0000000000721981
AUTHOR
Adcock I.
Is diet partly responsible for differences in COVID-19 death rates between and within countries?
Abstract Reported COVID-19 deaths in Germany are relatively low as compared to many European countries. Among the several explanations proposed, an early and large testing of the population was put forward. Most current debates on COVID-19 focus on the differences among countries, but little attention has been given to regional differences and diet. The low-death rate European countries (e.g. Austria, Baltic States, Czech Republic, Finland, Norway, Poland, Slovakia) have used different quarantine and/or confinement times and methods and none have performed as many early tests as Germany. Among other factors that may be significant are the dietary habits. It seems that some foods largely use…
Role of TGF-b1 in type I collagen production in bronchial epithelial cells: effects on Smad7 inhibitory role?
Airway epithelial cells play an important role in inflammatory, apoptotic and remodelling process associate with fibrosis and COPD. Transforming growth factor 1 (TGF-b1) is involved in airways remodelling by Smads signalling pathway. We investigated the role of TGF-b1 on type I collagen production and Smads (Smad 2-3-4-and 7) expression in bronchial epithelial cells (16HBE). Cells were treated with 1ng/ml and 10ng/ml of TGF-b1 for 0, 3 and 24 hours. With low dose of TGF-b1 we observed no significant variation on Smad2 mRNA expression for both times but a significant increased of Smad7 mRNA expression at 3h (p=0.0043) and a significant reduction of Smad3, Smad4 and Smad7 mRNA expression at 2…