Connective tissue growth factor (CTGF) plays an essential role in the pathogenesis of diabetic nephropathy and we have previously identified that high glucose induced the expression of CTGF by decreasing DNA methylation. The aim of the present study was to investigate the underlying mechanisms of the high glucose-induced CTGF hypo-methylation. Human glomerular mesangial cells (hMSCs) were treat...

Expression of connective tissue growth factor (CTGF) was induced in renal mesangial cells by activation of heptahelical receptors by serotonin (5-HT) and lysophosphatidic acid (LPA). Induction of CTGF mRNA was transient with maximal expression after 1 to 2 h, whereas induction of CTGF by transforming growth factor beta (TGF-b) increased over time. In contrast to the induction of other early res...

Connective tissue growth factor (CTGF) is a member of the CCN family of immediate early genes, which are involved in cell proliferation, migration, and matrix production. Recently, CTGF was observed to be strongly upregulated in human proliferative and fibrogenic renal disease. By in situ hybridization and reverse transcriptase-PCR, the expression of CTGF was investigated in experimental prolif...

The objective of this study was to determine the mechanism by which insulin-like growth factor-I (IGF1) stimulates proliferation of mammary epithelial cells, using the bovine mammary epithelial cell line MAC-T as a model. IGF1 significantly up- or down-regulated the expression of 155 genes in MAC-T cells. Among the most significantly suppressed was the gene for connective tissue growth factor (...

PURPOSE Pseudoexfoliation (PXF) syndrome is a generalized disorder of the extracellular matrix (ECM) involving the trabecular meshwork (TM), associated with raised intraocular pressure, glaucoma, and cataract. The purposes of this study were to quantify aqueous humor connective tissue growth factor (CTGF) in PXF glaucoma, to determine the effect of CTGF on ECM production in TM cells, and to ide...

The myocardium of the failing heart undergoes a number of structural alterations, most notably hypertrophy of cardiac myocytes and an increase in extracellular matrix proteins, often seen as primary fibrosis. Connective tissue growth factor (CTGF) is a key molecule in the process of fibrosis and therefore seems an attractive therapeutic target. Regulation of CTGF expression at the promoter leve...

Background: Tumor invasion and metastasis cause most deaths in cancer patients. Connective tissue growth factor (CTGF), a secreted protein that binds to integrins, modulates the invasive behavior of certain human cancer cells, but few mechanistic details are known. We investigated the roles of CTGF and collapsin response mediator protein 1 (CRMP-1) in metastasis and invasion of human lung adeno...

Connective-tissue growth factor (CTGF) is a secreted protein implicated in multiple cellular events including angiogenesis, skeletogenesis and wound healing. It is a member of the CCN family of secreted proteins, named after CTGF, cysteine-rich 61 (CYR61), and nephroblastoma overexpressed (NOV) proteins. The molecular mechanism by which CTGF or other CCN proteins regulate cell signalling is not...

To explore the possible role for connective tissue growth factor (CTGF) during tooth movement, we evaluated CTGF gene and protein expression in MG-63 cells subjected to cyclic stretch. Cyclic stretch caused a time-dependent increase in CTGF mRNA and protein levels.Inhibition of p38 MAP kinase or ERK activation did not affect cyclic stretch-induced CTGF expression. Specific inhibitors of PI3K su...

AIMS Myocardial CCN2/CTGF is induced in heart failure of various etiologies. However, its role in the pathophysiology of left ventricular (LV) remodeling after myocardial infarction (MI) remains unresolved. The current study explores the role of CTGF in infarct healing and LV remodeling in an animal model and in patients admitted for acute ST-elevation MI. METHODS AND RESULTS Transgenic mice ...