TUB 1 Polyclonal Antibody

In contrast to the rapid early-onset weight gain seen in ob/ob mice (1-3), mutations in the tub gene lead to obesity gradually and strongly resemble late-onset obesity as seen in the human population (4) . In addition to excessive deposition of adipose tissue, mice with the tub phenotype also suffer retinal degeneration and neurosensory hearing loss (4-6) . The tripartite character of tubby phenotype is strikingly similar to human obesity syndromes such as Alstr (5) and Bardet-Biedl (6) . A candidate for the tub gene has been described (4) . A G_ transversion in this candidate gene eliminates a donor splice site in the 3' coding region resulting in a larger transcript containing an unspliced intron (4) . A second prematurely truncated mRNA transcript with the unspliced intron was found to be expressed in the brains of tubby mice at a 2-3 fold higher rate as compared to B6 mice (4) . It has been postulated that the phenotypic features of tubby mice can be attributed to cellular apoptosis triggered by the expression of a mutated tub gene (4) .