Exposing the skin to solar UV radiation induces cascades of signaling pathways and biological alterations such as redox imbalance, suppression of antioxidant genes and programmed cell death. Therefore, the aim of this study was to use RNA-Seq to unravel the effects of UV radiation on Normal Human Adult Fibroblast cells (NHDF). Cells were exposed to UV (20 mJ/cm2 for 3 mins) and incubated for 24 h. Total mRNA from the cells generated libraries of 72,080,648 and 40,750,939 raw reads from UV-treated and control cells respectively. Of the differentially expressed genes (DEGs) produced 2,007 were up-regulated and 2,791 were down-regulated (fold change ≥2, p signaling pathways in cancer were significantly activated and antioxidant genes were down-regulated. This study applied Next Generation Sequencing technology to reveal the genes and pathways involved in UV-induced human dermal fibroblast cells necrosis.
Matched MeSH terms: Signal Transduction/radiation effects*
Synchrotron microbeam radiation treatment (MRT) is a preclinical radiotherapy technique with considerable clinical promise, although some of the underlying radiobiology of MRT is still not well understood. In recently reported studies, it has been suggested that MRT elicits a different tumor immune profile compared to broad-beam treatment (BB). The aim of this study was to investigate the effects of synchrotron MRT and BB on eosinophil-associated gene pathways and eosinophil numbers within and around the tumor in the acute stage, 48 h postirradiation. Balb/C mice were inoculated with EMT6.5 mouse mammary tumors and irradiated with microbeam radiation (112 and 560 Gy) and broad-beam radiation (5 and 9 Gy) at equivalent doses determined from a previous in vitro study. After tumors were collected 24 and 48 h postirradiation, RNA was extracted and quantitative PCR performed to assess eosinophil-associated gene expression. Immunohistochemistry was performed to detect two known markers of eosinophils: eosinophil-associated ribonucleases (EARs) and eosinophil major basic protein (MBP). We identified five genes associated with eosinophil function and recruitment (Ear11, Ccl24, Ccl6, Ccl9 and Ccl11) and all of them, except Ccl11, were differentially regulated in synchrotron microbeam-irradiated tumors compared to broad-beam-irradiated tumors. However, immunohistochemical localization demonstrated no significant differences in the number of EAR- and MBP-positive eosinophils infiltrating the primary tumor after MRT compared to BB. In conclusion, our work demonstrates that the effects of MRT on eosinophil-related gene pathways are different from broad-beam radiation treatment at doses previously demonstrated to be equivalent in an in vitro study. However, a comparison of the microenvironments of tumors, which received MRT and BB, 48 h after exposure showed no difference between them with respect to eosinophil accumulation. These findings contribute to our understanding of the role of differential effects of MRT on the tumor immune response.
Matched MeSH terms: Signal Transduction/radiation effects
Plants have a remarkable ability to perceive and respond to various wavelengths of light and initiate regulation of different cascades of light signaling and molecular components. While the perception of red light and the mechanisms of its signaling involving phytochromes are largely known, knowledge of the mechanisms of blue light signaling is still limited. Chemical genetics involves the use of diverse small active or synthetic molecules to evaluate biological processes. By combining chemicals and analyzing the effects they have on plant morphology, we identified a chemical, 3-bromo-7-nitroindazole (3B7N), that promotes hypocotyl elongation of wild-type Arabidopsis only under continuous blue light. Further evaluation with loss-of-function mutants confirmed that 3B7N inhibits photomorphogenesis through cryptochrome-mediated light signaling. Microarray analysis demonstrated that the effect of 3B7N treatment on gene expression in cry1cry2 is considerably smaller than that in the wild type, indicating that 3B7N specifically interrupts cryptochrome function in the control of seedling development in a light-dependent manner. We demonstrated that 3B7N directly binds to CRY1 protein using an in vitro binding assay. These results suggest that 3B7N is a novel chemical that directly inhibits plant cryptochrome function by physical binding. The application of 3B7N can be used on other plants to study further the blue light mechanism and the genetic control of cryptochromes in the growth and development of plant species.
Matched MeSH terms: Light Signal Transduction/radiation effects