Mercury is a toxic and hazardous metal that occurs naturally in the earth's crust. Natural
phenomena such as erosion and volcanic eruptions, and anthropogenic activities like metal …

The production of CRP occurs almost exclusively in the liver by the hepatocytes as part of
the acute phase response upon stimulation by IL-6, TNF-αand IL-1-βoriginating at the site of …

Systemic lupus erythematosus (SLE) is a common systemic autoimmune disease with
complex etiology but strong clustering in families (λ S=∼ 30). We performed a genome-wide …

A novel polymorphism in the extracellular domain 2 (EC2) of FcgammaRIIIA affects ligand
binding by natural killer (NK) cells and monocytes from genotyped homozygous normal …

Antibodies to DNA are of interest to a broad spectrum of physicians and other scientists. The
presence of large amounts of serum antibodies to double-stranded DNA is specific for …

Although Toll-like receptors (TLRs) are critical mediators of the immune response to
pathogens, the influence of polymorphisms in this gene family on human susceptibility to …

Genetic predisposition plays a crucial role in susceptibility to systemic lupus erythematosus
(SLE) in both human patients and animal models. Recent progress in experimental systems …

Systemic lupus erythematosus (SLE) is a complex autoimmune disease characterized by the
loss of tolerance to self-nuclear antigens. Accumulating evidence shows that Toll-like …

Persistent mitochondrial hyperpolarization (MHP) and enhanced calcium fluxing underlie
aberrant T cell activation and death pathway selection in systemic lupus erythematosus …

Cellular immunity aberrations in patients with SLE are underscored by the abnormal early
Ag receptor-mediated lymphocyte signal transduction pathway. To further characterize the T …