AIMS/BACKGROUND Telomerase is an enzyme that is expressed in most human neoplasms and is associated with tumour immortality. Determination of the point in neoplastic transformation at which telomerase is expressed may aid the understanding of tumour pathogenesis and progression. Despite numerous reports on telomerase, few studies have investigated its expression in high grade glial tumours. The...

High telomerase expression is a hallmark of most types of cancer, and, therefore, strategies to inhibit telomerase as an anticancer treatment have been pursuit for many years. In contrast to cancer, short telomeres and lack of telomerase are associated with aging and agerelated disease, including heart disease. Consequently, pharmacological telomerase activation can delay aging and also provide...

In recent years there has been considerable interest in telomerase as a target for therapeutic intervention in oncology. This largely stems from the vast number of studies that have demonstrated expression and activity of the enzyme telomerase in the majority of human cancer tissues with little or no activity detectable in normal somatic tissues. These studies have led to an interest in the rol...

Telomeres provide stability to eukaryotic chromosomes and consist of tandem DNA repeat sequences. Telomeric repeats are synthesized and maintained by a specialized reverse transcriptase, termed telomerase. Tetrahymena thermophila telomerase contains two essential components: Tetrahymena telomerase reverse transcriptase (tTERT), the catalytic protein component, and telomerase RNA that provides t...

Telomerase Activator 1: A Zinc-Finger Protein That Acts Synergistically with Auxin to Control Telomerase Expression in Arabidopsis thaliana. (August 2003) Shuxin Ren, B.S., Beijing Agricultural University, Beijing, P.R. China Co-Chairs of Advisory Committee: Dr. Thomas D. McKnight Dr. Dorothy E. Shippen Telomerase is the key enzyme synthesizing telomeric DNA in most eukaryotic organisms. In mam...

Telomerase can synthesize telomeric DNA repeats onto chromosome ends. Telomere length and telomerase activity have recently been implicated in the control of the proliferative capacity of normal and malignant cells. The expression of telomerase activity is concomitant with the attainment of immortality in tumor tissues and cells. Thus, enzyme activity may indicate a prevalent or even ubiquitous...

Telomere replication of eukaryotic chromosomes is achieved by a specialized enzyme, the telomerase. Although the biochemistry of end-replication is well understood, little is known about the organization of the end-replication machinery, its regulation throughout the cell cycle or the biological function of the telomerase-associated proteins. Here we investigate the function of the telomerase-a...

The activation of telomerase in unstable plaques is an important factor in atherosclerosis, and may be predictive of the risk of cerebrovascular diseases. Human telomerase reverse transcriptase (hTERT) is a subunit of telomerase that is essential for telomerase activation. The aim of the present study was to investigate whether aspirin inhibits the activation of telomerase and hTERT in unstable...

Telomerase elongates chromosome ends by addition of telomeric DNA repeats. The telomerase ribonucleoprotein can copy only a short template sequence within the telomerase RNA subunit. Here, we identify a region of telomerase RNA that is necessary for both correct 5' template boundary definition and high affinity telomerase reverse transcriptase (TERT) interaction. We also demonstrate that TERT m...

While telomerase is known to extend the length of telomeres and prevent the onset of telomeric cell senescence, it has recently come to light that it has other lengtheningindependent properties. Resurrection of telomerase expression in tumor cells leads to cell “immortalization”. Ectopic expression of telomerase has been shown to alter expression of growth-promoting genes and enhance cell proli...