The authors discuss the technical problems in clinical evaluation of newly-developed Chinese medicines.For improvement of evaluation quality,this paper puts forward some suggestions for solving the common problems such as unitary intervention pattern,lack of corresponding treatment for the changed syndrome,subjectivity in standards of syndrome-differentiated diagnosis,ill-chosen medicine in control group,and mismanagement of medicine combination.

Nonalcoholic fatty liver(NAFL)is characterized by the hepatocyte steatosis and lipid accumulation,and is a clinical syndrome of unrelated to excessive alcohol consumption. At present,patients with the syndrome obviously increase in the whole world. Sterol regulatory element-binding proteins (SREBPs) are the key transcription factors of controlling the biosynthesis of cholesterol,fatty acids and triglycerides,and adipocyte differentiation. In this paper,the regulation of SREBPs and its research progress in the development of NAFL were reviewed.

ObjectiveTo evaluate the clinical efficacy of acupuncture plus moxibustion in treating chronic superficial gastritis (due to colddeficiency of spleen and stomach).MethodTotally 112 patients with chronic superficial gastritis (due to cold deficiency of spleen and stomach) were randomized into a treatment group of 56 cases and a control group of 56 cases. The treatment group was intervened by acupuncture plus moxibustion, while the control group was by using Ranitidine, both for 2 treatment courses (20 d).ResultAfter 2 treatment courses, the total effective rate of the treatment group was significantly higher than that of the control group (P<0.01); in comparing the gastroscopic results after treatment, the total effective rate of the treatment group was significantly superior to that of the control group (P<0.01).ConclusionAcupuncture plus moxibustion can produce a significantly higher therapeutic efficacy than orally taking Ranitidine in treating chronic superficial gastritis.

High-throughput screening is a regular approach available for identitying new lead compounds for the growing validated drug targets in drug screening. However, it has also introduced a large number of peculiar molecules which interfere drug screening. Pan assay interference compounds (PAINS) interfere with the progress of drug screening in various ways, such as interfering with a biochemical assay, modifying the protein, aggregate-based inhibitors and so on. So it is of vital significance to remove them. This paper has consulted the concept, category of PAINS and reviewed the way of PAINS interfering and the countermeasures to cope with them to direct the approach of high through screening and improve the hits percent.

Recent studies suggest that astrocyte elevated gene 1 ( AEG-1 ) is almost highly expressed in all types of malignant solid tumors and correlates with poor prognosis,which becomes a prognostic marker for many kinds of tumors.As a strongly basic protein,AEG-1 possesses a transmembrane domain and multiplenuclear localization signals.It is present in the cell membrane,cytoplasm and nucleus.As an oncogene,AEG-1 palys an important role in a virety of malignant biological behaviors of cancer,which range from cell proliferation,apoptosis,migration,adhesion,invasion to tumor angiogenesis and chemotherapy resistance.Its critical role in tumor genesis and progression has made it a potential therapeutic target.

High-throughput screening is a regular approach available for identitying new lead compounds for the growing validated drug targets in drug screening. However, it has also introduced a large number of peculiar molecules which interfere drug screening. Pan assay interference compounds (PAINS) interfere with the progress of drug screening in various ways, such as interfering with a biochemical assay, modifying the protein, aggregate-based inhibitors and so on. So it is of vital significance to remove them. This paper has consulted the concept, category of PAINS and reviewed the way of PAINS interfering and the countermeasures to cope with them to direct the approach of high through screening and improve the hits percent.
Drug Discovery ; High-Throughput Screening Assays ; methods

Objective To investigate the change of adhesive properties of polymorphonuclear neutrophils(PMN) and endothelial cells (EC) in patients with cerebral infarction (CI), and define the effects of antibodies to intercellular adhesion molecular 1 (ICAM 1, anti CD54 antibodies) upon the adhesion.Methods We detected the adhesive rate between human umbilical vein endothelial cells (ECV 304) and PMN of patients with CI within 1 week and at 21 days.Results (1) The adhesive rate of ECV 304 to PMN of 30 patients with CI within 1 week increased significantly ( P

Objective: To explore neural correlates for the recognition of facial expression videos using event-related functional magnetic resonance imaging.Methods:Thirteen right-handed healthy Chinese women underwent blood oxygen level dependent (BOLD) fMRI voluntarily while recognizing happy, sad, neutral emotional faces and fixation cross videos.Results:In comparison with fixation cross, recognition of neutral faces activated the left middle frontal gyrus, the bilateral precentral gyrus, the right amygdala, the left parahippocampal gyrus, the right postcentral gyrus and the left thalamus. In comparison of neutral faces recognition, the recognition of happy faces elicited increased activation in the right medial frontal gyrus, the right superior frontal gyrus, the middle frontal gyrus, the right anterior cingulated gyrus, the left subcallosal gyrus, the right superior occipital gyrus, the left middle occipital gyrus and the right superior temporal gyrus; while the recognition of sad faces activated the left medial frontal gyrus, the right middle frontal gyrus, the left inferior temporal gyrus and the left superior temporal gyrus.Conclusion:This study indicates that the recognition of facial expression is mediated by a distributed cortical network, and the medial frontal gyrus may be involved in discriminating different affective information, while the superior temporal gyrus may play an important role in processing the dynamic characters of face.

Objective To observe the effect of ligustrazine (TMP) on the expression of connective tissue growth factor (CTGF) and osteopontin (OPN) in the renal tubulointerstitium of diabetic nephropathy (DN) rats. Methods Wistar rats were used to establish the models through intraperitoneal injection of onedose streptozotocin (STZ) and nephrectomy. Rats were divided into 5 groups at random: model group, blank control group, Lotensin (1.7 mg? kg- 1? d- 1) group, of high-and lowdosage of TMP groups (150, 50 mg? kg- 1? d- 1). Except the rats in blank group and model group, the rats received corresponding medicines according to the experimental design for 12 weeks.Volume of urine protein within 24 hours was examined in the 4th, the 8th and the 12 th week, OPN mRNA expression in the renal tubulointerstitium was detected by RT- PCR and CTGF was detected by means of immunohistochemistry. Results Compared with normal group, the volume of 24 h urine protein rised obviously (P

Objective To investigate the imaging and condylar movements during mandibular opening/closing movement in AngleⅡ2 malocclusion accompanying one side of temporomandibular joint(TMJ)click before and after orthodontic treatment.Methods There were 20 AngleⅡ2 malocclusion patients with one side of TMJ click in treatment group,and 23 with the individual normal occlusion in control group.This study was performed taking the films of Sch?ller position before and after treatment,using CADIAX to record the condylar tracings during opening/closing movement and analyze the qualitative and quantitive changes.Results In AngleⅡ2 malocclusion patients,the condylar position of 58.33% patients recovered from retroposition to mesoposition.The condyle movement presented conspicuous verticality,the smoothing and symmetry were not well,and obvious improvements were observed after the treatment.All the index changed remarkably except the TCI and TCI of 5 mm.Conclusion It is suggested that orthodontic treatment can make the disc-condyle relationship return to normalization,and the condylar movement become much more coherent.