MR imaging of anterio cruciate ligament injuries

Background: Of all the ligaments of the knee joint the Anterior cruciate ligament (ACL) is the most commonly injured. It is an important pillar of the ligament stabilization of knee joint preventing anterior translation of Tibia over Fibula. Magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) is an excellent modality providing fine-resolution and multiplanar imaging without any radiation, for detection and evaluation of ACL injury with the associated injuries to other ligaments of the knee join. The purpose of the work was to study the role of MRI in classifying the ACL injuries.Methods: MRI Knee of 162 patients with ACL injuries was studied. All the MR imaging scans were performed on 1.5-T MR system (Siemens magnetom Essenza).Results: A total of 162 patients were studied in which majority of them i.e. 43 patients had interstitial sprain, 38 patients had complete tear, 33 patients had mucoid degeneration, 27 had partial tear and 14 had high grade partial tear, however 7 patients had normal ACL. There were associated injuries to the other ligaments of the knee joint along with ACL injury, medial meniscus tear being the most common and was seen in 39.50% followed by lateral meniscus tear in 9.87%, MCL tear in 6.79%, LCL tear in 1.85% and PCL tear in 2.46 %.Conclusions: MRI is a good modality for classifying ACL injury and evaluation of injuries to the associated ligaments

EFFECT OF ETHANOLIC EXTRACT OF GLYCYRIZZA GLABRA AGAINST STEREPTOZOTOCIN AND HIGH FAT DIET INDUCED DIABETES AND HYPERLIPIDEMIA

Objective: To study the effect of ethanolic extract of Glycyrrhiza glabra against streptozotocin and high-fat-diet-induced diabetes and hyperlipidemia.Methods: The present study was conducted on a 14 d model in which Glycyrrhiza glabra extract was given to Streptozotocin (STZ; 50 mg/kg; i. p.) induced diabetic rats fed with high fat diet (HFD), and its protective effect has been studied. The antihyperlipidemic and antihyperglycemic effects have been evaluated on the basis of physical, biochemical as well as histomorphological parameters.Results: The Glycyrrhiza glabra extract pre-treated group showed a significant decrease in biochemical parameters like Total cholesterol (TC), Triglyceride (TG), High-density lipoprotein (HDL), Lactate dehydrogenase(LDH), Alanine transaminase (ALT) compared with D-HFD group (p<0.01). The pre-treated groups also showed significant protection in physical parameters as compared to D-HFD group (p<0.01) which was also confirmed by histopathological studies. All these results were compared and found to be similar with two standard drugs metformin (500 mg/kg) and atorvastatin (10 mg/Kg).Conclusion: This study concluded that alcoholic extract of Glycyrrhiza glabra (500 mg/kg) has significant antidiabetic and antihyperlipidemic potential against streptozotocin and high-fat diet induced diabetic hyperlipidemic rats comparable to the clinically used drugs.Keywords: Atherosclerosis, Diabetic hyperlipidemia, Diabetes mellitus, Hyperlipidemia, Lipid profile, Streptozotoci

Sugar alcohol provides imaging contrast in cancer detection

Clinical imaging is widely used to detect, characterize and stage cancers in addition to monitoring the therapeutic progress. Magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) aided by contrast agents utilizes the differential relaxivity property of water to distinguish between tumorous and normal tissue. Here, we describe an MRI contrast method for the detection of cancer using a sugar alcohol, maltitol, a common low caloric sugar substitute that exploits the chemical exchange saturation transfer (CEST) property of the labile hydroxyl group protons on maltitol (malCEST). In vitro studies pointed toward concentration and pH-dependent CEST effect peaking at 1?ppm downfield to the water resonance. Studies with control rats showed that intravenously injected maltitol does not cross the intact blood-brain barrier (BBB). In glioma carrying rats, administration of maltitol resulted in the elevation of CEST contrast in the tumor region only owing to permeable BBB. These preliminary results show that this method may lead to the development of maltitol and other sugar alcohol derivatives as MRI contrast agents for a variety of preclinical imaging applications

MR imaging of meniscal tears

Background: Menisci transmit the forces across the joint and cushion the mechanical loading of the joint. Thus, it is important to identify meniscal tear. A thorough understanding of normal meniscal anatomy and surrounding structure is critical for diagnosis. Magnetic resonance imaging is the current modality of choice providing fine resolution and multi-planar imaging for identifying the meniscal injuries and the various pattern of tear, helping to plan the subsequent management. The purpose of the work was to study the role of MRI in classifying the meniscal injuries.Methods: MRI Knee of 136 patients with meniscal injuries was studied. All the MR imaging scans were performed on 1.5-T MR system (Siemens magnetom Essenza).Results: A total of 136 patients were studied in which majority of the patient’s i.e.  90.44 % had medial meniscal tear while 18.38 % patients had lateral meniscal tear. Both medial and lateral meniscal tears were found in 8.82 % patients. Among the different types of tears, horizontal tear was the most common tear in both medial and lateral meniscus comprising 52.8 % and 52 % respectively. The tears being most common in the age group 41-50years. There were associated injuries to the other ligaments of the knee joint along with meniscal tear, ACL tear being the most common and was seen in 50% of patients.Conclusions: MRI is a good modality for classifying meniscal injury and evaluation of injuries to the associated ligaments. Secondary signs are good predictors of underlying meniscal tear in equivocal cases

A Fully Differential Digital CMOS Pulse UWB Generator

A new fully-digital CMOS pulse generator for impulse-radio Ultra-Wide-Band (UWB) systems is presented. First, the shape of the pulse which best fits the FCC regulation in the 3.1-5 GHz sub-band of the entire 3.1-10.6 GHz UWB bandwidth is derived and approximated using rectangular digital pulses. In particular, the number and width of pulses that approximate an ideal template is found through an ad-hoc optimization methodology. Then a fully differential digital CMOS circuit that synthesizes the pulse sequence is conceived and its functionality demonstrated through post-layout simulations. The results show a very good agreement with the FCC requirements and a low power consumptio

Bromelain capped gold nanoparticles as the novel drug delivery carriers to aggrandize effect of the antibiotic levofloxacin

To develop bromelain capped gold nanoparticles (BRN capped Au-NPs) as the effective drug delivery carriers of the antibiotic levofloxacin (LvN) and evaluate antibacterial potential of its bioconjugated form compared to pure LvN. BRN capped Au-NPs were synthesized by in vitro method and bioconjugated to LvN using 1-ethyl-3-(3-dimethylamino-propyl)-carbodiimide as activator to form Au-BRN-LvN-NPs. These were characterized for mean particle size by dynamic light scattering analysis, zeta potential by Zetasizer nanosystem analysis and transmission electron microscopy (TEM) on carbon coated TEM copper grids by TEM respectively. Drug loading efficiency of LvN was calculated using UV-visible spectroscopy by standard curve of pure LvN. Antibacterial efficacy of Au-BRN-LvN-NPs and pure LvN was determined by evaluating minimum inhibitory concentration (MIC) against Staphylococcus aureus and Eschereschia coli.Two peaks were observed in Au-BRN-LvNNPs spectrum one at 307 nm and other at 526 nm while one peak in BRN capped Au-NPs at 522 nm during UV spectroscopy suggesting red shift. The drug loading efficiency of LvN was found to be 84.8 ± 2.41 %. The diameter of Au-BRN-LvN-NPs and BRN capped Au-NPs were found to be (58.65 ± 2 nm, 38.11 ± 2 nm), zeta potential (-9.01 mV, -13.8 mV) and surface morphology (~13.2 nm, 11.4 nm) respectively. The MICs against S. aureus and E. coli were found to be (0.128 μg/mL, 1.10 μg/mL) for Au-BRN-LvN-NPs and (0.547 μg/mL, 1.96μg/mL) for pure LvN. The results suggested that BRN capped Au-NPs can be used as effective drug delivery carriers of the antibiotic LvN. The Au-BRN-LvN-NPs exhibited enhanced antibacterial activity compared to pure LvN alone

Upregulated sirtuin 1 by miRNA-34a is required for smooth muscle cell differentiation from pluripotent stem cells

© 2015 Macmillan Publishers Limited. All rights reserved. microRNA-34a (miR-34a) and sirtuin 1 (SirT1) have been extensively studied in tumour biology and longevityaging, but little is known about their functional roles in smooth muscle cell (SMC) differentiation from pluripotent stem cells. Using well-established SMC differentiation models, we have demonstrated that miR-34a has an important role in SMC differentiation from murine and human embryonic stem cells. Surprisingly, deacetylase sirtuin 1 (SirT1), one of the top predicted targets, was positively regulated by miR-34a during SMC differentiation. Mechanistically, we demonstrated that miR-34a promoted differentiating stem cells' arrest at G0G1 phase and observed a significantly decreased incorporation of miR-34a and SirT1 RNA into Ago2-RISC complex upon SMC differentiation. Importantly, we have identified SirT1 as a transcriptional activator in the regulation of SMC gene programme. Finally, our data showed that SirT1 modulated the enrichment of H3K9 tri-methylation around the SMC gene-promoter regions. Taken together, our data reveal a specific regulatory pathway that miR-34a positively regulates its target gene SirT1 in a cellular context-dependent and sequence-specific manner and suggest a functional role for this pathway in SMC differentiation from stem cells in vitro and in vivo

A green fluorescent protein fused to rice prolamin forms protein body-like structures in transgenic rice

Prolamins, a group of rice (Oryza sativa) seed storage proteins, are synthesized on the rough endoplasmic reticulum (ER) and deposited in ER-derived type I protein bodies (PB-Is) in rice endosperm cells. The accumulation mechanism of prolamins, which do not possess the well-known ER retention signal, remains unclear. In order to elucidate whether the accumulation of prolamin in the ER requires seed-specific factors, the subcellular localization of the constitutively expressed green fluorescent protein fused to prolamin (prolamin–GFP) was examined in seeds, leaves, and roots of transgenic rice plants. The prolamin–GFP fusion proteins accumulated not only in the seeds but also in the leaves and roots. Microscopic observation of GFP fluorescence and immunocytochemical analysis revealed that prolamin–GFP fusion proteins specifically accumulated in PB-Is in the endosperm, whereas they were deposited in the electron-dense structures in the leaves and roots. The ER chaperone BiP was detected in the structures in the leaves and roots. The results show that the aggregation of prolamin–GFP fusion proteins does not depend on the tissues, suggesting that the prolamin–GFP fusion proteins accumulate in the ER by forming into aggregates. The findings bear out the importance of the assembly of prolamin molecules and the interaction of prolamin with BiP in the formation of ER-derived PBs