The renin-angiotensin system (RAS) plays important roles in blood pressure control and tissue disease. An inappropriate local angiotensin II elevation in the kidneys leads to the development of hypertension, tissue damage and chronic injury. Studies have demonstrated that the JAK-STAT pathway mediates angiotensin II-triggered gene transcription. The JAK-STAT pathway in turn, acting as an amplif...

OBJECTIVE To investigate whether maternal anxiety in the third trimester is associated with an increased uterine artery resistance index. DESIGN Cohort based study. SUBJECTS 100 pregnant women, with a mean gestation of 32 weeks. OUTCOME MEASURES Self rating Spielberger questionnaire for state anxiety and trait anxiety, and uterine blood flow waveform patterns as assessed by colour Doppler...

We identified orthologues of all mammalian Janus kinase (JAK) and signal transducer and activator of transcription (STAT) genes in teleostean fishes, indicating that these protein families were already largely complete before the teleost tetrapod split, 450 million years ago. In mammals, the STAT repertoire consists of seven genes (STAT1, -2, -3, -4, -5a, -5b, and -6). Our phylogenetic analyses...

The TOR and Jak/STAT signal pathways are highly conserved from Drosophila to mammals, but it is unclear whether they interact during development. The proline-rich Akt substrate of 40 kDa (PRAS40) mediates the TOR signal pathway through regulation of TORC1 activity, but its functions in TORC1 proved in cultured cells are controversial. The Drosophila gene Lobe (L) encodes the PRAS40 ortholog req...

BACKGROUND/AIMS CD4+ T cells are a critical component of the adaptive immune response. While the mechanisms controlling the differentiation of the Th1, Th17, and regulatory T cell subsets from naïve CD4+ T cells are well described, the factors that induce Th2 differentiation are still largely unknown. METHODS The effects of treatment with exogenous H2O2 on STAT-6 phosphorylation and activatio...

Persistent tyrosine phosphorylation of Stat3 and Stat5 is associated with oncogenic activity. Phosphorylation of the conserved tyrosine residue (pTyr) was long believed to be the only essential prerequisite to promote activation and nuclear translocation of Stat proteins. It has become evident, however, that post-translational protein modifications like serine phosphorylation, acetylation, glyc...

OBJECTIVE To evaluate the functional requirement of signal transducer and activator of transcription-3 (STAT-3) in cardiac myocyte tolerance to ischemia (I) and in classical preconditioning. METHODS Cardiac myocyte STAT-3 was depleted in mice using Cre-lox p technology. Isolated cardiomyocytes from wild-type (WT) and STAT-3-deficient mice were evaluated for viability following simulated ische...