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Kaempferol (kaem) is a dietary flavonoid found in a variety of fruits and vegetables. The inhibitory effects of kaem on primary tumour growth have been extensively investigated; however, its effects on tumour metastasis are largely unknown. In the present study, we found that kaem significantly suppresses both primary tumour growth and lung metastasis in mouse breast tumour model. Furthermore, decreased expression of citrullinated histone H3 (H3‐cit), a biomarker of neutrophil extracellular traps (NETs), had been founded in metastatic lung upon treated with kaem. The reduction of H3‐cit is not, however, due to the cytotoxicity of kaem on neutrophils since the frequency of CD11b + Ly6G + neutrophils did not change in lung, tumour or blood in the presence of kaem. We then confirm the anti‐NETs effects of kaem in vitro by co‐culturing mouse neutrophils and kaem. Supplementing the neutrophils with GSK484, a potent NET inhibitor, totally abrogated the inhibitory effects of kaem on tumour metastasis while having little or no impact on primary tumour growth, indicating the specificity of kaem acting on NET formation and tumour metastasis. We also found that kaem suppressed ROS production in mouse bone‐marrow derived neutrophils. Supplementing with the ROS scavenger DPI abrogated kaem's effects on NET formation, suggesting the involvement of kaempferol in NADPH/ROS‐NETs signalling. Finally, we applied the kaem on NET‐deficient PAD4 ‐/‐ mice and found decreased primary tumour volume and weight but similar lung metastatic tumour with kaempferol treatment. Therefore, our findings reveal a novel mechanism of kaem in breast cancer development by targeting NETs induced tumour metastasis.

As a new zero‐dimensional carbon‐based material, carbon dots (CDs) have attracted extensive attention owing to their advantages such as easy preparation and surface modification, good biocompatibility and water solubility, and tunable photochemical properties. CDs have become one of the most promising nanomaterials in the field of fluorescent sensing, bioimaging, and cancer therapy. How to precisely regulate the photochemical properties, especially the absorption, fluorescence, phosphorescence, reactive oxygen species generation, and photothermal conversion of the CDs, is the key to developing highly efficient phototheranostics for cancer treatment. Although many studies on cancer therapy using CDs have been published, no review has focused on the regulation of photochemical properties of CDs for phototheranostic applications. In this review, we summarized the strategies such as the selection of suitable carbon source, heteroatomic doping, optimum reaction conditions, surface modification, and assembly strategy to efficiently regulate the photochemical properties of the CDs to meet the requirements of different practical applications. This review might provide some valuable insight and new ideas for the development of CDs with excellent phototheranostic performance. This article is categorized under: Therapeutic Approaches and Drug Discovery > Emerging Technologies Nanotechnology Approaches to Biology > Nanoscale Systems in Biology Diagnostic Tools > In Vivo Nanodiagnostics and Imaging

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Cardiac fibrosis is a major contributor for diabetic cardiomyopathy and Dendrobium officinale possessed therapeutic effects on hyperglycemia and diabetic cardiomyopathy. To further investigate the possible mechanisms of the Dendrobium officinale on diabetic myocardial fibrosis in mice. Water-soluble extracts of Dendrobium officinale (DOE) from dry stem was analyzed by HPLC and phenol-sulfuric acid method. Diabetic mice were induced by intraperitoneal injection of streptozotocin (STZ) (30 mg/kg) for 4 consecutive days after intragastric administration of a high-fat diet (HFD) for 2 weeks. The groups were as follows: control group, model group, DOE low, medium, high dose group (75, 150, 300 mg/kg) and Metformin positive group (125 mg/kg). The results showed that DOE dose-dependently lower serum insulin, total cholesterol (TC), triglyceride (TG), low-density lipoprotein cholesterol (LDL-C) and grew the high-density lipoprotein cholesterol (HDL-C) after 12 weeks of daily administration with DOE. Hematoxylin-eosin staining and Sirius red staining showed obvious amelioration of cardiac injury and fibrosis. In addition, the result of immunoblot indicated that DOE increased the expression of peroxisome proliferator activated receptor-α (PPAR-α), phosphorylation of insulin receptor substrate 1 (p-IRS1) and E-cadherin and repressed the expression of transforming growth factor β1 (TGF-β1), phosphorylation of c-Jun N-terminal kinase (p-JNK), Twist, Snail1 and Vimentin. The present findings suggested that DOE ameliorated HFD/STZ-induced diabetic cardiomyopathy (DCM). The possible mechanism mainly associated with DOE accelerating lipid transport, inhibiting insulin resistant and suppressing fibrosis induced by epithelial mesenchymal transition (EMT).

Background: Forkhead box J1 (FOXJ1) plays pivotal roles in motile cilia formation. However, it remains unclear whether abnormal expression or localization of FOXJ1 in nasal mucosa tissues is associated with allergic rhinitis (AR), in which impaired mucociliary clearance is implicated. Objective: We sought to investigate the expression and localization of FOXJ1 in inferior turbinate from patients with AR and controls. Methods: We assayed mRNA levels of FOXJ1, DNAI1, DNALI1, and DNAH9 by using whole-genome expression array and quantitative real-time polymerase chain reaction. We elucidated the localization of FOXJ1 by using immunofluorescence assays in paraffin sections and primary single cells. Four patterns of FOXJ1 localization (normal, N; intermediate, I; mislocalization, M; absence, A) were defined. We developed a semiquantitative scoring system to elucidate their localization in 5 areas per paraffin section, with individual sections being assigned a score between 0 and 2. Results: The mRNA levels of FOXJ1, DNAI1, DNALI1, and DNAH9 were significantly reduced in patients with AR compared with controls (all p < 0.05). The median (1st and 3rd quartile) of the FOXJ1 score was 0.4 (0.0 and 0.85) in patients with AR, and 0.2 (0.0 and 0.4) in controls (p < 0.05). For primary cytospin samples, the mean percentages of FOXJ1 localization patterns N, I, M, and A were 46.7, 10.0, 30.0, and 26.7% in patients with AR, and 82.5, 5.0, 5.0, and 7.5% in controls, respectively (p < 0.05). Conclusion: Downregulation and aberrant localization of FOXJ1 may be crucial characteristics of the allergic nasal mucosa.

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