Structures of core nanocrystals of physiological (horse spleen, human liver, and brain) and pathological human brain of patients with progressive supranuclear palsy (PSP) and Alzheimer's disease (AD) ferritin molecules were determined using electron nanodiffraction and high-resolution transmission electron microscopy. The poly-phasic structure of the ferritin cores is confirmed. There are signi...

Iron sequestration by host iron-binding proteins is an important mechanism of resistance to microbial infections. Inside oral epithelial cells, iron is stored within ferritin, and is therefore not usually accessible to pathogenic microbes. We observed that the ferritin concentration within oral epithelial cells was directly related to their susceptibility to damage by the human pathogenic fungu...

Previous studies have shown that IRP1(+/-) IRP2(-/-) knockout mice develop progressive neurodegenerative symptoms similar to those observed in human movement disorders such as Parkinson's disease. Histological investigations using optical microscopy show that these IRP knockout mice display accumulation of ferritin in axonal tracts in the brain, suggesting a possible role for excess ferritin in...

We overexpressed human mitochondrial ferritin in frataxin-deficient yeast cells (Δyfh1), but also in another mutant affected in [Fe-S] assembly (Δggc1). Ferritin was correctly processed and expressed in the mitochondria of these cells, but the fraction of total mitochondrial iron bound to ferritin was very low, and most of the iron remained in the form of insoluble particles of ferric phosphate...

Iron increases the synthesis of the iron-storage protein, ferritin, largely by promoting translation of preexisting mRNAs for both the H and L ferritin isoforms (H, heavy, heart, acidic; L, light, liver, basic). We have recently cloned and sequenced a full-length cDNA to murine ferritin H and identified ferritin H as a gene induced by tumor necrosis factor alpha (TNF-alpha, cachectin). Using pr...

A direct human ferritin immunosensor was developed using anti-human ferritin monoclonal antibodies (MAbs) immobilized on the gold surface of a self-assembled surface plasmon resonance (SPR) apparatus. A kind of self-assembled monolayer (SAM) prepared by cystamine-glutaraldehyde method was applied to immobilize the MAbs. The reusability of the sensor chip adopting the SAM was found to be better ...

We have examined human leukocyte preparations for the presence of surface-bound IgE by electron microscopy. Basophil-enriched leukocytes were reacted with burro anti-IgE, a hybrid antibody to burro IgG and ferritin, and ferritin, with or without prior incubation of the cells with an IgE myeloma protein. In the absence of preincubation with IgE small amounts of ferritin were fixed to the surface...

A genomic phage clone containing a full-length copy of a functional human gene for ferritin heavy chain has been isolated. The gene consists of four exons spanning approximately 3 kilobases and has been localized to chromosome 11. The functionality of the gene was demonstrated by the fact that both transient transfectants and stable transformants of murine fibroblasts actively transcribe human ...

Spectrin, a major protein constituent of mammalian red blood cell membrane preparations, has been localized on the inner surface of human red blood cell membranes by techniques that utilized specific ferritin-conjugated antibodies and fixation of membranes shortly after hemolysis so as to allow penetration of the ferritin-antibody labels. The labeling of spectrin was shown to be specific by the...

T cell immunoglobulin-domain and mucin-domain (TIM) proteins constitute a receptor family that was identified first on kidney and liver cells; recently it was also shown to be expressed on T cells. TIM-1 and -3 receptors denote different subsets of T cells and have distinct regulatory effects on T cell function. Ferritin is a spherical protein complex that is formed by 24 subunits of H- and L-f...