BACKGROUND Recent studies have demonstrated that transplantation of ATP7B-transduced hepatocytes ameliorates disease progression in LEC (Long-Evans Cinnamon) rats, a model of Wilson's disease (WD). However, the inability of transplanted cells to proliferate in a normal liver hampers long-term treatment. In the current study, we investigated whether transplantation of ATP7B-transduced bone marro...

Several members of the IL-1beta-converting enzyme (ICE) family of proteases recently have been implicated in the intracellular cascade mediating the apoptotic death of various cell types. It is unclear, however, whether ICE-related proteases are involved in apoptosis of mammalian neurons and, if so, how they are activated. Here we report the cloning of an ICE-related protease (IRP) from rat bra...

Ipsilateral retinal projections (IRP) in the optic chiasm (OC) vary considerably. Most animal groups possess laterally situated eyes and no or few IRP, but, e.g., cats and primates have frontal eyes and high proportions of IRP. The traditional hypothesis that bifocal vision developed to enable predation or to increase perception in restricted light conditions applies mainly to mammals. The eye-...

Changes in iron homeostasis have been implicated in cardiotoxicity induced by the anticancer anthracycline doxorubicin (DOX). Certain products of DOX metabolism, like the secondary alcohol doxorubicinol (DOXol) or reactive oxygen species (ROS), may contribute to cardiotoxicity by inactivating iron regulatory proteins (IRP) that modulate the fate of mRNAs for transferrin receptor and ferritin. I...

Iron regulates mRNA translation initiation through RNA iron responsive element (IRE) By Jia Ma Advisor: Professor Dixie J. Goss The non-coding IRE-RNA structure, a 30 nt stem loop structure, regulates synthesis of proteins in iron trafficking, cell cycling, and nervous system function. IRE-RNA binding with iron regulatory protein (IRP) proteins inhibits ribosome accessing mRNA. Increasing iron ...

It is commonly proposed that the number of fibers that do not cross in the optic chiasm (OC) is proportional to the size of the binocular visual field, and that the major advantage of binocular vision is acute depth perception. I present an alternative, an 'eye-forelimb' (EF) hypothesis, suggesting that alterations in the OC influence the length of neural pathways that transmit visual informati...

I read with interest the recent article by Zoltan et al. (1) regarding the use of an algorithm for testing and reporting serum choriogonadotropin at clinically significant decision levels with use of “pregnancy test” reagents. They stated that all human choriogonadotropin (hCG) concentrations (except where noted) were reported in WHO First International Preparation (1st IRP) units. However, whe...

The kidney plays an important role in iron homeostasis and actively reabsorbs citrate. The bifunctional iron-regulatory protein IRP-1 potentially regulates iron trafficking and participates in citrate metabolism as a cytosolic (c-) aconitase. We investigated the role of cellular iron status in determining the expression and dynamics of IRP-1 in two renal cell types, with the aim of identifying ...

Iron regulatory protein 1 (IRP-1) binding to an iron-responsive element (IRE) located close to the cap structure of mRNAs represses translation by precluding the recruitment of the small ribosomal subunit to these mRNAs. This mechanism is position dependent; reporter mRNAs bearing IREs located further downstream exhibit diminished translational control in transfected mammalian cells. To investi...

Immune-related pancytopenia (IRP) is one kind of bone marrow failure diseases which is related to autoantibodies. Autoantibodies have been detected on the membrane of various bone marrow (BM) hemopoietic cells by BM mononuclear-cell-Coombs test or flow cytometric analysis. There are autoantibodies in the BM supernatant of IRP patients, which can target several antigens on hematopoietic cells me...