Month: June 2012

The work of Dr Masaya Baba, at the National Cancer Institute, was highlighted in last week’s blog. Dr Baba was part of the team who identified Folliculin-interacting protein 1 (FNIP1) and a recent paper by this group now suggests a function for the protein (Baba et al., 2012). This new paper ties in well with … Read more

As more Video Interviews are added to the Features and Events section of BHDSyndrome.org, this month we would like to introduce you to the work of Dr Masaya Baba. Dr Baba is a staff scientist in the laboratory of Dr W. Marston Linehan in the Urologic Oncology Branch of the National Cancer Institute, which is … Read more

Last week’s blog post described a clear cell renal cell carcinoma (ccRCC) paper which suggests that microRNA-204 (MiR-204) acts as a VHL-regulated tumour suppressor through the inhibition of LC3B-associated autophagy (Mikhaylova et al., 2012). In this study, immunofluorescence experiments showed that an increase in MiR-204 led to an accumulation of factors involved in the initiation of … Read more

The loss of VHL and the subsequent dysregulation of HIF signalling are known to play a role in the development of clear cell renal cell carcinoma (ccRCC). However, a recent paper by Mikhaylova et al. (2012) has now suggested that VHL loss in ccRCC also modulates autophagy through the action of microRNA-204 (MiR-204). MiRs are short RNA molecules which can regulate … Read more

Folliculin-interacting protein 1 (FNIP1) was identified in 2006 by Baba et al. as a protein which interacts with the C-terminus of FLCN. Although the function of FNIP1 is unknown, the protein was also found to interact with and be phosphorylated by AMPK, an enzyme involved in cellular energy homeostasis. A recent paper by Park et … Read more