PURPOSE Retinal regeneration research holds potential for providing new avenues for the treatment of degenerative diseases of the retina. Various animal models have been used to study retinal regeneration over the years, providing insights into different aspects of this process. However the mechanisms that drive this important phenomenon remain to be fully elucidated. In the present study, we i...

Vertebrate kidney organogenesis is characterised by the successive formation of the pronephros, the mesonephros and the metanephros. The pronephros is the first to form and is the functional embryonic kidney of lower vertebrates; although it is vestigial in higher vertebrates, it is a necessary precursor for the other kidney types. The Xenopus pronephros is a simple paired organ; each nephron c...

After microinjection of Xenopus laevis oocytes with RNA from avian myeloblastosis virus, viral structural proteins p27, p19, p15, and p12 are formed by a sequence of posttranslational cleavages of a high-molecular-weight precursor polypeptide. The 60-70S RNA aggregate or its 30-40S RNA subunits obtained by heat or formamide treatment possess the same ability to serve as template in X. laevis oo...

The homology model of major haemoglobin component HbA1 of the African Clawed Frog was predicted using the pigeon (Columba livia) haemoglobin as a template. The model was built with the help of MODELLER9v8. The models were evaluated with ProSA and PROCHECK. In X. laevis Gln38α is unable to form a hydrogen bond with β97His or β99Asp, which is responsible for the increase in oxygen affinity of the...

Mutations in protein kinase C substrate 80K-H (PRKCSH), which encodes for an 80 KDa protein named hepatocystin (80K-H, PRKCSH), gives rise to polycystic liver disease (PCLD). Hepatocystin functions as the noncatalytic beta subunit of Glucosidase II, an endoplasmic reticulum (ER)-resident enzyme involved in processing and quality control of newly synthesized glycoproteins. Patients harboring het...

Appropriately-sized oocytes from Xenopus laevis can be grown in vitro in vitellogenin-containing serum for up to 2 weeks. The source of serum appears to be unimportant. Rates of oocyte growth are somewhat better than those achieved in the presence of vitellogenin alone. Rana pipiens oocytes grow about twice as fast as X. laevis oocytes under identical conditions. The oocyte culture conditions d...

A Na(+)-dependent bile acid (Na+/taurocholate co-transporting polypeptide; Ntcp) and a Na(+)-independent bromosulphophthalein (BSP)/bile acid uptake system (organic-anion-transporting polypeptide; oatp) have been cloned from rat liver by using functional expression cloning in Xenopus laevis oocytes. To evaluate the extent to which these cloned transporters could account for overall hepatic bile...

The directional migration of primordial germ cells (PGCs) to the site of gonad formation is an advantageous model system to study cell motility. The embryonic development of PGCs has been investigated in different animal species, including mice, zebrafish, Xenopus and Drosophila. In this study we focus on the physical properties of Xenopus laevis PGCs during their transition from the passive to...

The drastic morphological changes of the tadpole are induced during the climax of anuran metamorphosis, when the concentration of endogenous thyroid hormone is maximal. The tadpole tail, which is twice as long as the body, shortens rapidly and disappears completely in several days. We isolated a cDNA clone, designated as Xl MMP-9TH, similar to the previously reported Xenopus laevis MMP-9 gene, ...

Calpains are a superfamily of Ca-dependent cysteine proteases, implicated in various cellular processes and thus probably necessary in all the stages of cell life. The first extended report of quantification of total RNAs within the developmental stages of Xenopus laevis was described in this study. Decreases of total RNAs were positively associated with waves of apoptotic cell death (onset of ...