BACKGROUND Rejection is the major obstacle to survival after cardiac transplantation. We investigated whether overexpression of heat shock protein (Hsp)-27 in mouse hearts protects against acute rejection and the mechanisms of such protection. METHODS Hearts from B10.A mice overexpressing human Hsp-27 (Hsp-27tg), or Hsp-27-negative hearts from littermate controls (LCs) were transplanted into ...

The synthesis of heat shock proteins (HSP) and the development of thermotolerance were studied in Chinese hamster ovary cells in order to determine whether depletion of intracellular glutathione (GSH) inhibited their expression. Cells were exposed to 100 microM diethylmaleate/50 microM buthionine sulfoximine which reduced GSH levels by 95% or more during the experimental time course. HSP synthe...

Heat shock protects against myocardial ischemia-reperfusion injury possibly via increased expression of heat shock proteins. The direct evidence of heat shock protein protection in vivo remains circumstantial, and no other new mechanism of protection has been proposed. Recent studies suggest that opening of ATP-sensitive K+ channels (KATP channels) plays an important role in ischemic preconditi...

Interspecific variation in chloroplast low molecular weight (cLMW) HSP (heat shock protein) expression was examined with respect to phylogeny, species specific leaf area, chlorophyll fluorescence, and mean environmental conditions within species ranges. Eight species of Ceanothus (Rhamnaceae) were heat shocked for 4 h at several different temperatures. Leaf samples were collected immediately af...

Heat shock gene resides in a pore neighborhood R ohner et al. describe how the heat shock gene hsp-16.2 associates with nuclear pore complexes in C. elegans cells. Genes can occupy specifi c positions within the nucleus, and their localization may change upon activation or repression. Developmentally regulated genes in C. elegans, for example, move from the periphery to the interior of nuclei i...

The effects of early age feed restriction and heat conditioning on heat shock protein (HSP) 70 expression, antibody production, resistance to infectious bursal disease (IBD), and growth of heat-stressed male broiler chickens were investigated. Chicks were divided into 4 groups: 60% feed restriction on d 4,5, and 6 (FR); exposure to 36 +/- 1 degrees C for 1 h from d 1 to 21 (HT); combination of ...

The chromatin structure of heat shock protein (HSP)-encoding genes undergoes dramatic alterations upon transcriptional induction, including, in extreme cases, domain-wide nucleosome disassembly. Here, we use a combination of gene knock-out, in situ mutagenesis, chromatin immunoprecipitation, and expression assays to investigate the role of histone modification complexes in regulating heat shock...

P rotection of the ischemic heart has been the subject of experimental and clinical research for more than a decade. Myocardial infarct size is a function of cell necrosis occurring during ischemial and reperfusion,2 and numerous investigators have attempted to limit ischemic-and reperfusion-induced injury by pharmacological means. On balance, if the number of articles indicating successful int...

The regulation of heat shock protein (HSP) expression is critically important to pathogens such as Mycobacterium tuberculosis and dysregulation of the heat shock response results in increased immune recognition of the bacterium and reduced survival during chronic infection. In this study we use a whole genome spotted microarray to characterize the heat shock response of M. tuberculosis. We also...

Heat-inducible gene expression vectors are useful for hyperthermia-induced cancer gene therapy, because the combination of hyperthermia and gene therapy can considerably improve the therapeutic effects. In the present study, we developed an enhanced heat-inducible transgene expression system in which a heat-shock protein (HSP) promoter and tetracycline-responsive transactivator were combined. W...