Ghrelin inhibits the development of acute pancreatitis induced by sodium taurocholate. It exerts the therapeutic effects through inhibiting NF-kappaB expression, thereby blocks the inflammatory signal transduction pathway and reduces the release of inflammatory media and cytokines.

No abstract

Rosiglitazone attenuates hepatic insulin resistance induced by CP. The inhibition of hepatic IKK-β and NF-κB expressions via peroxisome proliferator-activated receptor-γ may be involved in the therapeutic effect of rosiglitazone.

Departmental sources Background:Pancreatic cancer (PAC) is a lethal cancer and it is essential to develop accurate diagnostic and prognostic biomarkers for PAC. Material/Methods:An integrated microarray analysis of PAC was conducted to identify differentially expressed genes (DEGs) between PAC and non-tumor controls. Expression of DEGs were further confirmed by The Cancer Genome Atlas and the Genotype-Tissue Expression. Gene Ontology and Kyoto Encyclopedia of Genes and Genomes enrichment analysis, and protein-protein integration network construction were performed to further research the biological functions of DEGs. Receiver-operating characteristic analysis and survival analysis were used to evaluate the diagnostic and prognostic value of DEGs for PAC. Results:Seventeen microarray datasets were downloaded from Gene Expression Omnibus to conduct the integrated microarray analysis. A total of 1136 DEGs (596 upregulated and 540 downregulated DEGs) in PAC tissues compared with non-tumor controls were identified. Pancreatic secretion (Kegg: 04972), insulin signaling pathway (Kegg: 04910), and several cancer-related pathways including pathways in cancer (Kegg: 05200), MAPK signaling pathway (Kegg: 04010), and pancreatic cancer (Kegg: 05212) were enriched for DEGs in PAC. Seven DEGs (AHNAK2, CDH3, IFI27, ITGA2, LAMB3, SLC6A14, and TMPRSS4) were found to have both great diagnostic and prognostic value for PAC. High expression of these 7 DEGs were significantly associated with poor prognosis of patients with PAC. Conclusions:These 7 DEGs might be potential diagnostic and prognostic biomarkers for PAC and help uncovering the mechanism of PAC.

No abstract

No abstract

Introduction Carbohydrate antigen 19-9 (CA19-9) is a well-studied tumor marker, yet its diagnostic value for gallbladder cancer remains unclear. The present meta-analysis was conducted to validate the role of serum CA19-9 for the detection of gallbladder cancer. Methods A systematic search of digital databases was conducted, complemented by additional hand-searching. Studies that reported serum CA19-9 for the differentiation of gallbladder cancer cases from non-gallbladder cancer controls were considered eligible. Results A total of 27 studies involving 4300 subjects were included. The pooled sensitivity, specificity, and area under the curve in diagnosing gallbladder cancer were 0.70 (95% confidence interval (CI): 0.63–0.76), 0.92 (95% CI: 0.88–0.94), and 0.89 (95% CI: 0.86–0.92), respectively. The pooled positive likelihood rate, negative likelihood rate, and diagnostic odds rate were 8.30 (95% CI: 5.84–11.69), 0.33 (95% CI: 0.27–0.41), and 25.13 (95% CI: 5.83–39.89), respectively. Meta-regression analysis revealed that there was significantly lower sensitivity (0.69, 95% CI: 0.61–0.77) and specificity (0.91, 95% CI: 0.87–0.95) when CA19-9 was used for the differentiation of gallbladder cancer cases from benign biliary diseases. A better specificity of 0.93 (95% CI: 0.90–0.96) was reached in the setting of a sample size ≥100. Conclusions Serum CA19-9 can be a potential candidate marker for the detection of gallbladder cancer, which maintains moderate sensitivity and good specificity. Attention should be paid to the control type and sample size, which may affect its diagnostic accuracy. Also, results should be interpreted with caution due to significant heterogeneity primarily caused by different thresholds between included studies.