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Ultrasound (US) causes multiple thermal and non-thermal effects, such as
mechanical and chemical stresses, that can result in damage to the cellular
membrane and nucleus, leading to transient membrane pores, alterations in gene
expression, and cell death, including apoptosis. On the basis of its biological
effects US has been proposed as a new drug delivery and molecular targeting
tool for cancer therapy. However, the molecular mechanisms involved in US
induced cell killing are not yet fully understood. Recently, we have reported
that the mechanical effects of US elicit DNA single strand as well as double
strand breaking- the most cytotoxic form of DNA damage, which initiates
subsequent DNA damage response associated with DNA repair, cell cycle arrest,
and cell death. Here in the present study we have focused on one of the most
significant biological effects of US, i.e., DNA damage and discussed the
underlying mechanisms and a unique cellular response. Read more>>>>>>>>>
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Nanomedicine
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The first experimental evidence for CSCs was given by Bonnet and Dick in
1997. They found that single CD34+CD38– Acute Myeloid Leukemia (AML) cell was
able to initiate AML in NOD-SCID mice. Furthermore, this small subset
population was found to be responsible for chemotherapy and radiotherapy
resistance because CSCs have enhanced DNA repair ability, enriched
anti-apoptotic proteins, improved drug efflux transporters, and are protected
in specific microenvironment or niche. Therefore, these leukemia initiating
cells (LIC) or leukemia Stem Cells (LSCs) are considered as a critical target
for leukemia therapy. Subsequently, CSCs in solid tumors have been identified
from brain, prostate, breast, colon, and pancreas cancer. Traditional cancer
treatments, such as Chemotherapy and Radiotherapy, are cytotoxic to both normal
and cancerous cells, which cause severe side effects, like bone marrow
suppression, cardiomyopathy, and neurotoxicity. Read more>>>>>>>>
Multiple Sclerosis (MS) is
a chronic inflammatory disease of the Central Nervous System (CNS) ultimately
leading to demyelination and axonal loss. This disease is complex andmultifactorial, but it seems that the main etiopathogenic event is presented by
an aberrant response of the cells of immune system (T and B lymphocytes) to
myelin proteins.
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| Multiple Sclerosis |
Three forms of MS disease
evolution exist. Approximately 80% of the patients have a Relapsing Remitting
Multiple Sclerosis (RRMS) form; two thirds of them can likely develop a
secondary progressive form over 10-15 years starting from MS disease onset.
Around 20% of the patients can develop a progressive form of MS right from very
onset, and such a disease is called Primary Progressive Multiple Sclerosis
(PPMS). An average age of the patients with MS disease who were studied
assembles 30 years. The main peak of morbidity due to MS can be attributed to
the age of 20-40 years. Disease onset in the age of patients up to 16 years
constitutes about 2.7% of cases. Read more>>>>>>>
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| Wound Healing |
Diabetes mellitus is a group of metabolic diseases characterized by
hyperglycemia resulting from defects in insulin secretion, insulin action, or
both. Regarding the absence of sufficient efficacy of the available methods in
diabetic wound healing, the use of alternative or complementary compounds has
been considered. Probiotics, chitosan and royal jelly are among these
compounds. Currently, after creating experimental diabetes with streptozotocin
in rats, effects of probiotics (Lactobacillus casei), exopolysaccharide of
Lactobacillus casei, chitosan Nano fibers and N-chromosome royal jelly were
investigated on wound healing of the mentioned animals and were compared to
common medications in the market. Read more>>>>>>
GDEPT
could be a two-step cistron medical aid approach wherever the cistron for a
non-endogenous catalyst is directed to focus on tissues. First one is a factor
of a far off catalyst is delivered to a tumour by a vector and second one is a
prodrug is then administered that is property activated within the tumour site.
Within the initiative, the cistron for a distant catalyst is run and is
directed to the neoplasm, wherever it’s expressed by the utilization of
specific promoters. Within the second step, injected prodrugs area unit
activated by the foreign catalyst. The planning and synthesis of prodrugs able
to bear protein activation in such systems is a vital part.The catalyst is
expressed intracellularly wherever it’s able to activate an afterwards
administered prodrug. It’s a promising new treatment for cancer therapy. The
planning and synthesis of prodrugs able to bear animate thing enzymic
activation by foreign genes in such systems is a vital part.(Read More)
Carcinoma
of the urinary bladder is the most prevalent cancer in most African countries.
In Egypt, bladder cancer represents the most common malignancy among Egyptian
males and previously has been attributed to Schistosoma infection, a major risk factor for
squamous cell carcinoma (SCC). Recently, urothelial carcinoma (UC) incidencehas been increasing while SCC has declined. About 85% of patients with
urothelial bladder carcinoma present with nonmuscle invasive urothelial tumours
(NMIUC) at first presentation, whereas the remaining 15% of primary tumours are
already muscle invasive (MIUC). After being removed by transurethral resection
(TUR), NMIUC will recur in up to 70% of patients and up to one third of pT1
tumours will eventually develop a progression to muscle invasive disease. Patients
with bladder cancer therefore have to be monitored thoroughly for disease
recurrence and progression. This makes bladder cancer one of the most expensive
cancer types for the health care system.
Early
detection of recurrent cancer is crucial to improve the treatment outcome.
Consequently, regular follow-up for patients with NMIUC is mandatory. The tension
on patients and the burden on health-care providers for life-long follow-up are
great. There are classical methods for follow-up purposes as urine cytology and
regular cystoscopy. Although cystoscopic biopsy is the most accurate diagnostic
tool for detection of recurrent cancer, and currently is the standard of choice,
cystoscopy may still miss tiny tumors, and also lead to false-negative results.
Also, importantly, cystoscopy is invasive, and associated with morbidity, which
is the main reason preventing patients from being regularly followed-up. Voided
urine cytology is the most commonly used noninvasive follow-up diagnostic tool.
In urine cytology, cells present in voided urine are examined and described as
being positive or negative for the presence of malignant cells, atypical or having
suspicious cells present.(Read more)
Congenital
hypothyroidism, defined as the functional deficiency of thyroid hormones
present at birth, occurs in approximately 1: 2,000 to 4,000 newborns. Thyroid
hormones play an essential role in the maturation of the central nervous
system. Congenital hypothyroidism results in severe neurodevelopmental
impairment if untreated and, therefore constitutes the most common preventableendocrine cause of irreversible mental retardation. As clinical diagnosis of
hypothyroidism in the newborn period is almost always overlooked, newborn
screening programs seeking to identify elevated thyrotropin levels at birth are
available to detect primary congenital hypothyroidism mainly.
Significantly,
early onset on levothyroxine replacement therapy virtually abolishes severe
intellectual development.Congenital
hypothyroidism is caused by genetic defects occurring at three different
levels, including the hypothalamic-pituitary axis, the thyroid gland, and the
peripheral tissues. Up to date, 30 monogenic forms of congenital hypothyroidism
have been reported in individuals with thyroid dysgenesis, thyroid
dyshormonogenesis, central and peripheral hypothyroidism, highlighting the
genetic heterogeneity of the disease.(Read more)
Continuously
usage of petroleum sourced fuels is now widely recognized as unsustainable and
environmental unfriendly because of its depleting supplies and the emission of
carbon dioxide into the atmosphere, which contributes to the worldwide
greenhouse effect and global climate change. Methods to convert biomass tocompetitive biofuels increasingly attract researchers’ attention in recent pastdecades, and microalgae used as the most promising feedstock source for the
third-generation biodiesel production interest biofuel researchers since they
can produce and accumulate large amount of lipids and fix the greenhouse gas
(CO2) by photosynthesis at the same time. Hence, development and
utilization of microalgae as feedstock candidates for biodiesel production
appears to be a cost effective, renewable, carbon neutral and environmentally
friendly way forward and offers great opportunities in the longer term.
However, inadequate microalgae species and relatively absence of information on
detailed FAs compositional profiles have limited the development of microalgae
bio-resources. Determination and analysis of microalgae strains with high
biomass concentration, high cellular lipid content, appropriate lipid
distribution, suitable FAs compositional profiles and proper biodiesel
properties under specific culture conditions are of great importance to promote
microalgae biodiesel production. Thus isolation and evaluation of autochthonic
appropriate microalgae species and exploitation of them in algal biotechnology
for bio-resource usage is urgently needed.(Read More)
(PGC-1α) is a
protein that in humans is encoded by the PPARGC1A gene. PPARGC1A is also known as human accelerated region 20
(HAR20). It may, therefore, have played a key role in differentiating humansfrom apes. PGC-1α is the master regulator of mitochondrial biogenesis. PGC-1α
is a transcriptional coactivator that regulates the genes involved in energy
metabolism. It is the master regulator of mitochondrial biogenesis. This
protein interacts with the nuclear receptor PPAR-γ, which permits the
interaction of this protein with multiple transcription factors.
This protein
can interact with, and regulate the activities of, cAMP response
element-binding protein (CREB) and nuclear respiratory factors (NRFs). It
provides a direct link between external physiological stimuli and the
regulation of mitochondrial biogenesis, and is a major factor that regulates muscle
fiber type determination. Endurance exercise has been shown to activate the
PGC-1α gene in human skeletal muscle. This protein may be also involved in
controlling blood pressure, regulating cellular cholesterol homoeostasis, and
the development of obesity.(Read more)
Equilibrium constants of Cadmium
Oxide (CdO) nanoparticles complexes in human cancer cells with DNA/RNA ligands
have been studied with biospectroscopic methods such as 1HNMR, 13CNMR,
31PNMR, Attenuated Total Reflectance Fourier Transform Infrared
(ATR–FTIR) and FT–Raman spectroscopies in cosolvent systems at 10, 20, 30°C ±
0.5 and 1 mol.dm–3 ionic strength, was maintained using Sodium
Chloride (NaCl) and Phosphate buffer. The stability constants of the complexesand the resulting free–energy changes are obtained. The results are discussed
in terms of effect of solvent on protonation and complexation.
The interaction between DNA/RNA
and Cadmium Oxide (CdO) nanoparticles are investigated by HF, PM3, MM2, MM3,
AM1, MP2, MP3, MP4, CCSD, CCSD (T), LDA, BVWN, BLYP and B3LYP methods using
31G, 6-31G*, 6-31+G*, 6-31G (3df, 3pd), 6-311G, 6-311G* and 6-311+G* basis sets
of the Gaussian 09. The structural, thermodynamic, biospectroscopic and
vibrational properties of DNA/RNA and Cadmium Oxide (CdO) nanoparticles
complexes in human cancer cells are studied by HF, PM3, MM2, MM3, AM1, MP2,
MP3, MP4, CCSD, CCSD (T), LDA, BVWN, BLYP and B3LYP methods using 31G, 6-31G*,
6-31+G*, 6-31G (3df, 3pd), 6-311G, 6-311G* and 6-311+G* basis sets of the
Gaussian 09. Also, interaction energies (ΔE) were calculated. Furthermore, some
of bond lengths, angles and torsions were compared. Moreover, results of
rotation about two bonds were reported. In addition, Natural Bond Orbital (NBO)
studies were performed to the second–order perturbation estimates of
donor–acceptor interaction has been done.(Read more)
The mouse
embryonic stem cells as a model for cardiac differentiation induced by ascorbic
acid used and the pattern of expression of PEP at certain stages of
differentiation were analyzed by Real-Time PCR technique. The results show a
dramatic increase in PEP gene expression in the adult cardiomyocytes. PEP
increased expression of genes may have a role in later stages cardiogenesis is
possible that further studies are needed to identify it.(Read more)
Such studies have in
common an evaluation of selection within a single lineage but generally do not
address selection that may be occurring as new species arise, that is at splits
in their respective phylogenetic trees. A few studies have targeted selection
as species diverge but most of them are restricted to evaluating SNPs scattered
throughout the genome and not whole sequences of genes. Using this approach,
one may infer whether selection is common or rare during speciation but not
necessarily whether selection is associated with particular functional groups
of genes, which in turn may inform hypotheses on the genetics of speciation.(Read more)
Herpes
simplex virus (HSV) is one of the main infectious causes of corneal blindness
worldwide. A variety of clinical manifestations of both infectious and
immunologic diseases affects all levels of the cornea in HSV keratitis.
Acyclovir (ACV) is the main therapeutic regime for corneal ulcer because HSV-1is sensitive to ACV . The common regimen for corneal herpes in Japan is
administration of ACV eye ointment (ACV-O). However, because ACV-O must be
administered 5 times daily and shows poor water solubility and thus low
bioavailability, alternative delivery approaches are needed to increase the
therapeutic potential of ACV.
Poly-N-p-vinylbenzyl-D-lactonamide
(PVLA) is a superior surface-coating material for culturing hepatocyte; it
adheres to hepatocytes through a highly specific interaction between its
galactose moiety and cell surface asialoglycoprotein receptors. PVLA has been
shown to form polymeric micelles in water because of the presence of a
hydrophobic polystyrene backbone and hydrophilic sugar moieties. A saline
solution containing PVLA may be an effective solvent for ACV.(Read more)
Colonscopy
is one of the most important tools for investigation of colorectal diseases as
it has been used to screen large bowel to identify early lesions in many risk
groups and to investigate patients with various complains as abdominal pain,
changes in bowel habits, gastrointestinal bleeding, chronic diarrhoea and
abdominal masses.(Read More)
Furthermore,
this small subset population was found to be responsible for chemotherapy and
radiotherapy resistance because CSCs have enhanced DNA repair ability, enriched
anti-apoptotic proteins, improved drug efflux transporters, and are protected
in specific microenvironment or niche . Therefore, these leukemia initiating
cells (LIC) or leukemia Stem Cells (LSCs) are considered as a critical target
for leukemia therapy. Subsequently, CSCs in solid tumors have been identified
from brain, prostate, breast, colon, and pancreas cancer.(Read more)
Nowadays, Diabetes is one of the most common diseases in
the world. These diseases and disorders of the problems for the patient and the
health system create. One of the long term complications of diabetes isneuropathy, or nerve problems which are involved in diabetic foot ulcers and
prevalence of this disorder in patients between 12 and 50 percent mentioned.
Diabetes mellitus is a group of metabolic diseases characterized by
hyperglycemia resulting from defects in insulin secretion, insulin action, or
both. Regarding the absence of sufficient efficacy of the available methods in
diabetic wound healing, the use of alternative or complementary compounds has
been considered. (Read more)
Alzheimer’s disease (AD) is a major healthcare problem, with
over five million patients in the United States, and an annual economic impact
of approximately $200 billion. With recent therapeutic trial failures and a
rapidly increasing number of cases, improved approaches for high-throughput
screening of large compound numbers are needed. To this end, simple models of
AD, such as cellular models, invertebrate models, and transgenic mouse models,
have been created. However, the invertebrate models described to date displaynumerous dissimilarities to human AD, such as expression of the relevant gene
in muscle or eye rather than brain, and the hyper-expression of the gene,
leading to generalized motor reflex deficits. In an effort to create a more
relevant Drosophila AD model, we utilized the gene switch approach, inducibly
expressing low levels of human amyloid-β precursor protein (hAβPP) and human
β-site AβPP cleaving enzyme 1 (hBACE1). Surprisingly, this expression led to a
phenotype highly reminiscent of attention deficit hyperactivity disorder
(ADHD), with hyperactivity, male predominance, marked exacerbation by simple
carbohydrates, reversible response to dextroamphetamine, and a “paradoxical
response” to stimulants, all characteristics of human ADHD. This represents the
first invertebrate model of ADHD faithfully reproducing these key features of
ADHD.
We sought to create an invertebrate model of AD that more
closely mimics the human disease in target tissue, mnemonic effects, and
response to candidate therapeutics. To create such a Drosophila AD model, we
used the RU-486-induced Elav-GeneSwitch driver to express low levels of hAβPPand hBACE1 in Drosophila. Previous studies have shown that over-expression of
hAβPP and hBACE1 leads to severe motor reflex deficits. We therefore employed
the Drosophila population activity monitors to measure spontaneous activity.
Surprisingly, these flies were not found to be hypoactive compared to the
uninduced controls, but rather were hyperactive, typically 50-100% more active
than the control, uninduced Drosophila.
Cerebral Toxoplasmosis is
a very common cause of focal neurologic disorder in Acquired Immune Deficiency
Syndrome (AIDS) patients with cerebral lesions, but it seems to be a rare cause of spinal cord disease. If not treated and detected immediately,
Toxoplasmosis may cause considerable mortality and morbidity.
Toxoplasma
gondii is an intracellular pathogen that contracts a major proportion of the
world population. Also, it is a well-known cause of sickness among persons with
Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome(AIDS). Although brain has been the major site for Toxoplasma
infection in Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome (AIDS) patients, spinal cord involvement by Toxoplasma has
been seldom reported. Spinal cord Toxoplasmosis may present as severe outset
weakness in both lower limbs correlating with both sensory and bladder
dysfunction. On the other hand, progression of cerebral infection may produce
seizures, ataxia, confusion, aphasia, hemianopsia, hemiparesis, drowsiness, and
cranial nerve palsies. Congenital Toxoplasmosis is an illness caused by
intrauterine transmission of the parasite Toxoplasma gondii to the fetus. A
pregnant woman may acquire this parasite during gestation. Toxoplasma gondii
can be found in up to 50% of the world population. Approximately 10% of
patients with Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome (AIDS) show some kind of
neurological deficit as their primary complaint, and around 80% will have Central Nervous System (CNS) involvement
during the course of their illness. The retina and the lungs are the major sites of extracerebral
manifestation of Toxoplasmosis, and such manifestations may happen with/without
concomitant Encephalitis. Here we present a case report and review of the
literature on Toxoplasmosis in Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome (AIDS)
patients.
It is often explicitly, or
implicitly, considered that an enzyme reaction occurring under steady state
conditions is a system that collects connected states of the enzyme that
appear during the reaction. Moreover,
there is little doubt that many enzymes in vivo are aggregated as multienzyme
complexes in such a way that one can wonder whether the corresponding enzyme
reactions are not aggregated to form a functional structure that connects and
associates the elementary reactions as to form a coherent whole.
The rate equation of the
global system of becomes more complex than the individual equations of
the enzymes E1 and E2 in isolation. However, one can notice that the global
system is dependent upon antagonistic effects exerted by system 1. A first
effect is a tendency to drift towards thermodynamic equilibrium. This tendency
is exerted through the rate constants of substrate binding and release. A
second effect is a tendency of the system to drift from the equilibrium and
is exerted through a subtle combination of catalytic and substrate binding
constants . The situation is thus of the same type, but more complex, than the
one already described. A global steady state of the system its organization, is
the result of these interactions.
