Gene/Protein Disease Symptom Drug Enzyme Compound
Pivot Concepts:   Target Concepts:
Query: EC:2.7.11.24 (mitogen-activated protein kinase)
 95,810 document(s) hit in 31,850,051 MEDLINE articles (0.00 seconds)

Plasma oxidized low-density lipoprotein (OX-LDL) levels are elevated in patients with renal diseases, including diabetic nephropathy. We examined effects of OX-LDL on cell proliferation and extracellular matrix (ECM) production by using normal human mesangial cells. Furthermore, we examined possible involvement of peroxisome proliferator-activated receptor gamma (PPARgamma). Mesangial cell proliferation with OX-LDL, 9-hydroxy-10,12-octadecadienoic acid (9HODE), and 13-hydroxy-9,11-octadecadienoic acid (13HODE), the major components of OX-LDL, were determined by 5-bromo-2'-deoxyuridine (BrdU) or 3-(4,5-dimethylthiazol-2-yl)-2, 5-diphenyl tetrazolium bromide (MTT) incorporation. The effect of OX-LDL on mesangial cell proliferation with PD98059 pretreatment was determined by BrdU incorporation. Type IV collagen, fibronectin, and PPARgamma expression with OX-LDL or 9HODE or 13HODE was determined by Western blotting. Type IV collagen expression with antisense oligonucleotide against PPARgamma pretreatment was also determined by Western blotting. The effect of PD98059 pretreatment on PPARgamma expression was determined by Western blotting. In mesangial cells exposed to isolated OX-LDL from human plasma, BrdU incorporation was increased, and this increase was deleted by PD98059. Type IV collagen expression was significantly increased by OX-LDL. 9HODE and 13HODE increased BrdU and MTT incorporation into mesangial cells and also increased expressions of Type IV collagen and fibronection, the major components of ECM. PPARgamma expression in mesangial cells was stimulated by 9HODE. The reduction of PPARgamma synthesis by pretreatment of antisense oligonucleotide against PPARgamma remarkably attenuated Type IV collagen synthesis induced by 9HODE. PPARgamma expression induced by 9HODE was also reduced by PD98059 pretreatment. These findings demonstrate that 9HODE, the major component of OX-LDL, stimulates cell proliferation and ECM production of human mesangial cells. In addition, the stimulatory effects are, at least in part, mediated by PPARgamma, which may exist in downstream of ERK1/2 pathway.
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PMID:9HODE stimulates cell proliferation and extracellular matrix synthesis in human mesangial cells via PPARgamma. 1552 42

Although a novel second form of GnRH (GnRH-II) has been reported to have an antiproliferative effect on gynecologic cancer cells, its biological mechanism remains to be elucidated. We have previously demonstrated that GnRH-II activates p38 MAPK. There is accumulating evidence that activation of MAPKs by GnRH-I and -II is important for cell proliferation, differentiation, and apoptosis. In the present study, we further investigated the involvement of GnRH-II in the inhibition of cell proliferation and activation of ERK1/2 and c-Jun N-terminal protein kinase/stress-activated protein kinase (JNK/SAPK) in ovarian cancer cells, OVCAR-3. The [(3)H]thymidine incorporation and 3-(4,5-dimethylthiazol-2-yl)-2,5-diphenyltetrazolium bromide (MTT) assays revealed that treatment with GnRH-II suppresses cell proliferation of ovarian cancer cells. Western blot analysis demonstrated that ERK1/2 was activated by GnRH-II (100 nm). Moreover, PD98059 (10 mum), an inhibitor of a MAPK/ERK kinase, reversed the activation of ERK1/2 induced by GnRH-II. The activation of ERK1/2 by GnRH-II subsequently phosphorylated Elk-1 as a downstream pathway, which was blocked by PD98059. On the other hand, it is not likely that GnRH-II activates the JNK/SAPK pathway. Taken together, these results indicate that the ERK1/2 pathway is involved in the effect of GnRH-II on antiproliferation and may be an important target for ovarian cancer therapy.
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PMID:Extracellular signal-regulated protein kinase, but not c-Jun N-terminal kinase, is activated by type II gonadotropin-releasing hormone involved in the inhibition of ovarian cancer cell proliferation. 1559 81

We synthesized lecithinized brain-derived neurotrophic factor (lecithinized-BDNF), in which an average of three molecules of a lecithin derivative were bound to recombinant human BDNF. We evaluated its pharmacological activity in C57BL/KsJ-db/db mice, and assessed its targetability and affinity for the nervous system. Subcutaneously administered lecithinized-BDNF markedly reduced the plasma glucose level, food intake, and body weight in C57BL/KsJ-db/db diabetic mice. Its potency was more than 20 times greater than that of unmodified BDNF. We then studied the mechanism for the markedly enhanced pharmacological activity. In vitro cell growth activity of lecithinized-BDNF using the MTT assay was lower than unmodified BDNF, probably due to steric hindrance of the lecithin moieties. While the plasma BDNF level after subcutaneous administration of lecithinized-BDNF was not higher compared with unmodified BDNF. However, higher amount of lecithinized-BDNF accumulated in the spinal cord was observed. Lastly, we found that in vitro binding capacity of lecithinized-BDNF for PC-pAB1 neural cells was much higher than unmodified BDNF. Moreover, lecithinized-BDNF bound to PC-pAB1 cells did not exchange with an excessive amount of unmodified BDNF or an excess of lecithinized-BDNF. PC-pAB1 cells treated with lecithinized-BDNF showed sustained mitogen-activated protein kinase (MAPK, ERK1/2) activation. These data would indicate that the high affinity of lecithinized-BDNF for the target cells, followed by prolonged MAPK activation, would play an important role in its potent pharmacological activity.
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PMID:Brain-derived neurotrophic factor bound with lecithin derivative showed a markedly enhanced pharmacological potency due to its potent cell membrane affinity followed by prolonged MAPK activation. 1565 64

We designed a series of experiments to explore the neuroprotective effects of insulin. Insulin significantly inhibited the alpha-amino-3-hydroxy-5-methylisoxazole-4-propionic acid (AMPA)-induced neuronal cell damage as evidenced by 3-(4,5-dimethylthiazol-2-yl)-2,5-diphenyltetrazolium-bromide (MTT) assay. However, insulin had little affect on the AMPA-induced glial cell damage. To determine whether insulin inhibits AMPA-induced excitotoxicity, we performed grease-gap recording assays using rat brain slices. In these experiments, insulin also significantly inhibited AMPA-induced depolarization. Flow cytometry and DNA fragmentation assays showed that insulin inhibits AMPA-induced apoptosis and DNA fragmentation, respectively. Insulin stimulated protein kinase B (Akt) activity, whereas AMPA pretreatment did not alter the insulin-stimulated Akt activity. On the contrary, insulin blocked induction of SAPK/JNK, which AMPA stimulated. Taken together, these results suggest that insulin exerts neuroprotective effects by inhibiting AMPA-induced excitotoxicity and apoptosis, possibly by activating Akt and blocking SAPK/JNK.
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PMID:Insulin inhibits AMPA-induced neuronal damage via stimulation of protein kinase B (Akt). 1565 39

Cardiac myocyte loss, regardless of insult, can trigger compensatory myocardial remodeling leading to heart failure. Identifying mediators of cardiac myocyte survival may advance clinical efforts toward myocardial preservation. Angiopoietin-1 limits ischemia-induced cardiac injury. This benefit is ascribed to angiogenesis because the receptor, tie2, is largely endothelial-specific. We propose that direct, non-tie2 interactions of angiopoietin-1 on cardiac myocytes contribute to this cardioprotection. We found that mouse C2C12 skeletal myocytes lack tie2, yet dose-dependently adhered to angiopoietin-1 and angiopoietin-2 similarly to laminin, fibronectin, vitronectin, and more than to collagen-I, -III, and -IV. Adhesion was divalent cation-mediated (Mn2+, Ca2+, not Mg2+), blocked with EDTA/EGTA, RGD-based peptides, and select integrin subunit antibodies. Similar findings were obtained with human skeletal myocytes (HSMs) and freshly isolated rat neonatal cardiac myocytes (NCMs). Furthermore, angiopoietin-1 conferred significant survival advantage exceeding that of most cell matrices, which was not fully explained by differences in cell adhesion. Angiopoietin-1 promoted survival of serum-starved C2C12, HSM, and NCM (MTT, trypan blue) and prevented taxol-induced apoptosis (caspase-3). Immobilized and soluble angiopoietin-1 phosphorylated Akt(S473) and MAPK(p42/44), (not FAK(Y397)) in C2C12 more than in endothelial cells and more than did angiopoietin-2 or cell matrices. EDTA, RGD-based peptides, and some integrin antibodies blocked these responses. Angiopoietin-1 activated HSM and NCM Akt(S473) and MAPK(p42/44) survival pathways. We propose that this novel function contributes to developmental and cardioprotective actions of angiopoietin-1 presently attributed to vascular effects alone. Angiopoietin-1 may prove therapeutically valuable in cardiac remodeling by supporting myocyte viability and preserving pump function. The full text of this article is available online at http://circres.ahajournals.org.
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PMID:Angiopoietin-1 promotes cardiac and skeletal myocyte survival through integrins. 1569 86

It is well documented that glucocorticoids (GC) promote arrest in the G1-S transition of the cell cycle in many cell types, resulting in a decrease in proliferation. However, the relationship between glucocorticoid receptor (GR) and the cell-cycle regulation remains unclear. Suppression of GR is important for exploring GR dependent processes. This study applied RNA interference targeting GR to the murine macrophage RAW264.7 cells. Transient transfection of the GR-siRNA expression vector reduced GR synthesis as measured on mRNA and protein level by RT-PCR and Western blot. GR-siRNA also depressesed GR transcriptional activity. A cell line [RAW-(GR-)] stably transfected with GR-siRNA expression vector was then established, the decreased GR level in this cell line was confirmed by Western blot. MTT assay showed RAW-(GR-) cells grew faster than control cells, which indicated that knockdown of GR promoted cell proliferation in macrophages. Further studies showed decreased p27 expression, increased PKC-alpha expression and enhanced basal and LPS-induced NF-kappaB activity in RAW-(GR-) cells as compared to the RAW-control cells. In contrast, virtually no change in p21, ERK1/2 and p38 expression was detected. In conclusion, these results indicate that GR itself is an inhibitor of cell proliferation in RAW264.7 cell line. This effect may be associated with the decreased expression of p27, the increased expression of PKC-alpha, and the activation of NF-kappaB. As all the experiments are carried out in GC free or serum-free medium, this study also shows the possibility for GR to have some constitutive functions, which are independent on GC activation.
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PMID:Knockdown of glucocorticoid receptor expression by RNA interference promotes cell proliferation in murine macrophage RAW264.7 cells. 1569 42

The extracellular signal-regulated kinase kinase (MEK)/extracellular signal-regulated kinase (ERK) pathway plays a critical role in the anticancer action in vitro. ERK1/2 activation or phosphorylation is responsible for increased cyclooxygenase-2 (COX-2) protein expression in some cancer cells treated with selective COX-2 inhibitor NS398. We determined the effect of NS398 on ERK signaling and the synergistic effect of combined treatment with NS398 and a specific MEK inhibitor U0126 on three human endometrial cancer cell lines: Ishikawa, HEC-1A and AN3CA cells. Results showed that NS398 and U0126 individually, and especially the combination of both exhibited profound anti-proliferation of all three cell lines in a time- and concentration-dependent manner by [3-(4, 5)-dimethylthiazol-z-yl]-2, 5-diphenyl tetrazolium bromide (MTT) assay. The phosphorylated ERK1/2 was up-regulated in HEC-1A and AN3CA cells, but the COX-2 protein expression was unchanged in the three cancer cell lines treated with NS398 alone. However, both phosphorylated ERK1/2 and COX-2 protein expression were concentration-dependently decreased in all three cell types by combined treatment with NS398 and U0126 assessed by western blot analysis. Simultaneously, the combination of NS398 and U0126 resulted in 2-fold increase in apoptosis of all three lines over that by the individual alone, and enhanced G0/G1 phase arrest of Ishikawa and HEC-1A cells induced by U0126 treatment determined by flow cytometry. The synergistic and complementary effects of combining NS398 and U0126 were found to be associated with activation of caspase-3, alterations of Bcl-2 family proteins and cell cycle regulatory proteins detected by western blot analysis. Taken together, these findings correlate with blocking MEK-ERK signaling cascade and down-regulating COX-2 protein expression in endometrial cancer cells with combination treatment of NS398 and U0126, suggesting that the combinatory use of NS398 and specific MEK inhibitors may be valuable for chemotherapy or chemoprevention of human endometrial cancer.
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PMID:Significant anti-proliferation of human endometrial cancer cells by combined treatment with a selective COX-2 inhibitor NS398 and specific MEK inhibitor U0126. 1570 31

Interleukin-4 (IL-4) is an immunomodulatory cytokine, which can inhibit the growth of tumour cells. Pancreatic cancer cells and tissues express high levels of IL-4 receptors. The aim of this study was to characterise the effects of IL-4 on the growth and signalling pathways of pancreatic cancer cells. Cell growth was determined by cell counting and MTT assays in association with fluorescence-activated cell sorter analysis, IL-4 expression using ELISA and real-time PCR techniques, and signal transduction using immunoprecipitation or immunoblot analysis. We now report for the first time that IL-4 significantly enhanced the growth of five out of six cultured pancreatic cancer cell lines in a dose-dependent manner in association with an increased fraction of cells in S-phase. Surprisingly, all six cell lines expressed endogenous IL-4, and IL-4 was detectable in the supernatant. Incubating cells with neutralising IL-4 antibodies resulted in a significant inhibition of basal growth in three cell lines, including IL-4-unresponsive MIA PaCa-2 cells, which however expressed the highest endogenous IL-4 levels. Interleukin-4 enhanced activity of MAPK, Akt-1, and Stat3 in IL-4-responsive, but not in IL-4-unresponsive MIA PaCa-2 cells; however, IL-4 enhanced tyrosine phosphorylation of insulin receptor substrate-1 and -2 in all cell lines. Our results demonstrate for the first time that pancreatic cancer cells produce IL-4 and that IL-4 can act as a growth factor in pancreatic cancer cells. Together with the observation that neutralising IL-4 antibodies can inhibit the growth of these cells, our results suggest that IL-4 may act as an autocrine growth factor in pancreatic cancer cells and also give rise to the possibility that cancer-derived IL-4 may suppress cancer-directed immunosurveillance in vivo in addition to its growth-promoting effects, thereby facilitating pancreatic tumour growth and metastasis.
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PMID:Interleukin-4 enhances proliferation of human pancreatic cancer cells: evidence for autocrine and paracrine actions. 1571 3

The object was to study the effect of ouabain on Jurkat cells and its possible mechanism. The effect of ouabain of low concentration on Jurkat cells was confirmed by MTT, while c-myc gene transcription was measured by RT-PCR, and the phosphorylation of MAPK (ERK1/2) as well as the expression of c-myc gene was tested by Western blot respectively. The results showed that ouabain at low concentration could induce the proliferation of Jurkat in a time-and dose-dependent manner. At the same time, the phosphorylation of MAPK (ERK1/2) and the expression of c-myc gene was enhanced. In conclusion, ouabain stimulates the intracellular MAPK signal pathway by acting on the Na, K-ATPase, and thus induce the proliferation of Jurkat cells, in which the regulation of c-myc gene expression may be involved.
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PMID:[MAPK signal pathway plays a role in proliferation of Jurkat cells induced by ouabain]. 1574 51

Compared with freshly isolated peripheral blood natural killer (NK) cells, the YT and NK-92 cell lines are characterized by elevated cytolytic activity. The molecular mechanisms underlying the rapid proliferation and enhanced lytic activity of NK cell lines are poorly understood. Investigation of these cell lines revealed that ERK1/2 and NF-kappa B are constitutively activated, providing evidence that these two signaling pathways are differentially involved in cytolysis and proliferation. Furthermore, blocking ERK1/2 activation with the specific inhibitor, PD098059, inhibited cytolytic activity in both cell lines and reduced mRNA expression of cytolysis-related effector molecules such as Fas-L and IFN gamma, as measured by semi-quantitative RT-PCR. However, MTT colormetric analysis showed that treatment with the PD098059 inhibitor did not affect cell proliferation. Meanwhile, blockade of the NF-kappa B signaling pathway using MG132 inhibited cellular growth without impacting cytolytic capability. No synergistic interactions were observed between ERK1/2 and NF-kappa B after combination treatment with PD098059 and MG132, suggesting that these two signaling pathways likely affect cellular proliferation and cytotoxicity by NK cells differentially.
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PMID:Differential roles of constitutively activated ERK1/2 and NF-kappa B in cytotoxicity and proliferation by human NK cell lines. 1577 20


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