Glycyrrhizin alleviates neuroinflammation and memory deficit induced by systemic lipopolysaccharide treatment in mice.

The present study investigated the effects of glycyrrhizin (GRZ) on neuroinflammation and memory deficit in systemic lipopolysaccharide (LPS)-treated C57BL/6 mice. Varying doses of GRZ was orally administered (10, 30, or 50 mg/kg) once a day for 3 days before the LPS (3 mg/kg) injection. At 24 h after the LPS injection, GRZ significantly reduced TNF-α and IL-1ß mRNA at doses of 30 and 50 mg/kg. COX-2 and iNOS protein expressions were significantly reduced by GRZ at doses of 30 and 50 mg/kg. In the Morris water maze test, GRZ (30 mg/kg) significantly prolonged the swimming time spent in the target and peri-target zones. GRZ also significantly increased the target heading and memory score numbers. In the hippocampal tissue, GRZ significantly reduced the up-regulated Iba1 protein expression and the average cell size of Iba1-expressing microglia induced by LPS. The results indicate that GRZ ameliorated the memory deficit induced by systemic LPS treatment and the effect of GRZ was found to be mediated through the inhibition of pro-inflammatory mediators and microglial activation in the brain tissue. This study supports that GRZ may be a putative therapeutic drug on neurodegenerative diseases associated with cognitive deficits and neuroinflammation such as Alzheimer's disease.

The lack of histological changes of CDMA cellular phone-based radio frequency on rat testis.

We examined the histological changes by radiofrequency (RF) fields on rat testis, specifically with respect to sensitive processes such as spermatogenesis. Male rats were exposed to 848.5 MHz RF for 12 weeks. The RF exposure schedule consisted of two 45-min RF exposure periods, separated by a 15-min interval. The whole-body average specific absorption rate (SAR) of RF was 2.0 W/kg. We then investigated correlates of testicular function such as sperm counts in the cauda epididymis, malondialdehyde concentrations in the testes and epididymis, frequency of spermatogenesis stages, germ cell counts, and appearance of apoptotic cells in the testes. We also performed p53, bcl-2, caspase 3, p21, and PARP immunoblotting of the testes in sham- and RF-exposed animals. Based on these results, we concluded that subchronic exposure to 848.5 MHz with 2.0 W/kg SAR RF did not have any observable adverse effects on rat spermatogenesis.

Non-organ-specific preventive effect of long-term administration of Korean red ginseng extract on incidence of human cancers.

Previously, two case-control studies and a cohort study strongly suggested that Panax ginseng C.A. Meyer exerted non-organ-specific preventive effects against cancer. The purpose of the present study was to evaluate the effects of red ginseng extract on the incidence of human primary cancer. We conducted a randomized, double-blinded, placebo-controlled trial on 643 chronic atrophic gastritis patients in four hospitals in Zhejiang Province, China. Red ginseng extract powder (1 g) was administered orally to each patient per week for 3 years and followed up for 8 years. The development of various cancers in the red ginseng subjects was compared to that of a placebo group. The red ginseng extract powder was specified in terms of its components. Twenty-four cancers of various organs were diagnosed from these subjects during the 11 years: eight lung cancers, six stomach cancers, two liver cancers, two colorectal cancers, and one cancer each of the nasopharynx, esophagus, pancreas, urinary bladder, prostate, and gallbladder. The red ginseng group, which included both genders, demonstrated a relative cancer risk of 0.54 (95% confidence interval, 0.23-1.28; P = .13) compared to the placebo group, which was not statistically significant. Among the 24 cancer patients, 21 were male. The male red ginseng group showed a relative cancer risk of 0.35 (95% confidence interval, 0.13-0.96; P = .03) compared to the male placebo group, which was highly significant statistically. In the present clinical trial on chronic atrophic gastritis patients, administration of red ginseng extract powder for 3 years exerted significant preventive effects on the incidence of non-organ-specific human cancers in males.

Lack of promotion of mammary, lung and skin tumorigenesis by 20 kHz triangular magnetic fields.

In order to evaluate possible tumorigenic effects of a 20 kHz intermediate frequency triangular magnetic field (IF), a frequency emitted from TV and PC monitors at 6.25 microT rms, which is the regulated exposure limit of magnetic field for the public in Korea, mammary tumors were produced in female Sprague-Dawley rats by oral intubation of dimethylbenz(a)anthracene (DMBA), lung tumors in ICR mice by scapular region injection of benzo(a)pyrene (BP), and skin tumors in female ICR mice by topical application of DMBA and tetradecanoylphorbol ester (TPA). IF was applied 8 h/day for 14 weeks beginning the day after DMBA treatment for mammary tumor experiment, for 6 weeks after weaning for lung tumor, and for 20 weeks beginning 1 week after DMBA application for skin tumor experiment. For skin tumors, TPA was applied once a week for 19 weeks. Results showed no significant differences in tumor incidence, mean tumor number and volume, and histological patterns between IF magnetic-field exposed and sham control rats in the above three tumor models. Therefore, we conclude that within the limitation or number of animals and the experimental conditions, 20 kHz IF triangular magnetic field exposure of 6.25 microT does not appear to be a strong co-tumorigenic agent in the chosen murine mammary, lung and skin models.

Toxicity bioassay in Sprague-Dawley rats exposed to 20 kHz triangular magnetic field for 90 days.

Sprague-Dawley rats (10 each of male and female per group for sham and magnetic field exposed) were exposed in a carrousel irradiator to 20 kHz intermediate frequency (IF) magnetic field at 6.25 microT rms for 8 h/day, 5 days/week for 90 days. Urine analysis (pH, serum glucose, protein, ketone bodies, RBC, WBC, bilirubin, urobilinogen, and specific gravity), blood analysis [WBC, RBC, hemoglobin, hematocrit, mean corpuscular volume (MCV), mean corpuscular hemoglobin (MCH), mean corpuscular hemoglobin concentration (MCHC), thrombocyte count, and leucocyte count], blood biochemistry (total protein, blood urea nitrogen, creatinine, glucose, total bilirubin, total cholesterol, aspartate aminotransferase, alanine aminotransferase, alkaline phosphatase, and lactate dehydrogenase), and histopathological analysis for organs such as liver, kidney, testis, ovary, spleen, brain, heart, and lung were performed on day 90. Results showed no significant differences in the above analyses between IF magnetic field exposed and sham control rats. Therefore, we conclude that there were no significant toxicities in rats exposed to 20 kHz IF triangular magnetic field-exposure for 90 days.

A negentropy minimization approach to adaptive equalization for digital communication systems.

In this paper, we introduce and investigate a new adaptive equalization method based on minimizing approximate negentropy of the estimation error for a finite-length equalizer. We consider an approximate negentropy using nonpolynomial expansions of the estimation error as a new performance criterion to improve performance of a linear equalizer based on minimizing minimum mean squared error (MMSE). Negentropy includes higher order statistical information and its minimization provides improved converge, performance and accuracy compared to traditional methods such as MMSE in terms of bit error rate (BER). The proposed negentropy minimization (NEGMIN) equalizer has two kinds of solutions, the MMSE solution and the other one, depending on the ratio of the normalization parameters. The NEGMIN equalizer has best BER performance when the ratio of the normalization parameters is properly adjusted to maximize the output power(variance) of the NEGMIN equalizer. Simulation experiments show that BER performance of the NEGMIN equalizer with the other solution than the MMSE one has similar characteristics to the adaptive minimum bit error rate (AMBER) equalizer. The main advantage of the proposed equalizer is that it needs significantly fewer training symbols than the AMBER equalizer. Furthermore, the proposed equalizer is more robust to nonlinear distortions than the MMSE equalizer.