Objective To investigate the characteristics and clinical significance of ocular vestibular evoked myogenic potential (oVEMP) and caloric test in Meniere disease (MD) at different hearing stages.Methods Fifty-five patients(52.8±15.8 years old) with MD were divided into stage 1(9 cases,48.8±13.8 years old), stage 2(9 cases,46.0±16.3 years old), stage 3(23 cases,50.3±13.5 years old) and stage 4(cases 14, 53.5±16.2 years) respectively according to the pure tone audiometry.They were evaluated by oVEMP and caloric test.Results The abnormal rates of oVEMP were 55.6%, 66.7%, 78.3%, 78.6%,and caloric tests were 22.2%, 33.3%, 78.3%,and 85.7% respectively in stage 1, 2, 3, and 4 MD patients.The amplitudes of oVEMP in stage of 1, 2, 3, and 4 MD patients were 4.3±4.0 μV,3.5±2.3 μV,2.5±2.4 μV,and 1.3±0.5 μV,respectively.Conclusion The abnormal rates of oVEMP and caloric tests in MD patients increased with the degree of hearing impairment and the amplitudes of oVEMP were decreased, suggesting that utricle and horizontal semicircular canal injuries were aggravated.

Objective DryLab software was used to assist high performance liquid chromatography (HPLC) method to test and isolate six Cytochrome P450 (CYP450) probe substrates.Methods Six CYP450 probe substrates were selected and the right HPLC method was developed and validated with the assistance of DryLab software.Results The new HPLC method with the assistance of DryLab software could test and isolate six probe substrates with degrees of isolation more than 2.00. The correlation coefficients (R> 0.999 8) indicated high linear correlation between the concentrations and the peak areas among six probe substrates. Recovery studies showed good results for all the probe substrat from 86.38% to 110.29%. And therelative standard deviation (RSD) ranged from 1.69% to 3.80% with its intra-day and inter-day precision ranging from 0.42% to 2.01%, and 1.36% to 2.29%, respectively.Conclusions The developed HPLC method with the assistance of DryLab could test and isolate six probe substrates with shortertime than the HPLC method alone.

Objective The alm of this study was to determine the solubility and permeability of daldzin and daldzein and the interaction of these two components.Methods With the method inChinese Pharmacopoeia and in situ single-pass intestinal perfusion model we tested the solubility and permeability of daldzin, daldzein and their interaction.Results In pH 7.4 K-R buffer the solubility of daldzin was 6 times than daldzein and both the solubility of these two components were enhanced when they were determined together. In small intestine of rat, the permeability of daldzein was 3 times than daldzin. Daldzin could enhance the permeability of daldzein but the daldzein manifested an opposite trend.Conclusion When compared to daldzin, daldzein owned a lower solubility but a better permeability. When used together, both the solubility and permeability of daldzein would be enhanced. The solubility of daldzin could be enhanced slightly but its permeability would be reduced.

Gingseng is commonly used in traditional Chinese medicine community for the treatment of depression-like disorders. Ginsenosides is considered to be the major active components of ginseng. Previous studies have demonstrated that ginsenosides produced antidepressant-like action in various mouse models of behavioral despair. The present study aimed to examine whether ginsenosides could affect the chronic unpredictable mild stress (CUMS)-induced depression in rats. The mechanism(s) underlying the antidepressant-like action was investigated by measuring serum corticosterone level, glucocorticoid receptor (GR), mineralocorticoid receptor (MR) and brain-derived neurotrophic factor (BDNF) mRNA levels in brain tissues. CUMS, being lasted for 6 weeks, caused depression-like behavior in rats, as indicated by the significant decrease in sucrose consumption and increase in immobility time in the forced swim test. Whereas serum corticosterone level was significantly increased in rats exposed to CUMS, expressions of GR mRNA in hippocampus, and BDNF mRNA in hippocampus and frontal cortex, were decreased in CUMS-treated rats. Daily intragastric administration of ginsenosides (12.5, 25, 50 mg x kg(-1)) during the six weeks of CUMS significantly suppressed behavioral and biochemical changes induced by CUMS. However, there was no significant difference in MR mRNA level among groups. The results suggest that the antidepressant-like action of ginsenosides is likely mediated by modulating the function of hypothalamic- pituitary -adrenal axis and increasing the expression of BDNF in brain tissues.
Adrenal Glands ; drug effects ; metabolism ; Animals ; Brain-Derived Neurotrophic Factor ; genetics ; metabolism ; Depression ; drug therapy ; genetics ; metabolism ; Drugs, Chinese Herbal ; administration & dosage ; Ginsenosides ; administration & dosage ; Humans ; Hypothalamus ; drug effects ; metabolism ; Male ; Panax ; chemistry ; Pituitary Gland ; drug effects ; metabolism ; Random Allocation ; Rats ; Rats, Wistar

Parkinson′s disease (PD) is a common neurodegenerative disease. Its main pathological feature is the progressive loss of substantia nigra and other catecholaminergic neurons containing neuromelanin (NM). Therefore, NM may be closely related to the pathogenesis of PD. The content of NM can be detected by NM magnetic sensitive sequence imaging, and then it can be applied to the study of the neuropathological mechanism of NM and PD. This paper focuses on the physiological significance of NM, its role in the pathogenesis of PD and the prospect of NM as a biomarker to assist diagnosis and disease monitoring of PD.

Gardeniae Fructus (GF) and Semen Sojae Praeparatum (SSP) are both medicine food homologies and widely used in Chinese clinical prescriptions together. The research investigated the pharmacokinetics of four iridoids in normal rats and isolfavones-fed rats, which were administered with isolfavones from SSP for 7, 14, 21 and 28 consecutive days. A validated LC-MS/MS method was developed for determining shanzhiside, genipin-1-gentiobioside, geniposide and their metabolite genipin in rat plasma. Plasma samples were pretreated by solid-phase extraction using paeoniflorin as the internal standard. The chromatographic separation was performed on a Waters Atlantis T3 (4.6 mm × 150 mm, 3μm) column using a gradient mobile phase consisting of acetonitril and water (containing 0.06％acetic acid). The mass detection was under the multiple reaction monitoring (MRM) mode via polarity switching between negative and positive ionization modes. The calibration curves exhibited good linearity (r>0.997) for all components. The lower limit of quantitation was in the range of 1-10 ng/mL. The intra-day and inter-day precisions (RSD) at three different levels were both less than 12.2％ and the accuracies (RE) ranged from -10.1％ to 16.4％. The extraction recovery of them ranged from 53.8％ to 99.7％. Pharmacokinetic results indicated the bioavailability of three iridoid glycosides and the metabolite, genipin in normal rats was higher than that in rats exposed to isoflavones. With the longer time of administration of iso-flavones, plasma concentrations of iridoids decreased, while genipin sulfate, the phase II metabolite of genposide and genipin-1-gentiobioside, appeared the rising exposure. The pharmacokinetic profiles of main iridoids from GF were altered by isoflavones.

OBJECTIVE：Compare the fingerprint difference of Vaccariae Semen before and after processed （stir-fried），and to determine the contents of erythrine and vaccarin before and after stir-fried. METHODS ：UPLC method was adopted. The determination was performed on YMC Trait C 18 column with mobile phase consisted of acetonitrile-water （gradient elution ）at the flow rate of 0.35 mL/min. The detection wavelength was set at 219 nm，and the column temperature was 35 ℃. The sample size was 1 μL. Using vaccarin as reference，the fingerprints of Vaccariae Semen crude product and its processed product （each of 17 batches，S1-S17，CS18-CS34） were drawn. The similarity evaluation and common peak identification were carried out by Similarity Evaluation System of TCM Chromatographic Fingerprint （2012 edition）；cluster analysis ，principle component analysis （PCA）and factor analysis were performed by using SPSS 20.0 software. The contents of erythrine and vaccarin in Vaccariae Semen crude product and its processed product were determined by UPLC. RESULTS ：There were 5 common peaks in UPLC fingerprints of 17 batches of Vaccariae Semen crude product and its processed product. The similarities were all higher than 0.99. Among them ， 2 common peaks were identified ，i.e. erythrine ，vaccarin. Results of cluster analysis showed that S 1-S17 were clustered into one category and CS 18-CS34 were clustered into one category. Results of PCA and factor analysis showed that variance contribution rate of the first principle component was 76.418％；erythrine and vaccarin had higher loading on the first principal component （eigenvalues were 0.976 and 0.966，respectively）. The linear ranges of above 2 components were 6.437-321.832 μg/mL and 7.729-386.437 μg/mL，respectively（r＞0.999）. The limits of detection and quantitation were 0.085，0.284 ng （crude product） and 0.739， 2.465 ng （processed product ）， respectively. RSDs of precision ，reproducibility，stability（12 h）and durability tests were all lower than 3％（n＝6 or n＝5）. E-mail：1083656123@qq.com Average recoveries were 96.42％（RSD＝0.85％，n＝6）and 99.13％（RSD＝1.74％，n＝6）. The contents of the two components were 0.11％-0.20％，0.42％-0.63％（crude product ）and 0.08％-0.11％，0.34％-0.50％（processed product ）. CONCLUSIONS ：UPLC fingerprint of Vaccariae Semen crude product and its processed product are established successfully. Although the chemical constituents in Vaccariae Semen are consistent before and after stir-fried ，the contents of erythrine and vaccarin are all decreased after stir-fried.

ObjectiveTo observe the anti-swelling and analgesic effects of Jianpi Tongluo prescription （JPTL） and to explore its mechanism initially. MethodA total of 120 ICR mice were divided into normal group， model group， JPTL low-， medium- and high-dose groups （5， 10， 20 g·kg^-1） and positive drug （celecoxib， 0.03 g·kg^-1） group， with 10 in each group （po，once a day）. Complete freund's adjuvant （CFA） was used to induce the model of chronic inflammatory pain， and xylene-induced ear swelling test， hot plate test and acetic acid writhing test were performed to observe the anti-swelling and analgesic effects of different doses of JPTL in these four acute and chronic models. Further， enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay （ELISA） was used to detect the expressions of prostaglandin E₂ （PGE₂）， interleukin-1β （IL-1β）， interleukin-6 （IL-6） and tumor necrosis factor-α （TNF-α） in serum and inflammatory paw of mice with chronic inflammatory pain， and the expressions of aquaporin 1 （AQP1）， aquaporin 3 （AQP3）， cyclooxygenase 1 （COX1）， cyclooxygenase 2 （COX2） and mitogen-activated protein kinases （MAPKs） in inflammatory paw were detected by Western blot， to explore the preliminary mechanism of JPTL. ResultCompared with the conditions in the normal group， there was a significant increase in the ear swelling of xylene-induced model mice， a shortened paw withdrawal latency in the hot plate test （P<0.01）. Compared with the model group， JPTL remarkably increased the inhibition rate of xylene-induced ear swelling （P<0.05， P<0.01）， prolonged the latency period of writhing caused by acetic acid and reduced the number of writhing （P<0.05， P<0.01）. Compared with normal group, the degree of feet swelling in chronic inflammatory pain mice was significantly increased， the threshold of mechanical pain was decreased and the threshold of cold pain was increased （P<0.05， P<0.01）， the protein contents of AQP1 and AQP3 in inflammatory feet were increased， and the contents of IL-1β， IL-6， TNF-α， PGE₂ and COX2 in inflammatory feet were increased in serum and/or inflammatory feet. The protein expression levels of p-p38 MAPK， p-JNK and p-ERK in inflammatory feet were increased （P<0.01）. Compared with the model group， JPTL relieved paw swelling of mice with chronic inflammatory pain， elevated mechanical withdrawal threshold while decreased cold withdrawal threshold， with analgesia lasting for 4 h and the optimal time point for analgesia being 2 h after administration （P<0.05， P<0.01）. Moreover， JPTL down-regulated AQP1， AQP3， COX2， p-p38 MAPK， p-JNK and p-ERK in inflammatory paw of mice with chronic inflammatory pain and reduced IL-1β， IL-6， TNF-α， and PGE₂ in serum and/or inflammatory paw， but it had no significant effect on COX1 （P<0.05， P<0.01）. ConclusionJPTL has anti-swelling and analgesic effects， and its mechanism is related to inhibiting the production of cytokines and inflammatory mediators via the down-regulation of MAPKs signaling pathway， which provides an experimental basis for the clinical application of JPTL.

A fundamental challenge that arises in biomedicine is the need to characterize compounds in a relevant cellular context in order to reveal potential on-target or off-target effects. Recently, the fast accumulation of gene transcriptional profiling data provides us an unprecedented opportunity to explore the protein targets of chemical compounds from the perspective of cell transcriptomics and RNA biology. Here, we propose a novel Siamese spectral-based graph convolutional network (SSGCN) model for inferring the protein targets of chemical compounds from gene transcriptional profiles. Although the gene signature of a compound perturbation only provides indirect clues of the interacting targets, and the biological networks under different experiment conditions further complicate the situation, the SSGCN model was successfully trained to learn from known compound-target pairs by uncovering the hidden correlations between compound perturbation profiles and gene knockdown profiles. On a benchmark set and a large time-split validation dataset, the model achieved higher target inference accuracy as compared to previous methods such as Connectivity Map. Further experimental validations of prediction results highlight the practical usefulness of SSGCN in either inferring the interacting targets of compound, or reversely, in finding novel inhibitors of a given target of interest.
Drug Delivery Systems ; Proteins ; Transcriptome