyurethane manufacturing, were investigated in the nano, micro and macro scales. this investigation was carried out using x-ray diffraction, rh...