Antineoplastic effects of bee honey and Nigella sativa on hepatocellular carcinoma cells.

Objectives: To evaluate in vitro antitumor effects of bee honey (BH) and Nigella sativa (NS) on HepG2 through their antioxidant and apoptotic activities.

Methods: HepG2 cell line was treated with different concentrations of diluted unfractionated BH and different concentrations of alcohol extract of NS. Exposure lasted for different time durations (6-72 hours), both dose-response and time course-response were conducted.

TGF-beta1, TNF-alpha and cytochrome c in human astrocytic tumors: a short-term follow up and correlation with survival.

Objectives: To evaluate the association of signals of apoptosis namely, TGF-beta1, TNF-alpha and cytochrome c release in cytoplasm with survival rate to determine the potential use of such parameters as predictive markers for patients with astrocytomas.

Design And Methods: We measured TGF-beta1, TNF-alpha and cytoplasmic cytochrome c in 30 astrocytic tumors Grade II, III and IV.

Results: We found that TNF-alpha and cytochrome c release in Grade IV tends to be significantly lower than those in Grade II, whereas TGF-beta1 did not significantly change in the different grades.

Evaluation of blood units with isolated anti HBC for the presence of HBV DNA.

We screened blood donors in one center in Saudi Arabia for a safety transfusion. We found that among 5043 blood donors negative for HCV and HIV, the incidence of HBsAg positivity was 2.97%.