This video is so helpful! It's a nice lecture about gene regulation. To understand the much more complex Eukaryotic gene regulation, he starts out explaining Prokaryotic gene regulation. He includes lots of pictures and diagrams that follow along with what he's saying. He manages to speak in a very easy to understand way, while still using all of the names and terms we've learned.
I really liked this video! It explains what microRNAs do and how they impact the cell. The video also talks about what could happen if microRNAs do not work. As many of us intend to go into medicine, I also liked the video because it explained how microRNAs are now being looked at to figure out more medicines and diseases. The display is simple and engaging. It reminded me a bit of part of the lecture we watched on telomeres!
Tuesday, January 31, 2012
You Are What You Eat!
This article talks about how microRNA from rice and other vegetables were found in the blood of 21 volunteers. Chen-Yu Zhang of Nanjing University in China conducted a study about plant-animal microRNA transfers. Blood was collected from 21 volunteers, and their bloodstreams contained about 30 different microRNAs from commonly eaten plants. MicroRNAs are short sequences of nucleotides and although they do not code for proteins, they prevent specific genes from producing the proteins the encode for.
Although the microRNAs do not code for proteins, they can apparently cell function. A specific rice microRNA was shown to bind to and inhibit the activity of receptors controlling the removal of LDL ("bad" cholesterol) from the bloodstream. MicroRNAs are now being compared to vitamins and minerals as perhaps another functional molecule obtained from food. Zhang comments that these findings may also illuminate our understanding of co-evolution. Co-evolution is the process by which genetic changes in one species trigger genetic changes in another species. For example, human ability to digest lactose in milk after infancy arose only after we began to domesticate cattle. This suggests that perhaps the plants we cultivate and eat have altered us in some way.
And It Begins Again...
Break's over and our blogs begin once again!
So this article talked about transcriptional regulation of gene expression during osmotic stress. Now even though stress can suppress growth and proliferation, cells can induce adaptive responses allowing them to maintain growth and proliferation functions under stress. There have been numerous studies on the inhibitory effects of stress on cells, but not much is known about how growth-promoting pathways influence stress response. To find out more information, researchers decided to analyze the effect of mammalian target of rapamycin (mTOR), a central growth controller, on the osmotic stress response.
Researchers found that mammalian cells that were exposed to moderate hypertonicity maintained active mTOR. mTOR was required to sustain their cell size and proliferative capacity. mTOR regulated the induction of diverse osmostress response genes. These genes included targets of the tonicity-responsive transcription factor NFAT5 and NFAT5-independent genes. Genes that were sensitive to mTOR-included regulators of stress responses, growth and proliferation. Among these genes, researchers identified REDD1 and REDD2, which had been previously characterized as mTOR inhibitors in other stress contexts. mTOR facilitated transcription-permissive conditions for several osmoresponsive genes by enhancing histone H4 acetylation and RNA polymerase II being present at the scene.
So this article talked about transcriptional regulation of gene expression during osmotic stress. Now even though stress can suppress growth and proliferation, cells can induce adaptive responses allowing them to maintain growth and proliferation functions under stress. There have been numerous studies on the inhibitory effects of stress on cells, but not much is known about how growth-promoting pathways influence stress response. To find out more information, researchers decided to analyze the effect of mammalian target of rapamycin (mTOR), a central growth controller, on the osmotic stress response.
This picture demonstrates mTOR's role in the process of
the cell sustaining cell size and proliferative capacity.
Researchers found that mammalian cells that were exposed to moderate hypertonicity maintained active mTOR. mTOR was required to sustain their cell size and proliferative capacity. mTOR regulated the induction of diverse osmostress response genes. These genes included targets of the tonicity-responsive transcription factor NFAT5 and NFAT5-independent genes. Genes that were sensitive to mTOR-included regulators of stress responses, growth and proliferation. Among these genes, researchers identified REDD1 and REDD2, which had been previously characterized as mTOR inhibitors in other stress contexts. mTOR facilitated transcription-permissive conditions for several osmoresponsive genes by enhancing histone H4 acetylation and RNA polymerase II being present at the scene.
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