Cholecystokinin regulates atrial natriuretic peptide secretion through activation of NOX4-Sirt1-LEF1 signaling in beating rat hypoxic atria.

The mammalian cardiac myocytes not only synthesize and secrete atrial natriuretic peptide (ANP), but also express cholecystokinin (CCK) and its receptors (CCKR and CCKR). However, atrial CCK expression patterns and its effects on ANP secretion during hypoxia are unclear. Therefore, this study is aimed to investigate the effect of hypoxia on the expression levels of CCK and its receptors, as well as the underlying mechanisms involved in regulating hypoxia-induced ANP secretion in isolated beating atria.

Evolution and modeling of texture changes and drying kinetics of bamboo shoots under high-humidity air-impingement blanching.

This study investigated the effect of hot water blanching (HWB), high-humidity air-impingement blanching (HHAIB), different HHAIB blanching times (2, 4, 6, 8, and 10 min), and different HHAIB blanching temperatures (80, 85, 90, and 95°C) on texture quality, lignin content, weight loss, color, microstructure, and drying kinetics of bamboo shoots. After HWB treatment, the lignin content of bamboo shoots was apparently lower than that of HHAIB and the samples obtained the highest weight loss value of 6.13%.

Enhanced mass transfer of pulsed vacuum pressure pickling and changes in quality of sour bamboo shoots.

Sour bamboo shoot is a traditional Chinese fermented vegetable food. The traditional pickling method of sour bamboo shoots has the disadvantages of being time-consuming, inhomogeneous, and difficult to control. Pulsed vacuum pressure pickling (PVPP) technology uses pulsed vacuum pressure to enhance the pickling efficiency significantly.

Mining Therapeutic Efficacy from Treasure Chest of Biodiversity and Chemodiversity: Pharmacophylogeny of Ranunculales Medicinal Plants.

Ranunculales, comprising of 7 families that are rich in medicinal species frequently utilized by traditional medicine and ethnomedicine, represents a treasure chest of biodiversity and chemodiversity. The phylogenetically related species often have similar chemical profile, which makes them often possess similar therapeutic spectrum. This has been validated by both ethnomedicinal experiences and pharmacological investigations.

Fresh insights into glucocorticoid-induced diabetes mellitus and new therapeutic directions.

Glucocorticoid hormones were discovered to have use as potent anti-inflammatory and immunosuppressive therapeutics in the 1940s and their continued use and development have successfully revolutionized the management of acute and chronic inflammatory diseases. However, long-term use of glucocorticoids is severely hampered by undesirable metabolic complications, including the development of type 2 diabetes mellitus. These effects occur due to glucocorticoid receptor activation within multiple tissues, which results in inter-organ crosstalk that increases hepatic glucose production and inhibits peripheral glucose uptake.

First total syntheses of kanjone and its natural analogues.

Kanjone (), a bioactive furanoflavone and a potent biomolecule, was first isolated from (L.). Herein, we have developed two approaches to synthesize kanjone as well as its natural analogues 6-methoxyisopongaglabol () and 6,3'-dimethoxy-[2″,3″:7,8]furanoflavone () starting from khellin and 3-hydroxy-4-methoxy-benzaldehyde, respectively.

Juvenile hormone biosynthetic genes are critical for regulating reproductive diapause in the cabbage beetle.

In insects, the juvenile hormone (JH) biosynthetic pathway regulates the in vivo JH titer. Thus, its downregulation potentially contributes to the lowering of JH titers typically observed in insects undergoing reproductive diapause, a developmental arrest at the adult stage. However, no systematic evidence has yet been presented to demonstrate the physiological and genetic roles of JH biosynthetic genes in reproductive diapause.

4-Phenylbutyric acid improves free fatty acid-induced hepatic insulin resistance in vivo.

Plasma free fatty acids (FFAs) are elevated in obesity and can induce insulin resistance via endoplasmic reticulum (ER) stress. However, it is unknown whether hepatic insulin resistance caused by the elevation of plasma FFAs is alleviated by chemical chaperones. Rats received one of the following i.

Analysis of a stochastic IVGTT glucose-insulin model with time delay.

Diabetes mellituse has been one of the major diseases in the world due to the high percentage of diabetics in the global population and the increasing growth rate of its onset. Identifying individual physiological characteristics, e.g.

Modeling the dynamics of glucose, insulin, and free fatty acids with time delay: The impact of bariatric surgery on type 2 diabetes mellitus.

The role of free fatty acids (FFA) on Type 2 diabetes mellitus (T2DM) progression has been studied extensively with prior studies suggesting that individuals with shared familial genetic predisposition to metabolic-related diseases may be vulnerable to dysfunctional plasma FFA regulation. A harmful cycle arises when FFA are not properly regulated by insulin contributing to the development of insulin resistance, a key indicator for T2DM, since prolonged insulin resistance may lead to hyperglycemia. We introduce a hypothesis-driven dynamical model and use it to evaluate the role of FFA on insulin resistance progression that is mathematically constructed within the context of individuals that have genetic predisposition to dysfunctional plasma FFA.

In silico approach in reveal traditional medicine plants pharmacological material basis.

In recent years, studies of traditional medicinal plants have gradually increased worldwide because the natural sources and variety of such plants allow them to complement modern pharmacological approaches. As computer technology has developed, in silico approaches such as virtual screening and network analysis have been widely utilized in efforts to elucidate the pharmacological basis of the functions of traditional medicinal plants. In the process of new drug discovery, the application of virtual screening and network pharmacology can enrich active compounds among the candidates and adequately indicate the mechanism of action of medicinal plants, reducing the cost and increasing the efficiency of the whole procedure.

Surface-Enhanced Raman Spectroscopy for Bioanalysis: Reliability and Challenges.

Surface-enhanced Raman spectroscopy (SERS) inherits the rich chemical fingerprint information on Raman spectroscopy and gains sensitivity by plasmon-enhanced excitation and scattering. In particular, most Raman peaks have a narrow width suitable for multiplex analysis, and the measurements can be conveniently made under ambient and aqueous conditions. These merits make SERS a very promising technique for studying complex biological systems, and SERS has attracted increasing interest in biorelated analysis.

Approach for Anti-Thrombosis Drug Discovery: P2YR Structure-Based TCMs Screening.

Cardiovascular diseases (CVDs), including thrombosis, which is induced by platelet aggregation, are the leading cause of mortality worldwide. The P2Y receptor (P2YR) facilitates platelet aggregation and is thus an important potential anti-thrombotic drug target. The P2YR protein structure contains a binding site for receptor antagonist MRS2500 within its seven-transmembrane bundle, which also provides suitable pockets for numerous other ligands to act as nucleotide antagonists of P2YR.

Discrimination between Leave of Apocynum venetum and Its Adulterant, A. pictum Based on Antioxidant Assay and Chemical Profiles Combined with Multivariate Statistical Analysis.

An integrated approach including chemical and biological assessments was developed to investigate the differences between Apocynum venetum L. (AV) and its adulterant, Apocynum pictum Schrenk (AP). Ten flavonoids were tentatively identified by ultra-visible and mass spectra data.

Novel cycloartane triterpenoid from Cimicifuga foetida (Sheng ma) induces mitochondrial apoptosis via inhibiting Raf/MEK/ERK pathway and Akt phosphorylation in human breast carcinoma MCF-7 cells.

Background: Cycloartane triterpenoids exhibited anticancer effects. This study aims to identify any potential novel anticancer cycloartane triterpenoids from Cimicifuga foetida L. rhizome (Sheng ma) and the mode of actions.

Label-free surface-enhanced Raman spectroscopy detection of DNA with single-base sensitivity.

Direct, label-free detection of unmodified DNA is a great challenge for DNA analyses. Surface-enhanced Raman spectroscopy (SERS) is a promising tool for DNA analyses by providing intrinsic chemical information with a high sensitivity. To address the irreproducibility in SERS analysis that hampers reliable DNA detection, we used iodide-modified Ag nanoparticles to obtain highly reproducible SERS signals of single- and double-strand DNA in aqueous solutions close to physiological conditions.

Minocycline inhibits ICAD degradation and the NF-κB activation induced by 6-OHDA in PC12 cells.

6-Hydroxydopamine (6-OHDA) is a neurotoxin that is commonly employed to induce lesions of the dopaminergic pathways to generating experimental models of Parkinson's disease (PD) in rodents. Antioxidant and anti-inflammatory therapy approaches have been the focus of attention in the treatment of neurodegenerative. PD and Alzheimer's diseases, and oxidative stress have been implicated in these diseases.

Label-free detection of native proteins by surface-enhanced Raman spectroscopy using iodide-modified nanoparticles.

Proteins perform vital functional and structural duties in living systems, and the in-depth investigation of protein in its native state is one of the most important challenges in the postgenomic era. Surface-enhanced Raman spectroscopy (SERS) can provide the intrinsic fingerprint information of samples with ultrahigh sensitivity but suffers from the reproducibility and reliability issues. In this paper, we proposed an iodide-modified Ag nanoparticles method (Ag IMNPs) for label-free detection of proteins.

[Spectrum-effect relationship between anti-HIV 1 activities and ultra-performance liquid chromatography fingerprints of Rheum species].

Objective: To study the relationship between ultra-performance liquid chromatography (UPLC) fingerprints of Rheum species and their anti-HIV 1 activities.

Method: Twenty two samples of 16 species belonging to genus Rheum from various sources were collected and analyzed in this study. Firstly they were assayed for the HIV-1 reverse transcriptase (RT) associated ribonuclease H (RNase H) activity.

The study of absorption kinetics of berberine based on portal vein in rat, and the influence of verapamil and borneol to its absorption ability by UHPLC method.

This paper aims to investigate the portal-vein absorption kinetics of berberine in rat, and the influence of P-gp inhibitors such as verapamil and borneol, to its absorption ability. In the paper, a validated UHPLC method was established to determine the berberine in plasma, and the portal-vein absorption model was applied to conduct the pharmacokinetic study. Animals were divided into four groups as follow: group berberine group (BG); group verapamil + berberine group (VBG); group borneol + berberine group (BBG) and group long-term use of borneol + berberine group (LBBG).

Two new antioxidant diarylheptanoids from the fruits of Alpinia oxyphylla.

Two new diarylheptanoids, 1-(3',5'-dihydroxy-4'-methoxyphenyl)-7-phenyl-3-heptanone (1) and 1-(2',4'-dihydroxy-3'-methoxyphenyl)-7-(4″-methoxyphenyl)-3-heptanone (2), along with known diarylheptanoid yakuchinone A (3), and five flavanoids, tectochrysin (4), chrysin (5), izalpinin (6), kaempferol 7, 4'-dimethyl ether (7), and kaempferide (8) were isolated from the fruits of Alpinia oxyphylla Miq. Their structures were determined by means of spectroscopic methods. Antioxidant activities of all the isolated compounds were evaluated using a 1,1-diphenyl-2-picrylhydrazyl (DPPH) assay.