p130Cas regulates cancer progression by driving tyrosine receptor kinase signaling. Tight regulation of p130Cas expression is necessary for survival, apoptosis, and maintenance of cell motility in ...various cell types. Several studies revealed that transcriptional and post-translational control of p130Cas are important for maintenance of its expression and activity. To explore novel regulatory mechanisms of p130Cas expression, we studied the effect of microRNAs (miRs) on p130Cas expression in human breast cancer MCF7 cells. Here, we provide experimental evidence that miR-362-3p and miR-329 perform a tumor-suppressive function and their expression is downregulated in human breast cancer. miR-362-3p and miR-329 inhibited cellular proliferation, migration, and invasion, thereby suppressing tumor growth, by downregulating p130Cas. Ectopic expression of p130Cas attenuated the inhibitory effects of the two miRs on tumor progression. Relative expression levels of miR-362-3p/329 and p130Cas between normal and breast cancer correlated inversely; miR-362-3p/329 expression was decreased, whereas that of p130Cas increased in breast cancers. Furthermore, we showed that downregulation of miR-362-3p and miR-329 was caused by differential DNA methylation of miR genes. Enhanced DNA methylation (according to methylation-specific PCR) was responsible for downregulation of miR-362-3p and miR-329 in breast cancer. Taken together, these findings point to a novel role for miR-362-3p and miR-329 as tumor suppressors; the miR-362-3p/miR-329-p130Cas axis seemingly has a crucial role in breast cancer progression. Thus, modulation of miR-362-3p/miR-329 may be a novel therapeutic strategy against breast cancer.
A missense somatic mutation in JAK2 gene (JAK2 V617F) has recently been reported in chronic myeloproliferative disorders, including polycythemia vera, essential thrombocythemia and myelofibrosis with ...myeloid metaplasia, strongly suggesting its role in the pathogenesis of myeloid disorders. As activation of JAK2 signaling is occurred in other malignancies as well, we have analysed 558 tissues from common human cancers, including colon, breast and lung carcinomas, and 143 acute adulthood leukemias by polymerase chain reaction -- single strand conformation polymorphism analysis. We found three JAK2 mutations in the 113 acute myelogenous leukemias (AMLs) (2.7%), but none in other cancers. The mutations consisted of two V617F mutations and one K607N mutation. None of the AML patients with the JAK2 V617F mutation had a history of previous hematologic disorders. This is the first report on the JAK2 gene mutation in AML, and the data indicated that the JAK2 gene mutation may not only contribute to the development of chronic myeloid disorders, but also to some AMLs.
Edge localized modes (ELMs) in high-confinement mode plasmas were completely suppressed in KSTAR by applying n=1 nonaxisymmetric magnetic perturbations. Initially, the ELMs were intensified with a ...reduction of frequency, but completely suppressed later. The electron density had an initial 10% decrease followed by a gradual increase as ELMs were suppressed. Interesting phenomena such as a saturated evolution of edge T(e) and broadband changes of magnetic fluctuations were observed, suggesting the change of edge transport by the applied magnetic perturbations.
Mammalian sirtuin 1 (SIRT1) has connected to an ever widening circle of activities that encompass cellular stress resistance, energy metabolism and tumorigenesis. However, underlying mechanisms ...leading to oncogenic SIRT1 overexpression are less understood. In this study, we identified SIRT1 regulatory microRNA (miRNA) and its function in hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC). Aberrant SIRT1 overexpression was demonstrated in a subset of human HCCs. SIRT1 knockdown suppressed HCC cell growth by transcriptional deregulation of cell cycle proteins. This led to hypophosphorylation of pRb, which inactivated E2F/DP1 target gene transcription, and thereby caused significant increase of HCC cells to remain in the G1/S phase. A comprehensive miRNA profiling analysis indentified five putative endogenous miRNAs that are significantly downregulated in HCC. Ectopic expression of miRNA mimics evidenced miR-29c to suppress SIRT1 in HCC cells. Notably, ectopic miR-29c expression repressed cancer cell growth and proliferation, and it recapitulated SIRT1 knockdown effects in HCC cells. In addition, miR-29c expression was downregulated in a large cohort of HCC patients, and low expression of miR-29c was significantly associated with poor prognosis of HCC patients. Taken together, we demonstrated that miR-29c suppresses oncogenic SIRT1 by way of binding to 3'-untranslated region of SIRT1 mRNA causing translational inhibition in liver cancer cells. The loss or suppression of miR-29c may cause aberrant SIRT1 overexpression and promotes liver tumorigenesis. Overall, we suggest that miR-29c functions as a tumor suppressor by regulating abnormal SIRT1 activity in liver.
We introduce a method for the verification of nonclassical light which is independent of the complex interaction between the generated light and the material of the detectors. This is accomplished by ...means of a multiplexing arrangement. Its theoretical description yields that the coincidence statistics of this measurement layout is a mixture of multinomial distributions for any classical light field and any type of detector. This allows us to formulate bounds on the statistical properties of classical states. We apply our directly accessible method to heralded multiphoton states which are detected with a single multiplexing step only and two detectors, which are in our work superconducting transition-edge sensors. The nonclassicality of the generated light is verified and characterized through the violation of the classical bounds without the need for characterizing the used detectors.
A recent report revealed that phosphoinositide-3-kinase, catalytic, alpha (PIK3CA) gene is somatically mutated in several types of human cancer, suggesting the mutated PIK3CA gene as an oncogene in ...human cancers. However, because the previous report focused the mutational search primarily on colon cancers, the data on PIK3CA mutations in other types of human cancers have been largely unknown. Here, we performed mutational analysis of the PIK3CA gene by polymerase chain reaction-single-strand conformation polymorphism assay in 668 cases of common human cancers, including hepatocellular carcinomas, acute leukemias, gastric carcinomas, breast carcinomas, and non-small-cell lung cancers. We detected PIK3CA somatic mutations in 26 of 73 hepatocellular carcinomas (35.6%), 25 of 93 breast carcinomas (26.9%), 12 of 185 gastric carcinomas (6.5%), one of 88 acute leukemias (1.1%), and three of 229 non-small-cell lung cancers (1.3%). Some of the PIK3CA mutations were detected in the early lesions of breast cancer carcinoma, hepatocellular carcinoma, and gastric carcinomas, suggesting that PIK3CA mutation may occur independent of stage of the tumors. The high incidence and wide distribution of PIK3CA gene mutation in the common human cancers suggest that alterations of lipid kinase pathway by PIK3CA mutations contribute to the development of human cancers.
We present a source of entangled photons that violates a Bell inequality free of the "fair-sampling" assumption, by over 7 standard deviations. This violation is the first reported experiment with ...photons to close the detection loophole, and we demonstrate enough "efficiency" overhead to eventually perform a fully loophole-free test of local realism. The entanglement quality is verified by maximally violating additional Bell tests, testing the upper limit of quantum correlations. Finally, we use the source to generate "device-independent" private quantum random numbers at rates over 4 orders of magnitude beyond previous experiments.
Einstein-Podolsky-Rosen steering is known to be a key resource for one-sided device-independent quantum information protocols. Here we demonstrate steering using hybrid entanglement between ...continuous- and discrete-variable optical qubits. To this end, we report on suitable steering inequalities and detail the implementation and requirements for this demonstration. Steering is experimentally certified by observing a violation by more than 5 standard deviations. Our results illustrate the potential of optical hybrid entanglement for applications in heterogeneous quantum networks that would interconnect disparate physical platforms and encodings.
We propose and experimentally realize a novel versatile protocol that allows the quantum state engineering of heralded optical coherent-state superpositions. This scheme relies on a two-mode squeezed ...state, linear mixing, and a n-photon detection. It is optimally using expensive non-Gaussian resources to build up only the key non-Gaussian part of the targeted state. In the experimental case of a two-photon detection based on high-efficiency superconducting nanowire single-photon detectors, the freely propagating state exhibits a 67% fidelity with a squeezed even coherent-state superposition with a size |α|(2)=3. The demonstrated procedure and the achieved rate will facilitate the use of such superpositions in subsequent protocols, including fundamental tests and optical hybrid quantum information implementations.
We report on MoSi SNSPDs which achieved high system detection efficiency (87.1 ± 0.5% at 1542 nm) at 0.7 K and we demonstrate that these detectors can also be operated with saturated internal ...efficiency at a temperature of 2.3 K in a Gifford-McMahon cryocooler. We measured a minimum system jitter of 76 ps, maximum count rate approaching 10 MHz, and polarization dependence as low as 3.3 ± 0.1%. The performance of MoSi SNSPDs at 2.3 K is similar to the performance of WSi SNSPDs at < 1 K. The higher operating temperature of MoSi SNSPDs makes these devices promising for widespread use due to the simpler and less expensive cryogenics required for their operation.