N-Methanocarbathymidine [(N)-MCT], a thymidine analogue incorporating a pseudosugar with a fixed Northern conformation, exhibits antiherpetic activity against both herpes simplex virus (HSV) HSV-1 and HSV-2, with a potency greater than that of the reference standard, ganciclovir (GCV). In the present study, we have assessed the cytotoxic activity in vitro of (N)-MCT in wild-type murine colon ca...

Transduction of the herpes simplex virus thymidine kinase (HSV-tk) into vascular endothelial cells using a replication-defective adenoviral vector (Ad.CMV-tk) to confer sensitivity to ganciclovir (GCV) was investigated. The cytotoxic sensitivity of bovine aortic endothelial cells (BAEC) to GCV following Ad.CMV-tk transduction at multiplicity of infection of 100 was ten-fold that of 9L glioma ce...

Foreign DNA was inserted into two nonessential regions of the vaccinia virus genome by homologous recombination in cells infected with virus and transfected with plasmids containing the foreign DNA elements flanked by vaccinia virus DNA. Thymidine kinase-negative (TK-) recombinants were selected after inserting foreign DNA into the coding region of the TK gene of wild-type vaccinia virus; TK+ r...

Adenoviral (ADV) gene therapy with the thymidine kinase gene (TK) under control of the Rous sarcoma virus (RSV) promotor followed by the administration of acyclovir leads to replication errors in transcription and to cell death. This concept of ADV-RSV-TK has been established for the treatment of ovarian cancer cells. The purpose of this investigation was to clarify whether cell death after ADV...

BACKGROUND To investigate the feasibility of gene therapy in treating Epstein-Barr virus (EBV)-associated cancer by employing the suicide gene, herpes simplex virus thymidine kinase/ganciclovir (HSV-tk/GCV), which uses the signaling pathway through the HIV-long terminal repeat (LTR) gene which is expressed from a nuclear factor-kappaB (NF-kappaB)-binding motif-containing promoter that is regula...

Replication-competent adenoviruses armed with thymidine kinase (TK) combine the concepts of virotherapy and suicide gene therapy. Moreover TK-activity can be detected by noninvasive positron emission-computed tomography (PET) imaging, what could potentially facilitate virus monitoring in vivo. Here, we report the generation of a novel oncolytic adenovirus that incorporates the Tat8-TK gene unde...

We have used the technique of reverse transcription coupled to the polymerase chain reaction to detect mRNA precursors [heterogeneous nuclear RNA (hnRNA)] transcribed from the thymidine kinase (TK) gene of human diploid fibroblasts. With this method, the amplification products of both hnRNA (containing the introns) and mature mRNA can be detected on Southern blots with appropriate hybridization...

The prognosis of patients with metastatic gastric cancer, particularly peritoneal carcinomatosis, remains poor despite intensive interventions. Gene therapy and hyperthermia can be promising strategies for such advanced disease. The study was conducted to explore the possible effective therapeutic approach of suicide gene therapy with herpes simplex virus thymidine kinase (HSV-tk) in combinatio...

In order to determine the contribution of thymidine (dThd) salvage to intrinsic resistance to antimetabolites (5-fluoropyrimidines, antifolates) in the human colon adenocarcinoma xenograft, H X GC3, a subline deficient in thymidine kinase has been developed. A cell line (GC3/M) was established in continuous culture that demonstrated a karyotype identical to that of the stem line of H X GC3 (46,...

UNLABELLED Serum thymidine kinase (TK), zeta-associated protein of 70 kDa (ZAP-70) and CD38 levels have been shown to be correlated with survival in chronic lymphocytic leukaemia (CLL). AIM To investigate the possible correlations between TK, ZAP-70 and CD38 levels as prognostic markers in new diagnosed Rai stages of CLL patients. METHODS 120 CLL patients were enrolled. ELISA was used to me...