Preliminary study on a polymer carrier containing ginger extract with possible applications in cardiovascular disease

OBJECTIVES AND BACKGROUND The aim of the study was to synthesize and characterize a polyurethane drug delivery system used for a ginger extract with possible applications in cardiovascular disease. MATERIALS AND METHODS The obtained procedure is based on a poly-addition reaction between a diisocyanate and a mixture of polyols and a spontaneous emulsification in the presence of a surfactant. Only aliphatic compounds were used as raw materials and no other chemicals were added as reaction catalyst or promoters. RESULTS Nanostructures sized between 92 and 128 nm, with a medium tendency of agglomeration and very stable to thermal degradation between 30 and 300oC were obtained. We observed the fact that nanostructures’ diluted aqueous solution presents a pH around 6.7 and no evidence of any irritation potential was found after using different assays. CONCLUSIONS The obtained nanostructures can be used as a polymer carrier for ginger extract based on our results. Graphical abstract: Chemical structures of: (a) gingerol, (b) eucalyptol, (c) borneol. REFERENCES 1. Prasad EM, Mopuri R, Islam MS, Kodidhela LD. Cardioprotective effect of Vitex negundo on isoproterenol-induced myocardial necrosis in wistar rats: A dual approach study. Biomed Pharmacother. 2016 [epub ahead of print]. 2. Abdel-Naeem HH, Mohamed HM. Improving the physico-chemical and sensory characteristics of camel meat burger patties using ginger extract and papain. Meat Sci. 2016;118:52-60. 3. Shirpoor A, Rezaei F, Fard AA, Afshari AT, Gharalari FH, Rasmi Y. Ginger extract protects rat’s kidneys against oxidative damage after chronic ethanol administration. Biomed Pharmacother. 2016;84:698-704

QSAR–CoMSIA applied to antipsychotic drugs with their dopamine D2 and serotonine 5HT2A membrane receptors

Antipsychotic drugs are psychiatric medication primarily used to manage psychosis (e.g., delusions or hallucinations), particularly in schizophrenia and bipolar disorder. First and second generations of antipshychotics tend to block receptors in the brain's dopamine pathways, but antipsychotic drugs encompass a wide range of receptor targets. The inhibition constant, Ki, at the level of membrane receptors is a major determinant of their pharmacokinetic behavior and, consequently, it can affect their antipsychotic activity. Here, predicted inhibition constants, Ki for 71 antipsychotics, already approved for clinical treatment, as well as representative new chemical structures which exhibit antipsychotic activity, were evaluated using 3D-QSAR–CoMSIA models. Significant values of the cross-validated correlation q2 (higher than 0.70) and the fitted correlation r2 (higher than 0.80) revealed that these models have reasonable power to predict the biological affinity of the 15 new risperidone and 12 new olanzapine derivatives in interactions with dopamine D2 and serotonin 5HT2A receptors; these compounds are suggested for further studies

Designing of artificial peptides for an improved antiviral activity

© 2018 Bentham Science PublishersBackground: Few HIV-1fusion and replication inhibitors were developed, with limited clinical applications because of their short half-life, drug resistance and cross-reactivity with preexisting antibodies in HIV-infected patients. Objective: These limitations call for new strategies in the development of next anti-HIV-1 drugs. Among anti-gp41HIV-1 inhibitors, short-peptides exhibit high antiviral activity but the mechanism of action at molecular level has not been sufficiently addressed. Method: We report potent QSAR (Quantitative Structure-Activity Relationship) models, used for biological activity prediction of novel short HIV-1 gp41 inhibitor peptides in order to: (i) validate the anti-HIV-1 activity of MT-sifuvirtide, MT-SC34EK, MT-C34 and HP23, expressed as IC50fusion and IC50replication; (ii) predict inhibitory activity of SC24EK and its MT-derivative expressed as IC50resistant HIV-1 NL4-3 variant; (iii) propose new derivatives DMT-SC22EK, DMT-SC29EK and DMT-sifuvirtide through addition of aspartic acids by induced-mutagenesis; (iv) use molecular similarity established by fingerprint models to correlate molecular spatial features with predicted biological activity of newly generated inhibitors over parent compounds. Results: We obtained good QSAR statistic parameters, demonstrating that our QSAR models are able to predict biological activity of new HIV-1 inhibitors with suitable accuracy. Conclusion: Despite acknowledged drawbacks of a reduced dataset, our results may enhance the evaluation of biological activity of new and classical synthetic peptides as anti-HIV-1agents and represent a good start for further studies in developing new antiviral drugs.info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio

Determination of the Ascorbic Acid Content and the Antioxidant Activity of Different Varieties of Vegetables Consumed in Romania, from Farmers and Supermarkets

Vitamin C sustains the health of the human organism. It reduces the risk of chronic diseases and it can help to control arterial hypertension. In addition, it prevents and reduces the risk of developing various heart diseases, it normalizes the level of uric acid in the blood, it can help with the prevention of gout attacks, it helps to prevent iron deficiency and strengthens the immune system. Considering these aspects, it can be stated that a diet rich in vitamin C plays an essential role in a person’s daily food intake. Within the present study, we identified the content of vitamin C in various types of bell peppers and tomatoes consumed in Romania. The vitamin C content was determined by using the titration and the iodometric methods. The research results pointed out that the content of vitamin C in the analyzed bell peppers is between 4.693 and 11.264 mg/ 100 g, and in the analyzed tomatoes is between 0.939 and 4.639 mg/100 g. The antioxidant activity was studied as well, by using the DPPH radical and the Trolox equivalent antioxidative capacity (TEAC). The antioxidant activity was correlated with the content of ascorbic acid, present in the samples. The studies revealed that the vegetables bought from the farmers had a higher content of vitamin C than the ones bought from the supermarkets. This aspect was also confirmed by their increased antioxidant activity, which points out that the local vegetables are a rich source of natural antioxidants, which can be used to prevent various health conditions caused by oxidative stress

Determination of the Ascorbic Acid Content and the Antioxidant Activity of Different Varieties of Vegetables Consumed in Romania, from Farmers and Supermarkets

Vitamin C sustains the health of the human organism. It reduces the risk of chronic diseases and it can help to control arterial hypertension. In addition, it prevents and reduces the risk of developing various heart diseases, it normalizes the level of uric acid in the blood, it can help with the prevention of gout attacks, it helps to prevent iron deficiency and strengthens the immune system. Considering these aspects, it can be stated that a diet rich in vitamin C plays an essential role in a person’s daily food intake. Within the present study, we identified the content of vitamin C in various types of bell peppers and tomatoes consumed in Romania. The vitamin C content was determined by using the titration and the iodometric methods. The research results pointed out that the content of vitamin C in the analyzed bell peppers is between 4.693 and 11.264 mg/ 100 g, and in the analyzed tomatoes is between 0.939 and 4.639 mg/100 g. The antioxidant activity was studied as well, by using the DPPH radical and the Trolox equivalent antioxidative capacity (TEAC). The antioxidant activity was correlated with the content of ascorbic acid, present in the samples. The studies revealed that the vegetables bought from the farmers had a higher content of vitamin C than the ones bought from the supermarkets. This aspect was also confirmed by their increased antioxidant activity, which points out that the local vegetables are a rich source of natural antioxidants, which can be used to prevent various health conditions caused by oxidative stress

Evaluation of Antimicrobial Activity of New Mastoparan Derivatives Using QSAR and Computational Mutagenesis

Antimicrobial peptides, also called body defense peptides, are used against a wide range of pathogens, such as negative- and positive-gram bacteria, mycobacteria, fungi, viruses, etc. Contrary to antibiotics, antimicrobial peptides do not develop resistance. Their wide antimicrobial spectrum situates them as important and attractive targets in research and pharmaceutical industry in order to obtain new structures using modern drug design techniques. We present here eleven QSAR models in which antimicrobial activity expressed as minimal inhibitory concentration values at Bacillus subtilis of 37 mastoparan analogs was correlated with different physicochemical parameters like: number of hydrophobic centers, molecular area and volume, internal dipole moment, refractivity, RPCG (relative positive charges) and number of donor and acceptor atoms generating by use of the computational software Sybyl. Significant R 2 (0.68-0.72) correlation coefficients and standard error of prediction SEE (0.199-0.230) were obtained, indicating that the established equations can be used. Thus, these linear models allowed us to create a library of 19 derivatives of mastoparan analogs obtained through computational mutagenesis. We propose this library of compounds as a source of possible derivatives with a more potent antimicrobial activity

Individualized Follow-up of Pregnant Women with Asymptomatic Autoimmune Thyroid Disease

Maternal hormones are essential for the normal fetal development during pregnancy. Autoimmune thyroid disease is a frequent pathology in our iodine replete region. The aim of this study is to evaluate the occurrence of subclinical hypothyroidism (SCH) in cases with known autoimmune thyroid disease, which were in a euthyroid state prior to pregnancy, and to assess the association between supplemental treatments administered and the outcome of the pregnancy. The study is a prospective interventional controlled study. The two cohorts comprise the interventional group, consisting of 109 pregnant women with known autoimmune asymptomatic thyroid disease, without any levothyroxine (LT4) treatment and an aged-matched control group, with an unknown thyroid disease. After the pregnancy, a monthly evaluation of TSH, FT3, and FT4 was performed. Offspring evaluation was made at birth time. 88.8% of the women developed SCH in the first four weeks of pregnancy. Average LT4 doses increased as the pregnancy progressed. The monthly adjustment was 12.5 or 25 μg. All SCH cases developed in the first trimester of pregnancy. There was no significant difference regarding the gestational week, weight, or length at birth between the interventional group and controls, when TSH values were in the optimal range, during the whole pregnancy. Premature birth was described in one case in the interventional group

TI-RADS Diagnostic Performance: Which Algorithm Is Superior and How Elastography and 4D Vascularity Improve the Malignancy Risk Assessment

Given the increased prevalence of thyroid nodules in the general population (~50%), the real challenge resides in correctly recognizing the suspicious ones. This study proposes to compare four important Thyroid Imaging and Reporting Data Systems (TI-RADS) and evaluate the contribution of elastography and 4D Color Doppler assessment of vascularity in estimating the risk of malignancy. In the study, 133 nodules with histopathological examination were included. Of these, 35 (26.31%) proved to be malignant. All nodules were classified using the four selected systems and our proposed improved score. The American College of Radiology (ACR) and EU TI-RADS had good sensitivity (94.28%, 97.14%) and NPV (93.33%, 95.83%), but fairly poor specificity (31.81%, 23.46%) and PPV (35.48%, 31.19%), with an accuracy of 42.8% and 45.8%, respectively. Horvath TI-RADS had better accuracy of 66.9% and somewhat improved specificity (62.24%), but poorer sensitivity (80%). Russ’ French TI-RADS includes elastography in the risk assessment strategy. This classification proved superior in all aspects (Se: 91.42%, Sp:82.65%, NPV:96.42%, PPV:65.30%, and Acc of 84.96%). The mean strain ratio (SR) value for malignant lesions was 5.56, while the mean SR value for benign ones was significantly lower, 2.54 (p < 0.05). It also correlated well with the response variable: histopathological result (p < 0.001). Although, adding 4D vascularity to the French score generated a similar calculated accuracy and from a statistical point of view, the parameter itself proved beneficial for predicting the malignancy risk (p < 0.001) and may add important knowledge in uncertain situations. Advanced ultrasound techniques definitely improved the risk estimation and should be used more extensively