Bone Abstracts

Background: In pediatric osteogenesis imperfecta (OI), bisphosphonates (BPs) are considered the best treatment option to increase bone density and reduce fracture rate. Pamidronate (PAM) is regarded as standard care for moderate to severe OI. The most recent added BP is intravenous zoledronate (ZOL). ZOL has practical advances over PAM, however research on its efficacy and safety is scarce.Objectives: To investigate the efficacy and safety of treatment w...

Biographical DetailsWim Van HulWim Van Hul is full professor of Molecular biology and genetics at the University of Antwerp, Belgium. He obtained a bachelor degree in Chemistry from the University of Louvain (Belgium) and a master degree in biochemistry. He obtained his PhD on molecular genetics in 1993 from the University of Antwerp. He started his...

Activins belong to the transforming growth factor-β superfamily, and they regulate bone formation by controlling both osteoclast and osteoblast behaviour. We have previously shown that activin-A strongly inhibited matrix mineralization in osteoblast cultures, and that activin A-signalling was most effective before the onset of mineralization.The aim of this study was therefore to investigate how an early activin-A pulse affected osteoblast mineraliz...

Biographical DetailsM van den Heuvel-Eibrink is Associate Professor of Pediatric Oncology at the Erasmus MC/Sophia Children’s Hospital, Rotterdam, The Netherlands. She began her medical career with an MD from the University of Utrecht and following a number of years of clinical work in the pediatric oncology field completed her PhD in Rotterdam in 2001. Since 2009 Dr M van den Heuvel...

Biographical DetailsHans van LeeuwenHans (J.P.T.M.) van Leeuwen studied biology in Amsterdam, and did his PhD study on the mechanism of action of PTH in Leiden, The Netherlands. Currently he is professor at the Erasmus University Medical Center in Rotterdam, The Netherlands, leading the research program on Calcium and Bone Metabolism. Main research ...

About two decades ago, evidence was generated that canonical Wnt signaling plays an important role in bone accrual mainly based on the identification of mutations in genes from the Wnt pathway resulting in extremely low or high bone mass. Since then, it became clear that genetic variation in a lot of genes from this pathway have an influence on bone mass both in a number of skeletal dysplasias as well as in the general population. This is the case for a number of wnt ligands (...

Cancer cell growth is dependent on the microenvironmental support. Prostate and mammary cancer (PCa and MCa) cells preferentially metastasize to bone, where they induce either an osteoblastic or osteolytic response. These opposite stromal responses suggest that different types of cancers adopt distinct strategies to hijack the bone marrow/bone stroma for their growth support. However, the molecular cues underlying these divergent responses are largely elusive.<p class="abs...

Histomorphometric analysis is an essential technique to measure bone formation and resorption parameters. Here we present three novel open source image analysis packages that allow the rapid semi-automated analysis of histomorphometric bone resorption, osteoid, and calcein double labelling parameters.Mice were injected with calcein 5 and 2 days before killing. Tibia and vertebrae were fixed in formalin, embedded in methylmethacrylate and the blocks secti...

Recent studies have demonstrated that activin signalling plays a crucial role in the skeleton. Activins control both osteoblast and osteoclast function and are present in the bone extracellular matrix. This makes activin signalling an important new therapeutic target for a dual anabolic antiresorptive intervention in osteoporosis.Activins belong to the large TGF-β superfamily that also includes BMPs, TGFβs and GDFs. Like other TGF-β member...

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