Avicenna Journal of Medical Biochemistry
Volume:1 Issue: 1, Apr 2013

The aim of this study was to examine the effect of flaxseed on gene expression of intestinal transporters: Niemann-Pick C1 like 1 (NPC1L1), ATP-cassette binding proteins G5 (ABCG5) and G8 (ABCG8). Animals were randomly divided into 3 groups 8 rats in each group: group1; normal diet, group2; diabetic rats, and group3; diabetic rats + 4% (w/w) flaxseed. After one-month rats were sacrificed, blood was collected; lipid profiles were determined enzymatically, and mRNA levels were determined by RT-PCR. Compared to diabetic rats, flaxseed significantly decreased total cholesterol (TC), low-density lipoprotein cholesterol (LDL-C), triglycerides, very low density lipoprotein cholesterol (VLDL-C) and atherogenic index (all P<0.05). Intestinal NPC1L1 mRNA was significantly decreased (P<0.01) in flaxseed group treatment compared with diabetic animals. Intestinal ABCG5 and ABCG8 mRNAs were significantly increased (P<0.001) in flaxseed group treatment compared with diabetic animals. In conclusion, flaxseed significantly reduced lipid profile and atherogenic index, as compared with the diabetic group. Flaxseed treatment also led to down-regulation of NPC1L1 mRNA and up-regulation of ABCG5 and ABCG8 mRNAs in the intestine of rats.

Insulin resistance has been considered as the most important component of type 2 diabetes mellitus (DM2). Plants used in folk medicine to treat diabetes mellitus represent a viable alternative for the control of this disease. This study was aimed to examine the antidiabetic effects of three Iranian medicinal plants i.e. Urtica dioica, Trigonella foenum-graecum and Fumaria officinalis in an animal model of DM2. Diabetes was induced in male Wistar rats (6-8 weeks old) by feeding 21% fructose in drinking water for 8 weeks. They were treated with aqueous extracts (10%) of three medicinal plants (Urtica dioica, Trigonella foenum-graecum and Fumaria officinalis) for 8 weeks. After diabetes induction and the last day of the experiment, body weight, fasting blood glucose, plasma insulin, urine volume and glucose were assayed. Blood glucose, plasma insulin, urine glucose and urine volume were increased significantly after 8 weeks of high fructose feeding (P<0.05); the aqueous extracts of Urtica dioica reduced the blood and urine glucose and also the aqueous extracts of Trigonell Foenum diminished the insulin, weight and blood glucose in comparison with the high fructose-fed control group (P<0.05). The obtained data in this study showed hypoglycemia effects of Trigonell Foenum and Urtica dioica extracts. Also our findings indicated that the hypoglycemia effect of Trigonell Foenum extract is in part by improvement of insulin resistance. These results can be extrapolated to humans and these extracts might be useful in the treatment of insulin resistance.

The link between dietary fat and heart disease has been established for decades. Although, the atherogenic effect of saturated fatty acids is somehow controversial, the cardioprotective effects of polyunsaturated fatty acids (PUFA) are clearly documented. This study investigated the effects of different dietary oils on serum fatty acid composition in rat. Six week male Wistar rats (n=40) were randomly assigned into 5 groups and received chow diet for 3 weeks, before blood sample collection from 4 rats of each group. Remaining rats were then received chow diet or chow diet supplemented with yogurt butter, olive oil, soybean oil, or flaxseed oil providing 53% of energy from fat for another 4 weeks. Blood samples were then collected and serum fatty acid composition analysed by gas chromatography. Total saturated, monounsaturated, and n 6 and n 3 PUFA were significantly higher in rats received yogurt butter, olive oil, soybean oil, and flaxseed oil supplemented diets, respectively, compare to the controls (P<0.05). In addition, the ratio of n 6:n 3 PUFA markedly decreased by consumption of flaxseed oil compare to other diets (P<0.05). Rats received olive, soybean, and flaxseed oils showed significantly lower serum triacylglycerol compare to the control (P<0.05). Moreover, no significant effect observed on serum cholesterol in rats consumed yogurt butter. We clearly showed that the composition of dietary fat impact on serum fatty acid composition and consumption of yogurt butter had no significant atherogenic effects on serum total and LDL cholesterol.

In this study the association of phenotypes and activity of butyrylcholinesterase (BuChE) with serum level of lipid-lipoprotein and apolipoproteins during various phases of menstrual-cycle was determined. The study population consisted of 22 healthy women aged 19–25 years with regular menstrual cycles, 26–30 days in length. The serum levels of lipids, apolipoproteins, and BuChE activity were determined during menses (days 1-2 after the beginning of menstruations), follicular (days 7-8) and luteal (days 21-22) phases of the menstrual cycle. There were significant differences in the level of serum BuChE activity during three phases of the menstrual cycle (P=0.049). The activity of serum BuChE was the highest during follicular phase (890 ± 292 IU/L), the modest during the menses phase (831 ± 222 IU/L) and the lowest during luteal phase (707 ±211 IU/L). We found a significant positive correlation between BuChE activity with the levels of low density lipoprotein cholesterol (LDL-C, r=0.34, P=0.038) in the follicular and in the menses phase with LDL-C (r=0.4, P =0.025) and triacylglycerol (r=0.47, P=0.033). In addition, carriers of the non-UU phenotypes (non-wild type low BuChE activity) had significantly lower levels of serum high density lipoprotein cholesterol (HDL-C) and apolipoprotein A1 (APOA1) compared to UU phenotype (usual or wild type) during menstrual cycle. Our results demonstrate that serum BuChE activity elevates during menstrual cycle. It is low during luteal phase and reaches to a high level in follicular-phase. The lipid profiles are also affected by BuChE activity throughout the menstrual-cycle in reproductive aged, regularly cycling and young healthy women.

The overall goal of this study was to carry out a set of comparative analyses of arsR gene in plasmid R773 and bacterial chromosome from Escherichia coli BL-21(DE3). PDB and NCBI databases and Chimera, Mega4, CLC main workbench software and 3D-jigsaw and EMBL-EBI servers were applied to perform this study. By using these software and servers, multiple analyses including determination of residue composition, secondary structure and motifs, 3D structure, conserved regions, etc. were done. The results suggest that such high sensitivity to arsenic compounds in ars-containing plasmid R773 may be related to ArsR protein characteristics such as amino acids composition, secondary and tertiary structure, hy-drophobicity, level of interaction with DNA. Bioinformatics studies could be applied to describe the reason of different sensitivities to Arsenic compounds between arsR gene and ArsR protein in plasmid R773 and bacterial chromosome.

Colloidal drug delivery system, solid lipid nanoparticles (SLNs), helps to increase the solubility of the drug and its oral bioavailability. Tamoxifen (TAM) as a nonsteroidalantiestrogen drug was formulated in SLN and an in vitro study was conducted to determine the cytotoxicity effect of TAM-loaded SLNs on human breast cancer cell lines MCF-7 (estrogen receptor-positive) and MDA-MB231 (estrogen receptor-negative) cells. The cytotoxicity was measured by (3-(4, 5-Dimethylthiazol-2-yl)-2,5-diphenyltetrazolium bromide (MTT assay). The results showed that tamoxifen-loaded SLNs has an equally efficient cytotoxic activity against MCF-7 and MDA-MB231 cells, compared with free tamoxifen, and the half maximal inhibitory concentration (IC50) of TAM-loaded SLNs was generally lower than that of free TAM. This finding indicates that tamoxifen’s cytotoxicity may result from improved drug internalization through encapsulation into the SLN matrix and endocytosis. Therefore, when TAM is incorporated into the SLN carrier system, its antitumoral activity is still preserved, suggesting that SLN is a good carrier for the drug insoluble in water.

subsets of human spermatozoa isolated by density gradient.Rohollah Setarehbadi 1; Mojgan Atabakhash 1; Amir Fattahi 1; Aboozar Mohagheghi 1; Asad Vaisi-Raygani 2; Hossain Mahjub 3; and Heidar Tavilani Tavilani *, 4 1 Student Research Committee, Hamadan University of Medical Sciences, Hamadan, Iran2 Fertility and Infertility Center, Kermanshah University of Medical Sciences, Kermanshah, Iran3 Department of Epidemiology and Biostatistics, Faculty of Public Health, Hamadan University of Medical Science, Hamadan, Iran4 Urology & Nephrology Research Center, Hamadan University of Medical Sciences, Hamadan Iran*Corresponding author: Heidar Tavilani Tavilani, Urology & Nephrology Research Center, Hamadan University of Medical Sciences, Hamadan Iran, Tel.: +98 8118380717, Fax: +98 8118380313, E-mail: tavilani@gmail.com. Lipid components of spermatozoa have an important role in its functional activity. In this study the concentration of cholesterol, phospholipid, triacylglycerol and total lipid in different subsets of human spermatozoa, isolated as three fractions by a discontinuous PureSperm gradient, was determined. Aliquots of the liquefied semen samples (n=107) were layered on top of the upper layer of 40 and 80% PureSperm gradient. The resulting interfaces 40 and 80% (fraction 1), 80% and pellet (fraction 2), and pellet (fraction 3) aspirated and transferred into separate tubes. Lipids were extracted with 6 volumes of chloroform-methanol (2/1, V/V) and the concentration of cholesterol, phospholipid, triacylglycerol were determined by colorimetric method. Percent of sperm with normal morphology was significantly higher in sperm fraction 3 compared to fraction 2 and 1, while percent of sperm with midpiece and tail defect was significantly higher in fraction 1 compared to fractions 2 and 3 (P<0.01). The amount of cholesterol, phospholipid and total lipid of sperm fractions 2 and 3 were about 1.5-fold higher than that of found in sperm from fraction 1 (P<0.05). This result suggests that the total lipid contents of sperms increase with increasing normal morphology from fraction 1 to 3.