Effect of Taohong Siwu Decoction() early intervention on mesenchymal stem cells homing in fracture healing in rats / 中国骨伤

OBJECTIVE@#To observe the effects of Taohong Siwu Decoction(, THSWD) on the mesenchymal stem cells(MSCs) migration, homing number and cytokine expression in callus during the early process of fracture healing, and to explore the mechanism of THSWD on accelerationg fracture healing by regulating the homing of MSCs in rats.@*METHODS@#A rat model of right femoral shaft open fracture was established. Thirty-two 5-week-old male Sprague-Dawley rats, weighting 110 to 130 g, were divided into control group, low-dose group, medium-dose group and high-dose group by using random number table. Distilled water was given to the control group, and the other groups were given Taohong Siwu Decoction. The rats were gavaged twice a day for 5 consecutive days after surgery. Bone volume/tissue volume(BV/TV) and bone mineral density(BMD) were observed using micro-computed tomography (micro-CT) at 21 days after surgery. At 5 days post-fracture, peripheral blood MSCs from THSWD treated and untreated rats were cultured in vitro. Subsequently, the migration ability of MSCs was observed by cell migration assay. The number of MSCs homing to the callus at the early stage of fracture (5 d) was detected by Immunohistochemistry (IHC). Protein chip was used to detect the expression of cytokines in callus.@*RESULTS@#Micro-CT results showed that BV/TV was higher in the high-dose group than in the medium-dose group (P=0.032), and higher in the medium-dose group than in the low-dose group(P=0.041), with no difference between the control and low-dose group (P=0.651). In addition, there was no difference in BMD between low-dose group and the model group (P=0.671), and lower in the low-dose group than in the medium-dose group(P=0.018), and the medium-dose group was lower than the high-dose group(P=0.008). Cell migration assay showed that THSWD promotes enhanced the migration ability of peripheral blood MSCs. IHC assay revealed that CD45-, CD90+, CD29+ MSCs significantly increased in bone callus after THSWD intervention compared with the control group. Protein chip showed that THSWD promoted the upregulation of CINC-1(×2.91), CINC-3(×1.59), LIX(×1.5), Thymus Chemokine (×2.55), VEGF (×1.22) and the down-regulation of TIMP-1 (×2.98).@*CONCLUSION@#THSWD, a representative formula of "promoting blood circulation and removing blood stasis", can significantly accelerate fracture healing, and its mechanism may be related to enhancing the migration ability of peripheral blood MSCs and up-regulating CINC-1, CINC-3, LIX, Thymus Chemokine, VEGF and down-regulating TIMP-1 in bone callus, which promotes the peripheral blood MSCs homing in the early stage of fracture.

Study on MSCs homing and its research on osteodiseases / 中国骨伤

Mesenchymal stem cell (MSCs) has recently emerged as an appealing and potential therapeutic strategy to cure a diverse range of diseases in the orthopaedic field. Owing to its capacity of osteogenic differentiation, most of researches just focused on promoting MSC differentiation. With the in-depth study, MSCs homing is also a key issue for bone formation and bone diseases treatment, which have been described that MSCs mobilize from in situ environment (bone marrow) and migrate into injured tissues during the healing process through peripheral circulation. MSC homing is the incipient step of bone formation. MSCs need to firstly migrate to the bone surface and then differentiate into osteogenic cells to enhance bone repair. Promoting MSCs homing have been shown to improve recovery of several orthopedic diseases, such as osteoporosis, fracture, bone defect and wear-particle-related osteolysis. Therefore, further research on MSCs homing may provide a new thinking for treatment of osteoporosis.

Catharmus tinctorius volatile oil promote the migration of mesenchymal stem cells via ROCK2/Myosin light chain signaling / 中国天然药物

MSC transplantation has been explored as a new clinical approach to stem cell-based therapies for bone diseases in regenerative medicine due to their osteogenic capability. However, only a small population of implanted MSC could successfully reach the injured areas. Therefore, enhancing MSC migration could be a beneficial strategy to improve the therapeutic potential of cell transplantation. Catharmus tinctorius volatile oil (CTVO) was found to facilitate MSC migration. Further exploration of the underlying molecular mechanism participating in the pro-migratory ability may provide a novel strategy to improve MSC transplantation efficacy. This study indicated that CTVO promotes MSC migration through enhancing ROCK2 mRNA and protein expressions. MSC migration induced by CTVO was blunted by ROCK2 inhibitor, which also decreased myosin light chain (MLC) phosphorylation. Meanwhile, the siRNA for ROCK2 inhibited the effect of CTVO on MSC migration ability and attenuated MLC phosphorylation, suggesting that CTVO may promote BMSC migration via the ROCK2/MLC signaling. Taken together, this study indicates that C. tinctorius volatile oil could enhance MSC migration via ROCK2/MLC signaling in vitro. C. tinctorius volatile oil-targeted therapy could be a beneficial strategy to improve the therapeutic potential of cell transplantation for bone diseases in regenerative medicine.

Synthesis, characterization, and antibacterial activity of cross-linked chitosan-glutaraldehyde.

This present study deals with synthesis, characterization and antibacterial activity of cross-linked chitosan-glutaraldehyde. Results from this study indicated that cross-linked chitosan-glutaraldehyde markedly inhibited the growth of antibiotic-resistant Burkholderia cepacia complex regardless of bacterial species and incubation time while bacterial growth was unaffected by solid chitosan. Furthermore, high temperature treated cross-linked chitosan-glutaraldehyde showed strong antibacterial activity against the selected strain 0901 although the inhibitory effects varied with different temperatures. In addition, physical-chemical and structural characterization revealed that the cross-linking of chitosan with glutaraldehyde resulted in a rougher surface morphology, a characteristic Fourier transform infrared (FTIR) band at 1559 cm⁻¹, a specific X-ray diffraction peak centered at 2θ = 15°, a lower contents of carbon, hydrogen and nitrogen, and a higher stability of glucose units compared to chitosan based on scanning electron microscopic observation, FTIR spectra, X-ray diffraction pattern, as well as elemental and thermo gravimetric analysis. Overall, this study indicated that cross-linked chitosan-glutaraldehyde is promising to be developed as a new antibacterial drug.

Application of the molecular combing technique to starch granules.

The molecular combing technique was used to dissociate the nanostructural units of starch granules from the starch fragments after a gelatinization process. With the help of atomic force microscopy (AFM), we observed that some nanostructural chains were just flowing out of the granules. It proves that there are substantive nanostructural units in the starch granules, a phenomenon not previously observed, so these nanostructural units were defined as suspected intermediates. Furthermore, we conclude that blocklets of starch granules are formed through twisting or distortion of nanochains.

[Isolation and identification of endophytic fungi from Ligusticum].

OBJECTIVE: To investigate the correlation between entophytic fungal community, habitations and varieties of Ligusticum. METHOD: The solidified potato dextrose agar (PDA) of plates was applied for the isolation of the endophytic fungi, and the identification was completed by spot-planting method. RESULT: Fifty strains of the entophytic fungi were isolated from the rhizome of L. chuanxiong collected from 6 habitations. They were morphologically identified as belonging to 13 genera, 4 families, 3 orders and 1 class. CONCLUSION: There were some differences at quantity, species and distributing of the entophytic fungi in different habitats and varieties of Ligusticum, which was suggested that entophytic fungal community is related with specific habitat.