Reference no: EM132931614

You are asked to lead and present at journal club (i.e. a formal lab meeting where you present and discuss newly published research literature that is of relevance to the lab) where several new volunteer undergraduate students need to learn about the research area in which the lab operates.

You are given a paper on cancer biology to present at this journal club meeting. You are given a week to prepare. The citation of the paper you are asked to present is shown below. Please use standard search methods to find this paper.

Lee SH, Jee JG, Bae JS, Liu KH, Lee YM. A group of novel HIF-1α inhibitors, glyceollins, blocks HIF-1α synthesis and decreases its stability via inhibition of the PI3K/AKT/mTOR pathway and Hsp90 binding. J Cell Physiol. 2015 Apr;230(4):853-62. doi: 10.1002/jcp.24813. PMID: 25204544.

During the process of preparing for this meeting in front of everyone in the lab, Dr. Kovinich can sense your growing panic. He gives you a general rundown of the background of this research article. The following points are important to understand and are expanded upon in this research article.

• HIF-Iα is a transcription factor known to induce the expression of several different genes, one of which is vascular endothelial growth factor (VEGF).
• The cellular levels of HIF-Iα protein are regulated through various means. Recall that the expression of a gene can be regulated at multiple levels. This is described in excruciating detail on the first page of the article.
• VEGF is a protein that initiates angiogenesis, or the stimulation of the formation of blood vessels. Under normal circumstances, the expression of VEGF is often induced under conditions of low oxygen, also known as hypoxia.
• Cancer cells will often overexpress VEGF to increase blood flow and oxygen delivery to sites of tumor growth. This appears to be an important step in the development of cancerous tumors, allowing them to grow larger.
• The general argument posed by the authors is that treatment withglyceollins can inhibit angiogenesis (and thus tumor growth) that is mediated by the causal chain described above through various mechanisms.

Your objective is to faithfully present the logical argument laid out by these authors, and to critically evaluate their argument to see whether it is convincing or not. Dr. Kovinich suggests that you interpret each figure independently to determine what the authors are trying to say or prove with each piece of data. He walks you through some of the figures to get you started...

A- What can be concluded from this piece of data and explain how this piece of data supports the argument (if at all).

B- What is the purpose of showing data for the CA9 and ALDOC genes? Explain the reasoning in two sentences at most.