Archive for the ‘Gene Therapy Research’ Category

ICBR: Cell Therapy
Judi Smith describes what cell therapy is and how it benefits people as well as the three locations where cell therapy is offered by the International Clinic...

By: Ryan Elliott

Read the rest here:
ICBR: Cell Therapy - Video

Retina Consultants of Southwest Florida

Dr. Ashish Sharma of Retina Consultants of Southwest Florida conducts an eye exam.

The Naples seminar will be from 1 p.m. to 4 p.m. at the Hilton Naples, 5111 U.S. 41 North.

An identical seminar in Fort Myers will be Monday from 9 a.m. to noon at Harborside Convention Center, 1375 Monroe St.

To register to attend, call 1-866-946-6824, or go to http://www.MassEyeAndEar.organization/symposium.

NAPLES Leonard Klein plays tennis and bridge, and both of his games could improve if he has stem cell therapy some day.

The 80-year-old suffers from dry macular degeneration. While his vision loss hasnt worsened in recent months, theres no telling the future.

Studies are under way to see if stem cell therapy can reverse vision loss for people suffering from age-related macular degeneration.

Klein will sign up if such a study opens up to Southwest Florida.

Im a risk taker and always have been, he said recently, before heading to a bridge game in the care center at the Vi at Bentley Village, a continuing care retirement community in North Naples.

View post:
Naples seminar to look at stem cell therapy to aid macular degeneration

Mar. 22, 2013 The notion that each gene can only codify for a single protein has been challenged for some years. Yet, the functional outcomes that may result from genes encoding more than one protein are still largely unknown. Now, in a study published in the latest issue of The Plant Cell journal, a group of scientists led by Paula Duque at the Instituto Gulbenkian de Cincia (IGC, Portugal) discovered a gene -- ZIFL1 -- that has the particularity of producing two different proteins with completely distinct locations and functions in the plant. The researchers observed that in the root ZIFL1 codifies a protein that is important for the transport of auxin, a hormone essential for the correct growth and development of the plant. However, in the leaves the same gene originates a protein that promotes tolerance to drought. The gene presented in this study is one of the few identified to produce two proteins with such different biological roles.

ZIFL1 belongs to a family of transporter genes known to be present in all classes of organisms, but the functional role of most of its members remains unknown. What is known is that these transporter genes encode proteins that are integrated into cell membranes and act by allowing the passage of small molecules across them. By undergoing genetic and cell biology studies in the plant model Arabidopsis thaliana, Paula Duque's team was able to study the role of the ZIFL1 gene. What surprised the scientists was that mutant plants unable to produce the ZIFL1 transporter presented specific defects in different organs and functions. On one hand, their roots exhibited problems of growth, ramification and orientation when compared to normal plants.

These observations suggested that the ZIFL1 gene was involved in the transport of the auxin hormone, which plays an important role in the development of the root. But the researchers also found out that the mutant plants had problems in tolerating drought. They realized that the leaf pores that regulate transpiration -- the stomata -- were more open in the mutants than in normal plants, resulting in the loss of higher quantities of water. This suggested a role for ZIFL1 in the closure of stomata and in the control of water loss by the plant, which can be critical under drought conditions.

Intrigued by these observations, the researchers investigated whether the ZIFL1 gene could be originating two proteins that would act differently in distinct tissues. Alternative splicing is a key mechanism allowing the same gene to produce multiple proteins. When genes are activated to give rise to proteins, they first originate an intermediate molecule of RNA that can be processed differently, with some parts being removed. This cut and paste process may originate different RNA molecules that can then be converted into different proteins. Estelle Remy, investigator at Duque's laboratory and first author of this work, observed that in the case of the ZIFL1 gene, alternative splicing originates two RNA molecules that differ in just two chemical residues. However, this small difference has a huge impact on the proteins that are generated, with one of them being shortened by 67 amino acids. In collaboration with Isabel S-Correia's group at Instituto Superior Tcnico, the researchers then tested the activity of the two proteins in yeast cells and found that both transport potassium ions.

Having different size but similar transport activity, Estelle looked for the reason why these two proteins had such distinct biological functions. Surprisingly, she observed that root tissues only present the longer form of the protein, whereas the shorter protein can only be found in the leaves. Furthermore, the location of these two proteins also differs inside the cells of the root and leaves, being integrated into different cell membranes. According to Estelle, "the fact that we cannot find both proteins being expressed either in roots or leaves suggests that these tissues may have specific factors that somehow influence the splicing of the ZIFL1 RNA into the form that confers the biological role necessary for that tissue."

Says Paula Duque, "To our knowledge, there are not many known cases of proteins with such different biological functions being codified by the same gene. What is most fascinating is how the inclusion or removal of just two chemical residues in the RNA molecule results in the production of two proteins that play essential roles either in hormone transport or in tolerance to drought."

Alternative splicing is a crucial mechanism to generate protein diversity. In humans, about 20,000 to 25,000 genes codify proteins. However, recent studies indicate that over 90% of these genes undergo alternative splicing, with scientists estimating that there may be up to 500,000 or more different proteins in the human body.

This study was carried out at the IGC in collaboration with the research groups of Isabel S-Correia (Biological Sciences Research Group, IBB/CEBQ, Instituto Superior Tcnico, Portugal) and Ji Friml (VIB/Ghent University, Belgium and Institute of Science and Technology, Austria). It was funded by Fundao para a Cincia e a Tecnologia (Portugal).

Share this story on Facebook, Twitter, and Google:

Other social bookmarking and sharing tools:

Read the original here:
When a gene is worth two: Same gene fulfills different biological roles in plants

Philosophy of music.

By: Eric Bottelberghe

See original here:
Philosophy of music. - Video

KORBANI STYLE-Gangnam Style in Bangali(Official)
Korbani Style!!! This is the official video #39;Kurbani Style #39; that is the remake of the famous music video Gangnam Style Please enjoy!.

By: EFAZTHEGREAT

Read the original:
KORBANI STYLE-Gangnam Style in Bangali(Official) - Video

AppTalk: web vs hybrid vs native apps
Speaker: Sebastian de Mel. The content starts at 31:11 See https://www.facebook.com/techclubtampere for more information.

By: Karl Ots

Go here to read the rest:
AppTalk: web vs hybrid vs native apps - Video

Vsauce - Can You Boomerang A Football?
Can you boomerang a football? Michael Stevens, creator of Vsauce, along with Steve Roberts from STRskillSchool finds out. Subscribe to Copa90: http://bit.ly/...

By: Copa90

Read the original here:
Vsauce - Can You Boomerang A Football? - Video

plants and their environments for technology

By: Zach Stone

Here is the original post:
plants and their environments for technology - Video

Living healthy in a fallen world
The course cover the core principles of a healthy christian life.

By: Mark Dailey

Read the rest here:
Living healthy in a fallen world - Video

Billy Corgan: Total Paradigm Shift
Smashing Pumpkins founder and lead singer Billy Corgan joined Alex Jones once again in studio for a powerful interview. In this excerpt, Corgan analyzes the ...

By: TheAlexJonesChannel

Here is the original post:
Billy Corgan: Total Paradigm Shift - Video

Nazi American Proof pt 2
This is proof nazi #39;s have taken over. This is by Dr. Phil Valentine video= The art and science of hyper dimensional warfare!!! Stop by my channel Subscribe!!!

By: wally810ft

Read more:
Nazi American Proof pt 2 - Video

When is a fish not a fish but a drug? When government regulators take old laws and twist themselves into knots trying to apply them to new technology.

In the emotionally charged battle over the safety and appropriateness of genetically modified foods, people on both sides agree that the way the government oversees genetically modified plants and animals is patchy, inconsistent and at times just plain bizarre.

Soon, analysts say, the system may be stretched to the breaking point. That could leave many genetically modified crops unregulated a worry for those who fear environmental and safety risks or who believe that government vetting is key for broad public acceptance.

"It's a bit of a mess," said Jennifer Kuzma, a science policy expert at the Humphrey School of Public Affairs at the University of Minnesota.

The web of regulations used to govern genetically engineered species draws on more than 10 laws, all written for other purposes. Some were crafted to address issues such as tainted drugs, wheat spiked with sawdust and pollution by industrial chemicals.

The results can be odd.

Atlantic salmon that grow quickly thanks to a growth hormone gene from another salmon species are deemed "new animal drugs" because the Food and Drug Administration decided to regulate genetically engineered animals under the Food, Drug and Cosmetic Act of 1938.

A cotton plant that makes insect-killing proteins with the help of a gene from a soil bacterium is a pesticide in the eyes of the Environmental Protection Agency, which regulates the crop under the Federal Insecticide, Fungicide and Rodenticide Act of 1972.

In what some critics deem the biggest contortion, many genetically modified crops are classified as "potential plant pests" so that the U.S. Department of Agriculture may preside over them through the Federal Plant Pest Act of 1957 even though the key traits added to the plants have nothing to do with pests.

Some crops are regulated by more than one agency: A corn plant engineered to kill insects, for example, is reviewed by the EPA and USDA and also gets a voluntary assessment from the FDA.

Read more:
Genetic modification strains old food and drug laws

Jim W Dean Israel Partners in War Crimes

By: Gordon Duff

The rest is here:
Jim W Dean Israel Partners in War Crimes - Video

Public release date: 24-Mar-2013 [ | E-mail | Share ]

Contact: Les Lang llang@med.unc.edu 919-966-9366 University of North Carolina Health Care

CHAPEL HILL, N.C. Every time a cell divides it makes a carbon copy of crucial ingredients, including the histone proteins that are responsible for spooling yards of DNA into tight little coils. When these spool-like proteins aren't made correctly, it can result in the genomic instability characteristic of most birth defects and cancers.

Seven years ago, Dr. Joe Gall of the Carnegie Institute in Baltimore, Md. and coworkers noticed an aggregation of molecules along a a block of genome that codes for the critical histones, but they had no idea how this aggregate or "histone locus body" was formed.

Now, research conducted in fruit flies at the University of North Carolina School of Medicine has pinpointed a specific DNA sequence that both triggers the formation of this "histone locus body" and turns on all the histone genes in the entire block.

The finding, published March 25, 2013 in the journal Developmental Cell, provides a model for the coordinated synthesis of histones needed for assembly into chromatin, a process critical to keeping chromosomes intact and passing genetic information from generation to generation.

"Our study has uncovered a new relationship between nuclear architecture and gene activity," said senior study author Bob Duronio, PhD, professor of biology and genetics at UNC. "In order to make chromosomes properly, you need to make these histone building blocks at the right time and in the right amount. We found that the cell has evolved this complex architecture to do that properly, and that involves an interface between the assembly of various components and the turning on of a number of genes."

In the fruit fly, as in the human, the five different histone genes exist in one long chunk of the genome. The "histone locus" in flies contains 100 copies of each of the five genes, encompassing approximately 500,000 nucleotides of A's, C's, T's and G's. The proteins required for making the histone message a process that must happen every time a new strand of DNA is copied come together at this "histone locus" to form the "histone locus body."

Duronio and co-senior study author William Marzluff, PhD, Kenan Distinguished Professor of Biochemistry and Biophysics, wanted to figure out how these factors knew to meet at the histone locus.

They inserted different combinations of the five histone genes into another site of the genome, and looked to see which combinations recruited a new histone locus body. The researchers found that combinations that contained a specific 300 nucleotide sequence the region between the H3 and H4 histone genes formed a histone locus body. In contrast, combinations of genes that lacked this sequence did not form the body. They went on to show that this sequence turned on not only the H3 and H4 genes in its direct vicinity, but also other histone genes in the block.

Read more:
Researchers identify genetic sequence that helps to coordinate synthesis of DNA-packaging proteins

Biotech Vlog - Gene Therapy
A Biotech vlog on Gene Therapy that I did for a school assignment.

By: dkhl65

See the article here:
Biotech Vlog - Gene Therapy - Video

OMICS Publishing Group- Journal of Genetic Syndromes Gene Therapy
OMICS Publishing Group, Journal of Genetic Syndromes and Gene Therapy under Open Access Category conveys the latest research information on identification an...

By: OMICSPublishingGroup

Here is the original post:
OMICS Publishing Group- Journal of Genetic Syndromes

Journal of Genetic Syndromes Gene Therapy | OMICS Publishing Group
OMICS Publishing Group , Journal of Genetic Syndromes Gene Therapy is an international, peer-reviewed scientific journal emphasizes the documentation of ph...

By: OMICSPublishingGroup

Visit link:
Journal of Genetic Syndromes

Controlling Blood Loss in Laparoscopic Liver Pancreas Surgery Using the Aquamantys® System
Please join us on April 9th, 2013 at 7pm EDT as Michael House, MD Michael House, MD, from the Indiana University Health share their perspective on the use ...

By: ORLivedotcom

Visit link:
Controlling Blood Loss in Laparoscopic Liver

The Vaccine Gene Therapy Institute of Florida corporateroadshow.com
Watch Keith Knutson talk about how Tapimmune (tpiv) fits into the institutes program.

By: Frank Ferraro

Originally posted here:
The Vaccine

therapy
Therapy air ion a ZEptertol.

By: LDenes1

Visit link:
therapy - Video

Gene therapy to improve vision

By: BRC Ophthalmology

Go here to see the original:
Gene therapy to improve vision - Video

Editor's Choice Academic Journal Main Category: Lymphoma / Leukemia / Myeloma Also Included In: Stem Cell Research Article Date: 21 Mar 2013 - 12:00 PDT

Current ratings for: Cell Therapy Shows Promise For Advanced Leukemia In Adults

3 (1 votes)

1 (1 votes)

Similar immune-system therapy has proven effective in children with this cancer as well as in adults with a similar type of leukemia, however, this is the first time this specific therapy has worked in adults.

The findings of the current study were based on five patients with acute lymphoblastic leukemia (ALL). T cells were extracted from the patient and modified to express a receptor for protein on other immune cells - called B cells - that are found in both cancerous and healthy tissues.

ALL is a cancer of the blood and bone marrow which progresses quickly - if left untreated, patients sometimes die within weeks. The first treatment is generally three phases of chemotherapy drugs.

For most patients, this puts the cancer in remission. However, it often comes back. The second treatment agenda is usually another round of chemotherapy followed by a bone marrow transplant.

The authors point out that when the cancer returns, it is often immune to many chemotherapy drugs. Therefore, Dr. Renier Brentjens, an oncologist at Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center in New York City, and his colleagues set out to test a different approach.

The five participating patients received infusions of their altered T cells after undergoing standard chemotherapy. All five patients saw a total remission - for one patient this occured within just eight days, according to the researchers.

Read the original here:
Cell Therapy Shows Promise For Advanced Leukemia In Adults

Leukemia is never an easy disease to beat back, but adults with relapsed B cell acute lymphoblastic leukemia, or B-ALL, have especially grim prospects. This particular kind of blood cancer progresses quickly, and has only a 30 to 40 percent cure rate in adults. Chemotherapy drugs can sometimes clear out the cancer the first time around, but some patients relapse, requiring another round of chemotherapy, then a bone marrow transplant. But this second round can sometimes fail because the recurring leukemia proves resistant to the drugs.

Now, in a paper published Wednesday in the journal Science Translational Medicine, scientists have successfully treated B-ALL patients by inserting new genetic material into some of their T cells. The cell therapy allows the patients immune system to find and destroy the places where the blood cancer is hiding out.

In one case, the treatment cleared up a patients leukemia in a little more than a week.

We had hoped, but couldnt have predicted that the response would be so profound and rapid, Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center researcher Renier J. Brentjens told the New York Times.

Brentjens and his colleagues treated five B-ALL patients with some of their own T cells, which were genetically programmed to recognize a particular protein on the surface of B cells, the immune system cells that are affected by this kind of leukemia. The reengineered T cells then lay waste to all of the patients B cells, healthy and cancerous alike (the loss of healthy B cells can be treated later).

Were creating living drugs, senior author Michel Sadelain told the New York Times. Its an exciting story thats just beginning.

Still, the treatment is far from 100 percent perfect. Three of the five patients in the study have been in remission for anywhere between five months and two years. Another patient died of a blood clot after going in to remission, and another relapsed again possibly because a steroid treatment meant to control a side effect of the cell therapy may have wiped out the souped-up T cells before they could attack the B cells. The three survivors may yet relapse again.

And there are risks associated with the cell therapy. The T cells offensive onslaught can create whats called a cytokine storm, a potentially fatal immune chain reaction that usually induces an extremely high fever.

"This is very early in development," University of Pennsylvania researcher David Porter, who was not involved with the study, told US News & World Report. "We are just starting to learn about the short-term side effects, and we don't know about the long-term effectiveness or safety."

At the moment, this kind of cell therapy is being used as a lead-in to a bone marrow transplant. But in the future, doctors may be able to just use immunotherapy by itself.

Continue reading here:
Cell Therapy For Aggressive Leukemia Uses Patient's Own T Cells, Has Very Promising Results

Mar. 21, 2013 Food and environment can chemically alter your gene function and scientists have identified a gene that is consistently altered in obesity.

The gene LY86 was among a group of 100 genes identified as likely contributors to obesity through genome-wide association studies comparing the DNA of thousands of obese and lean individuals, said Dr. Shaoyong Su, genetic epidemiologist at the Medical College of Georgia at Georgia Regents University.

Su looked at progressively larger groups of obese versus lean individuals and found LY86 consistently and highly chemically altered, or methylated, in the obese individuals. "The association is solid; the methylation of this gene is important in obesity," Su said.

It's known that obesity is highly inheritable; that if parents are obese, children are at higher risk. However environment, including high-fat foods and chemical exposure, can put you at risk as well, said Su. Methylation is one way the body adjusts to its environment.

He received the 2013 Scott Grundy Fellowship Award for Excellence in Metabolism Research for his studies and is presenting the work this week during the Epidemiology and Prevention/Nutrition, Physical Activity and Metabolism Scientific Session of the American Heart Association in New Orleans.

Previously LY86 had been known as an inflammation gene and Su's studies show, in fact, it may be contributing to more than just obesity. He found high methylation of LY86 also was associated with increased inflammation -- a risk factor for a variety of maladies such as heart disease and cancer -- as well as insulin resistance, a cause of diabetes. This association also held up among a group of about 703 subjects that, like the general public, included obese, lean and average-weight individuals.

Now he wants to go back to the animal model to see whether methylation changes gene expression up or down in fat mice as well as fat, pregnant mice and their offspring. He believes that a lot of methylation starts in the womb and there are unfortunate real-life circumstances that support that theory.

For example, in the Dutch famine of 1944 near the end of World War II, babies born to starving mothers experienced DNA methylation that made them better able to survive such depravation, but in the more plentiful environment in which they grew up, put them at increased risk for cardiovascular disease as well as diabetes, obesity and other health problems.

He's already moving forward with more human studies as well, looking at a new group of lean and obese individuals, analyzing their DNA expression to see if increased methylation of LY86 means the gene is expressed more or less. Generally, higher methylation is thought to translate to lower gene expression.

He also wants to pin down whether methylation results from things like a high-fat diet, unfortunate genetics or both. These types of details may help explain why some individuals grow obese with a bad diet and little physical activity while others don't, Su said. It also may mean that positive environmental change, such as a better diet or more physical activity, can reverse at least some of the methylation. People may not get thin, for example, but they may reduce their risk for obesity-related disease, Su said.

Original post:
Scientists identify gene that is consistently altered in obese individuals

The Bible - Homeland - Part 2
Joshua conquers Jericho; Delilah betrays Samson as the Israelites battle the Philistines; Samuel anoints David king, a move that could throw the nation into ...

By: FHEFoxTVProductions

Original post:
The Bible - Homeland - Part 2 - Video