Mounting evidence supports a role for acid sphingomyelinase (ASM) in cellular stress signaling. Only murine and human sphingomyelinases have been defined at the molecular level. These enzymes are the products of a conserved gene and at the amino acid level share 82% identity. In this study, we show that the nematode Caenorhabditis elegans possesses two ASMs, termed ASM-1 and ASM-2 encoded by tw...

Opioids are the most widely used drugs for long-term pain management, but their use is limited by the development of antinociceptive tolerance. The present study investigated the role of ceramide production through acid sphingomyelinase (ASM) activation in the periaqueductal gray region, a brain region implicated in opioid analgesia and tolerance. Morphine treatment was found, using immunohisto...

We have identified acid sphingomyelinase (ASM) as an important player in the early and late anti-Salmonella activity of macrophages. A functional ASM participated in the killing activity of macrophages against wild-type Salmonella enterica serovar Typhimurium. The role of ASM in early macrophage killing of Salmonella appears to be linked to an active NADPH phagocyte oxidase enzymatic complex, s...

eosinophils when compared with medium alone. Interestingly, blocking the activity of cysteinyl Leukotries using antagonists inhibited eosinophil-derived ASM proliferation. Conclusions: Eosinophils enhances the proliferation of ASM cells. This role of eosinophil does not seem to depend on ASM derived ECM proteins nor on Eosinophil derived TGF-b or TNF-a. Eosinophil seems to induce ASM proliferat...

Human acid sphingomyelinase (ASM) hydrolyses sphingomyelin to ceramide and phosphocholine. Metabolic studies on COS-1 cells transfected with ASM cDNA revealed the occurrence of an enzymically inactive precursor which is differentially processed to two predominant native glycoprotein forms: a 70 kDa polypeptide corresponding to human urinary protein and a 57 kDa form. Formation of these potentia...

Inhibition of integrins αvβ3/αvβ5 by the cyclic function-blocking peptide, RGDfV (Arg-Gly-Asp-Phe-Val) can induce apoptosis in both normal cells and tumor cells. We show that RGDfV induced apoptosis in ECV-304 carcinoma cells, increased activity and mRNA expression of acid sphingomyelinase (ASM), and increased ceramides C(16), C(18:0), C(24:0) and C(24:1) while decreasing the corresponding sphi...

data related to yazd native fowls (obtained during 2000-2008) yazd native fowls were made use of in the present study. the investigated traits consisted of body weight at 8 (bw8) and 12 weeks (bw12), age at sexual maturity (asm), egg number during the first three months of production period (en) and the mean egg weight at 28, 30 and 32 weeks of age (ew). the genetic and phenotypic parameters we...

The Source Speciic Multicast (SSM) service model and protocol architecture have recently been proposed as an alternative to the currently deployed Any Source Multicast (ASM) service. SSM attempts to solve many of the deployment problems of ASM including protocol complexity, inter-domain scalability, and security weaknesses. However, the SSM protocol architecture is not radically diierent from t...