The mechanism of traditional medicine in alleviating ulcerative colitis: regulating intestinal barrier function

Ulcerative colitis (UC) is an idiopathic inflammatory disease mainly affects the large bowel and the rectum. The pathogenesis of this disease has not been fully elucidated, while the disruption of the intestinal barrier function triggered by various stimulating factors related to the host genetics, immunity, gut microbiota, and environment has been considered to be major mechanisms that affect the development of UC. Given the limited effective therapies, the treatment of this disease is not ideal and its incidence and prevalence are increasing. Therefore, developing new therapies with high efficiency and efficacy is important for treating UC. Many recent studies disclosed that numerous herbal decoctions and natural compounds derived from traditional herbal medicine showed promising therapeutic activities in animal models of colitis and have gained increasing attention from scientists in the study of UC. Some of these decoctions and compounds can effectively alleviate colonic inflammation and relieve clinical symptoms in animal models of colitis via regulating intestinal barrier function. While no study is available to review the underlying mechanisms of these potential therapies in regulating the integrity and function of the intestinal barrier. This review aims to summarize the effects of various herbal decoctions or bioactive compounds on the severity of colonic inflammation via various mechanisms, mainly including regulating the production of tight junction proteins, mucins, the composition of gut microbiota and microbial-associated metabolites, the infiltration of inflammatory cells and mediators, and the oxidative stress in the gut. On this basis, we discussed the related regulators and the affected signaling pathways of the mentioned traditional medicine in modulating the disruption or restoration of the intestinal barrier, such as NF-κB/MAPK, PI3K, and HIF-1α signaling pathways. In addition, the possible limitations of current studies and a prospect for future investigation and development of new UC therapies are provided based on our knowledge and current understanding. This review may improve our understanding of the current progression in studies of traditional medicine-derived therapies in protecting the intestinal barrier function and their roles in alleviating animal models of UC. It may be beneficial to the work of researchers in both basic and translational studies of UC

Label-Free Proteomics Reveals Decreased Expression of CD18 and AKNA in Peripheral CD4+ T Cells from Patients with Vogt-Koyanagi-Harada Syndrome

Vogt-Koyanagi-Harada (VKH) syndrome is a systemic autoimmune disease. CD4+ T cells have been shown to be involved in autoimmune diseases including VKH syndrome. To screen aberrantly expressed membrane proteins in CD4+ T cell from patients with active VKH syndrome, blood samples were taken from five patients with active VKH syndrome and five healthy individuals. A label-free quantitative proteomic strategy was used to identify the differently expressed proteins between the two groups. The results revealed that the expression of 102 peptides was significantly altered (p<0.05) between two groups and matched amino acid sequences of proteins deposited in the international protein index (ipi.HUMAN.v3.36.fasta). The identified peptides corresponded to 64 proteins, in which 30 showed more than a 1.5-fold difference between the two groups. The decreased expression of CD18 and AKNA transcription factor (AKNA), both being three-fold lower than controls in expression identified by the label-free method, was further confirmed in an additional group of five active VKH patients and six normal individuals using the Western blot technique. A significantly decreased expression of CD18 and AKNA suggests a role for both proteins in the pathogenesis of this syndrome

The Role of NLRP3 and IL-1β in the Pathogenesis of Inflammatory Bowel Disease

It is logical to assume that a major pro-inflammatory mechanism, i.e., the NLRP3 inflammasome would play a prominent role in the pathogenesis of the Inflammatory Bowel Disease (IBD) in humans. However, while both studies of murine models of gut disease and patients provide data that the main cytokine product generated by this inflammasome, IL-1β, does in fact contribute to inflammation in IBD, there is no evidence that IL-1β plays a decisive or prominent role in “ordinary” patients with IBD (Crohn's disease). On the other hand, there are several definable point mutations that result in over-active NLRP3 inflammasome activity and in these cases, the gut inflammation is driven by IL-1β and is treatable by biologic agents that block the effects of this cytokine

Biological Applications of Organic Electrochemical Transistors: Electrochemical Biosensors and Electrophysiology Recording

Organic electrochemical transistors (OECTs) are recently developed high-efficient transducers not only for electrochemical biosensor but also for cell electrophysiological recording due to the separation of gate electrode from the transistor device. The efficient integration of OECTs with electrochemical gate electrode makes the as-prepared sensors with improved performance, such as sensitivity, limit of detection, and selectivity. We herein reviewed the recent progress of OECTs-based biosensors and cell electrophysiology recording, mainly focusing on the principle and chemical design of gate electrode and the channel. First, the configuration, work principle, semiconductor of OECT are briefly introduced. Then different kinds of sensing modes are reviewed, especially for the biosensing and electrophysiological recording. Finally, the challenges and opportunities of this research field are discussed