Regulatory effects of saponins from Panax japonicus on colonic epithelial tight junctions in aging rats

Dun, Yaoyan,Liu, Min,Chen, Jing,Peng, Danli,Zhao, Haixia,Zhou, Zhiyong,Wang, Ting,Liu, Chaoqi,Guo, Yuhui,Zhang, Changcheng,Yuan, Ding The Korean Society of Ginseng 2018 Journal of Ginseng Research Vol.42 No.1

Background: Saponins from Panax japonicus (SPJ) are the most abundant and main active components of P. japonicus, which replaces ginseng roots in treatment for many kinds of diseases in the minority ethnic group in China. Our previous studies have demonstrated that SPJ has the effects of anti-inflammation through the mitogen-activated protein kinase (MAPK) and nuclear factor kappa B (NF-${\kappa}B$) signaling pathways. The present study was designed to investigate whether SPJ can modulate intestinal tight junction barrier in aging rats and further to explore the potential mechanism. Methods: Aging rats had been treated with different doses (10 mg/kg, 30 mg/kg, and 60 mg/kg) of SPJ for 6 mo since they were 18 mo old. After the rats were euthanized, the colonic samples were harvested. Levels of tight junctions (claudin-1 and occludin) were determined by immunohistochemical staining. Levels of proinflammatory cytokines (interleukin-$1{\beta}$ and tumor necrosis factor-${\alpha}$) were examined by Western blot. NF-${\kappa}B$ and phosphorylation of MAPK signaling pathways were also determined by Western blot. Results: We found that SPJ increased the expression of the tight junction proteins claudin-1 and occludin in the colon of aging rats. Treatment with SPJ decreased the levels of interleukin-$1{\beta}$ and tumor necrosis factor-${\alpha}$, reduced the phosphorylation of three MAPK isoforms, and inhibited the expression of NF-${\kappa}B$ in the colon of aging rats. Conclusion: The studies demonstrated that SPJ modulates the damage of intestinal epithelial tight junction in aging rats, inhibits inflammation, and downregulates the phosphorylation of the MAPK and $NF-{\kappa}B$ signaling pathways.

Over-expression of FaGalLDH Increases Ascorbic Acid Concentrations and Enhances Salt Stress Tolerance in Arabidopsis thaliana

Dun Wanwan,Wei Xuan,Wang Lu,Liu Jingjing,Zhao Jing,Sun Peipei,Fang Congbing,Xie Xingbin 한국식물학회 2023 Journal of Plant Biology Vol.66 No.1

The strawberry (Fragaria×ananassa) is an economically important perennial crop plant, and its fruits are rich in vitamin C (l-ascorbic acid [AsA]) and other nutrients. l-galactono-1,4-lactone dehydrogenase (GalLDH) is a key enzyme in the terminal step of AsA biosynthesis pathway in plants. Here, the GalLDH gene (FaGalLDH) was cloned from ‘Benihoppe’ strawberries. AsA content increased during fruit development and peaked at the red-ripening stage, and AsA concentrations in diferent tissues were correlated with enzyme activity and transcription level of FaGalLDH. Transient over-expression of FaGalLDH in strawberry fruit increased its overall expression and AsA production signifcantly, whereas transient RNAi of FaGalLDH decreased its expression and AsA content. Furthermore, the optimum pH and temperature for FaGalLDH activity were 8.0 and 25 °C, respectively. Ectopic expression of the FaGalLDH gene in Arabidopsis resulted in higher AsA content and enzyme activity in transgenic lines than in wild-type plants. FaGalLDH over-expression resulted in enhanced tolerance to salt stress due to reduced accumulation of malondialdehyde, H2O2, and O2 .−, as well as higher survival rates, root length, proline content, and superoxide dismutase, peroxidase, and catalase activities. These results provide useful information regarding AsA biosynthesis and salt tolerance, which may help to improve strawberry fruit quality and productivity.

Liver Shear-Wave Velocity and Serum Fibrosis Markers to Diagnose Hepatic Fibrosis in Patients with Chronic Viral Hepatitis B

Jianxue Liu,Yonghao Ji,Hong Ai,Bo Ning,Junzhi Zhao,Yaoren Zhang,Guoliang Dun 대한영상의학회 2016 Korean Journal of Radiology Vol.17 No.3

Objective: To compare several noninvasive indices of fibrosis in chronic viral hepatitis B, including liver shear-wave velocity (SWV), hyaluronic acid (HA), collagen type IV (CIV), procollagen type III (PCIII), and laminin (LN). Materials and Methods: Acoustic radiation force impulse (ARFI) was performed in 157 patients with chronic viral hepatitis B and in 30 healthy volunteers to measure hepatic SWV (m/s) in a prospective study. Serum markers were acquired on the morning of the same day of the ARFI evaluation. Receiver operating characteristic (ROC) analysis was performed to evaluate and compare the accuracies of SWV and serum markers using METAVIR scoring from liver biopsy as a reference standard. Results: The most accurate test for diagnosing fibrosis F ≥ 1 was SWV with the area under the ROC curve (AUC) of 0.913, followed by LN (0.744), HA (0.701), CIV (0.690), and PCIII (0.524). The best test for diagnosing F ≥ 2 was SWV (AUC of 0.851), followed by CIV (0.671), HA (0.668), LN (0.562), and PCIII (0.550). The best test for diagnosing F ≥ 3 was SWV (0.854), followed by CIV (0.693), HA (0.675), PCIII (0.591), and LN (0.548). The best test for diagnosing F = 4 was SWV (0.965), followed by CIV (0.804), PCIII (0.752), HA (0.744), and LN (0.662). SWV combined with HA and CIV did not improve diagnostic accuracy (AUC = 0.931 for F ≥ 1, 0.863 for F ≥ 2, 0.855 for F ≥ 3, 0.960 for F = 4). Conclusion: The performance of SWV in diagnosing liver fibrosis is superior to that of serum markers. However, the combination of SWV, HA, and CIV does not increase the accuracy of diagnosing liver fibrosis and cirrhosis.

High-accuracy servo press system for the clinching joint process

Chen Liu,Sheng-Dun Zhao,Xiaolan Han,Tong Guo 대한기계학회 2017 JOURNAL OF MECHANICAL SCIENCE AND TECHNOLOGY Vol.31 No.2

This paper focuses on the quality improvements on clinching joints using a servo press with a Radial basis function neural network and a sliding mode (RBFS) control strategy. Bottom thickness, which is affected by the press punch position, is usually used to monitor clinching joint quality. Traditional clinching presses are driven by pneumatic pistons or motors that provide feedback on punch force or motor position. However, this feedback is indirectly related to the joint bottom thickness. Clinching workers who set the control parameters on these presses depend on tests and statistics. Thus, this paper presents a servo press system that utilizes punch position feedback to directly control the joint bottom thickness. Transmission errors are considered for the movement accuracy of the servo press. A mathematical model of the servo press is established for analyzing. An algorithm, which combines RBF neural network and sliding mode, is proposed and applied for press position tracking. This algorithm adopts an RBF neural network to approximate the nominal model of the press system. The update law of the algorithm is based on the Lyapunov function used to prove the stability of a closed-loop system. The sliding mode controller compensates for the neural network error and disturbance. Finally, experiments are executed on the servo press with an RBFS controller. To evaluate the performance of the proposed method, a fuzzy PID controller is also applied to the press for comparison. The results indicate that the servo clinching press system with RBFS efficiently and accurately control the clinching jointing process.

HLA-A, HLA-B, HLA-DRB1 Polymorphisms and Risk of Cervical Squamous Epithelial Cell Carcinoma: A Population Study in China

Xiao, Xue,Liu, Li,Li, Wei-Jie,Liu, Juan,Chen, Dun-Jin Asian Pacific Journal of Cancer Prevention 2013 Asian Pacific journal of cancer prevention Vol.14 No.7

Cervical cancer is the second most common cancer in women. HLA class I and II alleles polymorphisms have been shown to be associated with cervical cancer risk, but results have varied among different populations. In this study, the HLA-A, -B, and -DRB1 alleles among 100 southern Chinese women with cervical squamous cell carcinoma (SCC) were compared to 254 controls. Our results showed that $B^*51$:01:02 allele frequency was significantly higher in patients with SCC than in healthy controls ($P=3.17{\times}10^{-5}$, $P_c$=0.005, OR=26.7). Statistical analysis also revealed a significantly decreased frequency of $B^*51$:01:02 ($P=7.01{\times}10^{-4}$, $P_c$=0.03, OR=0.12) in patients with SCC when compared with healthy controls. These results indicate that HLA-$B^*51$:01:02 may confer susceptibility to SCC and HLA-$B^*51$:01:02 may contribute to resistance to the development of SCC in Chinese women. None of the HLA-A-B or HLA-A-B-DRB1 haplotypes were significantly different in cases and controls after multiple testing corrections, indicating the individual allele associations to be independent of the identified haplotypes. These results support the hypothesis that some HLA-B alleles could be involved with susceptibility for developing SCC.

Abnormal Brain Activity Changes in Patients with Migraine: A Short-Term Longitudinal Study

Ling Zha,Jixin Liu,Xuemei Yan,Wanghuan Dun,Jing Yang,Liyu Huang,Yuan Kai,Dahua Yu,Wei Qin,Tian Jie,Fanrong Liang 대한신경과학회 2014 Journal of Clinical Neurology Vol.10 No.3

Background and Purpose Whether or not migraine can cause cumulative brain alterationsdue to frequent migraine-related nociceptive input in patients is largely unclear. The aim of thisstudy was to characterize longitudinal changes in brain activity between repeated observationswithin a short time interval in a group of female migraine patients, using resting-state functional magnetic resonance imaging. Methods Nineteen patients and 20 healthy controls (HC) participated in the study. Regionalhomogeneity (ReHo) and functional interregional connectivity were assessed to determine thefocal and global features of brain dysfunction in migraine. The relationship between changes inheadache parameters and longitudinal brain alterations were also investigated. Results All patients reported that their headache activity increased over time. AbnormalReHo changes in the patient group relative to the HC were found in the putamen, orbitofrontalcortex, secondary somatosensory cortex, brainstem, and thalamus. Moreover, these brain regions exhibited longitudinal ReHo changes at the 6-week follow-up examination. These headache activity changes were accompanied by disproportionately dysfunctional connectivity inthe putamen in the migraine patients, as revealed by functional connectivity analysis, suggesting that the putamen plays an important role in integrating diverse information among othermigraine-related brain regions. Conclusions The results obtained in this study suggest that progressive brain aberrations in migraine progress as a result of increased headache attacks.

Characteristics and provenance of hazardous trace elements in soil from a typical agricultural region in eastern Anhui, China

Lu Wei,Guijian Liu,Dun Wu 한국지질과학협의회 2020 Geosciences Journal Vol.24 No.5

With the purpose of investigate the characteristics and provenances of the hazardous trace elements (HTEs) in a typical agricultural land in the undulating plain area of eastern Anhui province, China, a total of 1170 soil samples were collected. Six HTEs, including Cd, Cr, Hg, Ni, Pb, and As, were determined. Statistical methods including box plot, Pears on correlation analysis, principal component analysis, and cluster analysis, were conducted to illustrate the provenances of HTEs. Results indicate that Cd and Hg were influenced by human activities (such as traffic transportation for Cd and Pb, and chemical pesticides for Hg). Cr, Ni, and As mainly originated from the parent materials (e.g., red detrital rocks, carbonate rocks, and late Pleistocene loess). Pb is of dual provenances of both human activity and parent material. In a word, regarding highly toxic HTEs, the soil in the study area is almost free from pollution, and only a small amount of soil samples contains slightly higher contents of As, Cd and Pb.

Characterization of Ha29, a Specific Gene for Helicoverpa armigera Single-nucleocapsid Nucleopolyhedrovirus

Guo, Zhong-Jian,An, Shi-Heng,Wang, Dun,Liu, Yan-He,Kumar, V. Shyam,Zhang, Chuan-Xi Korean Society for Biochemistry and Molecular Biol 2005 Journal of biochemistry and molecular biology Vol.38 No.3

Open reading frame 29 (ha29) is a gene specific for Helicoverpa armigera single-nucleocapsid nucleopolyhedrovirus (HearSNPV). Sequence analyses showed that the transcription factor Tfb2 motif, bromodomain and Half-A-TPR (HAT) repeat were present at aa 66-82, 4-76, 55-90 of the Ha29 protein respectively. The product of Ha29 was detected in HearSNPV-infected HzAM1 cells at 3 h post-infection. Western blot analysis using a polyclonal antibody produced by immunizing a rabbit with purified GST-Ha29 fusion protein indicates that Ha29 is an early gene. The size of Ha29 product in infected HzAM1 cells was about 25 kDa, which was larger than the presumed size of 20.4 kDa. Tunicamycin treatment of HearSNPV-infected HzAM1 cells suggested that the Ha29 protein is N-glycosylated. Fluorescent confocal laser scanning microscope examination, and Western blot analysis of purified budded virus (BVs), occlusion-derived virus (ODVs), cell nuclear and cytoplasmic fraction, showed that the Ha29 protein was localized in the nucleus. Our results suggested that ha29 of HearSNPV encodes a non-structurally functional protein that may be associated with virus gene transcription in Helicoverpa hosts.

A Novel Monoclonal Antibody Induces Cancer Cell Apoptosis and Enhances the Activity of Chemotherapeutic Drugs

Xu, Heng,Tian, Yan-Na,Dun, Bo-Ying,Liu, Hai-Tao,Dong, Guang-Kuo,Wang, Jin-Hua,Lu, Shang-Su,Chen, Bo,She, Jin-Xiong Asian Pacific Journal of Cancer Prevention 2014 Asian Pacific journal of cancer prevention Vol.15 No.11

A novel monoclonal antibody (mAb), known as AC10364, was identified from an antibody library generated by immunization of mice with human carcinoma cells. The mAb recognized proteins in lysates from multiple carcinoma cell lines. Cell cytotoxicity assays showed that AC10364 significantly inhibited cell growth and induced apoptosis in multiple carcinoma cell lines, including Bel/fu, KATO-III and A2780. Compared with mAb AC10364 or chemotherapeutic drugs alone, the combination of mAb AC10364 with chemotherapeutic drugs demonstrated enhanced growth inhibitory effects on carcinoma cells. These results suggest that mAb AC10364 is a promising candidate for cancer therapy.

Brain-based Correlations Between Psychological Factors and Functional Dyspepsia

( Jiao Fen Nan ),( Ji Xin Liu ),( Jun Ya Mu ),( Wang Huan Dun ),( Ming Zhang ),( Qiyong Gong ),( Wei Qin ),( Jie Tian ),( Fanrong Liang ),( Fang Zeng ) 대한소화기기능성질환·운동학회 2015 Journal of Neurogastroenterology and Motility (JNM Vol.21 No.1

Background/Aims Increasing evidence shows involvement of psychological disorders in functional dyspepsia (FD), but how psychological factors exert their influences upon FD remains largely unclear. The purpose of the present study was to explore the brain-based correlations of psychological factors and FD. Methods Based on Fluorine-18-deoxyglucose positron emission tomography-computed tomography, the altered cerebral glycometabolism was investigated in 40 FD patients compared with 20 healthy controls during resting state using statistical parametric mapping software. Results FD patients exhibited increased glucose metabolism in multiple regions relative to controls (P < 0.001, family-wise error corrected). After controlling for the dyspeptic symptoms, increased aberrations persisted within the insula, anterior cingulate cortex (ACC), middle cingulate cortex (MCC) and middle frontal cortex (midFC), which was related to anxiety and depression score. Interestingly, FD patients without anxiety/depression symptoms also showed increased glycometabolism within the insula, ACC, MCC and midFC. Moreover, FD patients with anxiety/depression symptoms exhibited more significant hypermetabolism within the above 4 sites compared with patients without anxiety/depression symptoms.Conclusions Our results suggested that the altered cerebral glycometabolism may be in a vicious cycle of psychological vulnerabilities and increased gastrointestinal symptoms.