Endocrine Abstracts

Papillary thyroid carcinoma (PTC), the most frequent thyroid cancer, has low proliferation but no apoptosis, presenting frequent lymph-node metastasis (Ordonez et al., 2004).SMAD3 has two opposite phosphorylation sites: the TGF-βRI–induced C-terminal Serine SMAD3 phosphorylation and the phosphorylation induced by CDK2 (T8, T179 and S213) and ERK (T179, S204, S208) (Wang et al. 2005, Matsuura et al. 2005).<p class=...

Background: Mammalian target of rapamycin (mTOR) is a downstream effector of the PI3K/AKT pathway. It can be activated by diverse stimuli, such as growth factors, nutrients, energy, stress signals and signaling pathways such as PI3K, MAPK and AMPK, in order to control cell growth, proliferation and survival. The active form of mTOR (pmTOR) may form two distinct complexes: mTORC1 that activates S6K1 and 4EBP1 which are involved in mRNA translation; and mTORC2 that activates PKC...

Pancreatic neuroendocrine tumors (PNETs) form a distinct entity of malignant lesions with a dreadful prognosis. More than 50% of the patients already have distant metastasis by the time of diagnosis, which underpins the urgent need for more effective treatment modalities. Notch pathway, evolutionary old and highly cellular context dependent signalling mechanism, was shown to regulate growth and development of normal neuroendocrine cells and PNETs, with experimental data implyi...

Objective: One of the hallmarks of cancer is its unlimited replicative potential. Recently, telomerase promoter (TERTp) mutations were presented as novel mechanism for telomerase re-activation/expression. Due to this fact, it was our objective to study pancreatic endocrine tumours (PET) and related cell lines, to determine if TERTp mutations were present.Design: We performed characterization of the TERTp in a series of 55 PETs and three common PET cell l...

Adrenocortical carcinoma (ACC) is a rare, heterogeneous malignancy with aggressive behavior and poor prognosis, particularly when metastatic at diagnosis. To date, radical surgery, possibly associated to mitotane adjuvant therapy, is considered the best option for ACC treatment. However, the mean 5-year survival rate diminishes dramatically in metastatic ACC and chemo-resistance often develops. Thus, more specific and effective drugs for ACC treatment are urgently required. Th...

Phaeochromocytomas (PCs) are neuroendocrine tumors derived from neural crest-derived chromaffin cells of the adrenal medulla and sympathetic ganglia (the latter referred to as paragangliomas), which produce significant amounts of catecholamines. Although PCs are mostly benign, 10% of all PCs can be malignant evidenced by the presence of metastases, predominantly in bone, lungs, liver and lymph. Currently, there is no effective therapy for malignant PCs.I...

Introduction: Intracranial germ-cell tumors (GCT) are rare, occurring in less than 4% of pediatric patients. Histologically, they are divided into several types, among which germinomatous GCTs represent over 50% of cases. Depending on their location, GCTs usually present with symptoms of intracranial hypertension for pineal lesions, whereas suprasellar ones lead to visual disturbances or pituitary hormonal defects.We present the case of a bifocal intracr...

We are presenting a case report of 82-year-old patient admitted at Cork University Hospital on 3 July 2015 for investigation of complete ptosis and ophthalmoplegia of left eye which had occurred in couple of weeks time. Initially patient was referred to ophthalmology department by his GP and ophthalmologist found left ophthalmopathy with complete ptosis and referred patient to medical for stroke work up. CT Brain showed abnormal mass in pituitary fossa. MRI Pituitary showed mu...