FCP、ACR、CRP与糖尿病视网膜病变严重程度关系的研究

目的:探讨空腹C肽(FCP)、尿微量白蛋白肌酐比值(ACR)和血清C反应蛋白(CRP)与糖尿病视网膜病变(DR)严重程度的关系。方法:回顾性分析就诊的157例2型糖尿病患者(T2DM)的临床资料,根据眼底检查结果分为非视网膜病变组(NDR)、非增殖期糖尿病视网膜病变组(NPDR)和增殖期糖尿病视网膜病变组(PDR)。比较三组患者FCP、ACR及CRP水平的关系。结果:NDR组与NPDR组的ACR和CRP之间差异有统计学意义(P<0.05);NDR组与PDR组的SBP、DBP、FCP、2hc-p、ACR、Cysc之间差异有统计学意义(P<0.05);NPDR组和PDR组的FCP、2hc-p、ACR、Cysc、Ccr之间差异有统计学意义(P<0.05);Logistic回归分析显示FCP是DR的保护因素,ACR、CRP是DR的危险因素。结论:联合FCP、ACR和CRP检测,对分析DR的病变程度和防治DR的发展有一定的参考意义。

C-peptide and Diabetic Encephalopathy

With the changes of life style, diabetes and its complications have become a major cause of morbidity and mortality. It is reasonable to anticipate a continued rise in the incidence of diabetes and its complications along with the aging of the population, increase in adult obesity rate, and other risk factors. Diabetic en- cephalopathy is one of the severe microvascular complications of diabetes, characterized by impaired cogni- tive functions, and electrophysiological, neurochemical, and structural abnormalities. It may involve direct neuronal damage caused by intracellular glucose. However, the pathogenesis of this disease is complex and its diagnosis is not very clear. Previous researches have suggested that chronic metabolic alterations, vascular changes, and neuronal apoptosis may play important roles in neuronai loss and damaged cognitive functions. Multiple factors are responsible for neuronal apoptosis, such as disturbed insulin growth factor （IGF） system, hyperglycemia, and the aging process. Recent data suggest that insulin/C-peptide deficiency may exert a primary and key effect in diabetic encephalopathy. Administration of C-peptide partially improves the condition of the IGF system in the brain and prevents neuronal apoptosis in the hippocampus of diabetic patients. Those findings provide a basis for application of C-peptide as a potentially effective therapy for diabetes and diabetic encephalopathy.

Antibodies against the C-terminal peptide of rabbit oviductin inhibit mouse early embryo development to pass 2-cell stage

A full-length rabbit oviductin cDNA(1909bp) was cloned. It consists of a 5’-UTR of 52bp, an open reading frame (ORF) of 1374bp and a 3’-UTR of 483bp and has more than 80% homology with that of other mammal oviductins. N-terminal peptide (NTP) (384 residues) and C-terminal peptide (CTP) (73 residues) of deduced protein precursor has about 80% and 50% identity with that of other mammals respectively. Fusion proteins GST-NTP 368(1R-368N)and GST-CTP73 (369F-441A) were expressed and purified. NH2-terminal of CTP sequencing reveals that the purified protein is consistent with the deduced one. In order to study the function of NTP and CTP the mouse anti-NTP and rabbit anti-CTP antisera were prepared. Tissue-specific (skeleton muscle, oviduct, uterus, ovary, liver, heart and brain) analysis indicated that rabbit oviductin was only found in oviduct. The conditioned medium derived from the rabbit oviduct mucosa epithelial cells has a function of overcoming the early embryonic development block of Kunming mous e cultured in vitro. Anti-CTP antiserum could totally inhibit the early embryo development at 2-cell stage cultured in the conditioned culture medium, but anti-NTP antiserum couldn’t. There was a positive relationship between the ratio of early embryos at development block and the dosage of anti-CTP antiserum added in the conditioned culture medium. These results suggest that oviductin has a function not only on fertilization, but also on the release of early embryonic development block, and the later function domain of rabbit oviductin may be situate in its C-terminal.

E-cadherin gene C-160A promoter polymorphism and risk of non-cardia gastric cancer in a Chinese population

AIM: To test the hypothesis that E-cadherin gene (CDH1)C-160A promoter variant genotype is associated with an increased risk for developing gastric cancer.METHODS: In this population-based case-control study of gastric cancer in Jiangsu Province, China, we performed polymerase chain reaction-restriction fragment length polymorphism (PCR-RFLP) to genotype the C-160A polymorphism of CDH1 promoter in 206 non-cardia gastriccancer patients and 261 age- and sex-matched but unrelated cancer-free controls.RESULTS: The frequencies of genotypes CC, CA and AA were 57.8%, 36.4% and 5.8% in gasfric cancer cases,respectively, and 58.2%, 34.9% and 6.9% in controls respectively. The distributions of CDH1 genotypes were not significantly different between gastric cancer cases and controls (P = 0.87 for genotype frequency and P = 0.92for allele frequency). Compared with the CC genotype, the CA and AA genotypes were not associated with an increased risk for non-cardia gastric cancer (adjusted odds ratios (OR)= 1.15, and 95% confidence interval (95% CI) = 0.78-1.72for CA genotype, and OR = 0.90 and 95% CI = 0.42-2.01for AA genotype).CONCLUSION: E-cadherin gene C-160A promoter polymorphism may not play a major role in the etiology of non-cardia gastric cancer in Chinese population.

C-type natriuretic-peptide-potentiated relaxation response of gastric smooth muscle in streptozotocin-induced diabetic rats

AIM: To study the sensitivity of gastric smooth muscle to C-type natriuretic peptide (CNP) in streptozotocin (STZ)-induced diabetic rats. METHODS: The spontaneous contraction of a gastric smooth muscle strip was recorded by using physiological methods in rats. The expressions of CNP and natriuretic peptide receptor-B (NPR-B) in gastric tissue were examined by using immunohistochemistry techniques in the diabetic rat. RESULTS: At 4 wk after injection of STZ and vehicle, the frequency of spontaneous contraction of gastric smooth muscle was significantly reduced in diabetic rats, and the frequency was decreased from 3.10 ± 0.14 cycle/min in controls to 2.23 ± 0.13 cycle/min (n = 8, P < 0.01). However, the amplitude of spontaneous contraction was not significant different from the normal rat. CNP significantly inhibited spontaneous contraction of gastric smooth muscle in normal and diabetic rats, but the inhibitory effect was significantly potentiated in the diabetic rats. The amplitudes of spontaneous contraction were suppressed by 75.15% ± 0.71% and 58.92% ± 1.32% while the frequencies were decreased by 53.33% ± 2.03% and 26.95% ± 2.82% in diabetic and normal rats, respectively (n = 8, P < 0.01). The expression of CNP in gastric tissue was not changed in diabetic rats, however the expression of NPR-B was significantly increased in diabetic rats, and the staining indexes of NPR-B were 30.67 ± 1.59 and 17.63 ± 1.49 in diabetic and normal rat, respectively (n = 8, P < 0.01).CONCLUSION: The results suggest that CNP induced an inhibitory effect on spontaneous contraction of gastric smooth muscle, potentiated in diabetic rat via up-regulation of the natriuretic peptides-NPR-B-particulate guanylyl cyclase-cyclic GMP signal pathway.

Effect of matrine on HepG2 cells: role of glutathione and cytochrome c

Objective: To investigate the death mode of human hepatoma cells exposed to matrine and the role of glutathione (GSH) and cytochrome c. Methods: The MTT test and Cell Death Detection ELISA were used to identify cell death mode and viability of cells exposed to matrine. The volume of intracellular GSH was detected by GSH reductase. Finally Western blotting was chosen to analyze the expression of cytochrome c and Caspase-9 in HepG2 cells treated by matrine. Results: The apop-totic cell death induced by matrine in Hep G2 cells dramatically increased in the time-, dose-dependent manner. Matrine can exhaust intracellular GSH effectively to change the redox state in cells. Furthermore it affect the cytotoxicity of matrine. Re-sults of Western blotting showed that matrine induced the release of cytochrome c from mitochondria to cytoplasm, and then stimulate the cleavage of Caspase-9 in a time-dependent manner. Conclusion: Matrine induced apoptosis in Hep G2 cells through the mitochondrial pathway, and oxidative stress via depletion of GSH is directly involved in the apoptotic process.

SELECTION OF NEW EPITOPES FROM MONOVALENT DISPLAYED PHAGE OCTAPEPTIDE LIBRARY

A library of 2 ×107 random octapeptides was constructed by use of phagemid-based monovalent phage display system. The randomly synthesized degenerated oligodeoxyribonucleotides (oligos ) were fused to the truncated g Ⅲ (p230-p403). Sequence analysis of 11 randomly chosen clones suggested that the degenerated inserts and its deduced amino acid (aa) sequences are randomly distributed. The library was used to select binding peptides to the monoclonal antibody (mAb) 9E10, which recognizes a continuous decapeptide epi- tope of denatured human c-myc protein. After four to five rounds of panning, most of the eluted clones could bind to 9E10. Sequence analysis of the selected positive clones indicated that the binding sequences could fall into two classes, one class (clone 1) shares a consensus motif, ISE x x L, with c-myc decapeptide; and the sequences of the other class are entirely different. The binding of both classes to 9E10 could be specifically inhibited by free c-myc decapeptide. The immunogenicity of the phage peptide was further investigated by construction of multivalent displayed phage peptides and immunization of animals with or without adjuvant. ELISA and competitive ELISA showed that anti-serum from both mice and rabbit immunized with either clone could bind to the original antigen, c-myc decapeptide. These results denote that in spite of the dissimilarity of the selected peptides with c-myc decapeptide, they are capable of inducing similar immune respones in vivo, thus actually mimicking the antigen epitope.

Folding of EK peptide and its dependence on salt concentration and pH: A computational study

In this study, we apply both palrwise AMBER03 force field and the recently developed polarized force field to study the folding process of EK peptide under various ion strength and pH conditions. The polarized force field is based on our newly proposed adaptive hydrogen bond-specific charge （AHBC） scheme. These two force fields differ only by the atomic charges. Solvent effect is described with generalized Born models （IGB5 in AMBER 10 package）. The result shows that although when applying AMBER03 charge, the helical structure is preferred, its dependence on salt concentration and pH is qualitatively wrong. While using AHBC the peptide finds its native structure within 10 ns, and then fluctuates around this folded state. Under high salt concentration or extreme pH conditions the calculated helical structure probability drops, which is in qualitative agreement with the experiment. Analysis of the atomic charges and the interaction between the donor-acceptor pair in main hydrogen bonds shows that the helical structure is stabilized when polarization effect is counted. It again shows that polarization effect is a very important improvement over traditional force field and is essential for protein folding. We also prove that the salt bridge interaction between 4-residue apart GLU and LYS residues is not critical to the stability of helical structure of EK peptide, but is merely an auxiliary factor, also in agreement with the experiment.

Effects of SKF-96365, a TRPC inhibitor, on melittin-induced inward current and intracellular Ca^2+ rise in primary sensory cells

Objective Melittin （MEL） is a major component of bee venom and can produce both persistent spontaneous nociception and pain hypersensitivity when injected subcutaneously in the periphery. The present study aimed to examine the roles of transient receptor potential canonical （TRPC） channels in mediation of MEL-indueed activation of primary nociceptive cells. Methods Whole-cell patch-clamp and laser scanning confocal calcium detection were used to evalu- ate the effects of SKF-96365, a TRPC inhibitor, applied on the acutely isolated dorsal root ganglion （DRG） cells of rat, on MEL-induced increase in intracellular calcium concentration （[Ca2＋]i） and inward current. Results Under voltage- clamp mode, 43.9% （40/91） DRG cells were evoked to give rise to the inward current by 2 pmol/L MEL, which could be significantly suppressed by 3 doses of SKF-96365 （1, 5 and 10μmol/L） in a dose-dependent manner. Of the other 210 cells, 67.6% responded to MEL with an intracellular Ca2＋ rise, as revealed by confocal calcium imaging. Of these MEL- sensitive cells, 46.5% （66/142） were suppressed by the highest dose of SKF-96365. Conclusion MEL-induced activation of small to medium-sized DRG cells can be suppressed by SKF-96365, suggesting the involvement of TRPC channels in the mediation of MEL-induced activation of primary nociceptive cells.