Semiautomated TaqMan PCR screening of GMO labelled samples for (unauthorised) GMOs.

In most countries, systems are in place to analyse food products for the potential presence of genetically modified organisms (GMOs), to enforce labelling requirements and to screen for the potential presence of unauthorised GMOs. With the growing number of GMOs on the world market, a larger diversity of methods is required for informative analyses. In this paper, the specificity of an extended screening set consisting of 32 screening methods to identify different crop species (endogenous genes) and GMO elements was verified against 59 different GMO reference materials.

Practical experiences with an extended screening strategy for genetically modified organisms (GMOs) in real-life samples.

Nowadays most animal feed products imported into Europe have a GMO (genetically modified organism) label. This means that they contain European Union (EU)-authorized GMOs. For enforcement of these labeling requirements, it is necessary, with the rising number of EU-authorized GMOs, to perform an increasing number of analyses.

Suppression of tumor growth, invasion and angiogenesis of human gastric cancer by adenovirus-mediated expression of NK4.

Background: To improve the prognosis of patients with gastric cancer it is important to develop novel treatment modalities targeting the malignant behavior of tumor cells. Concerning this, NK4, which acts as HGF-antagonist and angiogenesis inhibitor, might be a potential therapeutic agent for gastric cancer. The HGF-c-MET pathway plays a pivotal role in gastric tumor growth, invasion, metastasis and angiogenesis.

Conditionally replicative adenovirus with tropism expanded towards integrins inhibits osteosarcoma tumor growth in vitro and in vivo.

Purpose: The clinical course of osteosarcoma (OS) demands the development of new therapeutic options. Conditionally replicative adenoviruses (CRAds) represent promising agents for the treatment of solid tumors, because CRAds have an intrinsic replication capacity that allows in situ amplification and extensive tumor infection through lateral spread. The CRAd AdDelta24 has been developed to replicate selectively in cells with a defective retinoblastoma (Rb) pathway.

Gene-directed enzyme prodrug therapy for osteosarcoma: sensitization to CPT-11 in vitro and in vivo by adenoviral delivery of a gene encoding secreted carboxylesterase-2.

Despite improvement in the treatment of osteosarcoma (OS), there are still many patients who cannot benefit from current treatment modalities. This warrants exploration of new treatment options. To that end, we investigated gene-directed enzyme prodrug therapy (GDEPT) with the use of human liver carboxylesterase-2 (CE2) and the anticancer agent CPT-11.