Nasopharyngeal carcinoma (NPC) is endemic in Southern China and South East Asia, causally linked to Epstein-Barr virus (EBV) infection, and frequently shows dysregulation in a number of stem cell maintenance signalling pathways. This thesis has endeavoured to investigate the status of one of these pathways; the Hedgehog (HH) signalling pathway, in NPC tumours, and reveals the novel finding that EBV is able to active the HH signalling pathway through autocrine induction of the SHH ligand in the C666.1 authentic EBV-positive NPC-derived cell line and latently infected epithelial carcinoma cell lines. This study demonstrates that constitutive engagement of the HH pathway in EBV-infected epithelial cells in vitro induces the expression of a number of stemness-associated genes and imposes stem-like characteristics. Using epithelial cells expressing individual EBV latent genes, this study also investigates the viral protein responsible for HH dysregulation demonstrating that EBNA1, LMP1 and LMP2A are all capable of inducing SHH ligand and activating the HH pathway, but only LMP1 and LMP2A are able to induce expression of stemness-associated marker genes. These findings not only identify a role for dysregulated HH signalling in NPC oncogenesis but also provide a novel rationale for therapeutic intervention.

The Anaphase Promoting Complex/Cyclosome (APC/C) is a multi-subunit E3 ubiquitin ligase that regulates mitotic progression through targeting substrates for degradation by the 26S proteasome. In order to assess APC/C post-translational modification status, and identify novel APC/C substrates and regulators, a comprehensive analysis of the APC/C and APC/C-interacting proteins by mass spectrometry was undertaken. RNA polymerase I was identified as an APC/C-interacting complex, and the interaction was validated by reciprocal co-immunoprecipitation, GST pull-down and immunofluorescent confocal microscopy. Both RPA194 protein levels and RNA Polymerase I transcription were shown to be dependent upon APC/C activity. Ablation of APC/C function by RNAi interference increased RPA194 protein levels, and elevated RNA polymerase I activity significantly, as quantified by 5’-Fluorouridine incorporation into nascent pre-rRNA, and the increase in absolute levels of 45S, 28S and 18S rRNA transcripts, relative to non-silencing controls. A number of other potential APC/C substrates and regulators were identified by mass spectrometry. Many of these interacting proteins contained APC/C consensus degron motifs. The APC/C was also shown to be a major substrate for acetylation; a number of APC/C subunits were identified as being acetylated in vivo. In this regard, APC3 was shown to be a substrate for both CBP and p300 acetyltransferases.

Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of Washington, 2000. / Vita. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 131-133).

Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of Missouri--Columbia, 2001. / "December 2001." Typescript. Vita. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 95-113). Also available on the Internet.

Thesis (M.S.)--West Virginia University, 2002. / Title from document title page. Document formatted into pages; contains vi, 52 p. : ill. Vita. Includes abstract. Includes bibliographical references (p. 37-38).

Thesis (M.S.)--University of South Florida, 2009. / Title from PDF of title page. Document formatted into pages; contains 52 pages. Includes bibliographical references.

Source: Masters Abstracts International, Volume: 47-06, page: 3549. Adviser: Alfred L. Mcalister. Includes bibliographical references.

Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of Missouri--Columbia, 2003. / "August 2003." Typescript. Vita. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 240-251). Also issued on the Internet.

Thesis (M.S.)--University of Alabama at Birmingham, 2009. / Title from PDF title page (viewed on Feb. 2, 2009). Includes bibliographical references (p. 35-48).

More people are likely to be diagnosed with cancer and the number of people living with cancer is expected to increase, which means that patients live longer with cancer and different treatments. All patients in Sweden should have access to a nurse navigator to facilitate the cancer trajectory. The purpose of this literature review was to delineate patients' experiences of the care given by the nurse navigator. The result is based upon twelve scientific articles included in this review. The results show that the experiences of the patients can be divided into four different categories: emotional support- being present and offering supportive talks, support for physical symptoms- counseling and relief from symptoms due to illness and treatments, educational support- receiving information and knowledge about the disease and cancer trajectory and coordination support- collaboration with other healthcare professionals involved in patients´care. The result shows that the experiences of the patients were mainly positive and they received the care that was the aim of introducing nurse navigators in Sweden. It is important to continue doing research of the care given by the nurse navigator to ensure that patients with cancer are receiving evidenced based care. / Antalet människor som drabbas av cancer och som lever med cancer förväntas öka, vilket innebär att patienter lever längre med cancersjukdom och olika behandlingar. Alla patienter med cancer skall i Sverige ha tillgång till en kontaktsjuksköterska för att underlätta för patienten genom vårdprocessen. Syftet med litteraturstudien var att beskriva patienters erfarenheter av kontaktsjuksköterskans omvårdnad inom cancervården. Tolv vetenskapliga artiklar inkluderades och ligger till grund för resultatet. Resultatet visade att patienternas erfarenheter av kontaktsjuksköterskans omvårdnad kunde delas in i fyra kategorier: emotionellt stöd - att finnas till hands och ge stödjande samtal, stöd vid fysiska besvär- råd och lindring av symptom på grund av sjukdom och behandling, kunskapsstöd - information och utbildning om sjukdom och vårdprocessen och samordningsstöd - samarbete med andra vårdgivare delaktiga i patientens vård. Resultatet visade att patienternas erfarenheter av kontaktsjuksköterskans omvårdnad i huvudsak var positiva och att de fick den omvårdnad som var syftet med införandet av kontaktsjuksköterskefunktionen i Sverige. Fortsatt forskning om kontaktsjuksköterskans omvårdnad inom cancervården ses som betydelsefullt för att säkerställa att evidensbaserad omvårdnad erbjuds patienter med cancersjukdom.