👤 Suman Karmakar

Complex progressive neurodegenerative Alzheimer's disease is characterized by cognitive decline, memory impairment, and accumulation of amyloid and tau pathologies, along with aggravation of neuroinflammatory and oxidative stress pathways. In our previous studies, the potential of azilsartan, a widely used angiotensin receptor blocker (ARB), was demonstrated to possess neuroprotective action when administered through intranasal route, improving memory and cognition through modulation of central renin-angiotensin signalling in a demented animal model. With the intranasal administration, azilsartan nanoemulgel offers the ability to bypass the BBB due to the use of the olfactory and trigeminal neural pathways, achieving direct brain targeting of the therapeutics. In the present study, the neuroprotective effect of azilsartan (5 mg/kg via intranasal route consequently for 45 days) was further validated in an AlCl Show less

Dendritic cells (DCs) encounter Leishmania differentially, and the conflict can restrict or disseminate the parasite infection, either by activating or dampening the protective T cell responses and inducing the regulatory T cells. The outcome of this conflict depends on the species of Leishmania, infection tenure, DC subtypes, and, importantly, the DC-stimulating chemical and physical mediators. The critical balance between splenic cDC1 (CD8α Show less

NGS (next-generation sequencing) has become a rapid advance in discovering the variants in the genomic data for disease diagnosis, prognosis, and therapeutic decision. However, the scope of detecting single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) becomes limited by the availability of reliable high-throughput data. OUD (opioid use disorder) is a chronic condition marked by prolonged opioid misuse, leading to cycles of relapse and remission. The discovery of genetic variants associated with OUD is constrained by limited genomic data, making it crucial to identify these variants and their genetic factors. The identification of variants from RNA-seq (RNA-sequencing) data can become the representative of the SNP analysis that is generally preferred from the whole genome or exome sequencing data. This study aimed to identify variants from gene expression data downloaded from NCBI GEO with accession PRJNA492904 in postmortem ventral midbrain specimens of chronic opioid users. We hypothesized that the NRXN3 gene would exhibit the highest number of variants due to its significant role in neuronal synapse function and its association with opioid addiction and impulsivity. We utilized RNA-Seq data from OUD patients (PRJNA492904, NCBI SRA) to detect variants in expressed RNA, which can indicate functional protein changes. Eight genes were analyzed: BDNF, DRD2, DRD3, NRXN3, OPRD1, OPRM1, and NGFB, with a primary focus on NRXN3. Our findings revealed the highest number of variants in NRXN3 compared to the other genes, highlighting its potential importance in OUD and the robustness of RNA-Seq in variant detection. Show less

Deregulated epithelial-to-mesenchymal transition constitutes one of the major aspects of cancer progression. In this study, to identify key molecular principles of EMT pathway in prostate carcinogenesis, an elaborate gene expression profiling was conducted by qRT-PCR and Western blot analyses. A preponderance of mesenchymal trait was observed in the pathological samples of prostate cancer. To simulate an appropriate in vitro model, PC3 cell line was subjected to hypoxic stress, which resulted in elevated expression of vimentin along with EMT-mediating transcription factors Zeb1 and Slug. To conciliate this mesenchymal behavior of PC3 cells, hsa-miR-200c was deliberately overexpressed which led to a marked reduction of cell motility and expression of vimentin, N-cadherin, Zeb1 and Slug with concurrent increase in level of β-catenin. hsa-miR-200c was demonstrated to appease hypoxia-aggravated changes in cellular morphology by coordinated repression of vimentin, Zeb1 and Slug. Mode of action for hsa-miR-200c was mediated through transcriptional repression of Zeb1 and Slug interacting with E-box sequences in the vimentin promoter as documented by promoter assay. This ability of hsa-miR-200c to reclaim epithelial traits leads to the anticipation that molecular reprogramming of Zeb1-Slug/vimentin axis may relieve aggressiveness of prostate cancer. Show less