Targeting alternative splicing of fibronectin in human renal proximal tubule epithelial cells with antisense oligonucleotides to reduce EDA+ fibronectin production and block an autocrine loop that drives renal fibrosis.

TGFβ1 is a powerful regulator of fibrosis; secreted in a latent form, it becomes active after release from the latent complex. During tissue fibrosis, the EDA + isoform of cellular fibronectin is overexpressed. In pulmonary fibrosis it has been proposed that the fibronectin splice variant including an EDA domain (FN EDA+) activates latent TGFβ.

Predictors of heroin abstinence in opiate substitution therapy in heroin-only users and dual users of heroin and crack.

Aims: To analyse predictors of heroin abstinence in opiate substitution therapy (OST) based on frequency of crack use and its interactions with other predictors in a clinical non-experimental setting.

Design: Retrospective study.

Setting: A community drug service in London, UK.

Tuning liver stiffness against tumours: an in vitro study using entrapped cells in tumour-like microcapsules.

Liver fibrosis is a reversible pathology characterized by the up-regulated secretion and deposition of ECM proteins and inhibitors of metalloproteinases, which increase the stiffness and viscosity of this organ. Since recent studies have shown that fibrosis preceded the generation of hepatocellular carcinomas, we hypothesize that liver fibrosis could play a role as a mechanism for restricting uncontrolled cell proliferation, inducing the mortality of cancer cells and subsequent development of primary tumours. With this purpose, in this work we analysed in vitro how the modulation of stiffness can influence proliferation, viability and aggregation of hepatocarcinoma cells (HepG(2)) embedded in 3D micromilieus mimicking values of elasticity of fibrotic liver tissues.

Improved protocols for protein and RNA isolation from three-dimensional collagen sandwich cultures of primary hepatocytes.

The sandwich culture is the most widely used long-term culture system for functional primary hepatocytes. Despite its advantages, the currently available protocols for protein and RNA extraction are either time-consuming or contain steps that may skewer the results. This paper describes improved protocols for RNA and protein extraction from sandwich cultures that are easy to perform, require short working time, and use no additional enzymatic reactions that could change the expression profile of the cells.

Improved semiquantitative Western blot technique with increased quantification range.

With the development of new interdisciplinary fields such as systems biology, the quantitative analysis of protein expression in biological samples gains more and more importance. Although the most common method for this is ELISA, Western blot also has advantages: The separation of proteins by size allows the evaluation of only specifically bound protein. This work examines the Western blot signal chain, determines some of the parameters relevant for quantitative analysis and proposes a mathematical model of the reaction kinetics.