The potential role of kinesin and dynein in Golgi scattering and cytoplasmic vacuole formation during acute experimental pancreatitis

The shaping, making and baking of a pancreatologist

The European Pancreatic Club Lifetime Achievement award is a distinction awarded for research on the pancreas. It comes with the obligation to submit a review article to the society's journal, Pancreatology. Since the research topics of my group have recently been covered in reviews and book chapters I want to use this opportunity to appraise the stations of my clinical and research education, the projects that I pursued and abandoned, the lessons I have learned from them, and the women and men who influenced my training and development as a physician scientist. Some crossed my path, some become collaborators and friends, and some turned into role models and had a lasting impact on my life.

Proteomic analysis of heat shock-induced protection in acute pancreatitis

Acute pancreatitis is an inflammatory disease of the pancreas, which can result in serious morbidity or death. Acute pancreatitis severity can be reduced in experimental models by preconditioning animals with a short hyperthermia prior to disease induction. Heat shock proteins 27 and 70 are key effectors of this protective effect. In this study, we performed a comparative proteomic analysis using a combination of liquid chromatography-tandem mass spectrometry (LC-MS/MS) analysis and isobaric tagging to investigate changes in pancreatic proteins expression that were associated with thermal stress, both in healthy rats and in a model of caerulein-induced pancreatitis. In agreement with previous studies, we observed modulation of heat shock and inflammatory proteins expression in response to heat stress or pancreatitis induction. We also identified numerous other proteins, whose pancreatic level changed following pancreatitis induction, when acute pancreatitis severity was reduced by prior thermal stress, or in healthy rats in response to hyperthermia. Interestingly, we showed that the expression of various proteins associated with the secretory pathway was modified in the different experimental models, suggesting that modulation of this process is involved in the protective effect against pancreatic tissue damage.