Alcoholism is one of the most frequent dependences among people, leading to damage of the liver and death of the person. Chronic alcohol consumption decreases fatty acid oxidation by interfering with carnitine metabolism and citric acid cycle activity. Block in activity of the citric acid cycle caused by alcohol and its metabolites is partially compensated by increased ketone body production, which results in ketosis. Chronic administration of alcohol induces liver injury, inflammation, cirrhosis, focal necrosis and steatosis. L-carnitine (L-3-hydroxy-4-N, N, N-trimethylaminebutyric acid) is an essential factor in fatty acid metabolism, which plays a major role in transport of activated long-chain fatty acids to sites of β-oxidation in mitochondria. Carnitine also stabilizes cell membranes by removing long-chain acyl-CoA and excess of the acyl group from the body. L-carnitine can be a useful and safe drug in the liver pathology induced by chronic ethanol exposure.
Type 1 diabetes slightly changes the composition of saliva. Smoking cigarettes significantly modifies the composition and properties of saliva in healthy individuals and patients with Type 1 diabetes.
Lysosomal exoglycosidases and cathepsin D in colon adenocarcinoma 551 INTROduCTION Colon cancer is one of the most common malignant tumors in highly developed European countries. In 2006, there were 3,191,600 cases of cancer in Europe (excluding nonmelanoma skin cancers) and 1,703,000 deaths from cancer. The most common was breast cancer (429,900 cases; 13.5% of all cases), followed by colorectal cancer (412,900; 12.9%), and lung cancer (386,300; 12.1%). Lung cancer, with approximately 334,800 deaths (19.7%), was the most common cause of death from cancer, followed by colorectal (207,400 deaths), breast (131,900), and stomach (118,200) cancer. 1,2
There were approximately 93,060 deaths from cancers in Poland in 2008, and about 105,000 are predicted for the year 2025. Early detection of cancer is a major problem throughout the world, which is why many researchers are still looking for specific and sensitive markers of malignant tumors. Our work is a review of recent publications on activity of N-acetyl-β-D-hexosaminidase (HEX) and its isoenzymes A (HEX A) and B (HEX B) as potential markers of malignant tumors. HEX is the most active of the lysosomal exoglycosidases, taking part in degradation of glycoconjugates (glycoproteins, glycolipids, proteoglycans). HEX cleaves N-acetyl-D-glucosamine and N-acetyl-D-galactosamine from non-reducing ends of oligosaccharide chains of glycoproteins, glycolipids and glycosaminoglycans. The activity of HEX, and its isoenzymes A (HEX A) and B (HEX B), was determined by spectrophotometric and isoelectric focusing methods. There was a statistically significant increase in activity of HEX in tumors of the kidney, pancreas, thyroid, colon, ovary, brain, salivary gland, stomach and larynx, which suggests potential applicability of HEX and its isoenzymes in cancer diagnosis.
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