The practical utility of non-invasive indices in metabolic hepatic steatosis.

Background: Metabolic hepatic steatosis (metHS) is the most frequent cause of chronic liver disease in our environment. The "gold standard" for its diagnosis continues to be liver biopsy, but this is an invasive technique, is not risk-free, and has great interobserver variability, so noninvasive diagnostic methods are necessary.

Objective: To determine the diagnostic accuracy of non-invasive methods based on clinical and analytical data compared to liver biopsy, and to analyse their concordance with each other in the overall cohort and in subpopulations at risk of metHS.

Psychometric Properties of the Flourishing Scale and Measurement Invariance Between Two Samples of Spanish University Students.

The Flourishing Scale (FS), created by Diener et al., is a brief subjective perception measurement which assesses flourishing and provides a single score across 8 items. The aim of this study was to assess the psychometric properties of the Spanish version of the FS.

Development of Fluorescent Probes that Target Serotonin 5-HT Receptors.

Some 5-HT fluorescent probes were obtained by tagging 1-(2,5-dimethoxy-4-iodophenyl)-propan-2-amine (DOI) with a subset of fluorescent amines. Some of the resulting fluorescent ligands showed excellent affinity and selectivity profiles at the 5-HT receptors (e.g.

Application of BRET for studying G protein-coupled receptors.

G protein-coupled receptors (GPCRs) constitute one of the largest classes of cell surface receptors. GPCR biology has been a subject of widespread interest owing to the functional relevance of these receptors and their potential importance in the development of new drugs. At present, over 30% of all launched drugs target these receptors.

Pathogenesis of occult chronic hepatitis B virus infection.

Occult hepatitis B infection (OBI) is characterized by hepatitis B virus (HBV) DNA in serum in the absence of hepatitis B surface antigen (HBsAg) presenting HBsAg-negative and anti-HBc positive serological patterns. Occult HBV status is associated in some cases with mutant viruses undetectable by HBsAg assays; but more frequently it is due to a strong suppression of viral replication and gene expression. OBI is an entity with world-wide diffusion.

Leptin receptor Lys656Asn polymorphism is associated with decreased leptin response and weight loss secondary to a lifestyle modification in obese patients.

Background: Human obesity is characterized by high levels of leptin, and it has been suggested that obese patients may be leptin resistant. The aim of our study was to investigate the influence of Lys656Asn polymorphism in the leptin receptor gene on leptin response and weight loss secondary to a lifestyle modification (Mediterranean hypocaloric diet and exercise) in obese patients.

Methods: A population of 67 obese (body mass index >30) nondiabetic outpatients was analyzed in a prospective way.