Endocrine Abstracts

Chemerin, a chemoattractant protein, acts via a G-protein coupled chemokine receptor, i.e. Chemokine like Receptor 1/ChemR23; levels of which are elevated in pro-inflammatory states such as obesity and type 2 diabetes mellitus (T2DM). Obesity and T2DM patients are at high risk of developing cardiovascular disorders such as atherosclerosis. We have reported that chemerin induces human endothelial cell angiogenesis and since dy...

Chemerin, a chemoattractant protein, acts via a G-protein coupled chemokine receptor, i.e. Chemokine like Receptor 1/ChemR23; levels of which are elevated in pro-inflammatory states such as obesity and type 2 diabetes mellitus (T2DM). Obesity and T2DM patients are at high risk of developing cardiovascular disorders such as atherosclerosis. We have reported that chemerin induces human endothelial cell angiogenesis and since dy...

Changes in glycan composition are common in cancer and can play important roles in all of the recognised hallmarks of cancer (1). We recently identified glycosylation as a global target for androgen control in prostate cancer cells and further defined a set of 8 glycosylation enzymes (GALNT7, ST6GalNAc1, GCNT1, UAP1, PGM3, CSGALNACT1, ST6GAL1 and EDEM3), which are also significantly up-regulated in prostate cancer tissue (4). These 8 enzymes are under direct control of the and...

Introduction: Madelung’s disease is a rare disorder characterized by a disturbance in the adipocyte metabolism. Mainly occurs in alcoholic Mediterranean male, presenting multiple, symmetrical lipomas.Case report: A 49-year-old obese man with a history of alcoholism, complaint of weight gain, soft and slow-growing swelling of the neck, and shoulders. His past history: epilepsy, alcoholic CHD, hypothyroidism, severe sleep apnea, vitiligo and HTA. His ...

Patients with acromegaly have characteristic clinical features of soft tissue overgrowth. Both somatic and metabolic features of acromegaly are secondary to excess GH secretion and high circulating levels of insulin-like growth factor 1 (IGF1). However, an acromegaloid phenotype associated with severe insulin resistance is occasionally seen in the absence of biochemical hallmarks of acromegaly (insulin-mediated pseudoacromegaly). Here we present a case of ‘insulin-mediate...

Epigenetic reprogramming including altered transcription factor binding and altered patterns of chromatin and DNA modifications are now accepted as the hallmark of aggressive cancers. We show that global changes in chromatin structure and chromatin accessibility in prostate tumour tissue can define castrate-resistant prostate cancer and be used to inform the discovery of gene-level classifiers for therapy. In addition, we show that the androgen receptor overexpression alone, w...

Introduction: Nijmegen breakage syndrome(NBS) represents a rare autosomal recesive disorder, characterized by severe chromosomal instability. It is caused by mutations in the NBN gene, which product, nibrin, belongs to the hMre11/hRad50 protein complex, critical for processing DNA double-strand breaks during mitotic and meiotic recombination. The hallmarks of NBS are growth retardation, microcephaly, premature ovarian failure(POI) in females, immunodeficiency and predispositio...

Thyroid cancer remains the most common endocrine malignancy worldwide and its incidence and mortality has increased steadily over the last four decades. In general terms it has a good outcome, however, some patients develop aggressive forms of thyroid cancer that are untreatable and the molecular bases are poorly understood. These aggressive forms have lost NIS (Na/I Symporter) function, one of the most important hallmarks during thyroid cancer progression as it leads to radio...

Generating functional insulin-secreting cells is a major goal of developing cell therapies for diabetes. Studies have shown that insulin+ cells can be derived from non-beta cells by cellular reprogramming. We carried out a genetic screen in mouse to identify adult cell types amenable for direct conversion to insulin+ cells by a cocktail of reprogramming factors (Ngn3, Pdx1, and Mafa, termed NPM factors). Surprisingly, the antral stomach epithelial cells w...

Aim: One of the hallmarks of type 2 diabetes (T2D) is impaired beta cell function, which develops in part as a result of widespread cellular de-differentiation. The current state-of-the-art defines beta cells as a heterogeneous islet population, with the existence of individual subpopulations including specialised ‘pacemakers’. We sought here to understand how overexpression-induced beta cell maturity affects such heterogeneity, befo...