Endocrine Abstracts

We have previously shown PTTG and PBF to be over-expressed in differentiated thyroid cancer and to be prognostic indicators for recurrence. Subsequently we reported PBF to be a transforming gene in vitro and tumourigenic in vivo. Since over-expression of PTTG results in the same findings, we examined whether PBF-induced tumourigenesis was an independent effect, or else a result of increased PTTG activity. Two HA-tagged mutants of PBF were generated, firstly subst...

VEGF exerts its effects by binding to two tyrosine kinase receptors, KDR and VEGFR1. KDR is critical for transmitting signals for proliferation and migration of endothelial cells but is also expressed in several non-endothelial cells, and is elevated in some human tumour cells. We investigated KDR expression in human thyroid epithelial cells in vitro and thyroid cancers compared with normal thyroid samples examined ex vivo. Expression of KDR was demonstrated usin...

The sodium iodide symporter (NIS) mediates the uptake of iodide into thyroid follicular cells. The pituitary tumor transforming gene (PTTG) is a multifunctional oncogene which stimulates expression of fibroblast growth factor-2 (FGF-2) via the PTTG binding factor (PBF). PTTG, FGF-2 and PBF are all up-regulated in thyroid cancer. PTTG and FGF-2 inhibit NIS mRNA expression and iodide uptake in rat thyroid FRTL5 cells. We have shown previously that both PTTG and PBF repres...