Association Between Dentin Matrix Protein 1 (rs10019009) Polymorphism and Ankylosing Spondylitis in a Chinese Han Population from Shandong Province / 中华医学杂志(英文版)

<p><b>BACKGROUND</b>Ankylosing spondylitis (AS) is the most common rheumatic condition that is slowly progressive and predominantly affects adolescents. Pathological bone formation associated with AS is an important cause of disability. The aim of the study was to investigate the possible involvement of the genes related to endochondral ossification and ectopia ossification in genetic susceptibility to AS in a Chinese Han population.</p><p><b>METHODS</b>Sixty-eight single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) from 13 genes were genotyped in discovery cohorts including 300 AS patients and 180 healthy controls. The rs10019009 in dentin matrix protein 1 (DMP1) gene shown as association with AS after multiple testing corrections in discovery cohorts was replicated in a validation independent cohort of 620 AS patients and 683 healthy controls. The rs10019009 was assessed with bioinformatics including phylogenetic context, F-SNP and FastSNP functional predictions, secondary structure prediction, and molecular modeling. We performed a functional analysis of rs10019009 via reverse transcription-polymerase chain reaction, alkaline phosphatase (ALP) activity in human osteosarcoma U 2 OS cells.</p><p><b>RESULTS</b>Interestingly, the SNP rs10019009 was associated with AS in both the discovery cohort (P = 0.0012) and validation cohort (P = 0.0349), as well as overall (P = 0.0004) in genetic case-control association analysis. After a multivariate logistic regression analysis, the effect of this genetic variant was observed to be independent of linkage disequilibrium. Via bioinformatics analysis, it was found that the amino acid change of the rs10019009 led to changes of SNP function, secondary structure, tertiary conformation, and splice mode. Finally, functional analysis of rs10019009 in U 2 OS cells demonstrated that the risk T allele of the rs10019009 increased enzymatic activity of ALP, compared to that of the nonrisk allele (P = 0.0080).</p><p><b>CONCLUSIONS</b>These results suggested that the DMP1 gene seems to be involved in genetic predisposition to AS, which may contribute to the ectopic mineralization or ossification in AS. In addition, DMP1 gene may be a promising intervention target for AS in the future.</p>

Review and analysis on the meridian research of China over the past sixty years / 中国结合医学杂志

The meridian research situation and various meridian hypotheses of China in the past sixty years between 1950 and 2013 are summarized in the paper; possible existed problems in the process of current meridian research are analyzed. Based on previous research results, we proposed that the essence of meridian can not be explained by the reductive analysis method, meridian research should be carried out under the guidance of overall concept of Chinese medicine theory. In this paper, combined with coherence theory of biophoton, we put forward the quantum interference hypothesis of meridian, which provides a possible research idea for meridian study.

Effects of emodin on gene expression profile in small cell lung cancer NCI-H446 cells / 中华医学杂志(英文版)

<p><b>BACKGROUND</b>The treatment of patients with small cell lung cancer (SCLC) is based on chemotherapy. However, the treatment is limited by the development of drug resistance. Emodin has been shown to exhibit an anti-cancer effect. But the molecular mechanism remains unclear. This study was conducted to investigate the effect of emodin on the gene expression profile changes in SCLC NCI-H446 cells.</p><p><b>METHODS</b>NCI-H446 cells were treated with emodin and cell viability was determined by MTT assay. Cell apoptosis was determined by both flow cytometry and caspase-3 activity assay. The effect of emodin on the gene expression profile of NCI-H446 cells was analyzed using cDNA microarray. Semi-quantitative reverse transcriptase-polymerase chain reaction (RT-PCR) was used to validate the microarray results.</p><p><b>RESULTS</b>Emodin suppressed viability, induced apoptosis and changed cell cycle of NCI-H446 cells. Among the 1262 genes, 10 genes were up-regulated and 8 genes were down-regulated more than 2 folds in NCI-H446 cells when compared with the control cells after treatment with emodin for 12 hours, while 12 genes were up-regulated and 24 genes were down-regulated after treatment with emodin for 24 hours. These genes were involved in metabolism, signal transduction, transcription regulation, cytoskeleton organization, immune response, transport, protein synthesis, cell cycle control, cell adhesion and RNA processing. The RT-PCR results were consistent with those obtained by the microarray.</p><p><b>CONCLUSIONS</b>Emodin affects the expression of genes involved in various cellular functions and plays important roles in cell apoptosis, tumor metastasis and chemotherapy-resistance, which suggests emodin might become an effective chemopreventive or chemotherapeutic agent for SCLC.</p>

Recent Progress in Research on Muscle-derived Stem Cells / 中国生物工程杂志

Muscle recently has been identified as a good source of adult stem cells that can differentiate into cells of different lineages.Researchers have identified two types of stem cells in skeletal muscle.Further research is necessary to delineate the relationship between different populations of musclederived stem cells(MDSCs)and between MDSCs and other adult stem cells.The methods used to isolate these cells appear to influence the stem cell characteristics.As these efforts continue,the potential for MDSCsbased therapy for other musculoskeletal injuries,as well as for cardiac and smooth muscle injuries,is currently being explored.The behavior,biocharacteristic,isolation,differentiation and the probability of application to regenerate lost or diseased tissue of MDSCs were summarized.

Optimization of a Liquid Chip System for the Detection of Serum Biomarkers of Colorectal Cancer and Its Application / 中国生物工程杂志

Liquid chip technology have been licensed to be used in clinic because of its advantage of high-throughput, high-sensitivity, good signal to noise ratio, reaction in liquid phase, convenient operation and short time consuming, etc. The optimization of a liquid chip system for the detection of serum biomarkers of colorectal tumour and initial application in the detection of CEA were studied. The optimized reaction conditions of liquid chip were determined through orthogonal design after it was prepared. The results showed that the consuming reaction time of the coated antibody and the antigen was 1hour. The microspheres, biotinylated detecion antibody and the consuming complexes and avidin-PE time of the microspheres and the biotinylated tested antibody was 1hour, 1hour and 15minutes respectively.the consuming time of the complexes and avidin-PE was fifteen minutes, The optimized dilution of the biotinylated tested detection antibody was 1∶300 and the optimized concentration of avidin-PE was 12?g/ml. Totally 55 clinical samples were detected by the liquid chip and by Enzyme-Linked Immunosorbent Assay (ELISA) simultaneously and the results of the two methods were compared. The results of the two methods showed good correlation between positive and negative samples but the detection limits and the dynamic ranges of the liquid chip method were more sensitive and wider than those of the ELISA. The multiple tumour biomarkers may be detected simultaneously and the time of clinical test and manpower requirements were reduced by the liquid chip method.

Advances in Herpesviruses-encoded MicroRNAs / 中国生物工程杂志

MicroRNAs (miRNAs) are small (approximately 22 nt) RNAs that exhibit a diversity in sequence,structure,abudance,and expression profile. Bioinformatic approaches and direct cloning methods have identified 3518 miRNAs from various species. MiRNAs play a pivotal role in the regulation of genes involved in diverse processes such as development,differentiation,and cellular growth control. Recently,many viral-encoded miRNAs have been discovered, most from the herpesviruses viral family. Virus-encoded miRNAs seem to evolve rapidly and regulate both the viral life cycle and the interaction between viruses and their hosts. The detailed study on the virus-encoded microRNAs and the role they play in the progress of viral infection,replication and expression will be beneficial to understand viral molecular biology,and also provide new strategies for the prevention and treatment of virus.

Expression of Recombinant Nematode Anticoagulant Peptide in Pichia Pastoris / 中国生物工程杂志

Objective: To acquire recombinant nematode anticoagulant peptide ( NAP) with high anticoagulant activity. Methods: Pichia pastoris GS115 strain was transformed with recombinant yeast expression vector pPICS. 5K-rNAP. Expression of rNAP was induced with methanol after the identification of positive strains. NAP expressed in the collected yeast culture supernatant was confirmed with SDS-PAGE and Western blot. The biological activity of the products was validated with PT (prothrombin time) , INR (international normalized ratio) and APTT (activated partial thromboplastin time) , respectively. Results: The yeast strains expressing NAP were identified. The rNAP was secreted into culture supernatant with a molecular weight of about 10 kDa due to glycosylation, which is a little bigger than that predicted (8.7kDa). The anticoagulant efficiency of rNAP was confirmed with the in vitro assays. Conclusion: The recombinant nematode anticoagulant peptide with high biological activity was successfully expressed in Pichia pastoris and can be used in the future development of novel anticoagulant agent.

Expression of recombinant human cytomegalovirus fusion proteins pp150/MDBP fragments and its application / 生物工程学报

Human cytomegalovirus (HCMV) infection is an ubiquitous herpesvirus disease in human populations. It is rarely pathogenic to healthy adults, yet it may cause severe outcome to organ transplant recipients, the immunocompromised individuals and pregnant women. Using DNA from HCMV AD169 strain as template, the UL32 gene encoding pp150 protein fragment and the UL57 gene encoding MDBP protein fragment were amplified by PCR technique. After the construction of cloning vector pMD18-T-UL32, pMD18-T-UL57, pMD18-T-UL32/UL57 and expression vector pET-11a-UL32/UL57, the recombinant fusion proteins pp150/MDBP were induced with IPTG in BL21 host strain. The results showed that the relative molecular weight of recombinant fusion proteins pp150/MDBP is about 27 kD, the product of fusion proteins takes 17.45% in the total proteins in host bacteria, the analytical result was positive to the fusion proteins pp150/MDBP via Western blot technique, while the purified recombinant fusion proteins have strong antigenicity detected by ELISA and protein chip compared with whole virus antigens from HCMV. It was demonstrated that when used for the detection of serum from the clinical patients it has the same detection rate compared with the whole virus antigen. It needs further research for application.

Multiplex PCR normalization and parallel detection of HBV and HCV / 中华实验和临床病毒学杂志

<p><b>BACKGROUND</b>To design and establish a method of multiplex PCR normalization and parallel detection of HBV and HCV.</p><p><b>METHODS</b>Using two pairs of primers, one inner and the other outer, each having a 20 bp common sequence, the authors amplified target DNA for two rounds. All products would have this common sequence. Using this common sequence as primer the authors performed further amplification. Finally, multiplex PCR was normalized to a single PCR style and eliminated multiple factors disturbance. Four kinds of nucleic acid extraction method were compared. Multiplex PCR normalization was established and optimized by using orthogonal design by analysing 6 kinds of key factors. The method was evaluated by detecting 28 samples of HBV and HCV.</p><p><b>RESULTS</b>The sensitivity, specificity, diagnostic idex and efficiency for HBsAg, HCV antibody positive patients were 83.3%, 70.0%, 153.3%, 72.2% respectively. The sensitivity, specificity, idex and efficiency for HBsAg positive patients were 78.6%, 80.0%, 158.6%, and 79.2%, respectively. The sensitivity, specificity, idex and efficiency for HCV antibody positive patients were 75.0%, 90.0%, 165.0% and 83.3% respectively.</p><p><b>CONCLUSIONS</b>The multiplex PCR normalization method may have potential applicability in parallel amplification of multiple genes of pathogens.</p>

Experimental study on HDV ribozyme in vitro cleaving the HBV derived RNA fragment / 中华实验和临床病毒学杂志

<p><b>OBJECTIVE</b>To explore the possibility of transacting hepatitis D virus (HDV) ribozyme cleaving in vitro the hepatitis B virus (HBV) mRNA fragments.</p><p><b>METHODS</b>According to the established pseudoknot-like structure, its' H1 domain was changed to design the transacting HDV ribozyme Rc1 and Rc2, which targeted the 701-713 site and 776-788 site of HBV C domain. After the chemically synthesised cDNA of the ribozyme was cloned into the vector PGEM-4Z, the transacting HDV ribozyme was transcriped using in vitro transcription technology. The in vitro cleavage characteristics of the ribozyme were studied and the kinetic parameters (Kcat and Km) were determined by Eadie Hofstee plotting.</p><p><b>RESULTS</b>Both the two ribozymes had the ability to cleave the substrate, the cleavage percentage at 37 degrees for 90 minutes were 50% and 51%. According to the Eadie Hofstee plot, the Km of the Rc1 and Rc2 were 0.61 micromol and 0.58 micromol, the Kcat were 0.64 x min(-1) and 0.60 x min(-1),respectively.</p><p><b>CONCLUSIONS</b>The cleaving ability of trans-acting HDV ribozyme on non-HDV RNA fragment was tested. The results showed a new potential of the antisense antisense regent for HBV gene therapy.</p>