Impaired DNA damage repair, especially deficient transcription-coupled nucleotide excision repair, leads to segmental progeroid syndromes in human patients as well as in rodent models. Furthermore, DNA double-strand break signalling has been pinpointed as a key inducer of cellular senescence. Several recent findings suggest that another DNA repair pathway, interstrand cross-link (ICL) repair, m...

Interstrand crosslink (ICL)-inducing agents block the separation of the two DNA strands. They prevent transcription and replication and are used in clinics for the treatment of cancer and skin diseases. Here, we have introduced a single psoralen ICL at a specific site in plasmid DNA using a triplex-forming-oligonucleotide (TFO)-psoralen conjugate and studied its repair in Xenopus egg extracts t...

In this research, the effects of a sedimentary basin, environmental conditions, and the passage of time were investigated on consolidation processes and engineering characteristics of fine-grained soils in Kerman city. For this purpose, the natural consolidation curves of soil samples extracted from different locations of Kerman city were compared with the Kerman city intrinsic consolidation li...

To the Editor: In their recent article, Reinstein et al.1 described the use of the Artemis 2 very high frequency digital ultrasound (ArcScan, Inc., Morrison, CO) to calculate the fit of the Visian Implantable Collamer Lens (ICL). Another parameter previously proposed as influencing ICL vaulting is the crystalline lens anterior radius of curvature (ALR).2 The ALR has not yet been used in any pre...

During eukaryotic DNA interstrand cross-link (ICL) repair, cross-links are resolved ("unhooked") by nucleolytic incisions surrounding the lesion. In vertebrates, ICL repair is triggered when replication forks collide with the lesion, leading to FANCI-FANCD2-dependent unhooking and formation of a double-strand break (DSB) intermediate. Using Xenopus egg extracts, we describe here a replication-c...

Defects in the repair of DNA interstrand crosslinks (ICLs) are associated with the genome instability syndrome Fanconi anemia (FA). Here we report that cells with mutations in RFWD3, an E3 ubiquitin ligase that interacts with and ubiquitylates replication protein A (RPA), show profound defects in ICL repair. An amino acid substitution in the WD40 repeats of RFWD3 (I639K) found in a new FA subty...

Idiopathic CD4 lymphocytopenia (ICL) is characterized by a low CD4+ lymphocyte count in the absence of HIV or other underlying etiologies. We report a case of a 57-year old man with ICL and giant cell arteritis (GCA) who developed pulmonary mucormycosis, which, to our knowledge, is the first report of these occurring in a patient with ICL. Abnormally low total lymphocyte or CD4+ cell counts occ...

Kang, Sok Han, Pieter Vanden Berghe, and Terence K. Smith. Ca2 -activated Cl current in cultured myenteric neurons from murine proximal colon. Am J Physiol Cell Physiol 284: C839–C847, 2003. First published November 27, 2002; 10.1152/ajpcell.00437.2002.—Whole cell patchclamp recordings were made from cultured myenteric neurons taken from murine proximal colon. The micropipette contained Cs to r...

During replication-coupled DNA interstrand crosslink (ICL) repair, the XPF-ERCC1 endonuclease is required for the incisions that release, or "unhook", ICLs, but the mechanism of ICL unhooking remains largely unknown. Incisions are triggered when the nascent leading strand of a replication fork strikes the ICL Here, we report that while purified XPF-ERCC1 incises simple ICL-containing model repl...

The ion-channel laser (ICL) has been proposed as an alternative to the free-electron laser (FEL), replacing the deflection of electrons by the periodic magnetic field of an undulator with the periodic betatron motion in an ion channel. Ion channels can be generated by passing dense energetic electron bunches or intense laser pulses through plasma. The ICL has potential to replace FELs based on ...