Maintenance of methylation patterns is necessary for normal development of mice, and aberrant methylation patterns are associated with many human tumours. DNMT1 interacts with many proteins during cell cycle progression, including PCNA, p53, EZH2 and HP1. Ras family of GTPases promotes cell proliferation by its oncogenic nature, which transmits signals by multiple

pathways in both lipid raft dependent and independent fashion. DNA-methylation-mediated repression of DNA-repair protein O6-methylguanine DNA methyltransferase (MGMT) gene and increased rate of K-Ras mutation at codon for amino acids 12 and 13 have been correlated with a secondary role for Ras-effector homologues (RASSFs) in tumourigenesis. Lines of evidence suggest that DNA-methylation associated repression of tumour suppressors and apoptotic genes and ceaseless proliferation of tumour selleck chemical cells are regulated in part by Ras-signaling. Control of Ras GTPase signaling might reduce the aberrant methylation and accordingly may reduce the risk of cancer development. (C) 2008 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.”
“The role of CD44 in Epstein-Barr virus (EBV)-related epithelial tumors is poorly understood. We studied the expression of CD44 in EBV infection in patients with oral squamous cell carcinoma

(SCC) and nasopharyngeal carcinoma (NPC) Bcl-2 inhibitor and measured the EBV DNA.\n\nWhole blood, plasma and tissue samples from 8 male and 2 female patients with oral SCC, NPC, salivary gland HM781-36B mouse lymphoepithelioma, normal salivary gland and buccal mucosa were assayed

for EBV DNA. Expression of CD44, latent membrane protein (LMP), and labeling of lymphocytes, macrophages and dendritic cells were estimated by immunohistochemistry.\n\nTissue EBV DNA was detected in 7 of 8 cases (87.5%) of oral malignant, benign and border-line lesions. LMP expression levels in tumors varied from absence and minimal to moderate – 50.3, 43.6, 6.0% and 91.1, 6.7, 2.2% for SCC and NPC, respectively. Levels of CD44 positivity in neoplasms were minimal (15.5 and 16.7%), moderate (30.3 and 47.8%), and diffuse (54.2 and 35.5%) for SCC and NPC, respectively, thus deviating from normal oral mucosa revealing heavily stained (100.0%) epithelial contours. CD19-positive B lymphocytes and S100-positive dendritic cells were intermixed with neoplastic cells.\n\nCollectively, CD44 mediated signaling may be implicated in EBV infection associated with the pathogenesis of oral SCC and NPC. (C) 2012 Elsevier GmbH. All rights reserved.”
“Motivation: Structural alignment of RNA is found to be a useful computational technique for idenitfying non-coding RNAs (ncRNAs). However, existing tools do not handle structures with pseudoknots.