Skin autofluorescence of advanced glycation end-products, glycemic memory, and diabetes complications.

Since the pionneer work of Meerwaldt and the Groningen team, who related skin autofluorescence (SAF) to the dermal concentrations of advanced glycation end-products (AGEs), hundreds of articles have been devoted to its application in diabetes. Due to the slow turnover of the AGEs formed on collagen of the skin, the SAF can reflect the progressive accumulation of AGEs and hence be a marker of long-term glucose exposure. Accordingly, relations with HbA1c from the previous 3-10 years have been established in both type 1 and type 2 diabetes, and even in gestational diabetes mellitus.

Early- and life-long intake of dietary advanced glycation end-products (dAGEs) leads to transient tissue accumulation, increased gut sensitivity to inflammation, and slight changes in gut microbial diversity, without causing overt disease.

Dietary advanced glycation end-products (dAGEs) accumulate in organs and are thought to initiate chronic low-grade inflammation (CLGI), induce glycoxidative stress, drive immunosenescence, and influence gut microbiota. Part of the toxicological interest in glycation products such as dietary carboxymethyl-lysine (dCML) relies on their interaction with receptor for advanced glycation end-products (RAGE). It remains uncertain whether early or lifelong exposure to dAGEs contributes physiological changes and whether such effects are reversible or permanent.

Development of Receptor for Advanced Glycation End Products (RAGE) ligands through target directed dynamic combinatorial chemistry: a novel class of possible antagonists.

RAGE is a transmembrane receptor of immunoglobulin family that can bind various endogenous and exogenous ligands, initiating the inflammatory downstream signaling pathways, including inflammaging. Therefore, RAGE represents an attractive drug target for age-related diseases. For the development of small-molecule RAGE antagonists, we employed protein-templated dynamic combinatorial chemistry (ptDCC) using RAGE's VC1 domain as a template, the first application of this approach in the context of RAGE.

Firalink: A bioinformatics pipeline for long non-coding RNA data analysis.

Summary: The Firalink bioinformatics pipeline has been developed to analyse long non-coding RNA (lncRNA) data generated by targeted sequencing. This pipeline has been first implemented for use with the FIMICS panel containing 2906 lncRNAs useful for investigations in cardiovascular disease. It has been subsequently tested and validated using a panel of lncRNAs targeting brain disease.