Wednesday....the halfway point....

The end of the week is almost near! Lab work began immediately in Dr. Camenisch's lab in order to begin another trial of the immunoassays (also known as histochemistries according to Sophia Lalani, a graduate student from the College of Medicine). I've broken my caffeine detox regimen. I hate cold showers, and I keep getting tired, not alert. Boy...I really do need to get some sleep.



Anyway, the histochemistry began at its usual 8:00 A.M. Well, anyway, the first steps into the procedure went very smoothly, as it seemed. I can't really observe at the molecular level. Anyway, I was pretty busy, but I also enjoyed my participation in the research lab.



Journal club was also interesting. I gave my presentation on how MEKK4 was important in embryonic heart development. It definitely has participation, for its absence presented congenital heart defects, the most frequently diagnosed developmental disorder within the first year of life. Current treatment is just to treat the phenotypic traits, such as surgery to correct valve defects and medicine to treat metabolic disorders. The cause is currently unknown, but they hypothesized that there are changes in the molecular program in development of the physical traits of the heart cell. They think that the defects occur during gastrulation, when the embryonic organs are developed. The cranial portion contains the endocardial and myocardial portions. When these two parts combine, they create what is called the cardiac crescent. The cardiac crescent is an incomplete layer of cardiac muscle surrounded by endothelial tube, which is then separated by the extracellular matrix. It also was associated with a genetic disorder called Noonan Syndrome. It's often called "the male version of Turner's Syndrome", but it's also found in females. It manifests in several organ systems, not just the cardiovascular system. To return to relevance, MEKK4 is actually a Mitogen-Activated Protein Kinase Kinase Kinase (MAP3K). No, I wasn't trying to be funny or redundant by repeating the word "kinase". Mark said it, I didn't. MEKK4 is activated by growth factors or stress and actually activates the MAP2Ks and the MAPKs, which are all found in the endocardial cushions. They discovered that MEKK4 was necessary, but was not the only participant in valvuloseptal formation. Further data can provided that MEKK4 was a possible GATA4-responsive gene, and was expressed at day ten of embryonic development, within the edothelial and mesenchymal cells of cushions. MEKK4, however, was detected much less at E10.5, which probably displayed some degree of stability.



Translation: MEKK4 is important for us, and mice.



Alex....