Biomarkers and Drug Discovery
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Published By Auctores Publishing LLC

2642-9799

2018 ◽  
Vol 1 (2) ◽  
pp. 01-04
Author(s):  
Robert Skopec

State Department evacuates a number of Americans from the U.S. consulate in Guangzhou, China after they experienced unexplained health issues. A group of U.S. diplomats stationed in China have been brought back to the states after being inflicted by a mystery illness that reportedly resembles the brain injuries previously suffered by staff in Cuba. Heather Nauert, a State Department spokeswoman, said in a statement that the individuals from the U.S. office in Guangzhou were returned home for further evaluation. It was unclear if there was any connection to last year’s situation in Cuba where 24 U.S. government employees experienced a range of ailments after hearing an unusual sound.


2018 ◽  
Vol 1 (2) ◽  
pp. 01-02
Author(s):  
Shiva kumar M ◽  
Sadasivan Sadasivan ◽  
Chanderasekharan Chanderasekharan ◽  
Yogananda Moolemath ◽  
Anup M Oomme

Background: Use of biomarkers particularly under in vivo condition is of importance in risk assessment. This study is proposed to identify the in vivo antigenotoxic potential using dominant lethal mutation test in B(a)P exposed, turmeric fed animals and evaluate the role of turmeric in counteracting the germ cell mutations. Methods: Twenty four male mice were taken and divided into 4 groups each group containing 6 mice/group. The first and second group received stock diet (control) while the third and fourth groups received 5% turmeric diet for a period of one month. At the end of feeding period, second and fourth group received a single dose of benzo(a)pyrene 1mg/mouse intraperitoneally. After 1 week each male mouse was mated to 3 female mice at 1,4, 8 and 12 week intervals. On 13th day from mid point of mating, the females were sacrificed and live and dead embryos were counted to study the pre and post implantation loss of embryos. The differences in the frequencies of pre and post implant deaths were done by comparing treated with control group at 4-time periods by analysis of variance (ANOVA) and chi-square test which is used to compare treatment group and positive control with negative control. Results: Feeding of 5% turmeric and treatment with a single dose of B(a)P did not show any significant effect on the mutagenic index or the frequency of pregnancy in treated groups compared with control. There was no apparent induction of dominant lethal mutations in B(a)P or B(a)P+Turmeric treated groups. No post implantation dominant lethal effects produced by B(a)P could be detected in this study. The induction of B(a)P and treatment with turmeric did not influence the dominant lethal test. Conclusion: B(a)P did not produce a significant increase in the dominant lethal mutations. Turmeric also did not give any positive response and may be considered as non-mutagenic. The negative result suggests that under the conditions of the test the test substance may not be genotoxic in the germ cell of the treated sex of the test species.


2018 ◽  
Vol 1 (1) ◽  
pp. 01-04
Author(s):  
Robert Skopec

2018 ◽  
Vol 1 (1) ◽  
pp. 01-01
Author(s):  
Haleena Kaur

Aptamers are short single stranded oligonucleotide sequences that exhibit high binding affinity and high specificity against their target molecule. Binding affinity and specificity are crucial features for aptamers in order to exploit their therapeutic and diagnostic potential and to make them an appealing candidate for the commercial market1,2. Aptamers contain functional moieties that can fold into different conformation such as hairpin stem and loops, G-quadruplexes, and pseudoknots. A study led by Dr Harleen Kaur involving unique stem-loop truncation strategy was employed to find the binding domain in a 66-mer long DNA aptamer sequence against the heparin binding domain of vascular endothelial growth factor (VEGF165) protein1. The results from the work demonstrated identification of a 26-mer long aptamer sequence referred as SL2-B in the paper with improvement in the binding affinity by more than 200-folds (Kd = 0.5nM) against VEGF protein. To improve the biostability of the aptamer in the biological fluids, the phosphorothioate linkages (PS-linkages) in the phosphate backbone of the DNA were introduced at the 5’-and 3’-termini of the obtained SL2-B aptamer sequence. The PS-modified SL2-B aptamer sequence demonstrated significant improvement in the stability without comprising


2018 ◽  
Vol 1 (1) ◽  
pp. 01-03
Author(s):  
Robert Skopec

State Department evacuates a number of Americans from the U.S. consulate in Guangzhou, China after they experienced unexplained health issues. A group of U.S. diplomats stationed in China have been brought back to the states after being inflicted by a mystery illness that reportedly resembles the brain injuries previously suffered by staff in Cuba. Heather Nauert, a State Department spokeswoman, said in a statement that the individuals from the U.S. office in Guangzhou were returned home for further evaluation. It was unclear if there was any connection to last year’s situation in Cuba where 24 U.S. government employees experienced a range of ailments after hearing an unusual sound.


2018 ◽  
Vol 1 (1) ◽  
pp. 01-05
Author(s):  
Yuan Ko Wang ◽  
Jun- Ming Xu

Background: Depression and cardiovascular disease risk factors develop in childhood. The objective of this study was to investigate cross sectional and longitudinal associations between blood pressure, mood scores and tagged SNPs within the Monoamine oxidase A (MAOA) gene in the Western Australian Pregnancy Cohort (Raine) Study. Methods: Data from the five (n=1097), eight (n=1046), ten (n=1026) and fourteen (n=1124) year surveys were used. Blood pressure was measured at all surveys, anxious-depressed scores obtained from the Childhood Behavior Checklist at all surveys and depressive symptom scores from the Beck Depression Inventory for Youth at 14 years. Single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) tagging the MAOA gene were identified from HapMap Phase II (CEU) data and genotyped. Cross sectional and longitudinal analyses were used to examine the association between blood pressure (outcome) and tagged SNPs within the MAOA gene and anxious/depressed scores (outcome) and tagged SNPs within the MAOA gene. Results: At 14 years, boys with the risk allele of SNP rs5905859 and rs3027396 had higher systolic blood pressure (βrs5905859=2.5; 95% CI: 0.743, 4.337 and βrs3027396=2.5; 95% CI: 0.681, 4.383 respectively) and lower mood scores (βrs5905859=-0.1; 95% CI: -0.100, -0.022 and βrs3027396=-0.2; 95% CI: -0.313,-0.045 respectively). Longitudinally, boys with the risk allele of SNPs rs5905859 (β=0.3; 95% CI: 0.026, 0.540) or rs6609257 (β= 0.3; 95% CI: 0.022, 0.521) had a higher mean systolic blood pressure trajectory compared to boys without. Conclusions: Variation within or close to the MAOA gene may explain in part the association between lower depressive symptom scores and higher systolic blood pressure in Caucasian boys within the Raine cohort.


2018 ◽  
Vol 1 (1) ◽  
pp. 01-03
Author(s):  
Vkihih-Hwa Chen

Background: Numerous single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) located in chromosomal region 9p21 have been associated with cardiovascular disease, most of these studies in European populations. We have no knowledge of studies conducted in admixed populations populations as the Latin Americans. For this reason we decided to study the association of SNPs rs2383206, rs10757274 and rs10757278, together with some non-genetic factors with arterial thrombotic events (AT), in individuals from the north-eastern portion of Venezuela. Methods: Gender, age and non-genetic risk variables were evaluated in 119 patients with AT and 119 control subjects. Genotypes were identified using TaqMan probes. The odds ratio (OR) for genotypes alone and in conjunction with non-genetic variables were estimated. Results: There was a consistent association of rs10757278 with AT, increased in males (OR=2.38). The medium-low socioeconomic status also confers a significant risk for AT in both sexes (OR=4.04). Haplotypes with at least two A alleles, proved to be protective (OR=0.53) in developing arterial thrombosis. Conclusions: There was a consistent association with AT for the rs10757278 polymorphism, increased in males. Sex and socioeconomic status were also significant risk factors in this study reinforcing the importance in studying other variables such as environmental and sex differences together with the genetic structure of each population when analyzing risks for AT diseases. These results serve as a guide when searching for markers of risk for this disease common in Venezuela.


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