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Advertising is a form of communication used to promote or sell something. Children spend many hours daily watching television. Increased exposure to television advertisement is associated with increased consumption of product advertised. Objectives:To assess the impact of viewing television advertisement on the behaviour of children as perceived by parents. Methods: An exploratory study was conducted on 100 parents of children in age group of (3-12 years) which were selected by convenience sampling technique. Result: All children watch television and television advertisements; from which 60% spend

Neuroinflammation is indicated in the pathogenesis of several acute and chronic neurological disorders. Acute lesions in the brain parenchyma induce intense and highly complex neuroinflammatory reactions with similar mechanisms among various disease prototypes. Microglial cells in the CNS sense tissue damage and initiate inflammatory responses. The cellular and humoral constituents of the neuroinflammatory reaction to brain injury contribute significantly to secondary brain damage and neurodegeneration. Inflammatory cascades such as proinflammatory cytokines from invading leukocytes and direct cell-mediated cytotoxicity between lymphocytes and neurons are known to cause "collateral damage" in models of acute brain injury. In addition to degeneration and neuronal cell loss, there are secondary inflammatory mechanisms that modulate neuronal activity and affect neuroinflammation which can even be detected at the behavioral level. Hence, several of health conditions result from these pathogenetic conditions which are underlined by progressive neuronal function loss due to chronic inflammation and oxidative stress. In the first part of this Review, we discuss critical neuroinflammatory mediators and their pathways in detail. In the second part, we review the phytochemicals which are considered as potential therapeutic molecules for treating neurodegenerative diseases with an inflammatory component.

The prevalence of obesity is increasing at an alarming rate worldwide with about 30% of the world population classified as obese. Obese body structure results when energy intake exceeds energy expenditure in an individual. Increase in the consumption of high-energy eatables, in the context of portion and energy provided, has resulted in obese populations which is becoming the leading cause of metabolic disorders related to morbidity. The obesity-related comorbidity is an enormous liability on health services and will affect measures taken in tackling the increasing obesity rate. Prevention of an obese phenotype is the most suitable long-term strategy. Another approach towards the treatment of obesity is weight management through phytotherapeutics. In this study, we explored the anti-obesity effects of Cinnamon (Cinnamomum zeylanicum) in adult male zebrafish. Through BMI measurements, blood glucose level analyses, serum triglyceride analyses, Oil Red O staining as well as quantitative Real Time-PCR, the ability of cinnamon to reduce metabolic disorders associated with obesity is investigated for the first time in a zebrafish model. Our studies indicate that cinnamon ameliorates the genotypic and phonotypic characteristics associated with obesity through lowering of BMI, blood glucose, triglyceride levels, lipid levels in the liver and through gene modulation.

In many countries, public health departments are using innovative strategies to improve the reach and accessibility of health services for a variety of conditions.1–9 India is a low- to middle-income country, with approximately 30% of the population earning below the international poverty line (US$

Dietary interventions for preventing colon cancer have recently attracted increased attention from researchers and clinicians. The probiotics have emerged as potential therapeutic agents but are also regarded as healthy dietary supplements for nutrition and health applications. The probiotic metabolome may interfere with various cellular and molecular processes, including the onset and progression of colon cancer. Probiotic metabolites may lead to the modulation of diverse cellular signal transduction and metabolic pathways. The gut microbial metabolites (organic acids, bacteriocins, peptides, etc.) have been noted to interact with multiple key targets in various metabolic pathways that regulate cellular proliferation, differentiation, apoptosis, inflammation, angiogenesis, and metastasis. Progress in this field suggests that epigenetic alterations will be widely used in the near future to manage colon cancer. The present review provides insights into the molecular basis of the therapeutic applications and the chemopreventive activities of certain probiotic metabolites, with emphasis on the interaction between these metabolites and the molecular signaling cascades that are considered to be epigenetic targets in preventing colon cancer.

Radioprotectors are agents required to protect biological system exposed to radiation, either naturally or through radiation leakage, and they protect normal cells from radiation injury in cancer patients undergoing radiotherapy. It is imperative to study radioprotectors and their mechanism of action comprehensively, looking at their potential therapeutic applications. This review intimately chronicles the rich intellectual, pharmacological story of natural and synthetic radioprotectors. A continuous effort is going on by researchers to develop clinically promising radioprotective agents. In this article, for the first time we have discussed the impact of radioprotectors on different signaling pathways in cells, which will create a basis for scientific community working in this area to develop novel molecules with better therapeutic efficacy. The bright future of exceptionally noncytotoxic derivatives of bisbenzimidazoles is also described as radiomodulators. Amifostine, an effective radioprotectant, has been approved by the FDA for limited clinical use. However, due to its adverse side effects, it is not routinely used clinically. Recently, CBLB502 and several analog of a peptide are under clinical trial and showed high success against radiotherapy in cancer. This article reviews the different types of radioprotective agents with emphasis on the strategies for the development of novel radioprotectors for drug development. In addition, direction for future strategies relevant to the development of radioprotectors is also addressed.

Inflammation is viewed as one of the major causes for the development of different diseases like cancer, cardiovascular disease, diabetes, obesity, osteoporosis, rheumatoid arthritis, inflammatory bowel disease, asthma, and CNS related diseases such as depression and parkinson's disease; and this fervent phenomenon provides space for understanding different inflammatory markers. Increasing evidences have elucidated the outcome of inflammatory pathways dysregulation resulting in many symptoms of chronic diseases. The detection of transcription factors such as nuclear factor kappa-B (NF-κB), STAT and their gene products such as COX-2, cytokines, chemokines and chemokine receptors has laid molecular foundation for the important role of inflammation in chronic diseases in which the NF-κB is reported as a major mediator which makes a possible way for the development of new therapeutic approaches using synthetic and natural compounds that might eventually decrease the prevalence of these diseases. Even if many inflammatory markers like TNF-α, IL-1, IL-6, IL-8 and C-reactive protein (CRP) are reported to be the major key factors with proved role in several inflammatory diseases, IL-1 and TNF-α are the important cytokines that can induce the expression of NF-κB which is the potential target in these inflammatory diseases. This review aims to explore and summarize that how some drugs and natural compounds show their modulatory activity in inflammatory pathways and chronic inflammatory markers in these inflammatory diseases.

BACKGROUND: The genome of retroviruses, including HIV-1, is packaged as two homologous (+) strand RNA molecules, noncovalently associated close to their 5'-end in a region called dimer linkage structure (DLS). Retroviral HIV-1 genomic RNAs dimerize through complex interactions between dimerization initiation sites (DIS) within the (5'-UTR). Dimer formation is prevented by so calledLong Distance Interaction (LDI) conformation, whereas Branched Multiple Hairpin (BMH) conformation leads to spontaneous dimerization. METHODS AND RESULTS: We evaluated the role of SL1 (DIS), PolyA Hairpin signal and a long distance U5-AUG interaction by in-vitro dimerization, conformer assay and coupled dimerization and template-switching assays using antisense PNAs. Our data suggests evidence that PNAs targeted against SL1 produced severe inhibitory effect on dimerization and template-switching processes while PNAs targeted against U5 region do not show significant effect on dimerization and template switching, while PNAs targeted against AUG region showed strong inhibition of dimerization and template switching processes. CONCLUSIONS: Our results demonstrate that PNA can be used successfully as an antisense to inhibit dimerization and template switching process in HIV -1 and both of the processes are closely linked to each other. Different PNA oligomers have ability of switching between two thermodynamically stable forms. PNA targeted against DIS and SL1 switch, LDI conformer to more dimerization friendly BMH form. PNAs targeted against PolyA haipin configuration did not show a significant change in dimerization and template switching process. The PNA oligomer directed against the AUG strand of U5-AUG duplex structure also showed a significant reduction in RNA dimerization as well as template- switching efficiency.The antisense PNA oligomers can be used to regulate the shift in the LDI/BMH equilibrium.

Background HIV-1 requires the support of its appropriate host for the survival and propagation like any other parasite. These host cell factors have been reported to be involved in different stages of viral life cycle. The nuclear import and infection maintenance of HIV-1 Integrase (IN) in human cells is dependent upon the integration efficiency of the proviral DNA and stability of viral RNA. In our study we identified a new host cell interacting factor for HIV-1 IN, SFPQ-a RNA splicing protein, by cross-linking, pull down and mass spectrometry.

BackgroundIonizing radiation (IR) exposure often occurs for human beings through occupational, medical, environmental, accidental and/or other sources. Thus, the role of radioprotector is essential to overcome the complex series of overlapping responses to radiation induced DNA damage.Methods and resultsTreatment of human glioma U87 cells with DMA (5- {4-methylpiperazin-1-yl}-2-[2'-(3, 4-dimethoxyphenyl)-5'-benzimidazolyl] in the presence or absence of radiation uncovered differential regulation of an array of genes and proteins using microarray and 2D PAGE techniques. Pathway construction followed by relative quantitation of gene expression of the identified proteins and their interacting partners led to the identification of MAP3K14 (NFκB inducing kinase, NIK) as the candidate gene affected in response to DMA. Subsequently, over expression and knock down of NIK suggested that DMA affects NFκB inducing kinase mediated phosphorylation of IKKα and IKKβ both alone and in the presence of ionizing radiation (IR). The TNF-α induced NFκB dependent luciferase reporter assay demonstrated 1.65, 2.26 and 3.62 fold increase in NFκB activation at 10, 25 and 50 µM DMA concentrations respectively, compared to control cells. This activation was further increased by 5.8 fold in drug + radiation (50 µM +8.5 Gy) treated cells in comparison to control. We observed 51% radioprotection in control siRNA transfected cells that attenuated to 15% in siRNA NIK treated U87 cells, irradiated in presence of DMA at 24 h.ConclusionsOur studies show that NIK/IKK mediated NFκB activation is more intensified in cells over expressing NIK and treated with DMA, alone or in combination with ionizing radiation, indicating that DMA promotes NIK mediated NFκB signaling. This subsequently leads to the radioprotective effect exhibited by DMA.

Because of the shortage of donors, kidneys previously judged to be unsuitable are now accepted for transplantation. Successful engraftment of kidneys with multiple renal arteries is one of the challenges and requires meticulous vascular surgical technique. In one of our case of renal allograft with three renal arteries, we created a single lumen by suturing three arteries together, like a three-legged pair of pants. The end of the single lumen was anastomesed to the side of external iliac artery. There was brisk diuresis on table after transplantation. Postoperatively, the patient had an uneventful course and normal graft function.