Aldehyde oxidase (AOX), a highly conserved molybdoflavoenzyme in mammal cytoplasm, has broad substrate specificity and ability to catalyze the oxidation of aldehydes and nitrogen, oxygen-containing heterocyclic rings. AOX was found to widely distribute with the individual differences in vivo and plays an important role in phase I metabolism of drugs and xenobiotics. The biological characteristics of AOX and its contributions in drug metabolism are introduced briefly in this review.

This study was aimed to observe the influence of water-solubility nipponica saponin on activation of TNF-α+IL-17-induced rat fibroblast-like synovial cell line RSC-364 cellular model nuclear transcription factor NF-κB pathway as well as TNF-α, IL-1, ICAM-1, MMP-2, MMP-3 secretion. IL-17+ TNF-α were used for stimulating RSC-364 to establish rheumatoid arthritis (RA) cellular model. Water-solubility nipponica saponin in different con-centrations was used for intervention. The influence of water-solubility nipponica saponin in different concentrations on cell viability was detected by semi-quantitative RT-PCR method. Changes in the level of TNF-α, IL-1, ICAM-1, MMP-2, and MMP-3 of culture supernatant were detected by ELISA. The results showed that the activation of NF-κB p65 in RSC-364 stimulated by TNF-α+ IL-17 can be inhibited by water-solubility nipponica saponin ac-cording to its concentration. It improved IκB-α expression, and inhibited TNF-α, IL-1, ICAM-1, MMP-2 and MMP-3 secretion. It was concluded that water-solubility nipponica saponin can inhibit the activation of NF-κB pathway, hinder the secretion and activation of multiple downstream genes, which may be its effect in inhibiting syn-ovial inflammation in RA.

Swine hepatitis E virus (HEV) has been reported as a new zoonotic agent due to its close genomic resemblance to the human HEV. Recently this virus is indicated as one of the important pathogens in xenotransplantation that uses pig as a donor animal. We carried out to investigate the prevalence of HEV infections among the pigs and human population in Chungnam region using a nested RT-PCR for detection of a part of HEV ORF2 gene. The sequences of the amplified DNA were analyzed and the genetical divergency were characterized. A total of 18 HEV strains, comprising 16 strains from pig and 2 strains from human, were genetically isolated from the fecal and serum samples. Among the isolates, 5 strains (2.5%) were detected from 200 swine sera and 2 strains (2.0%) from 100 human sera. All of the 16 swine strains were isolated from the pigs at 3 month of age, but none of age groups revealed the positive for swine HEV RNA. In comparison of the nucleotide sequence between 16 swine HEV and 2 human HEV isolates, the range of identities was 91.5% to 100%. Two human HEV isolates shared 99.7% homology. In phylogenetic analysis, all of the isolates were classified into genotype III, and the 18 isolates were also closely related to the prototype of swine HEV and human HEV strains isolated in the United States and others recently identified from swine in Japan and Netherland.
Animals ; Base Sequence ; Chungcheongnam-do* ; DNA ; Genotype ; Hepatitis E virus* ; Hepatitis E* ; Hepatitis* ; Humans* ; Japan ; Korea* ; Prevalence ; RNA ; Swine* ; Tissue Donors ; Transplantation, Heterologous ; United States

Swine hepatitis E virus (HEV) has been reported as a new zoonotic agent due to its close genomic resemblance to the human HEV. Recently this virus is indicated as one of the important pathogens in xenotransplantation that uses pig as a donor animal. We carried out to investigate the prevalence of HEV infections among the pigs and human population in Chungnam region using a nested RT-PCR for detection of a part of HEV ORF2 gene. The sequences of the amplified DNA were analyzed and the genetical divergency were characterized. A total of 18 HEV strains, comprising 16 strains from pig and 2 strains from human, were genetically isolated from the fecal and serum samples. Among the isolates, 5 strains (2.5%) were detected from 200 swine sera and 2 strains (2.0%) from 100 human sera. All of the 16 swine strains were isolated from the pigs at 3 month of age, but none of age groups revealed the positive for swine HEV RNA. In comparison of the nucleotide sequence between 16 swine HEV and 2 human HEV isolates, the range of identities was 91.5% to 100%. Two human HEV isolates shared 99.7% homology. In phylogenetic analysis, all of the isolates were classified into genotype III, and the 18 isolates were also closely related to the prototype of swine HEV and human HEV strains isolated in the United States and others recently identified from swine in Japan and Netherland.
Animals ; Base Sequence ; Chungcheongnam-do* ; DNA ; Genotype ; Hepatitis E virus* ; Hepatitis E* ; Hepatitis* ; Humans* ; Japan ; Korea* ; Prevalence ; RNA ; Swine* ; Tissue Donors ; Transplantation, Heterologous ; United States

A rapid and sensitive liquid chromatography-tandem mass spectrometry (LC-MS/MS) method was developed and validated for the simultaneous determination of H002 and its phosphorylated metabolite, H002-P and hydroxylated metabolite H002-M, in rat blood. H001, an analogue of H002, was used as the internal standard. Blood samples were prepared by simple protein precipitation. The analytes and internal standard were separated on a Zorbax SB-C18 column with a gradient mobile phase consisting of methanol and water containing 0.1% formic acid at a flow rate of 0.2 mL/min with an operating temperature of 20 °C. The detection was performed on a triple quadrupole tandem mass spectrometer with positive electrospray ionization in multiple-reaction monitoring mode. Linear detection responses were obtained from 0.2-100 ng/mL for H002 and H002-M, while 0.5-100 ng/mL for H002-P. The intra- and inter-day precision (RSD%) was within 11.76%, with the accuracy (RE%) ranging from -9.84% to 9.12%. The analytes were shown to be stable during sample storage, preparation and analytic procedures. The method was applied to determine the pharmacokinetics of H002 in rats, and a preliminary study showed that the pharmacokinetics of H002 correlated with its biological effect on peripheral blood lymphocytes.