RRM2 (ribonucleotide reductase M2)

Ribonucleotide reductase subunit M2 (RRM2) is located in chromosome-2 p25-p24, converts ribonucleotides to deoxynucleotides which is required for DNA polymerization and repair. It has been shown that RMM2 plays a key role in DNA synthesis, cell growth, and drug resistance of cancer cells. There is accumulating evidence that alteration in the expression level of RRM2 can have a substantial impact on the biological characteristics of cancer cells, including tumor initiation and progression, suggesting its role as a prognostic factor and a possible therapeutic target for cancer therapy. Therefore, this review highlights several recent and clinically relevant aspects of the expression and function of RRM2 in human cancer

VEGF gene polymorphism interactions with dietary trace elements intake in determining the risk of metabolic syndrome

There is a complex interaction between genetic, metabolic, and environmental factors in determining the risk of Metabolic Syndrome (MetS). The aim of this study was to investigate the interaction between the dietary intake of iron, copper, zinc, manganese, selenium and iodine (assessed by 24 recall) with vascular endothelial growth factor variants (rs6921438, rs4416670, rs6993770, and rs10738760), on the risk of metabolic syndrome. Two hundred and forty eight individuals with MetS and 100 individuals without MetS recruited. Dietary intake and the daily average of energy and nutrients intake were obtained by questionnaire and quantified using Diet Plan 6 software. DNA was extracted from EDTA anticoagulated whole blood. The SNPs were assessed using using a Sequenom iPLEX Gold assay. Data analysis was undertaken using the Student’s t-test, χ2 test and logistic regression using SPSS 11.5 software. There was a significant interaction between low dietary iron intake with rs6993770 (β= 0.10, p<0.05), and a low dietary zinc and a high manganese intake with rs6921438 in relation to the presence of metabolic syndrome (β= -0.17, p<0.05, β= -0.30, p<0.05, respectively). Our data showed the association of rs6993770 with iron intake and rs6921438 with zinc and manganese intake, indicating further investigating in a larger population to evaluate their values

The association between death anxiety with spiritual experiences and life satisfaction in elderly people

Introduction: Death anxiety is a concept with greater importance among the elderly as they approach inevitability of death. Identifying the correlates of death anxiety among old people is important in order to reduce the burden of this problem. Therefore, the present study was performed with the aim to examine the association between spiritual experiences and life satisfaction with death anxiety in this stage of life. Method: This cross-sectional study with descriptive-analytical design included 190 elderly people visiting the health and medical centers of Neyshabur city, Iran, during fall and winter, 2016. Participants were asked to complete three questionnaires including a 16-item spiritual experiences scale, life satisfaction index proposed by Wood and Shifor with 13 items, and a 27-item death anxiety scale developed by Aminpour. Analytical statistics (Spearman’s correlation coefficient, Pearson’s correlation coefficient) were conducted using SPSS software version 22. Results: Fifty-eight percent of participants were in younger elderly age group with mean age of 68.18±7.13 years and the number of men and women was the same (95). A significant positive association between spiritual experiences and life satisfaction (r=0.2, p<0.05), a significant negative association between spiritual experiences and death anxiety (r=-0.184, p< 0.05) and a significant negative relationship between life satisfaction and death anxiety (r=-0.2, p<0.05) was found. Conclusion: Based on results, it seems that reducing stressors in this stage of life including reduction of death anxiety, is possible through use of spiritual experiences and increasing life satisfaction

Antitumor, Antioxidant and Antibacterial evaluation of new ligand of cinnemaldehyde and its Fe (III) and Mn (II) complexes

Cinnamomum zeylanicum is medicinal plant posse’s significant biological activities. In this    study, we investigated biological properties of the ligand and metal complexes synthesized from herb of C.zeylanicum (cinnemaldehyde) by chemical reactions.                                       N4 [(E, 2E)-3-Phenyl-2-propenylidene] isonicotinohydrazide abbreviated as NI were synthesized as ligand. Fe (III) and Mn (II) metal complexes of this ligand prepared. Characterization of the ligand and its complexes were made by microanalyses, 1H NMR, 13C NMR, FT-IR and UV–Visible spectroscopy. Cytotoxic, antioxidant and antibacterial activities of these compounds have been evaluated by MTT, DPPH, agar disc diffusion and agar dilution assays, respectively. These new compounds showed high Cytotoxic effect against K562, Jurkat and T47D cell lines. Our results showed that the metal complexes and their ligand, had weak antioxidant potential with RC50 value of 0.394, 0.724 and 1.429 mg/mL, respectively. The Fe (III) complex had the highest cytotoxic effects on K562, Jurkat and T47D with IC50 value of 86.12, 77.86, 118.52, respectively. The Fe (III) complex had the highest antibacterial activity and ligand and Mn (II) complex were in next level

24-Hour survival after cardiopulmonary resuscitation is reduced in patients with diabetes mellitus

Introduction: Diabetes mellitus is a risk factor for cardiovascular disease. Some recent studies have shown an association between diabetes and out-of-hospital cardiac arrest incidence and survival. We aimed to investigate whether there is an association between the presence of diabetes mellitus and survival after cardiopulmonary resuscitation (CPR) in patients with an in-hospital cardiac arrest. Methods: A cross-sectional study was conducted during the period of January to February 2014, among 80 cases of cardiopulmonary arrest in patients at Qaem hospital of Mashhad, Iran. A code 99 was announced after a cardiac arrest was identified, and CPR was performed by the cardiac arrest team. Twenty four hour survival was compared in diabetic and non-diabetic patients who had a return to spontaneous circulation after CPR. We used SPSS statistics for Windows version 16 for data analysis. Results: The return to spontaneous circulation in the diabetic group was not significantly lower than for the non-diabetic group (42.9% versus 61.0% [P = 0.15]). However, the 24-hour survival in the diabetic group was significantly lower than for the non-diabetic group (19.0% versus 44.1% [P = 0.04]). Conclusion: The presence of diabetes mellitus is associated with a significantly lower rate of survival after CPR

Evaluation of binding interaction of coumarin antifungals to bilipid membrane using Dock scoring function and Levenberg-Marquardt neural network

163-170Recently, investigation on natural antifungal resources has been increased due to vital need for brand new fungicidal agents. Neural network programs have lots of special features that make them suitable for handling complex problems like analyzing different properties of candidate compounds in computer-aided drug design. In the present study, Levenberg-Marquardt neural network (the fastest of the training algorithms) was used, and the relationship between some important thermodynamic and physico-chemical properties of coumarin compounds and their biological activities (measured by binding interaction energy to bilayer membrane of eukaryote cells) were evaluated. A set of already reported antifungal bioactive coumarin and some well known physical descriptors were selected and, by using Levenberg–Marquardt training algorithm, the best architecture of neural model was designed for predicting the effects of new bioactive compounds. Results revealed that the best architecture according to the term of calculation cycles and considering the correlating behaviour and output cycles of calculation was 19-7-6-1. In addition, the results revealed that the most sensitive input are Log P and molar refractivity. Descriptors, viz., surface tension, energy of LUMO and energy of HOMO were the most important inputs. The correlation coefficient between the observed and the interaction energy values was 0.9132. The study also showed that Dock scoring function can be used for modeling of coumarins antifungal bioactivity