E5 treatment showing improved health-span and lifespan in old Sprague Dawley rats.

Aging and, in particular, the emergence of age-related disorders is associated with tissue dysfunction and macromolecular damage, some of which can be attributable to accumulated oxidative damage. In the current study, we determine the potential of 'plasma-derived fraction (E5)' for cellular rejuvenation and extending the lifespan of Sprague Dawley (SD) rats. This is a unique study wherein we have used 24-month-old rats and monitored them until the end of their lifespan with and without E5 treatment. In the present investigation, the SD rats were separated into two groups old control group and the treatment group (n = 8). The treatment group received four injections of E5 every alternate day for 8 days, and eight injections every alternate day for 16 days. Body weight, grip strength, cytokines, and biochemical markers were measured for more than 400 days of the study. Clinical observation, necropsy, and histology were performed. The E5 treatment exhibited great potential by showing significantly improved grip strength, remarkably decreased pro-inflammatory markers of chronic inflammation and oxidative stress, as well as biomarkers for vital organs (BUN, SGPT, SGOT, and triglycerides), and increased anti-oxidant levels. Clinical examinations, necropsies, and histopathology revealed that the animals treated with the E5 had normal cellular structure and architecture. In conclusion, this unique 'plasma-derived exosome' treatment (E5) alone is adequate to improve the health-span and extend the lifespan of the old SD rats significantly.

A Rare Case of Acute Kidney Injury with Central Nervous System Manifestations.

Multiple myeloma (MM) is usually a disease of the elderly and only less than 1% are young individuals below 35 years of age. Central nervous system (CNS) manifestations of MM are even rarer, the most common being leptomeningeal involvement. We report a case of a 35-year-old male who presented with a fever of 3 weeks duration associated with slurring of speech, nasal regurgitation, hearing loss, and decreased urine output. CNS examination showed IX, X, and XII cranial nerve palsies with right otitis media and bilateral mastoiditis with conductive hearing loss. Renal biopsy showed cast nephropathy. The kappa-lambda ratio was 18, with ß2 microglobulin measuring 12 mg/L. Bone marrow showed 90% plasma cells, and skeletal survey had bony lytic lesions. He responded well to dexamethasone, bortezomib, and thalidomide. His renal functions returned to normal, and palsies have improved completely. This report shows that MM should be suspected even in young patients with classical features of myeloma and CNS involvement is very rare in MM.

Inflammatory breast cancer tumor emboli express high levels of anti-apoptotic proteins: use of a quantitative high content and high-throughput 3D IBC spheroid assay to identify targeting strategies.

Inflammatory breast cancer (IBC) is one of the most lethal breast cancer variants; with existing therapy, 5-yr survival rate is only 35%. Current barriers to successful treatment of IBC include frequent infiltration and the presence of tumor cell clusters, termed tumor emboli, within the breast parenchyma and lymphatics. Prior studies have identified the role of anti-apoptotic signaling, in particular hyperactivation of NFκB and its target genes, in IBC pathobiology and therapeutic resistance. The objectives of this study were to: (1) determine if IBC tumor emboli express anti-apoptotic proteins and (2) develop a high content, multiparametric assay to assess the morphology of the IBC 3D spheroids and to optimize a high throughput format to screen for compounds that can inhibit the formation of the IBC tumor clusters/embolic structures. Immunohistochemical analysis of IBC patient tumor samples with documented tumor emboli revealed high NFκB (p65) staining along with expression of XIAP, a potent anti-apoptotic protein known to interact with NFκB signaling in enhancing survival of malignant cells. Subsequently, the high content assay developed allowed for simultaneous imaging and morphometric analysis, including count and viability of spheroids derived from SUM149, rSUM149 and SUM190 cells and its application to evaluate XIAP and NFκB inhibitory agents. We demonstrate the efficacy of the off-patent drug disulfiram when chelated with copper, which we had previously reported to inhibit NFκB signaling, was highly effective in disrupting both IBC spheroids and emboli grown in vitro. Taken together, these results identify a high-throughput approach to target tumor spheroid formation for drug discovery. Finally, disulfiram is a safe and approved drug for management of alcohol abuse, warranting its evaluation for repurposing in IBC therapy.