It is well known that cocoa and dark chocolate possess polyphenols as major constituents whose dietary consumption has been associated to beneficial effects. In fact, cocoa and dark chocolate ...polyphenols exert antioxidant and anti-inflammatory activities switching on some important signaling pathways such as toll-like receptor 4/nuclear factor κB/signal transducer and activator of transcription. In particular, cocoa polyphenols induce release of nitric oxide (NO) through activation of endothelial NO synthase which, in turn, accounts for vasodilation and cardioprotective effects. In the light of the above described properties, a number of clinical trials based on the consumption of cocoa and dark chocolate have been conducted in healthy subjects as well as in different categories of patients, such as those affected by cardiovascular, neurological, intestinal, and metabolic pathologies. Even if data are not always concordant, modifications of biomarkers of disease are frequently associated to improvement of clinical manifestations. Quite interestingly, following cocoa and dark chocolate ingestion, cocoa polyphenols also modulate intestinal microbiota, thus leading to the growth of bacteria that trigger a tolerogenic anti-inflammatory pathway in the host. Finally, many evidences encourage the consumption of cocoa and dark chocolate by aged people for the recovery of the neurovascular unit.
In this review, special emphasis will be placed on red grape polyphenols for their antioxidant and anti-inflammatory activities. Therefore, their capacity to inhibit major pathways responsible for ...activation of oxidative systems and expression and release of proinflammatory cytokines and chemokines will be discussed. Furthermore, regulation of immune cells by polyphenols will be illustrated with special reference to the activation of T regulatory cells which support a tolerogenic pathway at intestinal level. Additionally, the effects of red grape polyphenols will be analyzed in obesity, as a low-grade systemic inflammation. Also, possible modifications of inflammatory bowel disease biomarkers and clinical course have been studied upon polyphenol administration, either in animal models or in clinical trials. Moreover, the ability of polyphenols to cross the blood-brain barrier has been exploited to investigate their neuroprotective properties. In cancer, polyphenols seem to exert several beneficial effects, even if conflicting data are reported about their influence on T regulatory cells. Finally, the effects of polyphenols have been evaluated in experimental models of allergy and autoimmune diseases. Conclusively, red grape polyphenols are endowed with a great antioxidant and anti-inflammatory potential but some issues, such as polyphenol bioavailability, activity of metabolites, and interaction with microbiota, deserve deeper studies.
Hypoxia and inflammation are strictly interconnected both concurring to prostate cancer progression. Numerous reports highlight the role of tumor cells in the synthesis of pro-inflammatory molecules ...and show that hypoxia can modulate a number of these genes contributing substantially to the increase of cancer aggressiveness. However, little is known about the importance of the tumor phenotype in this process. The present study explores how different features, including differentiation and aggressiveness, of prostate tumor cell lines impact on the hypoxic remodeling of pro-inflammatory gene expression and malignancy. We performed our studies on three cell lines with increasing metastatic potential: the well differentiated androgen-dependent LNCaP and the less differentiated and androgen-independent DU145 and PC3. We analyzed the effect that hypoxic treatment has on modulating pro-inflammatory gene expression and evaluated the role HIF isoforms and NF-kB play in sustaining this process. DU145 and PC3 cells evidenced a higher normoxic expression and a more complete hypoxic induction of pro-inflammatory molecules compared to the well differentiated LNCaP cell line. The role of HIF1α and NF-kB, the master regulators of hypoxia and inflammation respectively, in sustaining the hypoxic pro-inflammatory phenotype was different according to cell type. NF-kB was observed to play a main role in DU145 and PC3 cells in which treatment with the NF-kB inhibitor parthenolide was able to counteract both the hypoxic pro-inflammatory shift and HIF1α activation but not in LNCaP cells. Our data highlight that tumor prostate cell phenotype contributes at a different degree and with different mechanisms to the hypoxic pro-inflammatory gene expression related to tumor progression.
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Dostopno za:
DOBA, IZUM, KILJ, NUK, PILJ, PNG, SAZU, SIK, UILJ, UKNU, UL, UM, UPUK
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Oxidative stress induced post-translational protein modifications are associated with the development of inflammatory hypersensitivities. At least 90% of cellular reactive oxygen ...species (ROS) are produced in the mitochondria, where the mitochondrial antioxidant, manganese superoxide dismutase (MnSOD), is located. MnSOD’s ability to reduce ROS is enhanced by the mitochondrial NAD+-dependent deacetylase sirtuin (SIRT3). SIRT3 can reduce ROS levels by deacetylating MnSOD and enhancing its ability to neutralize ROS or by enhancing the transcription of MnSOD and other oxidative stress-responsive genes. SIRT3 can be post-translationally modified through carbonylation which results in loss of activity. The contribution of post-translational SIRT3 modifications in central sensitization is largely unexplored. Our results reveal that SIRT3 carbonylation contributes to spinal MnSOD inactivation during carrageenan-induced thermal hyperalgesia in rats. Moreover, inhibiting ROS with natural and synthetic antioxidants, prevented SIRT3 carbonylation, restored the enzymatic activity of MnSOD, and blocked the development of thermal hyperalgesia. These results suggest that therapeutic strategies aimed at inhibiting post-translational modifications of SIRT3 may provide beneficial outcomes in pain states where ROS have been documented to play an important role in the development of central sensitization.
MicroRNAs (miRNAs/miRs) are small conserved RNA molecules of 22 nucleotides that negatively modulate gene expression primarily through base paring to the 3' untranslated region of target messenger ...RNAs. The muscle-specific miR-1 has been implicated in cardiac hypertrophy, heart development, cardiac stem cell differentiation, and arrhythmias through targeting of regulatory proteins. In this study, we investigated the molecular mechanisms through which miR-1 intervenes in regulation of muscle cell growth and differentiation.
On the basis of bioinformatics tools, biochemical assays, and in vivo models, we demonstrate that (1) insulin-like growth factor-1 (IGF-1) and IGF-1 receptor are targets of miR-1; (2) miR-1 and IGF-1 protein levels are correlated inversely in models of cardiac hypertrophy and failure as well as in the C2C12 skeletal muscle cell model of differentiation; (3) the activation state of the IGF-1 signal transduction cascade reciprocally regulates miR-1 expression through the Foxo3a transcription factor; and (4) miR-1 expression correlates inversely with cardiac mass and thickness in myocardial biopsies of acromegalic patients, in which IGF-1 is overproduced after aberrant synthesis of growth hormone.
Our results reveal a critical role of miR-1 in mediating the effects of the IGF-1 pathway and demonstrate a feedback loop between miR-1 expression and the IGF-1 signal transduction cascade.
The functional interdependencies between the molecular components of a biological process demand for a network medicine platform that integrates systems biology and network science, to explore the ...interactions among biological components in health and disease. Access to large-scale omics datasets (genomics, transcriptomics, proteomics, metabolomics, metagenomics, phenomics, etc.) has significantly advanced our opportunity along this direction. Studies utilizing these techniques have begun to provide us with a deeper understanding of how the interaction between the intestinal microbes and their host affects the cardiovascular system in health and disease. Within the framework of a multiomics network approach, we highlight here how tryptophan metabolism may orchestrate the host-microbes interaction in cardiovascular diseases and the implications for precision medicine and therapeutics, including nutritional interventions.
Epicardial EMT and cardiac repair: an update Foglio, Eleonora; D'Avorio, Erica; Nieri, Riccardo ...
Stem cell research & therapy,
07/2024, Letnik:
15, Številka:
1
Journal Article
Recenzirano
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Epicardial epithelial-to-mesenchymal transition (EMT) plays a pivotal role in both heart development and injury response and involves dynamic cellular changes that are essential for cardiogenesis and ...myocardial repair. Specifically, epicardial EMT is a crucial process in which epicardial cells lose polarity, migrate into the myocardium, and differentiate into various cardiac cell types during development and repair. Importantly, following EMT, the epicardium becomes a source of paracrine factors that support cardiac growth at the last stages of cardiogenesis and contribute to cardiac remodeling after injury. As such, EMT seems to represent a fundamental step in cardiac repair. Nevertheless, endogenous EMT alone is insufficient to stimulate adequate repair. Redirecting and amplifying epicardial EMT pathways offers promising avenues for the development of innovative therapeutic strategies and treatment approaches for heart disease. In this review, we present a synthesis of recent literature highlighting the significance of epicardial EMT reactivation in adult heart disease patients. Keywords: EMT, Epicardial cells, Cardiac repair and regeneration, Molecular rehabilitation
Primary aldosteronism (PA) causes a cardiomyopathy (CM) which substrate and evolution after aldosterone normalization are unreported.
Four male patients with aldosterone-secreting adrenal adenoma and ...cardiomyopathy (PACM, group A) were evaluated with 2D-echo, Magnetic Resonance (CMR), coronary angiography and left ventricular endomyocardial biopsy. Biopsy samples were processed for histology, electron microscopy, immunohistochemistry, and Western Blot analysis of myocardial aldosterone receptors and aquaporin 1 and 4.
Results were compared with endomyocardial samples from 5 patients with hypertensive cardiomyopathy of equivalent severity and normal plasma aldosterone (group B) and surgical samples from 5 controls (group C). One PACM patient was re-examined with CMR and endomyocardial biopsy 12 months after adrenalectomy with aldosterone and cardiac normalization.
Coronary arteries were normal in all. Group A showed prominent myocardial hypertrophy and fibrosis, with water accumulation in the cytosol and organelles of cardiomyocytes and microvascular smooth muscle cells, associated to reduced myofibril concentration and 2.8-fold increase in myocardial aldosterone receptors and aquaporin 1. At CMR, LGE areas were diffusely present. After aldosterone normalization, cardiomyocyte diameter reduced with disappearance of intracellular vacuoles, recovery of electron-density of cytosol and cell organelles, and myofibrillar content, persisting fibrosis and down-regulation of aldosterone receptors and aquaporin 1 channels. At CMR, myocardial mass reduced with recovery of cardiac contractility. LGE signal remained unchanged.
PACM is a reversible entity characterized by over-expression of aldosterone receptors and aquaporin 1. It induces a reversible intracellular water overloading causing impaired cardiomyocyte relaxation, contraction and ultrastructural integrity.
•Primary aldosteronism•Cardiomyopathy•Endomyocardial biopsy
In mice, postnatal immune development has previously been investigated, and evidence of a delayed maturation of the adaptive immune response has been detected.
In this study, the effects of red grape ...polyphenol oral administration on the murine immune response were explored using pregnant mice (TAG/F3 transgenic and wild type (wt) mice) as the animal model. The study was performed during pregnancy as well as during lactation until postnatal day 8. Suckling pups from polyphenol-administered dams as well as day 30 post-weaning pups (dietary-administered with polyphenols) were used. Polyphenol effects were evaluated, measuring splenic cytokine secretion.
Phorbol myristate acetate-activated splenocytes underwent the highest cytokine production at day 30 in both wt and TAG/F3 mice. In the latter, release of interferon (IFN)-γ and tumor necrosis factor (TNF)-α was found to be higher than in the wt counterpart. In this context, polyphenols exerted modulating activities on day 30 TAG/F3 mice, inducing release of interleukin (IL)-10 in hetero mice while abrogating release of IL-2, IFN-γ, TNF-α, IL-6, and IL-4 in homo and hetero mice.
Polyphenols are able to prevent the development of an inflammatory/allergic profile in postnatal TAG/F3 mice.
Different cell types belonging to the innate and adaptive immune system play mutually non-exclusive roles during the different phases of the inflammatory-reparative response that occurs following ...myocardial infarction. A timely and finely regulation of their action is fundamental for the process to properly proceed. The high-mobility group box 1 (HMGB1), a highly conserved nuclear protein that in the extracellular space can act as a damage-associated molecular pattern (DAMP) involved in a large variety of different processes, such as inflammation, migration, invasion, proliferation, differentiation, and tissue regeneration, has recently emerged as a possible regulator of the activity of different immune cell types in the distinct phases of the inflammatory reparative process. Moreover, by activating endogenous stem cells, inducing endothelial cells, and by modulating cardiac fibroblast activity, HMGB1 could represent a master regulator of the inflammatory and reparative responses following MI. In this review, we will provide an overview of cellular effectors involved in these processes and how HMGB1 intervenes in regulating each of them. Moreover, we will summarize HMGB1 roles in regulating other cell types that are involved in the different phases of the inflammatory-reparative response, discussing how its redox status could affect its activity.