This paper briefly analyzed and discussed the current status and major scientific challenges of traditional Chinese medicine (TCM) formulaology research. To promote formulaology research, a new strategy and corresponding technology, network formulaology, were proposed to reveal the complex interaction between functional chemome and biological responses network. The research framework and directions of network formulaology were also summarized and prospected.
Chemistry, Pharmaceutical ; methods ; standards ; Drugs, Chinese Herbal ; chemistry ; Internet ; Medicine, Chinese Traditional ; standards

AIM: To observe the role of confocal microscopy in infectious keratitis management.
METHODS:Totally 466 patients (467 eyes) diagnosed as infectious keratitis from January 2010 to December 2013 were retrospectively studied. the corneas were examined early by in vivo confocal microscopy. The characteristics of their images and clinical features were studied and summarized.
RESULTS:All patients were recorded, the average age was 54. 4±13. 0 years, in which 264 cases (56. 7%) were male, and 202 cases ( 43. 3%) were female. In the 466 patients, 190 (40. 8%) were fungal keratitis, 148 (31. 8%) were viral keratitis, 125 (26. 8%) were bacterial keratitis and 3 ( 0.6%) were acanthamoeba keratitis. There were fungal hyphae in the images of fungal keratitis. Amebic cysts were found in acanthamoeba keratitis.
CONCLUSION:Confocal microscope can help the early diagnose and treatment of infectious keratitis. It is a noninvasive imaging technique that provides high resolution images of ocular structures at a cellular level and infectious keratitis represents one of its most important clinical uses.

Objective A HPLC method was established for determination of the content of ATST in the aqueous humor of rabbits. MethodsThe mobile phase was consisting of methanol-1％ triethylamine(57:43) and omeprazole (OMZ) as internal standard. The detection was carried out with an ultraviolet detector operated at 235nm. ResultsThere was linearity over the range of 2. 056～41.12 ug/ml in the humor aquosus, r=0.9997. The average recovery of ATST was 94.58 ％. Intra-day and in- ter-day RSD were less than 5 ％ and 10 ％ ( n = 5), respectively. Conclusion The method is reliable. It can be used for the study on the pharmacokinetics of ATST.

Objective To study the anatomical location and pathology of membranous obstruction of the inferior vena cava(IVC)in Budd-Chiari syndrome(BCS)with research on the etiologic mechanism and pathology.Methods Analysis of 100 normal adults was performed including the gross anatomy of IVC segment from the level of diaphragm up to right atrium.The conventional,microscopic pathologic examination of the biopsy sampling IVC obstruetice mambrane tissue in 70 cases toghther with the complete resected membrane from the radical therapy for 20 cases of BCS,were collected and under investigation.Results The macroscopic examination revealed the obstructive membrane in one case(1%)localizing at the diaphragmatic level,approximately 28 mm,away from the IVC entrance into the right atrium and a newly found valvula was seen on the left lateral wall of the upper part of the hepatic vein orifice.Simultaneously,47% adults showed Eustachiun valve existing in IVC near the entrance to right atrium.Microscopy confirmed all the forementioned membranes consisting of vascular valvular structures.Among them(21/70),30% showed additional organized thrombus formations,and 9%(6/70)with a few amount of inflammatory cellular infiltrations.The total intact resection membrane was continuous with the vascular wall under microscopic examination.Conclusions The first newly report of the existence of a special valvula at the diaphragmatic level of IVC reveals the possibility of high correlation with the occurance of IVC membranous obstruction type in BCS.

Human erythropoietin receptor (hEPOR) plays an important role in regulating the red blood cell production by promoting the proliferation and differentiation of RBC from erythroid precursors, hEpoR is a transmembrane protein, and its extrocellular domain (sEpoR) is of great importance in Epo signal transduction pathway. We cloned the gene of sEpoR by RT-PCR from the total RNA of human fetal liver and expressed it in E. coli after insertion of the gene in the expression vector pBV220. The cloned gene was confirmed by sequencing analysis and gene product was confirmed by both Western blot and its first 11 amino acid residues sequence of the N-terminal. In vitro bioassay showed that the purified gene product can repress the growth of TF-cells in the presence of Epo.

Fatty Liver ; prevention & control ; therapy ; Humans ; Obesity ; complications ; Weight Loss

Animals ; Male ; Particle Size ; Rats ; Rats, Sprague-Dawley ; Respiratory Distress Syndrome, Adult ; chemically induced ; Silicon Dioxide ; chemistry ; toxicity

Objective To construct a human phage single chain-antibody library, and to sieve out the antibody ScFv against lung cancer from the library. Methods Total RNA was abstracted from lymph node tissue of the lung cancer, and was used to amplify V_H and V_L gene by RT-PCR. V_H and V_L were joined by a DNA linker by SOE-PCR to form the single chain variable fragment ( ScFv) gene. ScFv gene was coloned into the phage vector pCANT-AB5E. Panning against lung cancer cell line A549 was performed and positive clones were chosen for soluble expression. Results A recombination phage single chain-antibody library was constructed. After 4 rounds panning, the number of eluted phages increased by 115 times. Positive reactions to A549 were detected in 7 of 10 random clones. The human ScFvs against lung cancer were produced and confirmed by SDS-PAGE and ELISA analysis. Conclusion ScFvs against lung cancer were acquired by the construction of phage single chain-antibody library. The soluble ScFvs has specificall avidity to human lung cancer cells.

It is the objective of this study to optimize the extraction process of red ginseng to minimize the unit cost of extracting effective ingredients. The relation between the target variables of total quantity of ginsenosides and first extraction time, first extraction solution amount, second extraction time, second extract solution amount were studied with Box-Behnken experimental design method. At the same we also considered the cost of extraction solution and energy usage. The objective function was set as unit cost of target (total quantity of ginsenosides or its purity) for the multi-objective optimization of extraction process. As a result, the optimal process parameters were found as first extraction time (108.7 min), first extraction solution amount folds (12), second extraction time (30 min), second extraction solution amount folds (8) to minimize the unit cost. It indicated that this approach could potentially be used to optimize industrial extraction process for manufacturing Chinese medicine.
Chemistry, Pharmaceutical ; economics ; methods ; Cost Control ; Drugs, Chinese Herbal ; analysis ; economics ; isolation & purification ; Panax ; chemistry

Analogous formulae (AF) refer to a set of traditional Chinese medicine (TCM) formulae sharing similar herbs and/or indications. Dissecting functional chemome of analogous formulae could enhance the understanding of the intrinsic nature of TCM. In this study, taking 5 Xiaoqinglong decoction analogous formulae (XQL AF) including Xiaoqinglong decoction, Mahuang Xingren Shigao Gancao decoction, Mahuang Fuzi decoction, Houpu Mahuang decoction and Daqinglong decoction as example, we systematically investigated the relationship between compounds and indications using network formulaology approach. The functional chemome of XQL AF were revealed by network analysis and molecular docking. This successful application in XQL AF suggests network formulaology could be a useful tool for AF-related research and therefore provide a new way to discover the scientific foundation of Zhang Zhongjing's herbal formulae.
Chemistry, Pharmaceutical ; Drugs, Chinese Herbal ; analysis ; Medicine, Chinese Traditional ; Molecular Docking Simulation