Search results for "Liver"

Targeting the mevalonate pathway for improved anticancer therapy.

2009

The mevalonate pathway is important for the generation of isoprene moieties thereby providing the basis for the biosynthesis of molecules required for maintaining membrane integrity, steroid production and cell respiration. Additionally, isoprene precursors are indispensable for the prenylation of regulatory proteins such as Ras and Ras-homologous (Rho) GTPases. These low molecular GTP-binding proteins play key roles in numerous signal transduction pathways stimulated upon activation of cell surface receptors by ligand binding. Thus, Ras/Rho proteins eventually regulate cell proliferation, tumor progression and cell death induced by anticancer therapeutics. Lipid modification of Ras/Rho pro…

Interconnections among inflammation, chronic liver disease and HIV: understanding the hepatoprotective effects of the antiretroviral drug rilpivirine

2022

INTRODUCCIÓN Durante las últimas décadas, la utilización de la terapia antirretroviral combinada (TARc) para combatir la infección por el virus de la inmunodeficiencia humana (VIH) ha convertido esta enfermedad en una patología crónica. A pesar de que la TARc ha mejorado enormemente la calidad de vida de los pacientes, según diversos estudios epidemiológicos, estos pacientes envejecen antes y sufren de enfermedades relacionadas con la edad como cáncer, osteoporosis, enfermedades metabólicas (diabetes mellitus y enfermedad hepática) y patologías neurodegenerativas aparecen a edades más tempranas que la población no infectada. Los mecanismos responsables de este fenómeno aún no se conocen, si…

The Influence of Nanoparticle Shape on Protein Corona Formation

2020

Nanoparticles have become an important utility in many areas of medical treatment such as targeted drug and treatment delivery as well as imaging and diagnostics. These advances require a complete understanding of nanoparticles' fate once placed in the body. Upon exposure to blood, proteins adsorb onto the nanoparticles surface and form a protein corona, which determines the particles' biological fate. This study reports on the protein corona formation from blood serum and plasma on spherical and rod‐shaped nanoparticles. These two types of mesoporous silica nanoparticles have identical chemistry, porosity, surface potential, and size in the y ‐dimension, one being a sphere and the other a …

Ultrasound bioeffects in rats: quantification of cellular damage in the fetal liver after pulsed Doppler imaging

2011

Objective To determine whether pulsed Doppler examination of the ductus venosus in rat fetuses could damage exposed tissue. Methods On gestational day 18, the livers of a mean of approximately five fetuses per mother (n = 5.14, SD = 1.6), in a cohort of 35 pregnant female rats, were exposed individually to pulsed Doppler and these were considered the 'exposed group'. The remaining fetuses in each pregnant rat (n = 5.16, SD = 2.1) formed the 'control group'. We tested for 600, 300, 60, 20, 15, 10 and 3 s of exposure of the fetal ductus venosus and the damage was evaluated measuring a cell death index of apoptotic activity at 7 h post-exposure (n = 16). In addition, subgroups of mothers were …

Warming temperatures and ectoparasitic sea lice impair internal organs in juvenile Atlantic salmon

2021

As a consequence of climate change and open net-pen salmon farming, wild Atlantic salmon Salmo salar are increasingly likely to encounter elevated temperatures and parasite abundances during their early marine migration. Such stressors can compromise fitness by diminishing liver energy stores and impairing cardiac muscle. To assess whether temperature and infestation by salmon lice Lepeophtheirus salmonis are important correlates of liver energy stores and cardiac muscle performance in juvenile salmon, we experimentally infested fish at 3 abundances of louse infestation (zero, low, and high) and 5 temperatures (10, 13, 16, 19, and 22°C). At the end of the experiment (i.e. when sea lice reac…

Testing the Modified Sediment Delivery Model (MOSEDD) at SPA2 Experimental Basin, Sicily (Italy)

2017

A new version of a spatially distributed sediment delivery model taking into account the hillslope sediment transport efficiency, named MOSEDD, is presented. This model gives estimates of basin sediment yield at event scale, which are more reliable than those obtained by the original SEDD. For SPA2 basin discretized into morphological units, four different calculation schemes of MOSEDD, including the original SEDD version, were applied. All parameterization schemes of the model were calibrated using 15 events measured at the outlet of the experimental basin in the period February 2005–February 2010. The model calibration was used to determine a relationship between the coefficient βe of the…

Delivery of shNupr1 plasmid by solid lipid nanoparticles reduces the expression of Nupr1 gene in hepatocellular carcinoma cells

2015

Polymeric nanoparticles for siRNA delivery: Production and applications

2017

Gene therapy through the use of siRNA and a polymeric carrier are becoming an efficient therapeutic option to conventional pharmaceutical formulations for the treatment of deadly diseases, such as cancer, pulmonary, ocular and neurodegenerative diseases. However, several considerations regarding the stability, formulation, and efficacy have to be faced up until these systems could be considered to be a marketable pharmaceutical products for to extend siRNA application to clinical practice. This review is focused on the key challenges of siRNA therapeutics, with special attention on the faced obstacles and on the formulation-related difficulties, providing a list of requirements needed for o…

Development of New Targeted Inulin Complex Nanoaggregates for siRNA Delivery in Antitumor Therapy.

2021

Here, a novel strategy of formulating efficient polymeric carriers based on the already described INU-IMI-DETA for gene material whose structural, functional, and biological properties can be modulated and improved was successfully investigated. In particular, two novel derivatives of INU-IMI-DETA graft copolymer were synthesized by chemical functionalisation with epidermal growth factor (EGF) or polyethylenglycol (PEG), named INU-IMI-DETA-EGF and INU-IMI-DETA-PEG, respectively, in order to improve the performance of already described “inulin complex nanoaggregates” (ICONs). The latter were thus prepared by appropriately mixing the two copolymers, by varying each component from 0 to 100 wt%…

Development of different nanosystems for drugs and siRNA delivery

Cancer is one of the leading causes of death in the world. Over the past several decades, the development of engineered nanosystems for targeted drug delivery have received great attention thanks to their possibility to overcome the limitations of classical cancer chemotherapy including poor solubility, targeting incapability, nonspecific action and, consequently, systemic toxicity. In this contest, four different models of nanocarriers have been analysed and compared for their capacity to target tumour tissue and to release the therapeutic agent in a controlled way: INU-EDA-P,C-DOXO; PHEA-EDA-P,C-DOXO; PVP-siRNA and RGO-siRNA. Inulin and PHEA were conjugated to the antineoplastic drug doxo…