IntroductionV. parahaemolyticus, a gram-negative marine bacterium, is a major food-borne pathogen that causes acute human gastroenteritis associated with the consumption of seafood. V. parahaemolyticus is a gram-negative halophilic bacterium and is responsible for human gastroenteritis worldwide. Sporadic cases and outbreaks of V. parahaemolyticus occur regularly in Asia and as well as in other countries [1][2][3][4][5]. Cases of V. parahaemolyticus were mostly sporadic and associated with diverse serovars. However, the emergence of a pandemic serovar O3:K6 in 1996 has changed the epidemiology abruptly and has since been accounted for many cases of V. parahaemolyticus outbreak worldwide [6][7][8].Not all strains of V. parahaemolyticus cause illness in humans; in fact, the majority of strains isolated from the environment or seafood are not pathogenic. The pathogenic strains of V. parahaemolyticus are those that produce Thermostable Direct Haemolysin (TDH) toxin [9,10]. TDH is an enzyme that lyses human red blood cells on Wagatsuma blood agar plates, which is referred to as the Kanagawa Abstract Introduction: The main aim of this study is to determine the antibiotic profile of V. parahaemolyticus gastroenteritis associated with the consumption of contaminated shrimp and cockles marketed in Selangor Malaysia. V. parahaemolyticus is the leading cause of seafood-associated gastroenteritis in Asian Countries typically is associated with the consumption of raw shellfish and oysters specially shrimp and cockles. Rapid, sensitive and specific detection methods are needed to control V. parahaemolyticus infections. We describe a recognized the pathogenic V. parahaemolyticus in shrimp and cockles that will be the risk of gastroenteritis associated with the consumption of seafood marketed in Malaysia. and other centers as collaboration. The seafood samples were collected from different markets and more than 400 samples from shrimp and cockles were investigated for detection and isolation of V. parahaemolyticus. CHROMagar Vibrio and TCBS agar media were used for fast detection and isolation of V. parahaemolyticus isolates. PCR based methods targeted to toxR regulatory gene, tlh the species and family gene, tdh and trh the virulence genes were extensively used. The antibiotic susceptibility testing of 65 V. parahaemolyticus isolates recovered from retail shrimp and cockles seafood were determined with four types of E-test antibiotic strips.Results: All the 65 isolates were positive to toxR and tlh genes. Out of 65 isolates, only eight isolates (12.31%) were positive for tdh virulence gene isolated form cockles and shrimp (3 isolates from shrimp and 5 isolates from cockles), whereas twenty six (40%) isolates were positive for trh virulence gene isolated from shrimp and cockles (9 from shrimp and 17 from cockles). This result indicates high occurrence of tdh+ and trh+ isolates in shrimp and cockles marketed in Malaysia. None of the isolates tested possess both virulence genes. For the antibiotic E-test susceptibility test, overa...

Head and neck squamous cell carcinoma (HNSCC) is the sixth most common malignancy worldwide. Evidence suggests that miRNAs play an important role in progression, recurrence, metastasis and postoperative survival of HNSCC. Studies have investigated the utility of miRNAs as diagnostic/prognostic tools and as potential therapeutic targets and biomarkers that may improve the management and outcomes of HNSCC. The aim of this article is to review the current literature on aberrant expression profiles of miRNAs in biopsy samples of HNSCC and their role in cancer development, metastasis, prognosis and survival of these patients. This review gives an overview that miRNAs deregulation play major role in the development of HNSCC. They offer the potential to be used as biomarkers or novel therapeutic targets. Future research is required to test their use in both of these fields.

Plants are primary source of natural product drugs. However, with every new bioactive molecule reported from a plant source, there follows reports of endangered status or even extinction of a medicinally important plant due to over-harvesting. Hence, the attention turned towards fungi namely the endophytes, which reside within medicinally important plants and thus may have acquired their medicinal properties. Strobilanthes crispus is a traditional medicinal plant which has been used traditionally to treat kidney stones, diabetes, hypertension and cancer as well as having antimicrobial activities. In our efforts to bioprospect for anticancer and antimicrobial metabolites, two fungal endophytes most closely related to the Sordariomycetes sp. showed promising results. Sample (PDA)BL3 showed highest significant antimicrobial activity against 6 bacteria at 200 µg/disc whereas sample (PDA)BL5 has highest significant anticancer activity against all 5 cancer cell lines at concentrations ranging from 30 to 300 μg/ml. As for the gas chromatography coupled with mass spectrometry (GC-MS) results, a total of 20 volatile metabolites identified from sample (PDA)BL3 and 21 volatile metabolites identified from sample (PDA)BL5 having more than 1% abundance. Both GC-MS analysis showed that compound Pyrrolo[1,2-a]pyrazine-1,4-dione, hexahydro-3-(2-methylpropyl) has the highest abundance at 15.10% abundance for sample (PDA)BL3 and 19.00% abundance for sample (PDA)BL5 respectively. In conclusion, these results have shown bio-prospecting potential of endophytic fungi having antimicrobial and anticancer activities as well as its potential secondary metabolites of interest. Therefore, this work has further indicated the medicinal and industrial potential of endophytic fungi.

This study evaluates the mitochondrial noncoding regions by using the Sanger sequencing method for application in Forensic Science. FTA® Technology (FTA™ paper DNA extraction) was utilized to extract DNA. Portion of coding region encompassing positions from (10,716 to 11,184) amplified in accordance with the Anderson reference sequence. PCR products purified by EZ-10 spin column were then sequenced and detected using the ABI 3730 × L DNA Analyzer. A new polymorphic positions 10,750 and 10,790 that are described may be suitable sources in future for identification purpose. The data obtained can be used to identify variable nucleotide positions characterized by frequent occurrence, most promising for identification variants.

High invasive cancer cells are thought to recruit specialised actin-rich protrusions for invasion in metastasis process. These protrusions are termed invadopodia. To study invadopodia formation, one of the first challenges faced by researchers has been to optimise the cell line passage number in order to be used for the invadopodia assay. Therefore, this study aims to investigate the effects of the passage number on invadopodia formation in MDA-MB-231 breast cancer cell line. Invadopodia assay was used to achieve the aim of the study. The results provided evidence that invadopodia formation is affected by the high passage number. The cells were also tested with dimethyloxalylglycine (DMOG) a hypoxic mimicking agent which is known to be an invadopodia inducer, the results showed that the cells in low passage number (P7) treated with DMOG increase the cells forming invadopodia, while the cells with high passage number (P35) showed that DMOG fails to stimulate the cells to form invadopodia. Furthermore, the cells with high passage number after passage 15 are starting to lose the ability to degrade the gelatin. In conclusion, this study suggests that only cells with a low passage number, less than passage 15 should be used in the study of invadopodia formation to obtain the results in the search for molecular targets and signaling at invadopodia.