Otitis media is an infection of the middle ear mainly caused by bacteria, and current treatments rely heavily on antibiotics. However, the emergence of antibiotic-resistant bacterial strains seriously affects their efficacy. In our study, we found that extracellular vesicles (EVs) derived from human natural killer cells (NKs) inhibit the proliferation of both standard and levofloxacin (LVX)-resistant strains of Staphylococcus aureus in a dose-dependent manner. Moreover, compared to LVX, EVs were more effective at reducing effusion and rescuing hearing thresholds in animal models. For LVX-sensitive strains, EVs were significantly more effective in terms of curative time but not curative rate. For LVX-resistant strains, EVs were significantly more effective in terms of both curative rate and curative time when applied alone or applied jointly with LVX. In summary, we found that NK EVs are highly effective in treating otitis media, providing an alternative approach for treating this common disease.
Killer Cells, Natural/metabolism* ; Exosomes/metabolism* ; Animals ; Humans ; Otitis Media/therapy* ; Staphylococcus aureus/drug effects* ; Disease Models, Animal ; Anti-Bacterial Agents/pharmacology* ; Levofloxacin/pharmacology*

OBJECTIVETo establish quality control criteria for medicinal herb Cajanus cajan based on the determination of longistylin A and longistylin C, two bioactive and specific stilbenes of the plant.

METHODLongistylin A and longistylin C were obtained from the leaves of C. cajan by silica gel column chromatography and identified as marker compounds of this plant by spectroscopic analysis. A RP-HPLC method was established to determine the two compounds.

RESULTLongistylin A and longistylin C were well separated on a Thermo BDS Hypersil C18 column (4.6 mm x 250 mm, 5 microm) with a mobile phase methanol-water (8:2), and showed good linearity in the range of 0.00288 - 0.0576 microg and 0.0112 - 0.224 microg, respectively. The average recoveries were 98.9% and 97.2% with RSD of 2.4% and 2.2% for these two compounds, respectively.

CONCLUSIONThe established analysis method is simple and accurate, whicn can be used for quality control of C. cajan.

Cajanus ; chemistry ; Chromatography, High Pressure Liquid ; methods ; Diethylstilbestrol ; analysis ; isolation & purification ; Drugs, Chinese Herbal ; analysis ; isolation & purification ; Plant Leaves ; chemistry ; Plants, Medicinal ; chemistry

Due to influnce of various factors, the transplanted kidney will appear the chronic renal insufficiency symptom at a certain period after transplantation. How to prolong the function of transplanted kidney and life of the patients is a key subject in clinical research. This study based on the retrospective analysis of 22 cases kidney transplant of chronic kidney failure patients enrolled in the Department of Blood Purification, Hainan SanYa Nongken Hospital. According to the different stages of the chronic renal failure of patients, tacrolimus (FK506) was used instead of cyclosporine A (CsA) combined with blood purification treatment (hemodialysis or/and hemoadsorption), the abnormal biochemical markers decreased significantly in all patients after treatment, with 7 cases are clinical cured (7/22, 31.8%), 10 cases are ameliorated (10/22, 45.5%) and 5 cases gave up treating (5/22, 22.7%). The result indicates that this therapy can ameliorate the transplanted kidney function, and improve the life quality of the patients.