PURPOSE Dopamine has several important functions in the retina including a possible role in controlling photoreceptor disk shedding to the RPE. While some cells express a transporter for dopamine, the RPE cell does not, leading us to ask whether the newly described catecholamine transport system, the extraneuronal monoamine transporter (uptake(2)) (also known as organic cation transporter 3 (OC...

Cluster of differentiation 44 (CD44) and octamer-binding transcription factor 3/4 (Oct3/4) are important factors influencing cancer stem cell (CSC) development, but their clinical applications on pancreatic cancer are still unknown. Here, we tested the hypothesis that expression of CD44 and Oct3/4 correlates with the clinicopathological parameters of pancreatic ductal adenocarcinomas (PDACs). F...

POU transcription factor Pou5f1 (Oct3/4) is required to maintain ES cells in an undifferentiated state. Here we show that global expression profiling of Oct3/4-manipulated ES cells delineates the downstream target genes of Oct3/4. Combined with data from genome-wide chromatin-immunoprecipitation (ChIP) assays, this analysis identifies not only primary downstream targets of Oct3/4, but also seco...

Oct3/4 plays a critical role in maintaining embryonic stem cell pluripotency. Regulatable transgene-mediated sustained Oct3/4 expression in ES cells cultured in serum-free LIF-deficient medium caused accelerated differentiation to neuroectoderm-like cells that expressed Sox2, Otx1 and Emx2 and subsequently differentiated into neurons. Neurogenesis of ES cells is promoted by SDIA (stromal cell-d...

OBJECTIVES To explore the role of Oct3/4, Nanog and Sox2 in regeneration of rat tracheal epithelium. MATERIALS AND METHODS An ex vivo model of rat tracheal epithelial regeneration using 5-fluorouracil (5-FU) was developed, to induce injury. Expression levels of Oct3/4, Nanog and Sox2 were examined using Western blot analysis, RT-PCR or microscopically observed immunofluorescence, and cell mor...

The organic cation transporters OCT1, 2, and 3 (SLC22A1-3) have been implicated in the elimination of biogenic amines such as histamine. Among them, OCT3 was identified as an uptake-2 transporter, responsible for clearance of histamine. Because increasing evidence suggests the involvement of histamine in cerebral ischemia, we investigated the effects of targeted disruption of organic cation tra...

OBJECTIVES The goals of this study were to determine the role of organic cation transporter 3 (OCT3) in the pharmacological action of metformin and to identify and functionally characterize genetic variants of OCT3 with respect to the uptake of metformin and monoamines. METHODS For pharmacological studies, we evaluated metformin-induced activation of AMP-activated protein kinase, a molecular ...

The organic cation transporter-3 (OCT3) is a glucocorticoid-sensitive uptake mechanism that has been shown to regulate the bioavailability of monoamines in brain regions that are implicated in the pathophysiology of depression. In the present study, the relative impacts of acute stress alone and acute stress with a history of repeated stress (chronic+acute) were evaluated in two strains of rats...

Transcription factors containing the POU-domain have been shown to be important regulators of tissue-specific gene expression in the pituitary and lymphoid cells. Using a polymerase chain reaction (PCR)-based strategy, we have searched for similar factors that may be expressed in adult human pancreatic islets. This approach resulted in the amplification of sequences encoding the octamer binding...

We investigated the relationship between promoter methylation and tracheal stem cell activation. We developed a model of rat tracheal epithelium regeneration after 5-fluorouracil (5-FU)-induced injury. Using immunohistochemistry and Western blotting, the expression levels of the stem cell pluripotency regulator Oct3/4 and differentiation marker CK14 were measured after 5-FU treatment. The methy...