Effects of diesel exhaust, heavy metals and pesticides on various organ systems: possible mechanisms and strategies for prevention and treatment

Environmental pollutants have a significant impact on the ecosystem and disrupt balance between environment, human and non-human components that result in deleterious effects to all forms of life. Identifying environmental factors for potential imbalance are extremely crucial for devising strategies for combating such toxic dysregulation. Automobile exhaust (in air), heavy metals (in food and water) and pesticides (in air, food, soil and water) are the most common environmental pollutants and their short and long-term exposures can cause hazardous effects in humans leading to systemic disorders involving lungs, kidney and immune systems. Mechanisms involved in genesis of such toxic effects have revealed complex, interactive pathways. Strategies for the protection of homeostasis and health, viz., general preventive measures, nutritional supplements and herbal agents have been described, to counter these pollutants induced damaging effects on various body systems.     

Differential antioxidative responses of ascorbate-glutathione cycle enzymes and metabolites to chromium stress in green gram (Vigna radiata L. wilczek) leaves

Chromium-induced antioxidative responses of ascorbate-glutathione cycle enzymes and metabolites in green gram(Vigna radiata L. Wilczek) leaves were investigated in both dose and time-dependent manners. Rapid uptake of Cr was observed immediately after the start of treatment. Significant reduction was observed in leaf biomass under 300 μM Cr-treatment. Treatment with 300 μM Cr increases the content of hydrogen peroxide and Superoxide dismytase activity upto initial 96 h, and then gradually declined to the basal level. Ascorbate peroxidase and guaiacol peroxidase activities were low in 300 μM Cr-treated leaves during the first 96 h, but significantly increased therefore, suggesting that increased enzyme activities would be responsible for the removal of H₂O₂. Catalase activities were always suppressed under Cr stress. Contents of reduced ascorbate and dehydroascorbate were significantly decreased under 300 uM Cr-treatment. The reduced glutathione content decreased at early stages of Cr-treatment. However, it was restored to the normal level as in controls thereafter. In contrast, the glutathione disulphide content showed a progressive increase during the initial hours of Cr-treatment. The non-protein thiol content was shown to increase during the first several hours, but it declines at later stages. The present results demonstrate that Cr-induced oxidative stress is an important component of the plant’s reaction to toxic levels of Cr.     

Analysis of sample set enrichment scores: assaying the enrichment of sets of genes for individual samples in genome-wide expression profiles

MOTIVATION: Gene expression profiling experiments in cell lines and animal models characterized by specific genetic or molecular perturbations have yielded sets of genes annotated by the perturbation. These gene sets can serve as a reference base for interrogating other expression datasets. For example, a new dataset in which a specific pathway gene set appears to be enriched, in terms of multiple genes in that set evidencing expression changes, can then be annotated by that reference pathway. We introduce in this paper a formal statistical method to measure the enrichment of each sample in an expression dataset. This allows us to assay the natural variation of pathway activity in observed gene expression data sets from clinical cancer and other studies. RESULTS: Validation of the method and illustrations of biological insights gleaned are demonstrated on cell line data, mouse models, and cancer-related datasets. Using oncogenic pathway signatures, we show that gene sets built from a model system are indeed enriched in the model system. We employ ASSESS for the use of molecular classification by pathways. This provides an accurate classifier that can be interpreted at the level of pathways instead of individual genes. Finally, ASSESS can be used for cross-platform expression models where data on the same type of cancer are integrated over different platforms into a space of enrichment scores. AVAILABILITY: Versions are available in Octave and Java (with a graphical user interface). Software can be downloaded at http://people.genome.duke.edu/assess.     

Enriched Environment Prevents Hypobaric Hypoxia Induced Neurodegeneration and is Independent of Antioxidant Signaling

Hypobaric hypoxia (HH) induced neurodegeneration has been attributed to several factors including increased oxidative stress, glutamate excitotoxicity, decreased growth factors, apoptosis, etc. Though enriched environment (EE) has been known to have beneficial effects in various neurological disorders, its effect on HH mediated neurodegeneration remains to be studied. Therefore, the present study was conducted to explore the effect of EE on HH induced neurodegeneration. Male Sprague-Dawley rats were placed in enriched and standard conditions during exposure to HH (7 days) equivalent to an altitude of 25,000 ft. The effect of EE on oxidative stress markers, apoptosis, and corticosterone level in hippocampus was investigated. EE during exposure to HH was found to decrease neurodegeneration as evident from decreased caspase 3 expression and LDH leakage. However, no significant changes were observed in ROS, MDA, and antioxidant status of hippocampus. HH elevates corticosterone level and affected the diurnal corticoid rhythm which may contribute to neurodegeneration, whereas EE ameliorate this effect. Because of the association of neurotrophins and stress and/or corticosterone the BDNF and NGF levels were also examined and it was found that HH decreases their level but concurrent exposure to EE maintains their level. Moreover, inhibition of Tyrosine kinase receptor (Trk) with K252a nullifies the protective effect of EE, whereas Trk activation with agonist, amitriptyline showed protective effect similar to EE. Taken together, we conclude that EE has a potential to ameliorate HH mediated neuronal degeneration which may act through antioxidant independent pathway by modulation of neurotrophins.     

Antitumor potential of Castanopsis indica (Roxb. ex Lindl.) A. DC. leaf extract against Ehrlich's ascites carcinoma cell

Methanol extract of C. indica (MECI) leaves showed direct cytotoxicity on Ehrlich ascites carcinoma (EAC) cell in a dose dependant manner and there was significant decrease in the tumor volume, viable cell count, tumor weight and elevated the life span of EAC tumor bearing mice. Hematological profile and biochemical estimations were significantly restored to normal levels in MECI treated as compared to EAC control mice. MECI treatment significantly modulated the tissue antioxidant assay parameters as compared to the EAC control mice. The results revealed that MECI possesses significant dose dependent antitumor potential which may be due to its cytotoxicity and antioxidant properties.     

Appraisal of a Leishmania major Strain Stably Expressing mCherry Fluorescent Protein for Both In Vitro and In Vivo Studies of Potential Drugs and Vaccine against Cutaneous Leishmaniasis

Background

Leishmania major cutaneous leishmaniasis is an infectious zoonotic disease. It is produced by a digenetic parasite, which resides in the phagolysosomal compartment of different mammalian macrophage populations. There is an urgent need to develop new therapies (drugs) against this neglected disease that hits developing countries. The main goal of this work is to establish an easier and cheaper tool of choice for real-time monitoring of the establishment and progression of this pathology either in BALB/c mice or in vitro assays. To validate this new technique we vaccinated mice with an attenuated Δhsp70-II strain of Leishmania to assess protection against this disease.

Methodology

We engineered a transgenic L. major strain expressing the mCherry red-fluorescent protein for real-time monitoring of the parasitic load. This is achieved via measurement of fluorescence emission, allowing a weekly record of the footpads over eight weeks after the inoculation of BALB/c mice.

Results

In vitro results show a linear correlation between the number of parasites and fluorescence emission over a range of four logs. The minimum number of parasites (amastigote isolated from lesion) detected by their fluorescent phenotype was 10,000. The effect of antileishmanial drugs against mCherry+L. major infecting peritoneal macrophages were evaluated by direct assay of fluorescence emission, with IC₅₀ values of 0.12, 0.56 and 9.20 µM for amphotericin B, miltefosine and paromomycin, respectively. An experimental vaccination trial based on the protection conferred by an attenuated Δhsp70-II mutant of Leishmania was used to validate the suitability of this technique in vivo.

Conclusions

A Leishmania major strain expressing mCherry red-fluorescent protein enables the monitoring of parasitic load via measurement of fluorescence emission. This approach allows a simpler, faster, non-invasive and cost-effective technique to assess the clinical progression of the infection after drug or vaccine therapy.     

Kaposi's sarcoma-associated herpesvirus forms a multimolecular complex of integrins (alphaVbeta5, alphaVbeta3, and alpha3beta1) and CD98-xCT during infection of human dermal microvascular endothelial cells, and CD98-xCT is essential for the postentry stage of infection

Kaposi's sarcoma-associated herpesvirus (KSHV) interacts with cell surface heparan sulfate (HS) and α3β1 integrin during the early stages of infection of human dermal microvascular endothelial cells (HMVEC-d) and human foreskin fibroblasts (HFF), and these interactions are followed by virus entry overlapping with the induction of preexisting host cell signal pathways. KSHV also utilizes the amino acid transporter protein xCT for infection of adherent cells, and the xCT molecule is part of the cell surface heterodimeric membrane glycoprotein CD98 (4F2 antigen) complex known to interact with α3β1 and αVβ3 integrins. KSHV gB mediates adhesion of HMVEC-d, CV-1, and HT-1080 cells and HFF via its RGD sequence. Anti-αV and -β1 integrin antibodies inhibited the cell adhesion mediated by KSHV-gB. Variable levels of neutralization of HMVEC-d and HFF infection were observed with antibodies against αVβ3 and αVβ5 integrins. Similarly, variable levels of inhibition of virus entry into adherent HMVEC-d, 293 and Vero cells, and HFF was observed by preincubating virus with soluble α3β1, αVβ3, and αVβ5 integrins, and cumulative inhibition was observed with a combination of integrins. We were unable to infect HT1080 cells. Virus binding and DNA internalization studies suggest that αVβ3 and αVβ5 integrins also play roles in KSHV entry. We observed time-dependent temporal KSHV interactions with HMVEC-d integrins and CD98/xCT with three different patterns of association and dissociation. Integrin αVβ5 interaction with CD98/xCT predominantly occurred by 1 min postinfection (p.i.) and dissociated at 10 min p.i., whereas α3β1-CD98/xCT interaction was maximal at 10 min p.i. and dissociated at 30 min p.i., and αVβ3-CD98/xCT interaction was maximal at 10 min p.i. and remained at the observed 30 min p.i. Fluorescence microscopy also showed a similar time-dependent interaction of αVβ5-CD98. Confocal-microscopy studies confirmed the association of CD98/xCT with α3β1 and KSHV. Preincubation of KSHV with soluble heparin and α3β1 significantly inhibited this association, suggesting that the first contact with HS and integrin is an essential element in subsequent CD98-xCT interactions. Anti-CD98 and xCT antibodies did not block virus binding and entry and nuclear delivery of viral DNA; however, viral-gene expression was significantly inhibited, suggesting that CD98-xCT play roles in the post-entry stage of infection, possibly in mediating signal cascades essential for viral-gene expression. Together, these studies suggest that KSHV interacts with functionally related integrins (αVβ3, α3β1, and αVβ5) and CD98/xCT molecules in a temporal fashion to form a multimolecular complex during the early stages of endothelial cell infection, probably mediating multiple roles in entry, signal transduction, and viral-gene expression.