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Severe acute pancreatitis (SAP) has a complex course and a worse prognosis. Immune response imbalance is an important cause of severe pancreatitis or even death in patients. Immunomodulation therapy can regulate the imbalance of inflammatory response, alleviate SAP-related organ damage and improve the prognosis of patients. There are some problems in early immune regulation measures, such as single target and simple way. In recent years, new treatment methods, such as regulating the maturation and apoptosis of immune cells, the application of mesenchymal stem cells (MSCs) and multifactor combination therapy, have provided new ideas and hope for the future treatment of SAP. This article reviews the development of SAP immunoregulation and its recent progress.

Genetic variations develop inherited tendency to progress cancer. The incidence rate of head and neck cancer (HNC) is 15–40% of all cancer types worldwide but this ratio is worse in South Asian region of Pakistan. We collected 185 samples and observed variations in IFNG, GTF2H4, OAS3 and SULF1 genes of HNC samples associated with tobacco, betel leaf and nuts, naswar and gutka. We performed the tetra-arm PCR and found significant allelic associations of IFNG rs11177074 (P = 0.001135), GTF2H4 rs2894054 (P = 0.0001), OAS3 rs12302655 (P = 0.000001) and SULF1 rs4737999 (P = 0.00001) with HNC. The cancer and control samples were in Hardy–Weinberg equilibrium and the pooled odds ratios was 95% of confidence. Tobacco and naswar was progressive factor of HNC compare to betel leaves and nuts. The irrational habits of population of the Southern Punjab is bringing a substantial change in SNPs and therefore these variants could be used as genetic biomarkers to diagnose HNC.

Cisplatin is a DNA-damaging chemotherapeutic agent used for treating cancer. Based on cDNA dataset analysis, we investigated how cisplatin modified gene expression and observed cisplatin-induced dysregulation and system-level variations relating to insulin resistance and type 2 diabetes mellitus (T2DM). T2DM is a multifactorial disease affecting 462 million people in the world, and drug-induced T2DM is a serious issue. To understand this etiology, we designed an integrative, system-level study to identify associations between cisplatin-induced differentially expressed genes (DEGs) and T2DM. From a list of differential expressed genes, cisplatin downregulated the cyclin-dependent kinase inhibitor 1 (CDKN1A), tumor necrosis factor (FAS), and sestrin-1 (SESN1) genes responsible for modifying signaling pathways, including the p53, JAK-STAT, FOXO, MAPK, mTOR, P13-AKT, Toll-like receptor (TLR), adipocytokine, and insulin signaling pathways. These enriched pathways were expressively associated with the disease. We observed significant gene signatures, including SMAD3, IRS, PDK1, PRKAA1, AKT, SOS, RAS, GRB2, MEK1/2, and ERK, interacting with source genes. This study revealed the value of system genetics for identifying the cisplatin-induced genetic variants responsible for the progression of T2DM. Also, by cross-validating gene expression data for T2DM islets, we found that downregulating IRS and PRK families is critical in insulin and T2DM signaling pathways. Cisplatin, by inhibiting CDKN1A, FAS, and SESN1, promotes IRS and PRK activity in a similar way to rosiglitazone (a popular drug used for T2DM treatment). Our integrative, network-based approach can help in understanding the drug-induced pathophysiological mechanisms of diabetes.

Insulin resistance and β-cell dysfunction are two major metabolic disorders in diabetic patients. Many genes are linked with insulin secretions and contribute to the pathogenesis of Type 2 diabetes mellitus (T2DM). This study is designed to investigate the single nucleotide polymorphism (SNP) of NFKB1A (rs7152376, rs1951276) and SRR k(rs1490763013) association with T2DM in the population of Southern Punjab Pakistan. We found a significant association of T2DM and our genetic variants among different associated genetic and environmental risk factors. The total study subjects in this investigation included 136 controls and 122 cases. The polymorphic genotyping was studied by Tetra ARMS-PCR. We found a significant association of the disease with genotypes of NFKB1A and SRR. We observed that NFKB1A (rs7152376) showed the ratio of mutant homozygous allele T is 0.7% in cases as compared to 0.5% in controls presenting increased disease-risk in our population. Similarly, the other SNP rs1951276 of NFKB1A revealed homozygous wild type G-allele higher in cases (0.91%). Similarly, the SRR (rs1490763013) showed that homozygous wild T-allele is 0.47% as compared to homozygous mutant C-allele 0.52% in control sample population. The stratification of our genetic variants with T2DM also revealed a significant association with smoking, cholesterol, and depression having P = 0.00001, at significance odd ratio level and 95% Confidence interval. Therefore, these polymorphic variants of NFKB1A and SRR are likely to be used in prognostics of T2DM.

Discovery of alternative and complementary regimens for HCV infection treatment is a need of time from clinical as well as economical point of views. Low cost of bioactive natural compounds production, high biochemical diversity and inexistent/milder side effects contribute to new therapies. Aim of this study is to clarify anti-HCV role of Taraxacum officinale, a natural habitat plant rich of flavonoids. In this study, methanol extract of T. officinale leaves was initially analyzed for its cytotoxic activity in human hepatoma (Huh-7) and CHO cell lines. Hepatoma cells were transfected with pCR3.1/Flagtag/HCV NS5B gene cloned vector (genotype 1a) along with T. officinale extract. Considering NS5B polymerase as potential therapeutic drug target, twelve phytochemicals of T. officinale were selected as ligands for molecular interaction with NS5B protein using Molecular Operating Environment (MOE) software. Sofosbuvir (Sovaldi: brand name) currently approved as new anti-HCV drug, was used as standard in current study for comparative analysis in computational docking screening. HCV NS5B polymerase as name indicates plays key role in viral genome replication. On the basis of which NS5B gene is targeted for determining antiviral role of T. officinale extract and 65% inhibition of NS5B expression was documented at nontoxic dose concentration (200μg/ml) using Real-time PCR. In addition, 57% inhibition of HCV replication was recorded when incubating Huh-7 cells with high titer serum of HCV infected patients along with leaves extract. Phytochemicals for instance d-glucopyranoside (-31.212 Kcal/mol), Quercetin (-29.222 Kcal/mol), Luteolin (-26.941 Kcal/mol) and some others displayed least binding energies as compared to standard drug Sofosbuvir (-21.0746 Kcal/mol). Results of our study strongly revealed that T. officinale leaves extract potentially blocked the viral replication and NS5B gene expression without posing any toxic effect on normal fibroblast cells of body.

Two new pregnane glycosides named desmiflavasides C (1) and D (2) were isolated from the sap of Desmidorchis flava (N.E.Br.) Meve & Liede and have had their structures confirmed from 1D and 2D NMR spectroscopic techniques and mass spectrometry (ESIMS). Further, the effects of desmiflavasides C (1) and D (2) on the proliferation of breast and ovarian cancer cells as well as normal breast epithelial cells in culture were examined. Interestingly, desmiflavasides C (1) and D (2) were able to cause a substantial decline in the viability of cancer cells in a concentration-dependent manner. Moreover, treatment of normal cells with compound 2 resulted in no significant growth inhibition, indicating that its cytotoxicity was selective towards cancer cells. Furthermore, the activity of compound 2 against cancer as well as normal epithelial cells was found to be similar to that of a previously reported pregnane glycoside, nizwaside (3). Molecular docking studies of desmiflavasides C (1) and D (2) and nizwaside (3) were carried out to ascertain if it was possible to predict any important binding orientations required of small molecule drug candidates with suggested protein target molecules for the purposes of being able to predict the affinity and activity to an acceptable degree by such compounds. Desmiflavaside D (2) showed a relatively good binding affinity (-22.4449kcal/mol) as compared to the other two compounds viz., nizwaside (3) (-20.0319kcal/mol), and desmiflavaside C (1) (-19.4042kcal/mol). Docking results of the three pregnane glycosides viz., 1-3 revealed that these ligand molecules can accurately interact with the target protein.

In this study, a library of new intriguing flavonol derivatives (1–17) was designed and synthesized through a facile route involving Algar-Flynn-Oyamada reaction in a one-pot synthesis. The molecular structures of all newly synthesized compounds were unequivocally corroborated by different spectroscopic techniques such as FTIR, UV–Vis, 1H NMR and 13C NMR and mass spectrometry (EI-MS). All the synthesized analogs (1-17) were evaluated in vitro for their inhibitory potential against ɑ-amylase and ɑ-glucosidase enzymes. Interestingly, all the synthetic compounds displayed good to moderate inhibition potential with IC50 values ranging from 4.86 ± 1.39 to 265.61 ± 5.85 μM for a-amylase, and 70.57 ± 1.13 to 322.98 ± 4.43 μM for a-glucosidase in comparison to the standard acarbose (IC50 = 5.03 ± 9.44 μM for a-amylase and IC50 = 75.26 ± 0.15 μM for α-glucosidase). It is worth mentioning that amongst the series, the compounds 9 (IC50 = 4.86 ± 1.39 μM for a-amylase and IC50 = 70.57 ± 1.13 μM for α-glucosidase) and 14 (IC50 = 5.02 ± 1.35 for a-amylase and IC50 = 71.69 ± 5.85 μM for α-glucosidase) were found the most potent dual inhibitors, even more active than standard. Furthermore, the target compounds (1-17) exhibited moderate to good antioxidant activities. Molecular simulations studies were conducted to correlate the in vitro results and to identify the possible mode of binding interaction of ligands with the active site of enzymes. Moreover, molecular description was performed with the drug-likeness and bioactivity scores. The results showed that some compounds are in a linear correlation with Lipinski’s rule of five demonstrating good drug-likeness and bioactivity score for drug targets. Structure-activity relationships delivered useful insights towards this class of compounds, and thus paved the way to design novel analogs with improved potency.