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Nathan Goodyear

Broad targeting of angiogenesis for cancer prevention and therapy - 0 views

  • vascular endothelial growth factor (VEGF), fibroblast growth factor-2 (FGF-2), interleukin-8 (IL-8), placental growth factor (PlGF), transforming growth factor-beta (TGFbeta), platelet derived growth factor (PDGF), angiopoietins (Angs) and others (reviewed in [4])
  • The switch may also involve down-regulation of endogenous inhibitors of angiogenesis such as endostatin, angiostatin or thrombospondin (reviewed in [5]) and has thus been regarded as the result of tipping the net balance between positive and negative regulators
  • There is a complex interrelationship between tumor hypoxia and tumor angiogenesis
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  • chronic hypoxia
  • acute hypoxia
  • Environmental stress as a result of low oxygen and proper nutrient deprivation, such as glucose deprivation, are capable of inducing VEGF mRNA stabilization resulting in increased levels of the secreted ligand and angiogenic growth
  • HIFalpha subunits accumulate in the cytoplasm where they bind HIFbeta to form a heterodimer that subsequently translocates to the nucleus to activate transcription of target genes, including genes important for various processes such as metabolism (glucose transporter (GLUT)-1, hexokinase (HK)-1), cell growth (cyclin (CCN)-D1 [23]) and also angiogenesis, such as erythropoietin, VEGF and PDGF [24] (summarized in Fig. 1)
  • When oxygen levels are low (hypoxia; red arrow) PHDs cannot hydroxylate HIFalphas thereby allowing them to escape pVHL-mediated degradation. HIFalpha subunits accumulate and bind to their heterodimeric partner, HIFbeta, translocate into the nucleus and activate a cascade of hypoxic signaling first by the transcription of various target genes including microRNAs that are important for tumor promoting pathways
  • c-Src is also capable of activating HIFs by indirectly inhibiting PHD activity via the NADPH oxidase/Rac pathway.
  • mTOR can also promote stabilization and HIF transcriptional activity
  • hypoxia inducible factors (HIFs), heterodimeric transcription factors composed from alpha and beta subunits, which can be rapidly stabilized to fluidly adapt to and overcome the effects of a hypoxic environment
  • Curcumin inhibits the expression of epidermal growth factor receptor (EGFR), VEGFR-1, VEGFR-2 and VEGFR-3, and the kinase activity of Src and FAK, which are responsible for the induction of angiogenic genes as well as endothelial cell polarity and migration
  • Curcumin also reduces the MMP-2 and MMP-9 expression, along with the suppression of growth and invasion potential of tumor cells in culture and xenograft experiments
  • The expression of angiogenic biomarkers COX-2 and serum levels of VEGF were significantly reduced in the curcumin-treated group
  • Resveratrol inhibits capillary endothelial cell growth and new blood vessel growth in animals
  • interrupting cell proliferation, inducing apoptosis
  • [155] and impeding angiogenesis by suppressing VEGF expression through down-regulation of HIF-1alpha
  • resveratrol was reported to inhibit cell proliferation of human ovarian cancer cells and human osteosarcoma cells by attenuating HIF-1alpha
  • prevents cytokine-induced vascular leakage and tumor metastasis
  • The underlying molecular mechanisms include: blocking VEGF- and FGF-receptor-mediated MAPK activation, inhibiting Akt- and MAPK-driven HIF-1alpha basal expression and its induction by IGF-1, stimulating the proteasomal degradation of HIF-1alpha, inhibiting phosphatidyl inositol (PI)-3K/Akt and Ras/mitogen/extracellular signal-regulated kinase (MEK)/ERK pathways, and activation of forkhead box (FOX)O transcription factors
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    natural compounds to attach cancer explained.
Nathan Goodyear

Activity and expression of progesterone metabolizing 5α-reductase, 20α-hydrox... - 0 views

  • Exposure of human breast cell lines (MCF-7, MCF-10A, and ZR-75-1) to 5α-pregnanes results in changes associated with neoplasia, including increased proliferation and decreased attachment [1], depolymerization of F-actin [2] and decreases in adhesion plaque-associated vinculin
  • Exposure to 4-pregnenes results, in general, in opposite (anti-cancer-like) effects
  • 5αR1 has been detected in various androgen-independent organs, such as the liver and brain
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  • 5αR2 has been found predominantly in androgen-dependent organs, such as epididymis and prostate
  • The 5α-pregnanes:4-pregnenes ratio was about 8-fold higher in tumorous than in nontumorous breast tissue after an 8-hour incubation with [14C]progesterone
  • Studies with breast cell lines, showing that 5α-pregnanes stimulate proliferation and decrease attachment of cells
  • both tissue and breast cell line studies suggest that an elevated level of progesterone 5α-reductase activity may be an indicator of breast tumorigenesis, regardless of presence or absence of ER and/or PR
  • 5αR1 is the main isoform expressed in human breast carcinomas [29] and that 5αR2 may not be associated with risk of breast cancer
  • the differences in 5α-pregnane production between the cells is due primarily to a difference in 5αR1 expression
  • As in the case of 5α-reductase activity, the presence or absence of ER and PR do not appear to be related to 5α-reductase expression.
  • the conversion of progesterone to the cancer promoting 5α-pregnanes is significantly higher in the human tumorigenic breast cell lines
  • lthough both 5αR1 and 5αR2 are expressed by these cells, the elevated 5α-reductase activity appears to be the result of significantly greater expression of 5αR1
  • Changes in progesterone metabolizing enzyme expression (resulting in enzyme activity changes) may be responsible for promoting breast cancer progression due to increased production of tumor-promoting 5α-pregnanes and decreased production of anti-cancer 20α – and 3α-4-pregnenes
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    balance of enzyme production between 5alpha-reductase and 20alpha-hydroxysteroid oxidoreductase and 3alpha(beta)-hydroxysteroid oxidoreductase play role in carcinogenesis and proliferation in the balance of production of progesterone metabolites. The 5alpha pregnenes are pro carcinogenic  and the 4-pregnenes are anti carcinogenic.
Nathan Goodyear

Chemistry and Structural Biology of Androgen Receptor - 0 views

  • Healthy adult men typically produce approximately 3–10 mg of testosterone per day
  • circulating levels ranging from 300 to 700 ng/dL in eugonadal men
  • endogenous testosterone secretion is pulsatile and diurnal
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  • highest concentration occurring at about 8:00 a.m. and the lowest at about 8:00 p.m.
  • Average serum concentrations and diurnal variation in testosterone diminish as men age
  • 40% is sequestered with high affinity to sex hormone-binding globulin (SHBG)
  • almost 60% is bound with low affinity to albumin
  • 2% as free, unbound hormone
  • 5α-DHT has even greater binding affinity to sex hormone-binding globulin than does testosterone
  • 5α-DHT is only about 5% as abundant in the blood as testosterone and is largely derived from peripheral metabolism of testosterone
  • Both 5α-reduction and aromatization are irreversible processes
  • Approximately 90% of an oral dose of testosterone is metabolized before it reaches the systemic circulation
  • there are three modes of action of testosterone. It may directly act through AR in target tissues where 5α-reductase is not expressed, be converted to 5α-DHT (5–10%) by 5α-reductase before binding to AR, or be aromatized to estrogen (0.2%) and act through the estrogen receptor
  • 5α-DHT is a more potent AR ligand than testosterone
  • has 2–10-fold higher potency than testosterone in androgen-responsive tissues
  • estrogen plays a major role in regulating metabolic process,74,75 mood and cognition,76 cardiovascular disease,77,78 sexual function including libido,79 and bone turnover in men
  • Free testosterone is considered the most “biologically active” form
  • testosterone is the major androgen that acts in the “DHT-independent” tissues, such as skeletal muscle, where 5α-reductase is not expressed or is expressed at a very low level
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    good review of androgens and AR.
Nathan Goodyear

The Epidemiology of Uric Acid and Fructose - 0 views

  • Previous studies have found that high doses of vitamin C supplementation lower serum uric acid via a uricosuric effect
  • fructose consumption coincided with the increasing trend of serum uric acid
  • Fructose is known to induce uric acid production by increasing ATP degradation to AMP, a uric acid precursor (85, 93, 94) and thus, within minutes after fructose infusion, serum uric acid levels rise
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    fructose intake, metabolic dysfunction, and elevated uric acid.
Nathan Goodyear

Association between endogenous sex steroid hormones and inflammatory biomarkers in US men - 0 views

  • modest statistically significant inverse associations for total and calculated free testosterone, and modest positive associations for total and calculated free estradiol with CRP concentration
  • Estradiol concentrations were also weakly positively associated with WBC count
  • SHBG was weakly inversely associated with WBC
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  • An association between testosterone and WBC count was not observed
  • These findings are consistent with the hypothesis that in men higher androgen concentration is anti-inflammatory, and higher estrogen concentration is pro-inflammatory.
  • the probability of elevated CRP concentrations (≥ 3 mg/L) decreased with higher total and calculated free testosterone concentrations, while the probability increased with higher total and calculated free estradiol concentrations
  • there is ample evidence supporting the immunosuppressive effect of androgens
  • The incidence of autoimmune diseases is higher in androgen-deficient men
  • Studies have shown that the induction of hypogonadism in older men is followed by a significant increase in IL-6 concentrations (Khosla et al. 2002), a potent stimulator of inflammation, and that activation of the androgen receptor exerts a direct anti-inflammatory effect
  • It has been suggested that the mechanisms for the immunosuppressive effect of androgens could be either a direct effect on the expression of inflammatory genes (Bellido et al. 1995; Asirvatham et al. 2006), or an indirect effect through inhibition of nuclear factor-kB activation
  • Estradiol is the major biologically active estrogen, and about 80% is formed in adult men from the aromatization of testosterone primarily in the adipose tissue
  • estrogen can stimulate the transcription factor C/EBP-β, which is involved in CRP transcription
  • Most prior cross-sectional studies have observed inverse associations between androgen concentrations and inflammatory biomarkers
  • A recent study in Chinese men showed that lower concentrations of total and calculated free testosterone were associated with higher CRP concentration
  • Data from the Boston Area Community Health Survey also reported inverse associations between testosterone and CRP concentrations
  • Total testosterone was inversely associated with WBC count (Tang et al. 2007; Schneider et al. 2009; Brand et al. 2012), but calculated free testosterone was not associated with WBC
  • The first trial found a decrease in CRP, interleukin-1β (IL-1β), and tumor necrosis factor-α (TNFα) but no changes in IL-6 and IL-10 concentrations between the active treatment and placebo arms
  • the majority of studies in the literature have not observed statistically significant associations between estradiol and inflammatory biomarkers in men, although several of them observed point estimates in the positive direction
  • total testosterone and estradiol compete for binding to SHBG, and seem to have opposite effects on the concentration of inflammatory biomarkers
  • A small randomized controlled trial of estrogen replacement therapy in prostate cancer patients showed an increase in CRP in the active treatment group versus the comparator group
  • Obese men are known to have lower androgen concentrations compared to their normal-weight counterparts
  • The strongest suggestion of an interaction was the inverse association between androstanediol glucuronide and CRP concentrations in obese participants, while the association was positive in the non-obese
  • A recent Chinese cross-sectional study observed stronger inverse associations between total testosterone and CRP concentrations in individuals with a BMI of 27.5 kg/m2 or greater
  • our results suggest that total and calculated free testosterone are modestly inversely associated with CRP concentrations, and that total and calculated free estradiol are modestly positively associated with CRP and WBC
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    Study results suggest that higher Testosterone and lower Estrogen levels provide anti-inflammatory effects in men.  The inflammatory biomarker assessed here was CRP.  Low total and calculated free Testosterone was associated with an increase in CRP.  In contrast, total and free Estrogen was associated with an increase in CRP.  Estradiol increased WBC count and SHBG was inversely related to WBC count in this study.
Nathan Goodyear

ENDOGENOUS SEX HORMONES, BLOOD PRESSURE CHANGE, AND RISK OF HYPERTENSION IN POSTMENOPAU... - 0 views

  • Among postmenopausal women, serum T was elevated in hypertensive participants [9, 11, 12], and total T, free T, and DHEA were positively correlated with SBP
  • T and DHEA were attenuated by adjustment for BMI, reflecting either a confounding or a mediating effect of obesity
  • SHBG concentration was inversely associated with risk of hypertension and longitudinal rise of BP over time
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  • SHBG has been postulated as a marker for insulin resistance
  • In vitro studies showed that insulin inhibits SHBG production from hepatoma cells
  • In intervention studies, successful weight loss and weight maintenance increased SHBG in men with obesity
  • E2 may also induce insulin resistance and thereafter tend to raise BP.
  • strong association between E2 and measures of insulin resistance in postmenopausal women, independent of adiposity
  • In postmenopausal women that received hormone replacement therapy, estrogen therapy increased mononuclear cell secretion of tumor necrosis factor alpha (TNF-α)
  • estrone levels were positively associated with inflammatory markers in postmenopausal women
  • higher baseline concentrations of endogenous E2, total and bioavailable T, and DHEA and lower concentration of SHBG were associated with a higher incidence of hypertension and a greater increase in BP during follow-up
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    Data from MESA study finds that increasing endogenous Estradiol, Total and free Testosterone, DHEA, and lower SHBG were associated with hypertension in postmenopausal women.
Nathan Goodyear

Long-term stabilization of stage 4 colon cancer using sodium dichloroacetate therapy - 1 views

  • inhibition of mitochondrial pyruvate dehydrogenase kinase
  • inhibition of aerobic glycolysis (the Warburg effect) and activation of mitochondrial potassium ion channels
  • angiogenesis blockade
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  • changes in expression of HIF1-α
  • alteration of pH regulators V-ATPase and MCT1, and other cell survival regulators such as PUMA, GLUT1, Bcl2 and p53
  • DCA as a cancer stabilizing agent
  • A protocol of natural medications was developed to address the dose-limiting neurologic toxicity, in collaboration with a naturopathic physician (Andrews). The oral DCA regimen that was developed included three natural medications acetyl L-carnitine[29-31], R-alpha lipoic acid[32-34] and benfotiamine[35-37], for the primary purpose of neuropathy prevention
  • measurable benefits from DCA therapy in 60%-70% of cases
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    Good review of dichloracetate or DCA in antitumor activity.  DCA has been shown to have numerous anticancer properties.
Nathan Goodyear

Ascorbic Acid Chemosensitizes Colorectal Cancer Cells and Synergistically Inhibits Tumo... - 0 views

  • therapeutic potential has been supported by a large and consistent body of evidences from in vitro
  • Ascorbic acid might act as a way to deliver hydrogen peroxide (H2O2) to the tissues
  • pharmacological concentrations of AA were capable of inducing anti-proliferative, cytotoxic and genotoxic effects
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  • chemosensitizing
  • pharmacological concentrations of AA can sensitize cancer cells to chemotherapy, enhancing its antineoplastic effect
  • synergistic effect with conventional chemotherapeutic drugs is a fact already reported, in various types of cancer, by numerous authors, namely in pancreatic (Espey et al., 2011), prostate (Gilloteaux et al., 2014), lung (Lee et al., 2017), breast (Kurbacher et al., 1996; Wu et al., 2017) and ovarian (Ma et al., 2014) cancers.
  • chemosensitizing effect of vitamin C has already been proven by several authors in various types of cancer
  • intravenous pharmacological concentrations, may not only potentiate the effects of conventional chemotherapy, but also improve the quality of life of cancer patients
  • AA reinforced the anti-proliferative activity of 5-FU
  • Combined treatment induced a reduction of 11.5% and 43% in cell viability compared with AA or Iri therapies, respectively, emphasizing the synergistic effect
  • cytotoxic effect occurred with treatment with Iri alone, but also this effect was further potentiated by the presence of AA.
  • association of AA with Oxa showed very promising results, considering that a synergistic effect was demonstrated, in almost all conditions
  • AA and Oxa seem to act synergistically by the activation of the intrinsic pathway of apoptosis, translated on the statistically significant increase of the ratio between BAX and BCL-2 proteins, which in turn is associated with a decrease of Δψm
    • Nathan Goodyear
       
      Apoptosis -> decrease in mitochondrial membrane potential
  • Previous results obtained by our group showed that AA mediates reactive oxygen species (ROS) formation capable of irreparably damaging DNA
  • oxidative role of AA may be a key factor on the synergistic anti-cancer mechanism
Nathan Goodyear

PPARs, Obesity, and Inflammation - 0 views

  • increase of 61% within 10 years
  • Many of the inflammatory markers found in plasma of obese individuals appear to originate from adipose tissue
  • obesity is a state of chronic low-grade inflammation that is initiated by morphological changes in the adipose tissue.
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  • secretion of MCP-1, resistin, and other proinflammatory cytokines is increased by obesity, the adipose secretion of the anti-inflammatory protein adiponectin is decreased
  • the peroxisome proliferators- activated receptor (PPAR) family are involved in the regulation of inflammation and energy homestasis
  • natural agonists, including unsaturated fatty acids and eicosanoids
  • PPARα also regulates inflammatory processes, mainly by inhibiting inflammatory gene expression
  • upregulation of COX-2 is seen in alcoholic steatohepatitis and nonalcoholic steatohepatitis and has been directly linked to the progression of steatosis to steatohepatitis, the inhibitory effect of PPARα on COX-2 may reduce steatohepatitis
  • PPARα agonists have a clear anorexic effect resulting in decreased food intake, evidence is accumulating that PPARα may also directly influence adipose tissue function, including its inflammatory status.
  • PPARα may govern adipose tissue inflammation in three different ways: (1) by decreasing adipocyte hypertrophy, which is known to be connected with a higher inflammatory status of the tissue [3, 11, 59], (2) by direct regulation of inflammatory gene expression via locally expressed PPARα, or (3) by systemic events likely originating from liver
  • PPARγ is considered the master regulator of adipogenesis
  • Unsaturated fatty acids and several eicosanoids serve as endogenous agonists of PPARγ
  • PPARγ2, which is adipose-tissue specific
  • two different molecular mechanisms have been proposed by which anti-inflammatory actions of PPARγ are effectuated: (1) via interference with proinflammatory transcription factors including STAT, NF-κB, and AP-1
  • and (2) by preventing removal of corepressor complexes from gene promoter regions resulting in suppression of inflammatory gene transcription
  • diet-induced obesity is associated with increased inflammatory gene expression in adipose tissue via adipocyte hypertrophy and macrophage infiltration
  • PPARγ is able to reverse macrophage infiltration, and subsequently reduces inflammatory gene expression
  • Inflammatory adipokines mainly originate from macrophages which are part of the stromal vascular fraction of adipose tissue [18, 19], and accordingly, the downregulation of inflammatory adipokines in WAT by PPARγ probably occurs via effects on macrophages
  • By interfering with NF-κB signaling pathways, PPARγ is known to decrease inflammation in activated macrophages
  • Recent data suggest that activation of PPARγ in fatty liver may protect against inflammation
  • PPARs may influence the inflammatory response either by direct transcriptional downregulation of proinflammatory genes
  • anti-inflammatory properties of PPARs in human obesity
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    PPARs play pivotal in obesity.  PPARs appear to reduce the inflammatory cascade associated with obesity.  Downregulation of PPARs are associated with increased inflammation.  Natural PPARs include unsaturated fats and eicosanoids.
Nathan Goodyear

Testosterone deficiency syndrome and cardiovascular health: An assessment of beliefs, k... - 0 views

  • The vast majority (88%) did not screen cardiac patients for TDS.
  • Testosterone deficiency has a prevalence of 7% in the general population, rising to 20% in elderly males
  • Males with CAD have lower testosterone levels than those with normal coronary angiograms of the same age,5 suggesting that the prevalence of testosterone deficiency is much higher in the CAD population
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  • Men with hypertension, another established risk factor for CAD, have lower testosterone compared to normotensive men
  • Recent meta-analyses showed that testosterone levels are generally lower among patients with metabolic syndrome, regardless of the various definitions of metabolic syndrome that are used
  • Testosterone (total and bioavailable) and sex-hormone binding globulin (SHBG) are inversely associated with the prevalence of metabolic syndrome in men between the ages of 40 and 80, and this association persists across racial and ethnic backgrounds
  • ower levels of testosterone and SHBG predict a higher incidence of metabolic syndrome.
  • Low testosterone levels have been related to increased insulin resistance and cardiovascular mortality,12 even in the absence of overt type 2 diabetes mellitus.
  • testosterone levels (total and bioavailable) in middle-aged men are inversely correlated with insulin resistance
  • The Massachusetts Male Aging Study (MMAS) demonstrated that low levels of testosterone and SHBG are independent risk factors for the development of type 2 diabetes,
  • Andropausal men (age 58 ± 7 years) have a higher maximal carotid artery intima-media thickness
  • There is an inverse linear correlation between body mass index (BMI) and wait-to-hip ratio with testosterone and insulin-like growth factor-1 levels.
  • Testosterone supplementation for 1 year in hypogonadal men has been shown to cause a significant improvement in body weight, BMI, waist size, lipid profile, and C-reactive protein levels
  • TRT for 3 months in hypogonadal men with type 2 diabetes significantly improved fasting insulin sensitivity, fasting blood glucose and glycated hemoglobin.
  • Testosterone replacement can improve angina symptoms and delay the onset of cardiac ischemia, likely through a coronary vasodilator mechanism
  • ADT is associated with an increased risk of cardiovascular events, including myocardial infarction and cardiovascular mortality.
  • ADT significantly increases fat mass, decreases lean body mass,29,30 increases fasting plasma insulin and decreases insulin sensitivity31 and increases serum cholesterol and triglyceride levels
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    Startling study on the knowledge of Testosterone and cardiovascular disease in general practitioners and cardiologists in Canada.  Eight-eight percent did not screen patients with cardiovascular disease for low Testosterone.  A whopping 67% of physicians did not know that low T was a risk factor for cardiovascular disease, yet 62% believed Testosterone would increase exercise tolerance. The lack of knowledge displayed by physicians today is staggering and is an indictment of the governing bodies.  This was a survey conducted in Canada so there are obvious limitations to the strength/conclusion of this study.
Nathan Goodyear

Toll-like receptor signaling links dietary fatty acids to the metabolic syndrome - 0 views

  • Activation of the innate immune system controls macronutrient metabolism
  • the innate immune response is the first line of defense against invading pathogens, wherein highly conserved pathogen-associated molecular patterns (PAMPs) are recognized by cognate pattern recognition receptors (PRRs
  • many studies have supported the idea that cytokine signaling directly promotes insulin resistance
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  • innate immune system may be causally linked to obesity
  • adipose tissue contains a substantial population of macrophages, and macrophage-driven adipose inflammation contributes significantly to the pathogenesis of obesity
  • Collectively, activation of the innate immune system is strongly associated with ASCVD, insulin resistance, and obesity, and recent evidence suggests that much of this association can be traced to a unique family of PRRs known as TLRs
  • TLRs are a family of type I transmembrane receptors, currently thought to comprise at least 13 members in mammals, that specifically recognize a variety of microbial PAMPs and trigger host cellular responses
  • Free SFAs have indeed been demonstrated to elicit TLR4-dependent and TLR2-dependent responses in several cell types.
  • Endogenous SFAs released from adipocytes activate cocultured macrophages via TLR4 [18], indicating the potential for cellular crosstalk in adipose tissue. Collectively, there is a growing body of evidence that SFAs promote, whereas long chain PUFA antagonize, TLR4-dependent and TLR2-dependent signaling in multiple cell models
  • In an elegant study, Shi et al. [16] demonstrated that SFAs activate TLR4-dependent signaling in both macrophages and adipocytes, and mice lacking TLR4 are protected against insulin resistance driven by intravenous lipid infusion
  • In addition to effects in macrophages and adipocytes, SFAs can activate TLR4 in the hypothalamus, which triggers a central inflammatory response that results in resistance to anorexigenic signals
  • endogenous SFAs can indeed promote innate immunity and inflammatory disease
  • This finding strongly supports the work of Hwang and coworkers [19–22] demonstrating that ω-3 PUFAs can effectively counteract SFA-induced TLR4 activation in cultured macrophages and dendritic cells.
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    high dietary fatty acids linked to metabolic syndrome through TLR.
Nathan Goodyear

Effect of Testosterone Replacement Therapy on Cognitive Performance and Depression in M... - 0 views

  • Azad et al [15] used single photon emission computed tomography and showed that, after 3~5 weeks of TRT, cerebral perfusion was increased in the midbrain and the superior frontal gyrus in seven men with hypogonadism
  • After 12~14 weeks, increased perfusion was still observed in the midbrain as well as in the midcingulate gyrus
  • TDS patients who received TRT showed significant improvement in cognitive function only if mild cognitive impairment was present at baseline
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  • Cherrier et al [17] evaluated a sample of 32 subjects, which included 17 men with mild cognitive impairment and 15 with Alzheimer's disease. At the 6-week follow-up, patients who received TRT showed significantly better scores regarding spatial memory, constructional abilities, and verbal memory compared to those noted in the placebo group. Taken together, these results suggest that TRT has a beneficial effect on cognitive function
  • TRT improved mood and well-being, and reduced fatigue and irritability in hypogonadal men
  • The study by Pope et al [20] involved men with depression refractory to standard anti-depressants, and found that TRT lowered the Hamilton Depression score,
  • depression tends to increase as testosterone levels decrease [21], it is highly likely that TRT improved symptoms of depression by increasing testosterone levels.
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    men with Testosterone <300 ng/dl with levels after 8 months of therapy achieving +680 ng/dl.
Nathan Goodyear

Sex, Receptors, and Attachment: A Review of Individual Factors Influencing Response to ... - 0 views

  • Estrogen upregulates OT and OT receptor (OTR) production
  • testosterone promotes both OTR binding in the hypothalamus (Johnson et al., 1991) as well as production of AVP (Delville et al., 1996), which has many opponent actions to OT
  • men and women show differences in plasma OT levels
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    Oxytocin and libido.
Nathan Goodyear

Antitumor activity of dichloroacetate on C6 glioma cell: in vitro and in vivo evaluation - 0 views

  • the oral bioavailability of DCA is nearly 100%
  • the oral bioavailability of DCA is almost 100%.
  • DCA can penetrate into the traditional chemotherapy sanctuary sites. Interestingly, it was reported that DCA could penetrate across the BBB,30 exhibiting the potential activity for brain therapy.
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  • Clinical studies of DCA have shown reduced lactate levels
  • It has been reported that DCA activates the PDH by inhibition of PDK in a dose-dependent manner, and results in increased delivery of pyruvate into the mitochondria
  • The antitumor activity of DCA on nonsmall cell lung cancer, breast cancer, glioblastomas, and endometrial and prostate cancer cells has been demonstrated
  • It is well known that many chemotherapeutic agents have a low therapeutic index in brain tumors.
  • The most common metabolic hallmark of cancer cells is their propensity to metabolize glucose to lactic acid at a high rate even in the presence of oxygen
  • Pyruvate dehydrogenase kinase (PDK) is a gate-keeping enzyme that regulates the flux of carbohydrates (pyruvate) into the mitochondria
  • In the presence of activated PDK, pyruvate dehydrogenase (PDH), a critical enzyme that converts pyruvate to acetyl-CoA instead of lactate in glycolysis, is inhibited, limiting the entry of pyruvate into the mitochondria.
  • the level of Hsp70 was significantly decreased
  • DCA can penetrate the BBB
  • It has been reported that DCA treatment resulted in an increase in the proportion of tumor cells in the S phase, showing a decrease in proliferation as well as the induction of apoptosis
  • Heat shock proteins (HSPs) are involved in protein folding, aggregation, transport, and/or stabilization by acting as a molecular chaperone, leading to the inhibition of apoptosis by both caspase-dependent and/or independent pathways
  • HSPs are overexpressed in a wide range of human cancers and are implicated in tumor cell proliferation, differentiation, invasion, and metastasis
  • Considering the fact that high expression of HSPs is essential for cancer survival, the inhibition of HSPs is an important strategy of anticancer therapy.
  • In addition, after 5 years of continued treatment with oral DCA at a dose of 25 mg/kg, the serum DCA levels are only slightly increased compared with the levels after the first several doses, also showing its safety for oral administration at this dose.
  • DCA can enter the circulation rapidly after oral administration and then generate the stimulation of PDH activity generally within minutes.
  • Our in vivo results in tumor tissues indicated that DCA significantly induced ROS production and decreased MMP in tumor tissues
  • The numbers of microvessels in the DCA treatment groups were significantly decreased, suggesting the potential antiangiogenic effect of DCA
  • Under hypoxic conditions, hypoxia-inducible factor (HIF-1α) is activated and induces angiogenesis
  • In addition, HIF-1α can also induce the expression of PDK,48 which can inhibit the activity of PDH
  • The inhibition effect of DCA on HIF-1α would decrease vascular endothelial growth factor and inhibit angiogenesis
  • the antiangiogenic effect in the 25 mg/kg treatment group was lower than that in 75 mg/kg or 125 mg/kg treatment groups
  • In conclusion, DCA induces the apoptosis of C6 cells through the activation of the mitochondrial pathway, arresting the cell cycle of C6 cells in S phase and down-regulating Hsp70 expression.
  • DCA significantly induced the ROS production and decreased the MMP in tumor tissues. Our in vivo antitumor activity results also indicated that DCA has an antiangiogenic effect
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    DCA as proposed therapy in cancer.
fnfdoc

Chalazion Eye: Causes, Surgery & Home Remedies - Health Blog - 0 views

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    Are you searching for Chalazion? We covered completely Causes, Symptoms, Treatment, Surgery and Home Remedies of Chalazion. Read and get rid of Stye too
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    Are you searching for Chalazion? We covered completely Causes, Symptoms, Treatment, Surgery and Home Remedies of Chalazion. Read and get rid of Stye too
Nathan Goodyear

PET/CT Standardized Uptake Values (SUVs) in Clinical Practice and Assessing Response to... - 0 views

  • use of PET in clinical research, clinical trials, and drug discovery
  • use of PET/CT in assessing response to therapy
  • In some cases, such as Hodgkins lymphoma, quantitative PET/CT imaging may not actually be needed, as success can be defined by the complete absence of tracer uptake in the PET image following a course of standardized therapy
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  • The utilization of PET/CT to assess response to therapy is increasing in the US related, in part, to the creation and subsequent favorable results of the National Oncologic PET Registry (NOPR)
  • Changes in size as a result of therapy may take many months to develop and any opportunity to make early decisions about therapy success or failure is often unduly delayed or lost altogether
  • measures of changes in metabolic activity via FDG PET/CT can provide an alternate approach to assess response to therapy -- often very early in the course of treatment
  • Current recommendations are that tumor SUVs should be reported
  • The true tracer uptake in a patient is composed of two components: the first being the amount of tracer uptake (e.g. FDG) associated with the disease status (the signal of interest), which can be modified by the biophysiological status of the patient. One of the more important patient parameters is the blood glucose level, which has been shown to inversely-linearly affect SUVs
  • A prospective study by Crippa et al.30 in eight patients showed that as blood glucose levels were increased from 92.4 ±10.2 to 158 ± 13.8 mg/100 ml by glucose loading, the average SUV of 20 liver metastases decreased from 9.4 ± 5.7 to 4.3 ± 8.3
  • chemotherapy can result in impaired renal function, significantly reducing the clearance of plasma FDG through the kidney and thus increasing tumor SUV relative to an initial PET scan
  • The second component of the true tracer uptake is biological variability
  • The biological variability has been estimated in several test-retest studies7,32–35 at approximately 10% for scans repeated within a few days
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    Good review of the SUVs of a PET/CT scan.
Nathan Goodyear

Impact of an Exercise Intervention on DNA Methylation in Skeletal Muscle From First-Deg... - 0 views

  • epigenetic modifications of single genes have been shown to affect the pathogenesis of T2D
  • An FH of T2D is an independent predictor of future risk for the disease
  • exercise for 6 months is associated with epigenetic changes, e.g., decreased DNA methylation of RUNX1 and MEF2A, two key transcription factors involved in exercise training (42–44), of THADA, previously associated with T2D (1), and of NDUFC2, which is part of the respiratory chain (45) was observed after exercise
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  • exercise changed both DNA methylation and expression of a number of genes, including ADIPOR1, ADIPOR2, and BDKRB2, encoding receptors for adiponectin and bradykinin, respectively, which both regulate metabolism in muscle
  • we cannot draw a conclusion as to whether differential expression is a consequence rather than a cause of changes in methylation
  • ageing is associated with increased DNA methylation and decreased expression of genes involved in oxidative phosphorylation in human muscle
  • exercise can induce genome-wide epigenetic changes in human muscle and that the response may differ in people with different genetic predispositions to metabolic disease
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    Six months of exercise induce epigenetic changes through decrease in methylation.  This study was designed to look at those with a family risk of DM.  They found a difference in the methylation status of muscle between those with a family h/o diabetes and those without.  This would have implications in therapeutic difference prior to diagnosis.  Even a increased VO2max and skeletal muscle mitochondrial density was found to be the result of decreased methylation of the NDUFC2 gene after exercise.
Nathan Goodyear

Substantial contribution of extrinsic risk factors to cancer development - 0 views

  • Here we provide evidence that intrinsic risk factors contribute only modestly (&lt;10~30%) to cancer development
  • we conclude that cancer risk is heavily influenced by extrinsic factors. These results carry immense consequences for strategizing cancer prevention
  • cancers are proposed to originate from the malignant transformation of normal tissue progenitor and stem cells
  • ...14 more annotations...
  • “Intrinsic processes” include those that result in mutations due to random errors in DNA replication whereas “extrinsic factors” are environmental factors that affect mutagenesis rates (such as UV radiation, ionizing radiation, and carcinogens
  • intrinsic factors do not play a major causal role.
  • intrinsic cancer risk should be determined by the cancer incidence for those cancers with the least risk in the entire group controlling for total stem cell divisions
  • if one or more cancers would feature a much higher cancer incidence, for example, lung cancer among smokers vs. non-smokers, then this most likely reflects additional (and probably extrinsic) risk factors (smoking in this case)
  • Particularly, for breast and prostate cancers, it has long been observed that large international geographical variations exist in their incidences (5-fold for breast cancer, 25-fold for prostate cancer)14, and immigrants moving from countries with lower cancer incidence to countries with higher cancer rates soon acquire the higher risk of their new country
  • Colorectal cancer is another high-incidence cancer that is widely considered to be an environmental disease17, with an estimated 75% or more colorectal cancer risk attributable to diet
  • melanoma, its risk ascribed to sun exposure is around 65–86%
  • non-melanoma basal and squamous skin cancers, ~90% is attributable to UV
  • 75% of esophageal cancer, or head and neck cancer are caused by tobacco and alcohol
  • HPV may cause ~90% cases in cervical cancer23, ~90% cases in anal cancer24, and ~70% in oropharyngeal cancer
  • HBV and HCV may account for ~80% cases of hepatocellular carcinoma
  • H pylori may be responsible for 65–80% of gastric cancer
  • While a few cancers have relatively large proportions of intrinsic mutations (&gt;50%), the majority of cancers have large proportions of extrinsic mutations, for example, ~100% for Myeloma, Lung and Thyroid cancers and ~80–90% for Bladder, Colorectal and Uterine cancers, indicating substantial contributions of carcinogen exposures in the development of most cancers
  • onsistent estimate of contribution of extrinsic factors of &gt;70–90% in most common cancer types. This concordance lends significant credibility to the overall conclusion on the role of extrinsic factors in cancer development
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    Really great read.  Cancer is a majority lifestyle disease.
Nathan Goodyear

The Gut Microbiota and Type 1 Diabetes - 0 views

  • A study by Bosi and colleagues suggested that the increased gut permeability preceded the clinical onset of T1D
  • gut permeability may be an important player in the development of T1D but, as yet, the findings in human studies have shown association but causation will be more difficult to prove.
  • Early childhood (≤ 3 month) introduction to cereals [10, 11] and cow's milk [48] were shown to promote beta cell autoimmunity
  • ...1 more annotation...
  • These findings suggest that prebiotics and probiotics could be potential therapeutic tools to improve gut integrity in various intestinal inflammatory and autoimmune diseases including T1D
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    another great review article of gut dysbiosis, altered gut permeability and type I diabetes.
Nathan Goodyear

Gender and sex hormones in multiple sclerosis pathology and therapy - 0 views

  • It is now well recognized that the disease manifestation is reduced in pregnant women with relapsing-remitting MS
  • This occurs particularly during the third trimester when levels of estrogens (estradiol and estriol) and progesterone (see Table 2) are elevated up to about 20 times
  • This seems well correlated with a decrease in active white matter lesions detected by MRI
  • ...12 more annotations...
  • This clinical improvement is however followed by temporary rebound exacerbations at post-partum, when the hormone levels decline
  • a shift from Th1 to Th2 immune response, expansion of suppressive regulatory T lymphocytes and decrease in the number of circulating CD16+ natural killer (NK)-cells
  • Th1 lymphocytes secrete proinflammatory cytokines (e.g. IL-2, IFNgamma, lymphotoxin) while Th2 cells secrete anti-inflammatory cytokines (e.g. IL-4, IL-5, IL-10), which favor humoral-mediated responses
  • Th2 cytokines are associated with down-regulation of Th1 cytokines and this Th2 shift is believed to provide protection from allograft rejection during pregnancy as well as from Th1-mediated autoimmune disease
  • it is worth noting that the levels of other hormones with anti-inflammatory activity (1,25-dihydroxy-vitamin D3, norepinephrine, cortisol) also increase by 2 to 4 times during late pregnancy
  • 1,25-dihydroxy vitamin D3 induces regulatory T-cell function important for development of self-tolerance
  • breast-feeding does not alter the relapse rate in women with MS
  • Leptin is a pleiotropic hormone produced primarily by adipocytes but also by T lymphocytes and neurons
  • Several lines of evidence indicate that leptin contributes to EAE/MS pathogenesis, influencing its onset and clinical severity, by acting as a proinflammatory cytokine which promotes regulatory T cell (Treg) anergy and hyporesponsiveness, resulting in increased Th1 (TNFalpha, INFgamma) and reduced Th2 (IL-4) cytokine production
  • circulating leptin levels are increased in relapsing-remitting MS patients (men and women analyzed together) while the CD4+CD25+Treg population decreases
  • As the leptin plasma concentrations are proportional to the amount of fat tissue, obese/overweight individuals produce higher levels of leptin
  • Nielsen et al found that estradiol and progesterone exert neuroprotection against glutamate neurotoxicity, while MPA antagonizes the neuroprotective effect of estradiol and exacerbated neuron death induced by glutamate excitotoxicity
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    very good review of the differences in MS and hormones between the sexes.
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