Humans ; Alzheimer Disease/genetics* ; Apolipoprotein E4/genetics* ; Amyloid beta-Peptides

Polyglutamine(PolyQ) diseases comprise a group of inherited neurodegenerative disorders with significant clinical and genetic heterogeneity. Although they share a common mechanism involving dynamic expansion of CAG trinucleotide repeats, their clinical features may vary and there has been no specific treatment. Recently, much attention had been attracted to microRNAs which, as a new type of posttranscription regulatory factor, have proven to significantly affect the progress of PolyQ disease. This review will focus on the roles of microRNAs in the pathogenesis of PolyQ diseases and their potential use for therapy.
Humans ; MicroRNAs ; genetics ; Neurodegenerative Diseases ; genetics ; Peptides ; genetics ; Trinucleotide Repeats ; genetics

Non-ribosomal peptide synthetases catalyze the biosynthesis of structurally and functionally diverse non-ribosomal peptide natural products, which have broad applications in pharmaceutical, agricultural, and industrial sectors. Engineered non-ribosomal peptide synthetases can be used to produce novel non-ribosomal peptides through combinatorial biosynthesis. This conforms to the concept of green chemistry, thus attracts increasing attention across the world. Herein, three different engineering strategies were summarized, and recent advances in this field were reviewed.
Biological Products ; Peptide Synthases/genetics* ; Peptides ; Protein Engineering

Familial isolated pituitary adenoma (FIPA) is an autosomal dominant disease, characterized by low penetrance, early-onset disease, more invasive tumor growth, as well as somatotroph and lactotroph adenomas in most cases. It has been indicated that the aryl hydrocarbon receptor interacting protein (AIP) gene is a tumor suppressor gene. Many heterozygous mutations have been discovered in AIP in about 20% of FIPA families. However, the exact molecular mechanism by which its disfunction promotes tumorigenesis of pituitary is unclear.
Growth Hormone-Secreting Pituitary Adenoma ; genetics ; Humans ; Intracellular Signaling Peptides and Proteins ; genetics ; Mutation ; Pituitary Neoplasms ; genetics

HCAP1 is a novel hepatic cancer related gene located on human chromosome 17p13.3. The loss of heterozygosity occurred at 17p13.3 in various human cancers. In order to investigate the effects of exogenous HCAP1 gene products on cell proliferation of T lymphoma Jurkat cell line, HCAP1 gene! was transfected into Jurkat cells mediated by liposome, and the cells stably expressing exogenous HCAP1 were screened with G418. The effects of HCAP1 products on cell proliferation were assessed by viable cell count, cell growth curve and colony formation assay in soft agar. The results showed that the HCAP1 transgenic Jurkat cells displayed slow growth rate, extended doubling time and reduced colony formation capability, as compared with the cells transfected with pBK/CMV empty vector (P < 0.01). It is concluded that exogenous HCAP1 gene products could inhibit the proliferation of Jurkat cells.
Carcinoma, Hepatocellular ; genetics ; Cell Division ; Humans ; Jurkat Cells ; Liver Neoplasms ; genetics ; Neoplasm Proteins ; genetics ; Peptides ; Transfection

The technology of genetic engineering has been widely used to express macromolecules such as enzymes. However, it is difficult to detect and purify the micromolecules such as small peptides, because of their instability and degradability. Construction of multi-copy recombinant expression plasmid can be achieved by inserting multiple target genes or expression cassette containing target genes with the same orientation into expression vector. This is effective to increase the expression level of small peptides. In this article we described four methods in order to provide some optional methods and ideas for the expression of active small peptides.
Gene Expression ; Genetic Engineering ; methods ; Genetic Vectors ; genetics ; metabolism ; Peptides ; genetics ; metabolism ; Recombinant Proteins ; biosynthesis ; genetics

Circular RNA (circRNA) is a single-stranded circular closed RNA molecule formed from linear RNA through reverse splicing. circRNAs are stable, highly conserved, and tissue-specific. circRNAs can regulate physiological and pathological processes through various mechanisms such as formation of competing endogenous RNA and interaction with binding proteins. It has been recently revealed that circRNAs can be translated into peptides and proteins to participate in the initiation and development of cancer. circRNAs are promising diagnostic and prognostic markers for human cancers as well as potential drug targets for cancer therapy. This review summarized the research progresses related to circRNA-encoded peptides and proteins in a variety of cancers. These peptides and proteins are translated through two different mechanisms that depend on internal ribosome entry site and m6A, respectively. We also summarized the potential use of circRNA-encoded peptides and proteins in the diagnosis, treatment, prognosis and mechanistic studies of various cancers.
Humans ; Internal Ribosome Entry Sites ; Neoplasms/genetics* ; Peptides, Cyclic ; RNA/genetics* ; RNA, Circular/genetics*

Polyglutamine (Poly Q) diseases are a group of neurodegenerative disorders, caused by the formation of PolyQ mutants due to trinucleotide repeats expansion in coding regions of disease-causing genes, which eventually lead to selective neuronal degeneration and death with unclarified pathogenesis. As a new type of genetic regulatory factor, microRNA (miRNA) plays an important role in modulating gene expression in eukaryote. During the recent years, more attention was paid to roles and related mechanism of miRNA involving in neurodegenerative disease, especially PolyQ diseases. This review is focused on research progress in roles of miRNA in the pathogenesis of PolyQ diseases.
Eukaryota ; MicroRNAs ; genetics ; physiology ; Nerve Degeneration ; Neurodegenerative Diseases ; genetics ; Peptides ; genetics ; Trinucleotide Repeat Expansion ; genetics ; Trinucleotide Repeats ; genetics

To study the expression of Dickkopf-1 (DKK-1) in endometrium of pregnant mice during the peri-implantation period and the role of DKK-1 during the embryo implantation in mice. Immunohistochemical technique was employed to determine the location of DKK-1 protein in endometrium, and semiquantitative reverse transcriptase polymerase chain reaction (RT-PCR) was utilized to determine the levels of DKK-1 mRNA. Our results showed that the expressions of DKK1 mRNA and protein were higher in experimental groups than in control group (P<0.01) and it increased significantly on day 3 and reached its peak on day 4, and then decreased gradually on day 5-7. The levels of DKK-1 mRNA and protein on day 4 was significantly higher than those of other groups (P<0.01). It is concluded that DKK-1 probably plays an important role in signal transudation of embryo implantation and its high expression indicates the opening of implantation window.
Embryo Implantation/*genetics ; Endometrium/*metabolism ; Intercellular Signaling Peptides and Proteins/*biosynthesis ; Intercellular Signaling Peptides and Proteins/genetics ; Protein Biosynthesis ; RNA, Messenger/genetics ; Transcription, Genetic

Humans ; Infant ; Intracellular Signaling Peptides and Proteins ; genetics ; Membrane Proteins ; genetics ; Mutation ; Nephrotic Syndrome ; etiology ; genetics ; WT1 Proteins ; genetics