Publications by authors named "Zerif Echarki"

Background: Oxidative stress and chronic inflammation, at both the systemic and the central level, are critical early events in atherosclerosis and Alzheimer's disease (AD).

Purpose: To investigate the oxidative stress-, inflammation-, and Tau-phosphorylation-lowering effects of pomegranate polyphenols (PPs) (punicalagin, ellagic acid, peel, and aril extracts).

Methods: We used flow cytometry to quantify the protein expression of proinflammatory cytokines (IL-1β) and anti-inflammatory mediators (IL-10) in THP-1 macrophages, as well as M1/M2 cell-specific marker (CD86 and CD163) expression in human microglia HMC3 cells.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Genetic polymorphisms at the IL-1 cluster are associated with increased ()-associated disease risk in an ethnically dependent manner. Due to the corroborated role of IL-1β in infection progression, our aim is to depict the impact of IL1B rs1143627 and rs16944 as well as the IL1RN variable number of identical tandem repeats (VNTR) on the clinical and biological features of Moroccan -infected patients. A total of 58 patients with epigastralgic pain were referred to the gastroenterology department for histopathological and clinical analysis.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Tolerogenic dendritic cells (toDCs) are crucial to controlling the development of autoreactive T cell responses and the prevention of autoimmunity. We have reported that NOD.CD11c transgenic mice expressing a constitutively active (CA) form of under the control of a CD11c promoter are protected from diabetes and that Stat5b-CA-expressing DCs are tolerogenic and halt ongoing diabetes in NOD mice.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Introduction: Helicobacter pylori induces acute gastritis that can progress to serious diseases such as gastric cancer. H. pylori interacts with host cells within the gastric mucosa, resulting in activation of multiple innate immune signalling pathways, leading to pro-inflammatory cytokines production and immune cells recruitment.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Dendritic cells (DCs) play a major role in innate and adaptive immunity and self-immune tolerance. Immunogenic versus tolerogenic DC functions are dictated by their levels of costimulatory molecules and their cytokine expression profile. The transcription factor C/EBPβ regulates the expression of several inflammatory genes in many cell types including macrophages.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Alzheimer's disease (AD) is the most frequent type of dementia. The pathological hallmarks of the disease are extracellular senile plaques composed of beta-amyloid peptide (Aβ) and intracellular neurofibrillary tangles composed of pTau. These findings led to the "beta-amyloid hypothesis" that proposes that Aβ is the major cause of AD.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

This study was aimed to investigate the effect of human PON1 overexpression in mice on cholesterol efflux and reverse cholesterol transport. PON1 overexpression in PON1-Tg mice induced a significant 3-fold (p<0.0001) increase in plasma paraoxonase activity and a significant ~30% (p<0.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Defects in dendritic cells (DCs) development and function lead to autoimmune disorders. Autoimmune diabetes in humans and NOD mice results from a breakdown of self-tolerance, ending in T cell-mediated β-cell destruction. DCs dysfunction in NOD mice results in part from a defect in the JAK-STAT5 signaling pathway associated with the idd4 susceptibility locus.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Background: Multiple sclerosis (MS) is an organ-specific autoimmune disease resulting in demyelinating plaques throughout the central nervous system. In MS, the exact role of microglia remains unknown. On one hand, they can present antigens, skew T cell responses, and upregulate the expression of pro-inflammatory molecules.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF