Medicine and Health Sciences Commons^™

Evaluation Of Toxicity Following Electrically Mediated Interleukin-12 Gene Delivery In A B16 Mouse Melanoma Model, Loree Heller, Kathleen Merkler, Jeffrey Westover, Yolmari Cruz, Domenico Coppola, Kaaron Benson, Adil Daud, Richard Heller

Bioelectrics Publications

PURPOSE: Interleukin-12 (IL-12) has potential as an immunotherapeutic agent for the treatment of cancer but is unfortunately associated with toxicity. Delivery of a plasmid encoding IL-12 with electroporation induces an antitumor effect in the B16 mouse melanoma model without serious side effects. To translate this observation to the clinic, an evaluation of toxicity was done in the mouse model.

EXPERIMENTAL DESIGN: Weight change, tumor response, blood chemistry and hematology values, and serum IL-12 levels were evaluated. Multiple tissues were analyzed histopathologically.

RESULTS: A pronounced reduction in tumor volume, including a large percentage of complete regressions, was observed after electrically mediated …

The Study Of Nitric Oxide Synthase Expression, Function, And Regulation In The Renal Vasculature During Postnatal Renal Development, Brian Blake Ratliff

Theses and Dissertations in Biomedical Sciences

The newborn kidney is vulnerable to vasomotor acute renal failure (ARF) from adverse perinatal events or complications of prematurity. Nitric oxide (NO) vasodilation is vitally protective in this type of ARF, but its relationship with other vasoactive factors, such as angiotensin II (AII) has not been examined. In the immature kidney, nitric oxide synthase (NOS) isoforms, specifically eNOS and nNOS, are developmentally regulated, but their specific role and regulation are unknown.

The enhanced vasodilatory role of NO in the immature kidney was hypothesized to be attributed to regulatory, expressional, and functional differences in eNOS and nNOS isoforms from the adult. …

Never Let Me Clone? Countering An Ethical Argument Against The Reproductive Cloning Of Humans, Yvette Pearson

Philosophy Faculty Publications

In the March 2006 issue of EMBO reports, Christof Tannert, a bioethicist at the Max Delbrück Research Centre in Berlin, Germany, presented a moral argument against human reproductive cloning on the basis of Immanuel Kant’s categorical imperative (Tannert, 2006). In this article, I address some problems with Tannert’s views and show that our concerns about this prospective procedure should prompt us to scrutinize carefully the conventional procreative practices and attitudes. Indeed, if we set aside objections that are grounded in genetic determinism, many of the offensive features of human cloning are identical to problems with procreation by more conventional means, …