Pathogen sensing by the inflammasome activates inflammatory caspases that mediate inflammation and cell death. Caspase-12 antagonizes the inflammasome and NF-κB and is associated with susceptibility to bacterial sepsis. A single-nucleotide polymorphism (T(125)C) in human Casp12 restricts its expression to Africa, Southeast Asia, and South America. Here, we investigated the role of caspase-12 in...

PURPOSE To investigate the effects of ischemic preconditioning (IPC) on the expression of pro and anti-apoptotic genes in rat endothelial cells undergoing enteric ischemia (I) and reperfusion (R). METHODS Thirty rats underwent clamping of the superior mesenteric vessels. Sham group (GS) laparotomy only; Ischemia (GI): intestinal ischemia (60 min); Ischemia and Reperfusion (GIR): ischemia (60 ...

OBJECTIVE The aim of the study was to investigate the expression patterns of a specific set of genes involved in the inflammation process in children with Down Syndrome (DS) and children without the syndrome (control group) to identify differences that may be related to the immune abnormalities observed in DS individuals. METHOD RNA samples were obtained from peripheral blood, and gene expres...

ASC (Apoptosis-associated Speck-like protein containing a CARD) acts as a platform protein in the inflammasome cascade of some cancer types. However, its potential involvement in OSCC (oral cavity squamous cell carcinoma) has not yet been determined. Here, we investigated the potential role of ASC in OSCC. RT-qPCR analysis of 20 paired tumor and adjacent normal tissue samples revealed that the ...

The predictions made for fold recognition and modeling accuracy at the 1996 Critical Assessment of Structure Prediction meeting (CASP2) were assessed to discover which groups did best. With 32 groups making a total of 369 predictions, it was necessary to use simple criteria for distinguishing between the entries. By focusing on the predictors' ability to use the sequence of the unknown target s...

BACKGROUND The NLR family, pyrin domain containing 3 (NLRP3) inflammasome is an interleukin (IL)-1β and IL-18 cytokine processing complex that is activated in inflammatory conditions. The role of the NLRP3 inflammasome in the pathogenesis of atherosclerosis and myocardial infarction is not fully understood. METHODS AND RESULTS Atherosclerotic plaques were analyzed for transcripts of the NLRP3...

The proinflammatory enzyme caspase-1 plays an important role in the innate immune system and is involved in a variety of inflammatory conditions. Rare naturally occurring human variants of the caspase-1 gene (CASP1) lead to different protein expression and structure and to decreased or absent enzymatic activity. Paradoxically, a significant number of patients with such variants suffer from febr...

The gene expression associated with immune response to bacteria/bacterial mimic has been extensively analyzed in amphioxus, but remains largely unknown about how gene are involved in the immune response to viral invasion at expression level. Here, we analyze the rRNA-depleted transcriptomes of Branchiostoma belcheri using strand-specific RNA-seq in response to the viral mimic, poly (I:C) (pIC)....

Diabetic retinopathy (DR) is a leading cause of blindness in working age adults. The objective of this study is to investigate the effects of vascular endothelial growth factor receptor 1 (VEGFR1) blockade on the complications of DR. Experimental models of diabetes were induced with streptozotocin (STZ) treatment or Insulin2 gene mutation (Akita) in mice. Protein expression and localization wer...

BACKGROUND The gain-of-function mutation JAK2V617F is frequently found in Philadelphia-chromosome-negative myeloproliferative neoplasm (MPN) patients. However, the tumorigenic properties of JAK2V617F have mostly been characterized in in vivo and in vitro murine models due to the lack of appropriate human cell lines. METHODS Using the multipotent hematologic cell line UT-7/GM, we established D...