RATIONALE Chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) is believed to result from an abnormal inflammatory response in the lungs to noxious particles and gases usually found in cigarette smoke. OBJECTIVES In this study, the molecular mechanisms for the enhanced proinflammatory cytokine gene transcription in COPD were investigated. METHODS Lung tissue was examined from 56 subjects undergoing...

PURPOSE Ixabepilone is an epothilone B analog that binds to microtubules and results in microtubule stabilization and mitotic arrest. Ixabepilone was evaluated for efficacy and safety in a phase II clinical trial for women with metastatic breast cancer. PATIENTS AND METHODS Patients were eligible if they had not previously received treatment with a taxane and had measurable metastatic breast ...

Splicing factor (SF) compartments, also known as speckles, are heterogeneously distributed compartments within the nucleus of eukaryotic cells that are enriched in pre-mRNA SFs. We derive a fourth-order aggregation-diffusion model that describes a possible mechanism underlying the organization of SFs into speckles. The model incorporates two hypotheses, namely (1) that self-organization of deph...

Nickel compounds influence carcinogenesis by interfering with a variety of cellular targets. It has been found that nickel is a potent inhibitor in vivo of histone H4 acetylation, in both yeast and mammalian cells. It has preference to specific lysine residues in the H4 N-terminal -S(1)GRGK(5)GGK(8)GLGK(12)GGAK(16)RH(18)RKVL(22) tail, in which the sites of acetylation are clustered. About the n...

objective: in this investigation murine embryonic stem (es) cells were differentiated into endothelial cells. materials and methods: murine es cells (cce cell line) exposed to alpha-mem medium containing 10% fbs for 4 days. then obtained flk-1 (flk-1: vascular endothelial growth factor receptor 2) positive cells were cultuted in endothelial growth medium-2 (egm-2) until the last day of experime...

Bromodomains are present in many chromatin-associated proteins such as the SWI/SNF and RSC chromatin remodelling and the SAGA HAT (histone acetyltransferase) complexes, and can bind to acetylated lysine residues in the N-terminal tails of the histones. Lysine acetylation is a histone modification that forms a stable epigenetic mark on chromatin for bromodomain-containing proteins to dock and in...

Previous studies suggest that the conjugation of ubiquitin to NH2 groups of proteins is required for protein breakdown. We now show that the selective modification of NH2-terminal alpha-NH2 groups of globin and lysozyme prevents their degradation by the ubiquitin proteolytic system from reticulocytes. The conjugation by ubiquitin of epsilon-NH2 groups of lysine residues, usually seen in multipl...

1. Cell-free extracts of Escherichia coli K12 catalyse the synthesis of N-acetyl-l-phenylalanine from acetyl-CoA and l-phenylalanine. 2. The acetyl-CoA-l-phenylalanine alpha-N-acetyltransferase was purified 160-fold from cell-free extracts. 3. The enzyme has a pH optimum of 8 and catalyses the acetylation of l-phenylalanine. Other l-amino acids such as histidine and alanine are acetylated at sl...

Three flavonol triglycosides kaempferol 3-[2Gal-(4-acetylrhamnosyl)robinobioside], kaempferol 3-(2Gal-rhamnosylrobinobioside) and quercetin 3-(2G-rhamnosylrutinoside) have been isolated from a methanolic extract of Galega officinalis aerial parts. They are reported for the first time in the genus Galega; moreover, the acetylated triglycoside is a new natural product.