High salt-induced excess reactive oxygen species production resulted in heart tube malformation during gastrulation

An association has been proved between high salt consumption and cardiovascular mortality. In vertebrates, the heart is the first functional organ to be formed. However, it is not clear whether high‐salt exposure has an adverse impact on cardiogenesis. Here we report high‐salt exposure inhibited basement membrane breakdown by affecting RhoA, thus disturbing the expression of Slug/E‐cadherin/N‐cadherin/Laminin and interfering with mesoderm formation during the epithelial‐mesenchymal transition(EMT). Furthermore, the DiI+ cell migration trajectory in vivo and scratch wound assays in vitro indicated that high‐salt exposure restricted cell migration of cardiac progenitors, which was caused by the weaker cytoskeleton structure and unaltered corresponding adhesion junctions at HH7. Besides, down‐regulation of GATA4/5/6, Nkx2.5, TBX5, and Mef2c and up‐regulation of Wnt3a/β‐catenin caused aberrant cardiomyocyte differentiation at HH7 and HH10. High‐salt exposure also inhibited cell proliferation and promoted apoptosis. Most importantly, our study revealed that excessive reactive oxygen species(ROS)generated by high salt disturbed the expression of cardiac‐related genes, detrimentally affecting the above process including EMT, cell migration, differentiation, cell proliferation and apoptosis, which is the major cause of malformation of heart tubes

Pattern Mining from Probabilistic Databases with Dependencies

In recent years, many emerging technologies, such as radio-frequency identification (RFID) networks and wireless sensor networks have produced a large amount of uncertain data. This brings great attention to uncertain data. As the pattern mining problem is studied a lot in certain data, it is also quite an important problem in uncertain data. Probabilistic databases are a commonly used framework to model uncertain databases. There are many studies on uncertain databases, however, most of them use the independence assumption. In this thesis, first, we propose a correlated tuple model that enables us to define dependencies between tuples for tuple level uncertain databases. As an improvement to this model, we define a general model that can capture existing dependencies in uncertain dependent databases. However, finding the support of an item set on such a model is an NP-complete problem. Instead, we propose a restricted version of this model. We also define a dynamic program to efficiently find frequent itemsets. Finally, we propose a pattern matching problem on transcription factor binding profiles. We generate uncertain dependent sequence data, to which we apply a mining algorithm to find frequent sub-sequences. After frequent sub-sequences have been found for each motif, whose family is already known, we use the Jaccard index to compare them with each other. Then, we apply the distance measure to the Jaccard similarity values to identify the right family for each motif. We validated our solutions through extensive experiments and discuss potential future research directions for mining patterns over dependent uncertain databases.</div

Blueberry treatment decreased D-galactose-induced oxidative stress and brain damage in rats

D-galactose (GAL) causes aging-related changes and oxidative stress in the organism. We investigated the effect of whole fresh blueberry (BB) (Vaccinium corymbosum L.) treatment on oxidative stress in age-related brain damage model. Rats received GAL (300 mg/kg; s.c.; 5 days per week) alone or together with 5 % (BB1) and 10 % (BB2) BB containing chow for two months. Malondialdehyde (MDA),protein carbonyl (PC) and glutathione (GSH) levels, and Cu Zn-superoxide dismutase (SOD), glutathione peroxidase (GSH-Px) and glutathione transferase (GST) activities as well as acetylcholinesterase (AChE) activities were determined. Expressions of B cell lymphoma-2 (Bcl-2), Bax and caspase-3 were also evaluated in the brain by immunohistochemistry. MDA and PC levels and AChE activity increased, but GSH levels, SOD and GSH-Px activities decreased together with histopathological structural damage in the brain of GAL-treated rats. BB treatments, especially BB2 reduced MDA and PC levels and AChE activity and elevated GSH levels and GSH-Px activity. BB1 and BB2 treatments diminished apoptosis and ameliorated histopathological findings in the brain of GAL-treated rats. These results indicate that BB partially prevented the shift towards an imbalanced prooxidative status and apoptosis together with histopathological amelioration by acting as an antioxidant (radical scavenger) itself in GAL-treated rats

Effect of Carnosine on Prooxidant-Antioxidant Balance in Several Tissues of Rats Exposed to Chronic Cold Plus Immobilization Stress

In this study, we investigated the effect of L-carnosine (CAR) on prooxidant antioxidant balance in several tissues of rats exposed to chronic stress. Both cold and immobilization stresses were applied to rats at the same time. In the stress group, rats were placed in restraint cages and kept in a cold room (+4 degrees C) for I h for 21 days (5 days a week). Rats were injected with CAR (250 mg/kg, i.p.) at 30 min before stress application. Malondialdehyde, diene conjugate, protein carbonyl and nitrotyrosine levels, nonenzymatic (glutathione, vitamin E, and vitamin C), and enzymatic (catalase, superoxide dismutase and glutathione peroxidase) antioxidants were determined in the liver, heart, and brain tissues. Chronic cold plus immobilization stress was observed to affect especially the prooxidant antioxidant status in the brain tissue of rats. This is the first report showing the beneficial effects of CAR on oxidative stress in the brain in rats exposed to stress

Effect of Carnosine on Prooxidant^|^ndash;Antioxidant Balance in Several Tissues of Rats Exposed to Chronic Cold Plus Immobilization Stress

In this study, we investigated the effect of L-carnosine (CAR) on prooxidant antioxidant balance in several tissues of rats exposed to chronic stress. Both cold and immobilization stresses were applied to rats at the same time. In the stress group, rats were placed in restraint cages and kept in a cold room (+4 degrees C) for I h for 21 days (5 days a week). Rats were injected with CAR (250 mg/kg, i.p.) at 30 min before stress application. Malondialdehyde, diene conjugate, protein carbonyl and nitrotyrosine levels, nonenzymatic (glutathione, vitamin E, and vitamin C), and enzymatic (catalase, superoxide dismutase and glutathione peroxidase) antioxidants were determined in the liver, heart, and brain tissues. Chronic cold plus immobilization stress was observed to affect especially the prooxidant antioxidant status in the brain tissue of rats. This is the first report showing the beneficial effects of CAR on oxidative stress in the brain in rats exposed to stress

Protective effect of Nigella sativa oil against binge ethanol-induced oxidative stress and liver injury in rats

AIM: Nigella sativa L. (Ranunculaceae) is considered as a therapeutic plant-based medicine for liver damage. In this study, the aim was to study the effect of Nigella sativa oil (NSO) pretreatment on ethanol-induced hepatotoxicity in rats

Beneficial effects of taurine and carnosine in experimental ischemia/reperfusion injury in testis

Testicular torsion can be thought of as an ischemia/reperfusion (I/R) injury to the testis. This study aimed to investigate the effects of taurine (TAU) and carnosine (CAR), which are strong antioxidants, on experimental testicular I/R injury model