Late pregnancy screening for preeclampsia with a urinary point-of-care test for misfolded proteins.

The aim was to describe and assess a new late pregnancy point-of-care urinary preeclampsia screening test. Urine samples were collected from a consecutive series of 1,532 pregnant women hospitalized at 20-41 weeks gestation in a Chinese single obstetric unit. A simple disposable Congo red based device was newly developed and employed to prospectively test misfolded proteins in pregnant women's urine. A total of 140 preeclampsia cases were clinically diagnosed, 101 severe and 87 pre-term. Detection and false positive rates were similar in the training and validation subsets with combined 74% and 3.0%. The detection rate was 83% in severe, 86% in pre-term, 49% and 50% in mild and term cases (P<0.0001) respectively. In conclusion, a simple point-of-care urinary test for misfolded proteins can be used to screen for preeclampsia in late pregnancy with very high screening performance. To the best of our knowledge, this is the first study to screen for preeclampsia using Congo red based device in Chinese pregnant population.

Towards muscle-specific meat color stability of Chinese Luxi yellow cattle: A proteomic insight into post-mortem storage.

Searching for potential predictors of meat color is a challenging task for the meat industry. In this study, the relationship between meat color parameters and the sarcoplasmic proteome of M. longissimuss lumborum (LL) and M. psoas major (PM) from Chinese Luxi yellow cattle during post-mortem storage (0, 5, 10 and 15days) were explored with the aid of the integrated proteomics and bioinformatics approaches. Meat color attributes revealed that LL displayed better color stability than PM during storage. Furthermore, sarcoplasmic proteins of these two muscles were compared between days 5, 10, 15 and day 0. Several proteins were closely correlated with meat color attributes and they were muscle-specific and responsible for the meat color stability at different storage periods. Glycerol-3-phosphate dehydrogenase, fructose-bisphosphate aldolase A isoform, glycogen phosphorylase, peroxiredoxin-2, phosphoglucomutase-1, superoxide dismutase [Cu-Zn], heat shock cognate protein (71kDa) might serve as the candidate predictors of meat color stability during post-mortem storage. In addition, bioinformatics analyses indicated that more proteins were involved in glycolytic metabolism of LL, which contributed to better meat color stability of LL than PM. The present results could provide a proteomic insight into muscle-specific meat color stability of Chinese Luxi yellow cattle during post-mortem storage.

Effects of combined therapy with glipizide and Aralia root bark extract on glycemic control and lipid profiles in patients with type 2 diabetes mellitus.

BACKGROUND: The root bark of Aralia is a rich source of bioactive components that may improve glycemic control and lipid status. In this study, 148 patients with type 2 diabetes mellitus (T2DM) were assigned randomly to receive either glipizide alone or glipizide plus Aralia root bark extract (ARBE) for 8 weeks to test the effects of ARBE plus glipizide therapy on glycemic control and lipid profiles in these patients. RESULTS: Levels of HbA1c, fasting plasma glucose (FPG) and 2 h postprandial plasma glucose (2-h PPG) in both groups significantly decreased from baseline. Glycated hemoglobin (HbA1c) decreased marginally significantly in participants taking glipizide plus ARBE compared with the glipizide group (P = 0.06). Participants in the combination group had significant decreases in total cholesterol (TC) and low-density lipoprotein cholesterol (LDL-C), and the between-group difference achieved statistical significance for LDL-C (P = 0.04). Reduction in HbA1c in the combination group was significantly associated with changes in TC (r = 0.32; P = 0.006) and LDL-C (r = 0.34; P = 0.005), and the change in FPG was inversely correlated with LDL-C reduction (r = 0.34; P = 0.004). CONCLUSIONS: In patients with T2DM, combination therapy with glipizide and ARBE resulted in moderately lowering HbA1c and LDL-C levels compared with glipizide alone.

T-18, a stemonamide synthetic intermediate inhibits Pim kinase activity and induces cell apoptosis, acting as a potent anticancer drug.

Pim-3 kinase has been shown to be aberrantly expressed in premalignant and malignant lesions of endoderm-derived organs such as the liver, pancreas, colon and stomach. Pim-3 kinase inactivates the Bad protein, a proapoptotic molecule, and improves the expression of Bcl-xL, an antiapoptotic molecule, to promote cell proliferation. Thus, blocking Pim-3 kinase activity may be a new strategy for the treatment of pancreatic cancer. In this study, we screened low molecular compounds and observed that the stemonamide synthetic intermediate, T-18, potently inhibited Pim kinase activity. Moreover, T-18 inhibited the proliferation of human pancreatic, as well as that of hepatocellular and colon cancer cells in vitro. It also induced the apoptosis of human pancreatic carcinoma cells in vitro by decreasing the levels of phospho-Ser112-Bad; the levels of Pim-3 kinase and total Bad protein were not altered. Furthermore, T-18 inhibited the growth of human pancreatic cancer cells in nude mice without apparent adverse effects when the tumor was palpable. These observations indicate that stemonamide synthetic intermediates may be novel drugs for the treatment of gastrointestinal cancers, particularly pancreatic cancer.

Colour and sarcoplasmic protein evaluation of pork following water bath and ohmic cooking.

The objective of this study was to investigate the effects of ohmic (OH) and waterbath (WB) cooking on colour attributes and sarcoplasmic changes of porcine longissimus dorsi muscle at the same endpoint temperatures (EPTs; range 10°C-80°C). The OH treatment was carried out at 10 Vcm(-1), and the WB temperature at 85°C. The colour parameters, deoxymyoglobin% (DeoMb) and metmyoglobin% (MetMb) of the OH-cooked meat were significantly lower (P<0.05) than those obtained by WB-cooking at the same EPTs (range 60°C-80°C). SDS-PAGE analysis showed that the meat treated with WB-cooking had a lower sarcoplasmic protein solubility (5.97 mg/g vs.14.89 mg/g, P<0.05) and fainter protein bands than that of OH-cooking thus, indicating paler colour, and lower water-holding capacity especially in WB-cooked meat at EPTs above 40°C. Strong correlations among lightness, browness, metmyoglobin% and soluble proteins were observed in meat following OH-cooking.