The apparent tumor selective apoptosis-inducing activity of recombinant soluble TNF-related apoptosis-inducing ligand (TRAIL) has aroused much interest for use in clinical application. However, to exploit fully its therapeutic potential, the characteristics of both the TRAIL receptor system and soluble TRAIL (sTRAIL) should be taken into account: first, the widespread expression of the various ...

Aberrant transforming growth factor-β (TGF-β) signalling has been associated with a number of disease pathologies, such as the development of fibrosis in the heart, lung and liver, cardiovascular disease and cancer, hence the TGF-β pathway represents a promising target for a variety of diseases. However, highly specific ways to inhibit TGF-β signalling need to be developed to prevent cross-talk...

economic development plans normally contain some policy objectives, especially for the most important macroeconomic variables. governments are expected to take best policies to achieve these objectives, although due to some structural or other impediments they may fail to touch the objectives. we have attempted to uncover the determinants of private consumption and investment as the objectives ...

Gueorguiev, Volodia D., Richard J. Zeman, Bhargava Hiremagalur, Ana Menezes, and Esther L. Sabban. Differing temporal roles of Ca21 and cAMP in nicotine-elicited elevation of tyrosine hydroxylase mRNA. Am. J. Physiol. 276 (Cell Physiol. 45): C54–C65, 1999.—The involvement of cAMPand Ca21-mediated pathways in the activation of tyrosine hydroxylase (TH) gene expression by nicotine was examined in...

Titanium silicide grows on silicon in a form of discontinuous layers, which is the most serious obstacle to the formation of high-quality epilayers for VLSI applications. At the same time, nanometric dimensions of the epitaxial silicide islands attract interest as quantum nanostructures. However, for this purpose, nanocrystals in a self-assembled array have to be defect-free, and exhibit high s...

The intermetallic compound MoSi2, which adopts the C11b crystal structure, and related alloys exhibit an excellent corrosion resistance at high temperatures but tend to be brittle at room and even relatively high temperatures. The limited ductility of MoSi2 in ambient conditions along with the anomalous temperature dependence of the critical resolved shear stress (CRSS) of the {110)<111], {011)...