Effects of Dermatopontin gene silencing on apoptosis and proliferation of osteosarcoma MG­63 cells.

The present study aimed to investigate the effect of Dermatopontin (DPT) gene silencing on the apoptosis and proliferation of osteosarcoma MG­63 cells. Three eukaryotic expression vectors of short hairpin (sh)RNA fragments targeting different loci of DPT were designed and transfected into an osteosarcoma cell line MG­63. The cells were assigned to a blank, shRNA­control, DPT­shRNA­a, DPT­shRNA­b or DPT­shRNA­c group. The shRNA with the highest silencing efficiency was screened using reverse transcription­quantitative polymerase chain reaction and western blotting. The screened shRNA was transfected into MG­63 cells. The proliferation, cell cycle and apoptosis of MG­63 cells were measured using a Cell Counting Kit­8 assay, flow cytometry and Annexin V­fluorescein isothiocyanate assay. The recombinant plasmids containing DPT shRNA were successfully constructed. DPT gene silencing was able to significantly reduce the proliferation rate of MG­63 cells (P<0.05). The proportion of cells in the G0/G1 phase and in the G2/M phase increased significantly (both P<0.05), while the proportion of cells in the S phase decreased (P<0.05). Furthermore, the cell apoptosis rate increased significantly (P<0.05). These results demonstrate that DPT gene silencing is able to reduce the proliferation of MG­63 cells, slow down cell cycle progression and promote apoptosis, hence may become a novel target for the treatment of osteosarcoma.

[Exploration of the Essence of "Endogenous Turbidity" in Chinese Medicine].

The essence of endogenous turbidity in Chinese medicine (CM) is different from cream, fat, phlegm, retention, damp, toxicity, and stasis. Along with the development of modern scientific technologies and biology, researches on the essence of endogenous turbidity should keep pace with the time. Its material bases should be defined and new connotation endowed at the microscopic level. The essence of turbidity lies in abnormal functions of zang-fu organs. Sugar, fat, protein, and other nutrient substances cannot be properly decomposed, but into semi-finished products or intermediate metabolites. They are inactive and cannot participate in normal material syntheses and decomposition. They cannot be transformed to energy metabolism, but also cannot be synthesized as executive functioning of active proteins. If they cannot be degraded by autophagy-lysosome or ubiquitin-prosome into glucose, fatty acids, amino acids, and other basic nutrients to be used again, they will accumulate inside the human body and become endogenous turbidity. Therefore, endogenous turbidity is different from final metabolites such as urea, carbon dioxide, etc., which can transform vital qi. How to improve the function of zang-fu organs, enhance its degradation by autophagy-lysosome or ubiquitin-prosome is of great significance in normal operating of zang-fu organs and preventing the emergence and progress of related diseases.