The aim of this work was to evaluate the effect of the administration of egg white hydrolysates on obesity-related disorders, with a focus on lipid metabolism, inflammation and oxidative stress, in Zucker fatty rats. Obese Zucker rats received water, pepsin egg white hydrolysate (750 mg/kg/day) or Rhizopus aminopeptidase egg white hydrolysate (750 mg/kg/day) for 12 weeks. Lean Zucker rats received water. Body weight, solid and liquid intakes were weekly measured. At the end of the study, urine, faeces, different organs and blood samples were collected. The consumption of egg white hydrolysed with pepsin significantly decreased the epididymal adipose tissue, improved hepatic steatosis, and lowered plasmatic concentration of free fatty acids in the obese animals. It also decreased plasma levels of tumor necrosis factor-alpha and reduced oxidative stress. Pepsin egg white hydrolysate could be used as a tool to improve obesity-related complications.

Inflammatory bowel diseases (ulcerative colitis; Crohn's disease) are debilitating relapsing inflammatory disorders affecting the gastrointestinal tract, with deleterious effect on quality of life, and increasing incidence and prevalence. Mucosal inflammation, due to altered microbiota, increased intestinal permeability and immune system dysfunction underlies the symptoms and may be caused in susceptible individuals by different factors (or a combination of them), including dietary habits and components. In this review we describe the influence of the Western diet, obesity, and different nutraceuticals/functional foods (bioactive peptides, phytochemicals, omega 3-polyunsaturated fatty acids, vitamin D, probiotics and prebiotics) on the course of IBD, and provide some hints that could be useful for nutritional guidance. Hopefully, research will soon offer enough reliable data to slow down the spread of the disease and to make diet a cornerstone in IBD therapy.

No abstract

Visceral leishmaniasis caused by the intracellular parasite Leishmania donovani is a significant public health problem in many regions of the world. Because of its large genome and complex biology, developing a vaccine for this pathogen has proved to be a challenging task and, to date, protective recombinant vaccine candidates have not been identified. To tackle this difficult problem, we adopted a reductionist approach with the intention of identifying cDNA sequences in an L. donovani amastigote cDNA library that collectively or singly conferred protection against parasite challenge in a murine model of visceral leishmaniasis. We immunized BALB/c mice with plasmid DNA isolated and pooled from 15 cDNA sublibraries (ϳ2,000 cDNAs/sublibrary). Following systemic challenge with L. donovani, mice immunized with 6 of these 15 sublibraries showed a significantly reduced (35-to 1,000-fold) hepatic parasite burden. Because of the complexity and magnitude of the sequential fractionation-immunization-challenge approach, we restricted our attention to the two sublibraries that conferred the greatest in vivo protection. From one of these two sublibraries, we identified several groups of cDNAs that afforded protection, including a set of nine novel cDNAs and, surprisingly, a group of five cDNAs that encoded L. donovani histone proteins. At each fractionation step, the cDNA sublibraries or the smaller DNA fractions that afforded in vivo protection against the parasite also induced in vitro parasite-specific T helper 1 immune responses. Our studies demonstrate that immunization with sequential fractions of a cDNA library is a powerful strategy for identifying anti-infective vaccine candidates.

Vincristine alters gastrointestinal motility, peripheral sensitivity and mucosal architecture. Vincristine-induced neuropathy (somatic and enteric), intestinal mucosa damage and inflammatory infiltrations are relatively long-lasting.

Coffee is one of the most popular beverages consumed worldwide. Roasted coffee is a complex mixture of thousands of bioactive compounds, and some of them have numerous potential health-promoting properties that have been extensively studied in the cardiovascular and central nervous systems, with relatively much less attention given to other body systems, such as the gastrointestinal tract and its particular connection with the brain, known as the brain–gut axis. This narrative review provides an overview of the effect of coffee brew; its by-products; and its components on the gastrointestinal mucosa (mainly involved in permeability, secretion, and proliferation), the neural and non-neural components of the gut wall responsible for its motor function, and the brain–gut axis. Despite in vitro, in vivo, and epidemiological studies having shown that coffee may exert multiple effects on the digestive tract, including antioxidant, anti-inflammatory, and antiproliferative effects on the mucosa, and pro-motility effects on the external muscle layers, much is still surprisingly unknown. Further studies are needed to understand the mechanisms of action of certain health-promoting properties of coffee on the gastrointestinal tract and to transfer this knowledge to the industry to develop functional foods to improve the gastrointestinal and brain–gut axis health.

Highlights Our study shows that 60-day exposure to low doses of aluminum, which aimed to mimic human exposure to dietary aluminum is able to impair male reproductive health. Strikingly, the reproductive impairment was, sometimes, less-marked at the higher dose of Al, raising concerns regard to safe values for human exposure to aluminum. AbstractConcerns about environmental aluminum (Al) and reproductive health have been raised. We investigated the effects of Al exposure at a human relevant dietary level and a high level exposure to Al. Experiment 1 (Lower level) rats were treated orally for 60 days: a) controls -ultrapure water; b) aluminum at 1.5 mg/kg bw/day and c) aluminum at 8.3 mg/kg bw/day. Experiment 2 (High level) rats were treated for 42 days: a) controls -ultrapure water; b) aluminum at 100 mg/kg bw/day. Al decreased sperm count, daily sperm production, sperm motility, normal morphological sperm, impaired testis histology; increased oxidative stress in reproductive organs and inflammation in testis. Our study shows the specific presence of Al in the germinative cells and, that low concentrations of Al in testes (3.35 μg/g) are sufficient to impair spermatogenesis and sperm quality. Our findings provide a better understanding of the reproductive health risk of Al.

Repeated cisplatin induces relatively long-lasting gut dysmotility in rat associated with important histopathological and molecular alterations in the small intestinal wall. In cancer survivors, the possible chemotherapy-induced histopathological, molecular, and functional intestinal sequelae should be evaluated.