This thesis is divided into two parts below. Part I Adriamycin (ADR) can produce nephrotoxicity in rodents. The underlying mechanism may relate to ADR induced oxidative stress. In this study, we used transgenic mice (NMT3), which over-expressed the...
Pituitary tumor transforming gene ( PTTG ), also known as securing, is a novel oncogene that is expressed at high levels in most of the tumors analyzed to date. Overexpression of PTTG in mouse fibroblast(NIH 3T3) cells increases cell proliferation,...
The fundamental question of the exact nature of the role played by TNF in the failing myocardium remains one of contention. Many preclinical studies have demonstrated beneficial effects with TNF antagonism and recently the dichotomous role played...
The lipid aldehydes, 4-hydroxy-2-nonenal (4-HNE) and propene-2-al (acrolein) are reactive α,β-unsaturated aldehydes generated during the peroxidation of lipids and are implicated in the pathogenesis of several oxidative-stress mediated diseases,...
Gene therapy; Spinal cord--Wounds and injuries; Tissue engineering
The combination of viral mediated gene delivery, tissue engineering, and Schwann cell (SC) transplantation offer a promising strategy to enhance axonal regeneration and functional recovery following spinal cord injury (SCI). The rationale and...
Recent advances in understanding the molecular mechanisms of mutagenesis indicate that most mutations are dependent on the activity of translesion synthesis DNA polymerases. The impact of reducing the level of these polymerases on mutagenesis and...
Myocardial infarction; Glucose--Metabolism; Mitochondrial DNA
Heart failure is a leading cause of morbidity and mortality in the USA. During the development of heart failure, many cardiac parameters change at the same time including fuel metabolism, oxidative stress and mitochondrial function. Each of these...
MicroRNAs (miRNAs) regulate gene expression at the post-transcriptional level by repressing translation or stimulating mRNA degradation. In this study, I tested the hypothesis that miRNAs are differentially expressed in antiestrogen-sensitive MCF-7...
Embryonic development requires the orchestration of temporally precise genetic events that culminate in the formation of a complete organism. The molecular mechanisms responsible for ontogenesis are regulated by environmental and somatic factors in...
Liver--Diseases--Genetic aspects; Liver--Effect of arsenic on; Arsenic--Toxicology
Arsenic exposure in drinking-water is a significant worldwide health problem. It causes adverse human health effects, such as cancer, increases the risks for others such as cardiovascular disease, and accelerates atherosclerosis. In this study, we...
Heart failure is the most frequent cause of mortality in western countries. Currently, there is no cure treatment for heart failure and the long term survival rate following heart failure is poor, with one third of patients dying within a year of...
III-nitrides (InN, GaN, AlN) are some of the most promising materials for making blue light emitting diodes (LED), blue laser diodes (LD) and high power, high temperature field effect transistors (FET). Current techniques produce GaN films with...
Oxidative stress-induced immunosuppression could be due to a decrease in CD4 + T lymphocyte activation or proliferation. 4-Hydroxynonenal (HNE), an end product of lipid peroxidation, and its protein adducts act as markers of oxidative stress. In...
Unrepaired DNA damage poses a serious threat to the genetic stability of a replicating cell. One mechanism of tolerating this damage is translesion DNA synthesis (TLS), in which an accessory polymerase synthesizes DNA directly across from a damaged...
Spinal cord injury (SCI) can be divided into two distinct stages, an initial mechanical impact and a later "secondary injury" resulting from a cascade of cytokines triggering a spreading demyelination and apoptosis of neurons and glia...
This thesis begins by reviewing human N-acetyltransferases (Chapter I), then outlines experiments involving human hepatocytes and rat N-acetyltransferases (Chapters II-V). These experiments facilitated the development of a dissertation project...
Simplified modeling generates a great deal of interest in the area of crashworthiness analysis. Modeling methods used to create simplified computer models for crashworthiness have been well developed. In advanced simplified models, researchers...
The ability of L. pneumophila to cause disease depends on its replication in alveolar macrophages. Infectivity and the expression of various virulence traits is triggered at post exponential growth phase. We show that unlike quiescent macrophages,...
Cortical and tectal inputs to the caudal LPN in the rat were examined using anatomical and physiological techniques. Pyramidal cells in layer 6 of the visual cortex and wide-field vertical cells in the stratum opticum of the superior colliculus...
Mucin 1 (MUC1) is a plasma membrane-bound glycoprotein that plays a protective role in corneal epithelial cells. Two full-length splice variants of MUCl: MUCl/B and MUCl/A, that differ by the inclusion of 27 bp from intron 1 and a SNP in MUCl/A,...
