Characterization of the nicotinic acetylcholine receptor antibodies after an unexpected increase of antibody titer in thymoma associated myasthenia gravis patients.

Two thymoma-associated myasthenia gravis patients with chronic well-controlled disease but an unexpected increase in anti-nAChR autoantibodies titer are reported. The specificity of anti-nAChR autoantibodies directed against extracellular parts of the receptor was studied in order to investigate the discrepancy between clinical and immunological status. Analysis of the anti-nAChR autoantibodies recognizing the extracellular parts of the nAChR revealed that when the concentration of anti-nAChR autoantibodies titer increased both patients had non-anti-α1 autoantibodies.

Analysis of nAChR Autoantibodies Against Extracellular Epitopes in MG Patients.

Myasthenia gravis (MG) is an autoimmune disorder caused by autoantibodies targeting components of the postsynaptic membrane of the neuromuscular junction (NMJ), leading to neuromuscular transmission deficiency. In the vast majority of patients, these autoantibodies target the nicotinic acetylcholine receptor (nAChR), a heteropentameric ion channel anchored to the postsynaptic membrane of the NMJ. Autoantibodies in patients with MG may target all the subunits of the receptor at both their extracellular and intracellular regions.

Diagnostic significance of IgG and albumin indices versus oligoclonal band types in demyelinating disorders.

Aims: The laboratory diagnosis of demyelinating inflammatory disorders (DIDs) relies on both intrathecal oligoclonal band (OCB) positivity and IgG index. Although OCB typing remains the gold-standard test for DIDs, it can be laborious and ambiguous, complicating diagnostics, and unduly increasing diagnostic time. We examined whether serum or cerebrospinal fluid (CSF) parameters can classify OCB types and, thus, be used as a replacement test to standard OCB typing.

Age at sampling and sex distribution of AChRAb vs. MuSKAb myasthenia gravis in a large Greek population.

Objective: Myasthenia gravis (MG) is a typical B-cell-mediated neuromuscular junction disease that can be classified into seropositive and seronegative subtypes. Association of patients' age at sampling and sex with the two major seropositive MG subcategories, i.e.

Autoantibodies to lipoprotein-related protein 4 in patients with double-seronegative myasthenia gravis.

Objectives: To determine whether patients with myasthenia gravis (MG) have serum antibodies to lipoprotein-related protein 4 (LRP4), a newly identified receptor for agrin that is essential for neuromuscular junction formation, and to establish whether such antibodies contribute to MG pathogenesis.

Design: Serum samples from patients with MG with known status of serum antibodies to the acetylcholine receptor (AChR) and muscle-specific kinase (MuSK) and serum samples from control subjects (healthy individuals and individuals with other diseases) were tested for antibodies to LRP4. Serum samples with such antibodies were tested to determine whether they had the ability to inhibit 2 different functions of LRP4 at the neuromuscular junction.

Survivin isoforms and clinicopathological characteristics in colorectal adenocarcinomas using real-time qPCR.

Aim: To investigate three isoforms of survivin in colorectal adenocarcinomas.

Methods: We used the LightCycler Technology (Roche), along with a common forward primer and reverse primers specific for the splice variants and two common hybridization probes labeled with fluorescein and LightCycler-Red fluorophore (LC-Red 640). Real time quantitative polymerase chain reaction (PCR) was performed on cDNAs from 52 tumor specimens from colorectal cancer patients and 10 unrelated normal colorectal tissues.

Discovery of potent vascular endothelial growth factor receptor-2 inhibitors.

Substantial evidence over the last decades has implicated uncontrolled angiogenesis with various pathological states, including cancer. Vascular endothelial growth factor (VEGF) plays a critical role in its regulation. Because the tyrosine kinase VEGF receptor-2 (VEGFR-2) is the major mediator of the mitogenic, angiogenic, and permeability-enhancing effects of VEGF, it has become one of the most profound anti-angiogenesis targets.

Growth inhibition of breast cancer cell lines overexpressing Her2/neu by a novel internalized fully human Fab antibody fragment.

The Her2/neu oncogene is overexpressed in various human cancers of epithelial origin and is associated with increased metastatic potential and poor prognosis. Blocking the Her2/neu signalling has been the focus of most therapeutic approaches. In this paper, the Her2/neu extracellular domain expressed in soluble form in yeast Pichia pastoris was used in order to isolate a fully human Fab fragment from a combinatorial Fab phage display library, derived from invaded lymph nodes of a breast cancer patient.

In vitro and in vivo antitumor activity of a mouse CTL hybridoma expressing chimeric receptors bearing the single chain Fv from HER-2/neu- specific antibody and the gamma-chain from Fc(epsilon) RI.

To broaden the applicability of adoptive cellular immunotherapy against HER-2/neu overexpressing human cancers, we constructed a chimeric scFv/gamma gene composed of the variable regions of a HER-2/neu specific monoclonal antibody (mAb) joined to the signaling gamma-chain of the Fc(epsilon)RI receptor. The scFv(anti-HER-2/neu)/gamma chimeric gene was successfully expressed as functional surface receptor in the MD.45 cytolytic T-cell (CTL) hybridoma (MD.