Animals ; Birds ; Disease Outbreaks ; prevention & control ; Hong Kong ; epidemiology ; Humans ; Influenza in Birds ; epidemiology ; prevention & control ; Poultry ; Public Health ; Public Health Administration

Adult ; Aged ; Aged, 80 and over ; Humans ; Male ; Middle Aged ; Occupational Health ; legislation & jurisprudence ; Pneumoconiosis ; diagnosis

BACKGROUND: The pathological changes of osteoarthritis are similar to that of kaschin-beck disease, but the cause of the latter is still unclear,damage is more serious. From the comparison of pathology changes between them, we hope to find out an effective therapeutic method with the assistance of arthroscope basing on the experiences in osteoarthritis.OBJECTIVE: To make comparison of the histomorphological changes between osteoarthritis and kaschin-beck disease with knee arthroscope,which give clues to the diagnosis and selection of operative technique for kaschin-bock disease under arthroscope.DESIGN: Case control study.SETTING: Department of Orthopaedics, Shaanxi People's Hospital.PARTICIPANTS: Thirty-five patients who needed arthroscope surgery due to severer knee osteoarthritis were randomly selected from Department of Orthopaedics, Shaanxi People's Hospital between April 1998 and September 2000; Meanwhile 31 patients with knee joint functional obstacle caused by kaschin-beck disease (epidemic disease area) were randomly selected from Luochuan Hospital of Shaanxi Province in November 2001.METHODS: Japanese made OLYMPUS series color television arthroscope and surgery system were used to carry out knee joint operations in all participants. During the operation, video recording, postoperative editing, photographs, comparison and analysis were conducted, in order to find out the pathological changes of the two groups in knee joint synovium, patella, femur, tibia and meniscus with the assistance of arthroscope.RESULTS: Totally 66 patients were enrolled in this study and all endamage in Kaschin-beck disease and osteoarthritis: Injuries were graded into grade 0, 1, 2 and 3, there were 0,3,5,23 cases and 0,3,16,16cases correspondingly in kaschin-beck disease group and osteoarthritis cartilage damage was presented by big piece of cartilage peeled off, part of them came off leading to bone exposure, the exposed bone surface is uneven; while cartilage damage in osteoarthritis was presented by the wear of cartilage, moreover cartilage island was found remained in the exposed bone with the surface covered with fiber strips and the exposed observed in 24 patients with Kaschin-beck disease, 5 cases with coarse stress point and 19 cases with burr-like damage, amongst which there were 9 cases displayed both medial and lateral meniscus damages; in osteoarthritis group there were 16 cases showed meniscus damages including edge wears in11 cases and breakage in 5 cases.CONCLUSION: Cartilage damage in knee articular was obviously severer in Kaschin-beck disease than in osteoarthritis, although kaschin-beck disease is no matter resulting in serious knee joint damage, but its pathology changes are different from osteoarthritis, we should pay more attention to the peculiarity of big piece of cartilage peeling off during operations.

BACKGROUND: In the field of organ transplantation, patients often take immunosuppressants after organ transplantation, such as CsA, FK506, DEX and MPA. However, their mechanisms of immunosuppression are different. The effect of immunosuppressive drugs on monocyte chemoattractant protein-1 (MCP-1) remains poorly understood. OBJECTIVE: To investigate the effects of different immunosuppressants on the secretions of MCP-1 in whole blood. METHODS: The whole blood of healthy volunteers was mixed with different immunosuppressants for 6 hours, such as CsA, FK506, DEX and MPA, which included low, middle and high concentrations, followed by PMA and IONO stimulation for 6 hours. MCP-1 levels in whole blood samples were compared. The whole blood cultured alone served as control. RESULTS AND CONCLUSION: MCP-1 secretion was inhibited by DEX (1, 10 mg/L) and CsA (0.25,1.25 mg/L)- However, FK and MPA exhibited no such effect. Therefore, DEX and CsA may inhibit the function of monocytes and macrophages in immune system by diminishing the secretion of MCP-1. The combination of FK (5 μg/L), MPA (10 mg/L) and DEX (1 mg/L) or CsA (0.25 mg/L), MPA (10 mg/L) and DEX (1 mg/L) can inhibit the secretion of MCP-1, but only DEX among all the immunosuppressants mentioned above exhibited significant effect on inhibiting the secretion of MCP-1 when using alone.

Calpain ; genetics ; Diabetes, Gestational ; genetics ; Female ; Genotype ; Haploidy ; Humans ; Polymorphism, Single Nucleotide ; Pregnancy

In this study, the human umbilical vein endothelial cell model was used to study the regulating effect of lipophilic components in Salvia miltiorrhiza on angiogenesis, and explore its possible mechanism. The cell model was established to determine the effect of lipophilic components in S. miltiorrhiza on the proliferative activity and migration capacity of endothelial cells. Then the realtime fluorescence quantification PCR technology was applied to detect the changes in the gene expressions of angiogenesis-related cytokines VEGF-A, VEGF-C and MMP-9. The results showed that 5 mg x L(-1) lipophilic components in S. miltiorrhiza could inhibit the proliferation and migration of endothelial cells, and reduce the expression of VEGF-A and MMP-9 genes. It indicated that lipophilic components in S. miltiorrhiza may inhibit the proliferation and migration of endothelial cells by inhibiting the expression of VEGF-A and MMP-9 genes, so as to show the inhibitory effect on angiogenesis.
Angiogenesis Inhibitors ; chemistry ; pharmacology ; Cell Movement ; drug effects ; Cell Proliferation ; drug effects ; Drugs, Chinese Herbal ; chemistry ; pharmacology ; Human Umbilical Vein Endothelial Cells ; cytology ; drug effects ; metabolism ; Humans ; Matrix Metalloproteinase 9 ; genetics ; metabolism ; Salvia miltiorrhiza ; chemistry ; Vascular Endothelial Growth Factor A ; genetics ; metabolism

AIMTo establish the two-dimension information fingerprints chromatograph of traditional Chinese medicine and investigate via pattern recognition.

METHODSHierarchical cluster was applied to fingerprints described by one-dimension information data and by two-dimension information data respectively and corresponding results was compared.

RESULTSThe gross classes, in which the samples denoted by two-dimension information data, classified by all kinds of hierarchical cluster methods had less differences and more robustness than the methods containing the samples expressed by one-dimension information data. The classes to which the unknown samples would be belonged were determined by hierarchical cluster analysis and artificial neural network (ANN), and the same results were obtained.

CONCLUSIONThe fingerprints characterized by two-dimension information data could provide more overall and special information as compared with the methods indicated by one-dimension information data.

Chromatography, High Pressure Liquid ; methods ; Cluster Analysis ; Drugs, Chinese Herbal ; chemistry ; isolation & purification ; Flavonoids ; chemistry ; isolation & purification ; Ginkgo biloba ; chemistry ; Neural Networks (Computer) ; Pattern Recognition, Automated ; Pharmacognosy ; Plants, Medicinal ; chemistry ; classification ; Species Specificity

AIMTo determine 3 kinds of biologically active components (9 compounds) in Gardenia, namely geniposidic acid, gentiobioside, gardenoside, genipin geniposide, chlorogenic acid, crocin 1, crocin 2, crocin 3 and crocetin simultaneously and quantitatively.

METHODSAn HPLC method detected by 3 different UV-vis waves--240 nm for geniposidic acid, geniposide, gardenoside, genipin gentiobioside, 330 nm for chlorogenic acid, 440 nm for crocin 1, crocin 2, crocin 3 and crocetin respectively, has been developed: Phenomenex Luna C18 column(250 mm x 4.6 mm ID, 5 microns) with linear gradient elution using methanol-acetotrile (9:1) and 0.3% aqueous formic acid.

RESULTSThis method successfully determined 9 compounds in Gardenia (from 5 different areas) simultaneously and quantitatively.

CONCLUSIONThis is a more reasonable and credible quality control method for the Chinese traditional medicine.

Carotenoids ; analysis ; Chlorogenic Acid ; analysis ; Chromatography, High Pressure Liquid ; methods ; Drugs, Chinese Herbal ; analysis ; Fruit ; chemistry ; Gardenia ; chemistry ; Glucosides ; analysis ; Iridoid Glucosides ; Iridoids ; analysis ; Plants, Medicinal ; chemistry ; Quality Control

Animals ; Antineoplastic Agents ; administration & dosage ; Delayed-Action Preparations ; administration & dosage ; Drug Carriers ; chemistry ; Drug Delivery Systems ; Growth Hormone-Releasing Hormone ; administration & dosage ; Nanotechnology ; Research

Applications of network pharmacology are increasingly widespread and methods abound in the field of drug development and pharmacological research. In this study, we choose rosiglitazone compound as the object to predict the targets and to discuss the mechanism based on three kinds of prediction methods of network pharmacology. Comparison of the prediction result has identified that the three kinds of prediction methods had their own characteristics: targets and pathways predicted were not in accordance with each other. However, the calcium signaling pathway could be predicted in the three kinds of methods, which associated with diabetes and cognitive impairment caused by diabetes by bioinformatics analysis. The above conclusion indicates that the calcium signaling pathway is important in signal pathway regulation of rosiglitazone compound, which provides a clue to further explain the mechanism of the compound and also provides a reference for the selection and application of methods of network pharmacology in the actual research.
Calcium Signaling ; Cognitive Dysfunction ; Computational Biology ; Diabetes Mellitus ; Humans ; Pharmacology ; methods ; Thiazolidinediones ; pharmacology