HULC was discovered as the first IGF2BP substrate that is not stabilized or translationally regulated, but destabilized by way of CNOT1-mediated deadenylation recruited by IGF2BP1. Sixty human HCCs were analyzed for HULC expression using microarray analysis. Median age at surgery was 57 years (range 16-78), and the male/female ratio was 4:1. All diagnoses were confirmed by histological reevaluation, and use of the samples was approved by the local Ethics Committee.

The cohort contained a balanced repertoire of relevant underlying etiologies: hepatitis B virus (HBV) (n = 15), HCV (n = 12), alcohol (n = 10), cryptogenic (presumably mostly nonalcoholic fatty liver disease [NAFLD]; n = 19) or genetic hemochromatosis Selleck C646 (n = 3). The patients’ characteristics are

Selleck MI-503 shown in Supporting Table 1. For in vitro transcription, the Megascript T7 kit (Life Technologies, Carlsbad, CA) was used according to the manufacturer’s recommendations. Briefly, 1 μg linearized plasmid template was used and reactions were incubated for 16 hours in the presence or absence of Biotin-16-UTP (Epicentre, Madison, WI). The ratio between UTP and Biotin-16-UTP was 20:1. The reaction was stopped by addition of 1 μL Turbo-DNase. RNA was precipitated with LiCl. RNA integrity and size were controlled using agarose gel electrophoresis. Beads were preblocked with 1 mg/mL BSA (Roche), 0.2 mg/mL yeast tRNA (Roche), and 0.2 mg/mL Glycogen (Carl selleck chemical Roth, Karlsruhe, Germany) in low salt wash buffer (20 mM Hepes, pH 7.9; 100 mM KCl; 10 mM MgCl2; 0.01% NP40; 1 mM DTT) before addition of RNA. RNA was incubated with 50 μL Streptavidine-Sepharose beads (GE Healthcare, Little Chalfont, UK) in 500 μL HS-WB300 (20 mM Hepes, pH 7.9; 300 mM KCl; 10 mM MgCl2; 0.01% NP40; 1 mM DTT) for 4 hours. Unbound RNA was washed away with 3× 1 mL HS-WB400 (20 mM Hepes, pH 7.9; 400 mM KCl; 10 mM

MgCl2; 0.01% NP40; 1 mM DTT). Cytoplasmic cell extract (2-3 mg) was added and incubated overnight at 4°C. The next day the extract was removed and beads were washed 6 times with 1 mL HS-WB400. Beads were resuspended in 50 μL 6 M urea; 1 mM DTT; 0.01% NP-40 and incubated at room temperature for 30 minutes in a shaking block at 900 rpm. Then the supernatant was transferred into a new tube and proteins were precipitated with 5 volumes of prechilled acetone for 1 hour at −20°C. Proteins were pelleted by way of centrifugation at 13,000g at room temperature. Pellets were washed twice with 1 mL 80% ethanol, dried for 5 minutes, and resuspended in 20 μL protein sample buffer. HepG2 cells were transfected with small interfering RNAs (siRNAs) as stated above. After 48 hours, alpha-amanitine (AppliChem, Darmstadt, Germany) was added (10 μg/mL f.c.) and cells were harvested at the indicated timepoints. All experiments were done in biological triplicates.