Research in Molecular Medicine
Volume:8 Issue: 4, Nov 2020

Rheumatoid arthritis (RA) is an autoimmune disease characterized by chronic inflammation of the joints and other tissues and organs of the body. Previous reports have demonstrated the imbalance of T helper (Th) subsets and Treg activity in the development, progression, and remission of RA. Here, we investigated the mRNA expression of four major transcription factors T-bet (Th1), GATA (Th2), RORc (Th17), and Foxp3 (Treg) in peripheral blood of different groups of RA patients.

In this case-control study, 60 patients with RA, including 20 newly diagnosed, 20 under treatment, and 20 in remission, as well as 20 patients with osteoarthritis, and 20 age- and the sex-matched healthy individual were enrolled. Diagnosis and classification of patients were done according to the American College of Rheumatology criteria. The relative mRNA expression of transcription factors, including T-bet, GATA, RORc, and Foxp3, was measured using qRT-PCR.

The relative expression of T-bet in RA patients was significantly increased in healthy controls (P = 0.002), while the relative expression of Foxp3 in RA patients was significantly decreased in healthy controls (P < 0.0001). There was no significant difference in the expression of GATA3 or RORc among RA patients, healthy controls, and osteoarthritis group.

The results indicate the importance of Th1 and Treg cells in RA; however, the role of Th17 cells appear to be of little importance in these patients. It seems that Th2 cells do not interfere with RA development.

The increasing resistance of human microbial pathogens to the available antibacterial compounds is a significant threat, resulting in the search for new antibiotic resources such as plants and probiotics. Therefore, this study aimed to evaluate the antibacterial effect of ethanolic and methanolic extracts of Urtica dioica, Mentha longifolia, and bacteriocin purified from a probiotic bacteria using the standard disk diffusion method against some pathogenic strains.
Materials  and 

Ethanolic/methanolic extract of U.  dioica,  M.  longifolia, and bacteriocin from probiotic bacteria were prepared by the standard methods. The effect of different concentrations of the extracts on some antibiotic-resistant bacteria was evaluated using the standard disk diffusion method by measuring the diameter of the growth inhibition zone.

The disk diffusion test showed that the bacteriocin Lactobacillus casei had more growth inhibitory effects on the tested bacterial strains than the methanolic and ethanolic extracts of U.  dioica  and M.  longifolia. Bacteriocin extract of L.  casei exhibited significant antibacterial activity at the concentrations of 12 and 18 mg/mL (P≤0.05) against antibiotic-resistant bacteria, while a 12 mm zone of inhibition was observed in the concentration of 1.5 mg/mL against Salmonella  enterica  serovar Typhimurium (S. Typhimurium).

According to the agar well diffusion method results, the bacteriocin producing L. casei has an extensive range of antibacterial spectrum against resistant bacteria. It can be used as an alternative to antimicrobia agents for the treatment of infections caused by resistant bacteria. It is suggested that in future research, the cytotoxicity of the extracts be evaluated in vitro/in vivo studies.

Gastric cancer is one of the most common malignancies in the world. It may result from a defect in the genes involved in DNA repair. One of the essential genes in the repair pathway is the XRCC1 gene that its polymorphisms in the human population play a role in gastric cancer susceptibility. The main purpose of this study was to investigate the association of 194C/T and 399G/A polymorphisms of the XRCC1 gene with gastric cancer in an Iranian population.

A total of 66 patients with gastric cancer and 67 control individuals were enrolled in our study. Following DNA extraction from blood samples, polymorphisms were analyzed by polymerase chain reaction-restriction fragment length polymorphism (PCR-RFLP) assay.

The allele frequencies of C/T of XRCC1-194C/T in the control and patients groups were 83.17% and 71.29%, respectively. Moreover, The allele frequencies of G/A of XRCC1-399G/A in control and patient groups were 66.34% and 62.38%, respectively. Our results indicated a significant positive association between the distribution T/C alleles and the risk of gastric cancer (χ2: 5.37 and P=0.02), but no significant association was found in the distribution G/A alleles (χ2: 0.47 and P=0.48).

Altogether, these findings indicate a positive association between the distribution of 194T/C alleles of XRCC1 and the risk of gastric cancer and the presence of the C allele may increase the risk of gastric cancer.

Because milk and milk products play a vital role in human nutrition, dairy cattle farmers are working in increasing milk production or changing its composition. For this reason, researching the genes which play an important role in milk production and its composition is of high value. Information theory is an interdisciplinary branch of mathematics which overlaps with communications engineering, biology, and medicine. It has been used in genetic and bioinformatics analyses such as the biological structures and sequences.

In this study, a total of 20 microRNAs from those affecting the breast tissue and mammary glands have been extracted from the microRNA database. For each microRNA sequence, the entropy values of the first- to third-order were calculated and the Kullback-Leibler divergence criteria were estimated. Then, the Kullback-Leibler divergence matrix of the microRNAs was considered as the inputs for clustering methods. All calculations were performed in the R program. The biological pathway of each target was predicted using the KEGG server.

MicroRNAs are divided into two main groups based upon comparing and analyzing all the created clusters. The first group contains 18 microRNA and the second group contains 2 microRNAs at the first- and third-order entropies. The second-order entropy contains 19 microRNA in the first group and only 1 microRNA in the second group. The clustering topology changes as the entropy order changes from 1 to 3, with the most significant changes being seen in the clustering resulted from the third-order entropy.

In the proposed method of clustering, we obtained a biological grouping of genes. There is a good concordance between most of the microRNAs within one cluster and their biological pathway.  The algorithm is applicable for clustering a range of genes and even genomes based on their DNA sequences entropy. Our method can help assign and predict the biological activity of those genes that lack robust annotations because it relies only on the DNA sequence and length of the genes.

Probiotics are “live microbial cells” that are beneficial for human and animal health. Lactobacilli are such a diverse group of bacteria with similar metabolic and physiological characteristics, and constitute important and beneficial gut microflora. During carbohydrate fermentation, lactobacilli produce lactic acid as an end product in metabolism. Hence, lactobacilli have high significance to be used as probiotics in the food industry, because of their acidifying properties. Also, lactobacilli are considered “safe”, owing to their ubiquitous presence in the food. Many researchers provided evidence for the presence of lactobacilli in milk sources. Thus, the present study aimed to isolate and characterize different lactobacilli strains from milk sources and analyze their “probiotic potential”.

Forty-one lactobacilli isolates were obtained from raw cow milk. Then, the strains were characterized by morphological identification and biochemical tests. Besides, probiotic potentials were evaluated with the bile tolerance test, antibiotic susceptibility test, and determining suitable pH for the optimal growth of lactobacilli. The lactobacilli isolates were also analyzed for their probiotic characteristics and the release of antimicrobial substances. Their antimicrobial activities against pathogenic strains were assessed by determining the minimum inhibitory concentration, with the help of agar diffusion methods.

From 50 milk samples, 41 lactobacilli isolates were obtained, out of which five lactobacilli strains were identified as Lactobacillus casei, Lactobacillus plantarum, Lactobacillus brevis, Lactobacillus acidophilus, and Lactobacillus lactis. Moreover, 35 isolates showed an inhibitory effect. These strains were able to survive and grow in 0.5% to 2.5% bile salt concentrations. Lactic acid bacteria were susceptible to antibiotics, and 35 isolates obtained from raw milk showed an inhibitory effect against pathogenic bacteria. The observed minimum inhibitory concentration ranged from 50 to 100 µL and varied between the different pathogens.

Out of 41 Lactobacillus isolates obtained from cow milk samples, 35 were identified with probiotic characteristics. Hence, this study highlighted the novel probiotic bacteria and validated the antimicrobial properties of the Lactobacillus spp against pathogenic bacteria.

This study aimed to explore whether the addition of a cyclic adenosine monophosphate (cAMP) analog and isobutylmethylxanthine (IBMX) in freezing media improved sperm quality and what role cAMP has in this recovery.

ach semen sample was cryopreserved into four groups: fresh semen sample, as a control group, freezing medium + 2.5 mM cAMP analog and 0.2 mM IBMX, freezing medium + 12.5 mM cAMP analog and 0.2 mM IBMX, and freezing medium + 25 mM cAMP analog and 0.2 mM IBMX. Sperm parameters after post-thaw were analyzed according to WHO instruction (2010). Viability, acrosome reaction, and DNA damage levels of the samples were evaluated.

Our results indicated that the effective concentrations of 12.5 and 25 mM cAMP analog and 0.2 mM IBMX significantly improved the total motility, progressive motility, and viability of the frozen-thawed (P<0.05). However, non-progressive motility and immotile were significantly reduced in the 12.5 and 25 mM cAMP analogs and 0.2 mM IBMX groups after thawing (P<0.05). During freezing the spermatozoa, the high concentration of the cAMP analog increased acrosome reaction after thawing in the 25 mM and 0.2 mM IBMX treated samples (P<0.05). DNA fragmentation in 25 mM cAMP analog and 0.2 mM (IBMX) supplementation was significantly lower compared to the other groups (P<0.05).

Our findings revealed that in vitro cAMP analog and IBMX supplementation in freezing media play an important role in preventing cryodamage by maintaining the sperm functional parameters.