Grant Winner Highlight

This month's grant winner highlight from our grant awards program is Kimberley Cordes, Ph.D., Postdoctoral Fellow at the Gladstone Institute of Cardiovascular Disease. Dr. Cordes is studying the mechanisms that regulate vascular smooth muscle proliferation, a hallmark of atherosclerosis. She identified miR-29 to be enriched in the adventitial layer of the artery, made up primarily of fibroblasts, which is associated with extra-cellular matrix (ECM) breakdown in the formation of aortic aneurysms. She found miR-29 was up-regulated during proliferation in some arterial disease models, such as Elastin haploinsufficiency. She will use 3'UTR GoClone reporters and the LightSwitch Luciferase Assay System to to study the targets of miR-29. Read more.

Featured Publication

IF1 Triggers a ROS-Mediated Retrograde Prosurvival and Proliferative Response

Numerous human carcinomas overexpress the mitochondrial ATPase Inhibitory Factor 1 (IF1). IF1 signals metabolic reprogramming, proliferation, invasion, and survival. The researchers in this study showed that IF1 overexpression in colon cancer cells plays a crucial role in metabolic adaptation of cancer cells to enhanced aerobic glycolysis. IF1-mediated inhibition of the H+-ATP synthase activated NFκB via reactive oxygen species (ROS) signaling. Activation of NFκB resulted in a cellular adaptive response including Bcl-xL mediated resistance to drug-induced apoptosis. Quenching ROS production prevented NFκB activation and  thus IF1-mediated cellular adaptive response.  These findings have important implications in cancer cell survival and proliferation. The researchers used SwitchGear Genomics’ NFκB, Bcl-xL and Bax promoter GoClone reporters to help obtain data for the study.Read more.

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