Evaluation of the safety and potential lipid-lowering effects of oral hydrogen-rich coral calcium (HRCC) capsules in patients with metabolic syndrome: a prospective case series study.

Background: Metabolic syndrome is characterized by a cluster-like occurrence of conditions such as hypertension, hyperglycaemia, elevated low-density lipoprotein (LDL) cholesterol or triglycerides (TG) and high visceral fat. Metabolic syndrome is linked to the build-up of plaque within the artery, which leads to disorders of the circulatory, nervous and immune systems. A variety of treatments target the regulation of these conditions; nevertheless, they remain dominant risk factors for the development of type 2 diabetes (T2DM) and cardiovascular disease (CVD), which affect 26.9% of the US population. Management and intervention strategies for improving cholesterol and/or TG are worthwhile, and recent studies on hydrogen treatment are promising, particularly as molecular hydrogen is easily ingested. This study aimed to investigate the lipid-lowering effects and quality of life (QOL) improvement of hydrogen-rich coral calcium (HRCC) in patients with metabolic syndrome. Methods: The patients, all Taiwanese, were randomly assigned to 3 different doses (low, medium, and high) of HRCC capsules. The primary outcome was the adverse effects/symptoms during this 4-week use of HRCC capsules. The secondary outcome was lipid profile changes. Complete blood count, inflammatory biomarkers, and QOL were also measured before and after the course of HRCC. Results: Sixteen patients with metabolic syndrome completed this study (7 males, 9 females; mean age: 62 years; range: 32-80). No obvious adverse effects were recorded. Only changes in blood TG reached significance. The baseline TG value was 193.19 µL (SD = 107.44), which decreased to 151.75 µL (SD = 45.27) after 4 weeks of HRCC (p = 0.04). QOL showed no significant changes. Conclusion: This study is the first human clinical trial evaluating HRCC capsules in patients with metabolic syndrome. Based on the safety and potential TG-lowering effects of short-term HRCC, further long-term investigations of HRCC are warranted. Clinical trial registration: [ClinicalTrials.gov], identifier [NCT05196295].

miRTarBase update 2014: an information resource for experimentally validated miRNA-target interactions.

MicroRNAs (miRNAs) are small non-coding RNA molecules capable of negatively regulating gene expression to control many cellular mechanisms. The miRTarBase database (http://mirtarbase.mbc.nctu.edu.tw/) provides the most current and comprehensive information of experimentally validated miRNA-target interactions. The database was launched in 2010 with data sources for >100 published studies in the identification of miRNA targets, molecular networks of miRNA targets and systems biology, and the current release (2013, version 4) includes significant expansions and enhancements over the initial release (2010, version 1). This article reports the current status of and recent improvements to the database, including (i) a 14-fold increase to miRNA-target interaction entries, (ii) a miRNA-target network, (iii) expression profile of miRNA and its target gene, (iv) miRNA target-associated diseases and (v) additional utilities including an upgrade reminder and an error reporting/user feedback system.

A new method for post Genome-Wide Association Study (GWAS) analysis of colorectal cancer in Taiwan.

Recently, single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) located in specific loci or genes have been identified associated with susceptibility to colorectal cancer (CRC) in Genome-Wide Association Studies (GWAS). However, in different ethnicities and regions, the genetic variations and the environmental factors can widely vary. Therefore, here we propose a post-GWAS analysis method to investigate the CRC susceptibility SNPs in Taiwan by conducting a replication analysis and bioinformatics analysis. One hundred and forty-four significant SNPs from published GWAS results were collected by a literature survey, and two hundred and eighteen CRC samples and 385 normal samples were collected for post-GWAS analysis. Finally, twenty-six significant SNPs were identified and reported as associated with susceptibility to colorectal cancer, other cancers, obesity, and celiac disease in a previous GWAS study. Functional analysis results of 26 SNPs indicate that most biological processes identified are involved in regulating immune responses and apoptosis. In addition, an efficient prediction model was constructed by applying Jackknife feature selection and ANOVA testing. As compared to another risk prediction model of CRC for European Caucasians population, which performs 0.616 of AUC by using 54 SNPs, the proposed model shows good performance in predicting CRC risk within the Taiwanese population, i.e., 0.724 AUC by using 16 SNPs. We believe that the proposed risk prediction model is highly promising for predicting CRC risk within the Taiwanese population. In addition, the functional analysis results could be helpful to explore the potential associated regulatory mechanisms that may be involved in CRC development.