Prostate cancer is the most common non-cutaneous cancer in men in the United States. Cancer metabolism has emerged as a contemporary topic of great interest for improved mechanistic understanding of tumorigenesis. Prostate cancer is a disease model of great interest from a metabolic perspective. Prostatic tissue exhibits unique metabolic activity under baseline conditions. Benign prostate cells accumulate zinc, and this excess zinc inhibits citrate oxidation and metabolism within the citric acid cycle, effectively resulting in citrate production. Malignant cells, however, actively oxidize citrate and resume more typical citric acid cycle function. Of further interest, prostate cancer does not exhibit the Warburg effect, an increase in glucose uptake, seen in many other cancers. These cellular metabolic differences and others are of clinical interest as they present a variety of potential therapeutic targets. Furthermore, understanding of the metabolic profile differences between benign prostate versus low- and high-grade prostate cancers also represents an avenue to better understand cancer progression and potentially develop new diagnostic testing. In this paper, we review the current state of knowledge on the metabolic phenotypes of prostate cancer.
Workers involved in battery manufacturing or recycling factories are occupationally exposed to high concentrations of lead. In humans, lead can cause a wide range of biological effects depending upon the level and duration of exposure. The purpose of this study was to find out the blood lead levels (BLL) in occupationally exposed workers involved in battery industry in Delhi NCR region and to study whether lead affected the vitamin D (vit D) and calcium metabolism. For this study 100 occupationally lead-exposed battery workers (LEBW) and 100 non-lead exposed controls (NLEC) were recruited. BLL were measured using inductively coupled plasma optical emission spectrometer (ICP-OES) technique while ELISA was performed to quantify the serum vit D levels in the study subjects. Routine biochemical parameters were measured by chemistry autoanalyzers. Statistical analysis was done using appropriate statistical tools. Results showed that BLL were significantly higher in LEBW as compared to NLEC (p \ 0.0001). Serum vitamin D, calcium and phosphorus levels were significantly decreased in battery workers as compared to controls (p \ 0.005). Spearman's rank correlation analysis showed significant negative correlation of BLL with serum Vitamin D and calcium levels. Significant positive correlation was observed between BLL and duration of lead exposure. Weak negative correlation was also observed between BLL and vit D even after adjusting for smoking status. In conclusion, this study demonstrated that higher BLL significantly alters the vit D and calcium metabolism.
Domain swapping and generation of chimeric insecticidal crystal protein is an emerging area of insect pest management. The lepidopteran insect pest, gram pod borer (Helicoverpa armigera H.) wreaks havoc to chickpea crop affecting production. Lepidopteran insects were reported to be controlled by Bt (cryI) genes. We designed a plant codon optimized chimeric Bt gene (cry1Aabc) using three domains from three different cry1A genes (domains I, II, and III from cry1Aa, cry1Ab, and cry1Ac, respectively) and expressed it under the control of a constitutive promoter in chickpea (cv. DCP92-3) to assess its effect on gram pod borer. A total of six transgenic chickpea shoots were established by grafting into mature fertile plants. The in vitro regenerated (organogenetic) shoots were selected based on antibiotic kanamycin monosulfate (100 mg/L) with transformation efficiency of 0.076%. Three transgenic events were extensively studied based on gene expression pattern and insect mortality across generations. Protein expression in pod walls, immature seeds and leaves (pre- and post-flowering) were estimated and expression in pre-flowering stage was found higher than that of post-flowering. Analysis for the stable integration, expression and insect mortality (detached leaf and whole plant bioassay) led to identification of efficacious transgenic chickpea lines. The chimeric cry1Aabc expressed in chickpea is effective against gram pod borer and generated events can be utilized in transgenic breeding program.
BACKGROUND: Fibromyalgia syndrome (FMS) is an extra-articular rheumatological disease characterised by widespread chronic musculoskeletal pain. Metal-induced oxidative stress contributes to the severity of FMS. AIMS: First, this study evaluated the association between plasma levels of toxic heavy metals and essential metals with oxidative stress (OS) markers. Second, the OS markers and metal contents were correlated with the disease severity by assessing the Fibromyalgia Impact Questioner Revised (FIQR) and tender points (TP). METHOD: A total of 105 FMS patients and 105 healthy controls of similar age and sex were recruited. OS parameter such as lipid peroxidation (LPO), protein carbonyl group (PCG), nitric oxide (NO) and essential metals such as zinc (Zn), magnesium (Mg), manganese (Mn), copper (Cu) and toxic heavy metals such as aluminium (Al), arsenic (As), lead (Pb) were estimated. RESULTS: Levels of LPO, PCG, NO (p< 0.001) and Cu, Mn, and Al (p< 0.001), were significantly higher, and Mg (p< 0.001) and Zn (p< 0.001) were significantly lower in patients compared to controls. A positive association was observed between OS parameters, FIQR and TP with Cu, Al and Mn. A significant negative association was observed between Zn and Mg with FIQR, TP and OS parameters. CONCLUSION: Heavy metals such as Al induce OS parameters and decrease the levels of essential trace elements such as Mg and Zn, which may be responsible for the severity of FMS.
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