The brain-pituitary-gonad axis regulates puberty and reproduction in all vertebrates. The two gonadotropins, FSH and LH are released from the pituitary and initiates maturing and growth of the gonads. To understand more ...

Summary Antibodies act as adapter molecules that link recognition of foreign substances, such as bacteria and viruses, to elimination mechanisms mediated by cells and molecules of the innate immune system. Cells that express ...

Mesenchymal stem cells (MSCs) derived from adipose tissue are multipotent stem cells able to give rise into multiple cell types, not only of the mesodermal lineage, but also of the neuroectodermal lineage. In this study, ...

Attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) is an early-onset and highly heritable human psychiatric disorder with negative adult outcomes. ADHD affects about 2 to 5 % of all children, mainly boys. The clinical symptoms ...

Endosomal maturation controls trafficking and degradation of macromolecules in eukaryotic cells and represents an important regulatory point in the endocytic pathway. Progression through this phase is primarily recognized ...

miRNAs are short non-coding RNA that regulate gene expression at the post-transcriptional level by inhibiting the translation of mRNAs through pairing to their 3’ UTR. The let-7 family of miRNAs regulates cell differentiation ...

The ErbB family of tyrosine kinase receptors mediates the activation of a wide network of signaling pathways, which are important for cell growth, differentiation and survival. The four different ErbB proteins, EGFR, ErbB2, ...

Previous studies indicate that central sensitization may be an underlying mechanism of hyperalgesia and development of persistent pain. However, some individuals may have a higher risk of long lasting pain than others, ...

This study was carried out at the Department of Cell Biology at the Institute of Cancer Research at the Oslo University Hospital as a part of my Master’s degree in molecular biosciences at the University of Oslo. Our group ...

The genome is organized into chromatin domains which can be distinguished by enrichment in post-translational modifications of histones and histone variants. Since the histone code has been discovered, little is known about ...

At the moment, one-third of the world’s population is estimated to be infected with Mycobacterium tuberculosis (M.tb), the causative agent of tuberculosis (TB) in humans. Our treatment strategies have been greatly challenged ...

Epigenetic gene regulation is crucial in developmental processes, controlling which genes that are expressed at what times and in what tissues. Posttranslational modifications on histone tail residues yield various outcomes ...

Low back pain and sciatica after disc herniation may be caused by mechanical compression of the nerve roots, but also by the release of inflammatory substances from nucleus pulposus (NP) of the herniated disc. In the present ...

Previous studies show that the endogenous opioid system has an important role in the pain control system. In recent years, it has also been suggested that epigenetic modifications, such as acetylations, may affect pain ...

Intellectual disability/mental retardation occur in 2-3% of newborns in the general population. In 80% of the cases, the causes remain elusive. Improved molecular and cytogenetic techniques have enabled the detection of ...

The structures of the immunity proteins for the two-peptide bacteriocins have not been determined, although knowledge of these structures is of great interest as it may reveal at a molecular level how these proteins render ...

Colorectal cancer (CRC) is a common type of cancer, and at present the TNM staging system is the only tool in routine clinical use for predicting patient outcome and making treatment decisions. Nuclear expression of the ...

The small GTPase Rab7b is localized to late endosomes and lysosomes and to the Golgi apparatus, and regulates the intracellular transport from late endosomal compartments to the Golgi. However, not much is known about ...

Ectoine is a small molecule that confers salt tolerance to organisms. It is synthesized in bacteria by the gene products of ectA, ectB, and ectC. Ectoine is used in medical, biotechnological, and cosmetic products. The ...

Abstract The concept that messenger RNA (mRNA) degradation in E. coli begins with endonucleolytic cleavage has been challenged by the recent discovery that the conversion of the 5’ terminus from a triphosphate to a ...

Proteins are subjected to various post-translational modifications (PTMs) that affect their activity, interaction and localization. Methylation is one such PTM that is well known to play a regulatory role in heterochromatin ...

Abstract Endonuclease V (EndoV) is highly conserved from prokaryotes to eukaryotes. Endonuclease V in E. coli functions in repair of DNA damages caused by deamination of adenine and guanine in particular. E. coli EndoV ...

Paratuberculosis is a chronic enteric disease that affects ruminants. It is caused by Mycobacterium avium subsp. paratuberculosis (MAP) an obligated intracellular acid-fast bacilli that usually infect macrophages in the ...

Most vertebrates die within minutes when exposed to anoxia (no oxygen). However, a few exceptions exist, and a champion among these is the crucian carp, which at low temperatures can survive several months in an active ...

I anledning universitetets 200 års jubileum og Mat Nat Fakultetets 150 års jubileum i 2011 fikk vi i oppdrag å fylle en dag med cellebiologi/strukturbiologi og lage en kortfilm med moderne mikroskopi som tema. Den 12. ...

Background There is a huge effort in developing ligand-mediated targeting of nanoparticles to diseased cells and tissue. The plant toxin ricin has been shown to enter cells by utilizing both dynamin-dependent ...

Background Previous studies have noted that drug targets appear to be associated with higher-degree or higher-centrality proteins in interaction networks. These studies explicitly or tacitly make choices ...

Serum half-life of IgG is controlled by the neonatal Fc receptor (FcRn) that interacts with the IgG Fc region and may be increased or decreased as a function of altered FcRn binding. Preclinical evaluations of modified ...

Albumin is the most abundant protein in blood where it has a pivotal role as a transporter of fatty acids and drugs. Like IgG, albumin has long serum half-life, protected from degradation by pH-dependent recycling mediated ...

The enzyme ribonucleotide reductase (RNR) catalyzes the conversion of ribonucleotides to deoxyribonucleotides, the precursors for DNA. RNR requires a thiyl radical to activate the substrate. In RNR of eukaryotes (class Ia ...

Sensitization of sensory neurons after noxious conditioning may be involved in many chronic pain states, including radiating low back pain and sciatica following disc herniation. Here, we examine such sensitization induced ...

Phage display has been instrumental in discovery of novel binding peptides and folded domains for the past two decades. We recently reported a novel pIX phagemid display system that is characterized by a strong preference ...

Ribonucleotide reductase (RNR) catalyses the reduction of the four ribonucleotides to their corresponding deoxyribonucleotides needed for synthesis and repair of DNA. RNR is found in the genome of all living organisms, ...

The Fe(II)- and 2-oxoglutarate (2OG)-dependent dioxygenase AlkB from E. coli is a demethylase which repairs alkyl lesions in DNA, as well as RNA, through a direct reversal mechanism. Humans possess nine AlkB homologs ...

Background Pockmarks (depressions in the seabed) have been discovered throughout the world’s oceans and are often related to hydrocarbon seepage. Although high concentrations of pockmarks are present in ...

The repair of DNA damage is crucial for the maintenance of genome stability. In base excision repair, lesion-specific DNA glycosylases recognize and cleave a variety of base lesions. The human Nei-like (NEIL) DNA glycosylases ...

The BEACH domain is common for a protein family that has expanded through eukaryotic evolution and contains eight human proteins. These proteins are generally very large and at their C-terminal ends contain a conserved set ...

Förster Resonance Energy Transfer , abbreviated FRET , is a fluorescence phenomenon, which can be used to study and map co-localizations and dynamics of co-localizations at nanometer precision on a light microscope. FRET ...

Syndecans (Syns) are transmembrane heparan sulfate proteoglycans (HSPGs) and comprise a family of four members, Syn 1-4. Syns have important roles as cell surface receptors involved in cell-cell and/or cell-matrix interactions. ...

Vitamin D har en potensiell anti-angiogenetisk effekt ved binding av 1,25 dihydroksyvitmin D3 til VDR (vitamin D reseptoren). VDR er en ligand-aktivert transkripsjonsfaktor som binder til VDRE (vitamin D responselementer) ...

Gene therapy strategies have been intensively studied for over 20 years. However, there are yet no gene therapy protocols in conventional use. In this project, a gene delivery protocol was optimized for the transient ...

Tumor-specific CD4+ T cells coordinate the adaptive immune response against cancer. Dendritic cells (DCs) are professional antigen presenting cells that are believed to be important for the initial activation of naïve ...

Abstract Seed development requires a coordinated interplay between different transcriptional programs in the embryo, the endosperm and the maternally derived seed coat. In angiosperms, the embryo and the endosperm are ...

Testicular germ cell tumours are the most frequent type of cancer in young adult Caucasian males. Yet, it is one of the neoplastic diseases with the best prognosis and outcome, making it an ideal model for curative disease. ...

Autophagy is an important growth regulatory process in eukaryotic cells. Dysfunctional autophagy can cause tumorigenesis and neurodegenerative diseases due to accumulation of defective cellular substructures and protein ...

Osteosarcomas are the most common primary malignant tumors of bone. They are highly aggressive with poor prognosis, and display complex genomic aberrations. Previously, our group has identified a frequently deleted region ...

Atlantic cod (Gadus morhua) is a large, cold-adapted teleost that sustains long-standing commercial fisheries and incipient aquaculture. Here we present the genome sequence of Atlantic cod, showing evidence for complex ...

Fusion genes have key roles in the development and progression of many human cancers. Detection of oncogenic fusion genes is already implemented in routine diagnostics and fusion proteins are targets in molecularly tailored ...

DNA vaccines have the ability to induce humoral and cellular immune responses but their efficiency needs further improvement. One strategy is to target the antigen to surface receptors on antigen-presenting cells (APCs), ...

Epitelcellelinjen ”Madin-Darby canine kidney” (MDCK) er en velstudert polarisert cellelinje som danner tette cellelag med separate apikale og basolaterale membrandomener, som ved hjelp av polarisert transport av nysyntetiserte ...

Multiple DNA damaging agents cause deaminations of the bases of DNA. If not repaired, these can lead to mutations, which in turn can result in dangerous diseases. Endonuclease V (EndoV) is a highly conserved gene from ...

Gb3 (Gal α1-4, Gal β1-4, Glc β1-1, Ceramide) is a neutral glycosphingolipid specifically expressed in several human tissues, and is recognised as a receptor for Shiga toxins. Gb3 has been demonstrated to be upregulated in ...

As the fish farming industry is growing all over the world, economic losses caused by diseases are also increasing. In Norway one fifth of the farmed fish are lost due to viral diseases; there is no treatment for viral ...

Osteogenic differentiation of mesenchymal stem cells (MSC) is a tightly regulated process, inducing large changes in cell phenotype and gene expression. Characterization of these expressional changes may be important in ...

Abstract The gram negative obligate human bacterium N. gonorrhoeae possesses a general O-linked glycosylation system with several target proteins. So far twelve glycoproteins have been identified. In all cases where the ...

Cells that grow in a restricted area will eventually become confluent. At that point normal cells will stop dividing, while cancer cells, with their invasive properties, will continue dividing. It has been known for quite ...

Eskild sin gruppe har klonet hNCU-G1 som viser seg å være et protein med en mulig dobbeltfunksjon. Proteinet ble vist til å være lokalisert i kjernen hvor det kan fungere som en transkripsjonsfaktor og kjernereseptor ...

The cell cycle of the fission yeast, Schizosaccharomyces pombe, does not easily lend itself to analysis by flow cytometry, mainly because cells in G1 and G2 phase contain the same amount of DNA. This occurs because fission ...

Chlamydomonas reinhardtii is a widely used model organism to study chloroplast gene expression and photosynthetic processes. In this project we worked to identify a novel trans-acting factor that is thought to contribute ...

Phage display has been instrumental in discovery of novel binding peptides and folded domains for the past two decades, arguably with most success in the field of drug discovery. Despite being a mature and dominating ...

The invariant chain (Ii) has for many years been known to have important functions in MHC class II antigen presentation. There are four isoforms of Ii in humans: Iip33, Iip35, Iip41 and Iip43. The two shorter isoforms ...

Previous studies indicate that inhibition of fatty acid amide hydrolase (FAAH) activity may result in accumulation of endocannabinoids both in the brain and the spinal cord. Furthermore, it has been suggested that the ...

Background: Phage display is a leading technology for selection of binders with affinity for specific target molecules. Polypeptides are normally displayed as fusions to the major coat protein VIII (pVIII) or the minor ...

Background The iRefIndex consolidates protein interaction data from ten databases in a rigorous manner using sequence-based hash keys. Working with consolidated interaction data comes with distinct challenges: ...

The success of Fc-fusion bio-therapeutics has spurred the development of other Fc-fusion products for treating and/or vaccinating against a range of diseases. We describe a method to modulate their function by converting ...

Background Conventional high-grade osteosarcoma is a primary malignant bone tumor, which is most prevalent in adolescence. Survival rates of osteosarcoma patients have not improved significantly in the last ...

Sorting of newly synthesized proteins in the secretory pathway of polarized cells is governed by signals of proteinacous nature or post-translationally added structures such as glycans. Among all polarized cell types, ...

In addition to providing morphological support, the actin cytoskeleton is involved in cell motility, endocytosis and intracellular transport. Cytoskeletal interaction with the membrane is an essential part of these processes ...

Colorectal cancer is one of the most prevalent causes of cancer deaths worldwide, with an estimated 1500 deaths each year in Norway alone. Early detection of colorectal cancer may significantly reduce this number, and it ...

Background: Phage display is a platform for selection of specific binding molecules and this is a clear-cut motivation for increasing its performance. Polypeptides are normally displayed as fusions to the major coat protein ...

Although cloning and expression of T-cell Receptors (TcRs) has been performed for almost two decades, these procedures are still challenging. For example, the use of T-cell clones that have undergone limited expansion as ...

Små vannløselige c cytokrommer finnes i elektrontransportkjeder i alle livets domener, og har essensielle roller i metabolismen. De inneholder jernatomer bundet i den plane kofaktoren hem. Disse jernatomene er koordinert ...

Human IgG3 displays the strongest effector functions of all IgG subclasses but has a short half-life for unresolved reasons. Here we show that IgG3 binds to IgG-salvage receptor (FcRn), but that FcRn-mediated transport and ...

Background The iRefIndex addresses the need to consolidate protein interaction data into a single uniform data resource. iRefR provides the user with access to this data source from an R environment. ...

Background Methane oxidizing prokaryotes in marine sediments are believed to function as a methane filter reducing the oceanic contribution to the global methane emission. In the anoxic parts of the sediments, ...

Aldehyde dehydrogenase (ALDH) has recently been shown to be a marker of cancer stem-like cells (CSCs) across tumour types. The primary goals of this study were to investigate whether ALDH is expressed in liposarcomas, and ...

Background Frequent failure and severe side effects of current sarcoma therapy warrants new therapeutic approaches. The small-molecule MDM2 antagonist Nutlin-3a activates the p53 pathway and efficiently ...

Background FLASH is a huge nuclear protein involved in various cellular functions such as apoptosis signalling, NF-κB activation, S-phase regulation, processing of histone pre-mRNAs, and co-regulation of ...

Background Triage and interhospital transfer are central to trauma systems. Few studies have addressed transferred trauma patients. This study investigated transfers of variable distances to OUH (Oslo ...

Background Surface proteins are a key to a deeper understanding of the behaviour of Gram-positive bacteria interacting with the human gastro-intestinal tract. Such proteins contribute to cell wall synthesis ...