Current Genomics - Volume 4, Issue 2, 2003

Human osteoarthritis (OA) is a complex multi-factorial disease that primarily targets the cartilage. The cartilage is a specialized tissue where the chondrocytes maintain matrix homeostasis. The paradigm for the post genomic era of molecular medicine is to identify the function of defective genes associated with specific diseases. Although the process of identification and validation of target genes is feasible with the availabl Read More

Joubert syndrome (JS) is a rare autosomal recessive syndrome characterised by agenesis or dysgenesis of the cerebellar vermis with accompanying brainstem malformations (OMIM: 213300). There is a distinctive (but not unique) MRI appearance in the posterior fossa of the brain termed the molar-tooth-sign, and the diagnosis of JS is usually made when this MRI finding is documented in an infant in combination wit Read More

Today, in various aspects of molecular biology, sequence alignment has become an essential tool to study the structure-function relationships of proteins. With the impressive increase of the number of available sequences, alignments provide a substantial piece of information by way of various computational methods. These approaches have generally become a crucial tool to put forward working hypotheses for time-co Read More

Kallikreins are a subgroup of serine proteases with diverse physiological functions. The human kallikrein gene family has now been fully characterized and includes 15 members tandemly located on chromosome 19q13.4 In this review, we discuss the common structural features of kallikreins at the DNA, mRNA and protein levels and summarize their tissue expression and hormonal regulation. Kallikreins are express Read More

Targeting of the therapeutic genes to the malignant or non-malignant tissue may be achieved using recombinant viral vectors for the transfer and tissue-specific or tumor-specific regulatory sequences. However, the efficiency of the recombinant viruses to infect tumor cells, was shown to be rather low. Therefore, repeated injections of the virus might be required to obtain a sufficient therapeutic response and in clinical trials n Read More

Reverse transcription polymerase chain reaction (RT-PCR) techniques are increasingly used for the quantification of gene transcripts. Compared to other methods permitting relative or absolute quantitation of mRNA, the RT-PCR approach offers the advantages of superior sensitivity, high specifity, and great versatility. In this review, we discuss different approaches to PCR-based quantification of gene expression including c Read More