The potential of mesenchymal stem cell coexpressing cytosine deaminase and secretory IL18-FC chimeric cytokine in suppressing glioblastoma recurrence.

Glioblastoma multiforme (GBM) patients have a high recurrence rate of 90%, and the 5-year survival rate is only about 5%. Cytosine deaminase (CDA)/5-fluorocytosine (5-FC) gene therapy is a promising glioma treatment as 5-FC can cross the blood-brain barrier (BBB), while 5-fluorouracil (5-FU) cannot. Furthermore, 5-FU can assist reversing the immunological status of cold solid tumors.

Signaling crosstalk between mesenchymal stem cells and tumor cells: Implications for tumor suppression or progression.

Mesenchymal stem cells (MSCs) have been extensively used in various therapeutic applications over the last two decades, particularly in regenerative medicine and cancer treatment. MSCs have the ability to differentiate into mesodermal and non-mesodermal lineages, which makes them a popular choice in tissue engineering and regenerative medicine. Studies have shown that MSCs have inherent tumor-suppressive properties and can affect the behavior of multiple cells contributing to tumor development.

Nanotechnology and bioengineering approaches to improve the potency of mesenchymal stem cell as an off-the-shelf versatile tumor delivery vehicle.

Targeting actionable mutations in oncogene-driven cancers and the evolution of immuno-oncology are the two prominent revolutions that have influenced cancer treatment paradigms and caused the emergence of precision oncology. However, intertumoral and intratumoral heterogeneity are the main challenges in both fields of precision cancer treatment. In other words, finding a universal marker or pathway in patients suffering from a particular type of cancer is challenging.

Bioengineering strategies to enhance the interleukin-18 bioactivity in the modern toolbox of cancer immunotherapy.

Cytokines are the first modern immunotherapeutic agents used for activation immunotherapy. Interleukin-18 (IL-18) has emerged as a potent anticancer immunostimulatory cytokine over the past three decades. IL-18, structurally is a stable protein with very low toxicity at biological doses.

Identification of candidate microRNA biomarkers in diabetic nephropathy: a meta-analysis of profiling studies.

Aims: The aim was to perform a meta-analysis on the miRNA expression profiling studies in diabetic nephropathy (DN) to identify candidate diagnostic biomarkers.

Methods: A comprehensive literature search was done in several databases and 53 DN miRNA expression studies were selected. To identify significant DN-miR meta-signatures, two meta-analysis methods were employed: vote-counting strategy and the robust rank aggregation method.

Identification of candidate microRNA biomarkers in renal fibrosis: a meta-analysis of profiling studies.

The prognostic, diagnostic and therapeutic value of microRNA (miRNA) expression aberrations in renal fibrosis has been studied in recent years. However, the miRNA expression profiling efforts have led to inconsistent results between the studies. The aim of this study was to perform a meta-analysis on the renal fibrosis miRNA expression profiling studies to identify candidate diagnostic biomarkers.

Identification of miR-24 and miR-137 as novel candidate multiple sclerosis miRNA biomarkers using multi-staged data analysis protocol.

Many studies have investigated misregulation of miRNAs relevant to multiple sclerosis (MS) pathogenesis. Abnormal miRNAs can be used both as candidate biomarker for MS diagnosis and understanding the disease miRNA-mRNA regulatory network. In this comprehensive study, misregulated miRNAs related to MS were collected from existing literature, databases and via in silico prediction.

Lipocalin 2 enhances mesenchymal stem cell-based cell therapy in acute kidney injury rat model.

Acute kidney injury (AKI) is one of the most common health-threatening diseases in the world. There is still no effective medical treatment for AKI. Recently, Mesenchymal stem cell (MSC)-based therapy has been proposed for treatment of AKI.

A home-brew real-time PCR assay for reliable detection and quantification of mature miR-122.

miR-122 is a liver-specific miRNA that has significant gene expression alterations in response to specific pathophysiological circumstances of liver such as drug-induced liver injury, hepatocellular carcinoma, and hepatitis B and C virus infections. Therefore, accurate and precise quantification of miR-122 is very important for clinical diagnostics. However, because of the lack of in vitro diagnostics assays for miR-122 detection and quantification of the existence of an open-source assay could inevitably provide external evaluation by other researchers and the chance of promoting the assay when required.

Co-culture of bone marrow-derived mesenchymal stem cells overexpressing lipocalin 2 with HK-2 and HEK293 cells protects the kidney cells against cisplatin-induced injury.

Conditioned medium of mesenchymal stem cells (MSCs) is now being used for its cytoprotective effects, especially when the cells are equipped with cytoprotective factors to strengthen them against unfavorable microenvironments. Overexpression of Lcn2 in MSCs mimics in vivo kidney injury. Hence, unraveling how Lcn2-engineered MSCs affect kidney cells has been investigated.

Lipocalin-2-mediated upregulation of various antioxidants and growth factors protects bone marrow-derived mesenchymal stem cells against unfavorable microenvironments.

Despite many advantages of mesenchymal stem cells (MSCs) that make them suitable for cell therapy purposes, their therapeutic application has been limited due to their susceptibility to several stresses (e.g., nutrient-poor environment, oxidative stress, and hypoxic and masses of cytotoxic factors) to which they are exposed during their preparation and following transplantation.

Colorimetric detection of Helicobacter pylori DNA using isothermal helicase-dependent amplification and gold nanoparticle probes.

This study describes a nanodiagnostic method using thermophilic helicase-dependent isothermal amplification (tHDA) and gold nanoparticle probes for colorimetric detection of Helicobacter pylori DNA. The primers targeting ureC gene were used for the amplification of bacterial DNA by the isothermal tHDA reaction, resulting in the accumulation of DNA amplicons. The amplicons were hybridized with specific gold nanoparticle probes.

Detection of Helicobacter pylori by enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay of thermophilic helicase-dependent isothermal DNA amplification.

An enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay (ELISA) of thermophilic helicase-dependent isothermal DNA amplification (tHDA) was developed for detection of Helicobacter pylori. The primers targeting ureC were used for the amplification of bacterial DNA by the isothermal digoxigenin (DIG)-labeling tHDA process, resulting in the accumulation of DIG-labeled DNA amplicons. The amplicons were denatured using heat and then hybridized with a specific biotinylated DNA probe, which was noncovalently immobilized on streptavidin-coated microtiter plate.

Global iron-dependent gene regulation in Escherichia coli. A new mechanism for iron homeostasis.

Organisms generally respond to iron deficiency by increasing their capacity to take up iron and by consuming intracellular iron stores. Escherichia coli, in which iron metabolism is particularly well understood, contains at least 7 iron-acquisition systems encoded by 35 iron-repressed genes. This Fe-dependent repression is mediated by a transcriptional repressor, Fur (ferric uptake regulation), which also controls genes involved in other processes such as iron storage, the Tricarboxylic Acid Cycle, pathogenicity, and redox-stress resistance.