Recent advances in breast cancer cell line research.

Breast cancer, a formidable global health challenge, needs continuous translational research to understand the complexity of mechanisms and improve therapeutic and diagnostic strategies. Breast cancer cell lines are of paramount importance as they significantly contribute to the initial stage of research to understand cancer biology. This review provides insights into targeted therapies and immunotherapies that have emerged using in vitro models and microbiome analysis. It focuses on therapeutic development using cell lines and the limitations of tumor heterogeneity and microenvironment. We explore the evolving landscape of breast cancer cell lines from two-dimensional (2-D) cultures to patient-derived xenograft (PDX) models advancing both fundamental and translational research. Patient-derived xenografts, cell line-derived xenografts (CDX), three-dimensional (3-D) cultures, organoids, and circulating tumor cells (CTC) models provide promising alternatives that capture the intricacies of the tumor microenvironment. This review bridges the gap between traditional cell lines and newer developments exploring the therapeutic and diagnostic advancements and needs for cell lines to expedite the progress in breast cancer research and treatment.

India's tryst with salt: Dandi march to low sodium salts.

Salt plays a critical role in India's past as well as its present, from Dandi March to its role as a vehicle for micronutrient fortification. However, excess salt intake is a risk factor for high blood pressure and cardiovascular diseases (CVDs). Indians consume double the World Health Organization recommended daily salt (<5 g). India has committed to a 30 per cent reduction in sodium intake by 2025. Evidence based strategies for population sodium intake reduction require a moderate reduction in salt in - home cooked foods, packaged foods and outside-home foods. Reducing the sodium content in packaged food includes policy driven interventions such as front-of-package warning labels, food reformulation, marketing restrictions and taxation on high sodium foods. For foods outside of the home, setting standards for foods purchased and served by schemes like mid-day meals can have a moderate impact. For home cooked foods (the major source of sodium), strategies include advocacy for reducing salt intake. In addition to mass media campaigns for awareness generation, substituting regular salt with low sodium salt (LSS) has the potential to reduce salt intake even in the absence of a major shift in consumer behaviour. LSS substitution effectively lowers blood pressure and thus reduces the risk of CVDs. Further research is required on the effect of LSS substitutes on patients with chronic kidney disease. India needs an integrated approach to sodium reduction that uses evidence based strategies and can be implemented sustainably at scale. This will be possible only through scientific research, governmental leadership and a responsive evidence-to-action approach through a multi-stakeholder coalition.

A comparison of the Indian diet with the EAT-Lancet reference diet.

BACKGROUND: The 2019 EAT-Lancet Commission report recommends healthy diets that can feed 10 billion people by 2050 from environmentally sustainable food systems. This study compares food consumption patterns in India, from different income groups, regions and sectors (rural/urban), with the EAT-Lancet reference diet and highlights the deviations. METHODS: The analysis was done using data from the Consumption Expenditure Survey (CES) of a nationally representative sample of 0.102 million households from 7469 villages and 5268 urban blocks of India conducted by the National Sample Survey Organization (NSSO) in 2011-12. This is the most recent nationally representative data on household consumption in India. Calorie consumption (kcal/capita/day) of each food group was calculated using the quantity of consumption from the data and nutritional values of food items provided by NSSO. Diets for rural and urban, poor and rich households across different regions were compared with EAT-Lancet reference diet. RESULTS: The average daily calorie consumption in India is below the recommended 2503 kcal/capita/day across all groups compared, except for the richest 5% of the population. Calorie share of whole grains is significantly higher than the EAT-Lancet recommendations while those of fruits, vegetables, legumes, meat, fish and eggs are significantly lower. The share of calories from protein sources is only 6-8% in India compared to 29% in the reference diet. The imbalance is highest for the households in the lowest decile of consumption expenditure, but even the richest households in India do not consume adequate amounts of fruits, vegetables and non-cereal proteins in their diets. An average Indian household consumes more calories from processed foods than fruits. CONCLUSIONS: Indian diets, across states and income groups, are unhealthy. Indians also consume excess amounts of cereals and not enough proteins, fruits, and vegetables. Importantly, unlike many countries, excess consumption of animal protein is not a problem in India. Indian policymakers need to accelerate food-system-wide efforts to make healthier and sustainable diets more affordable, accessible and acceptable.

Congenital Epulis: A Rare Benign Jaw Tumour in a 2-Day-Old Male Baby.

BACKGROUND: Congenital epulis is a rare benign jaw tumor. It is a reactive or degenerative lesion having a mesenchymal origin; presenting as an obvious mass arising from the gingival mucosa of the maxilla or mandible, presenting in neonates. Its etiology, histopathogenesis and natural history are still not well established. It is seen usually in the female gender and mostly involves the maxillary alveolar ridge. MATERIAL/MEHODS: We report a case of a 2.7 kg male baby born with growth on his mandibular ridge which was excised and was proved to be epulis on histopathology. RESULTS: Congenital epulis is often misdiagnosed before surgery because of its rarity and a lack of awareness of the condition by clinicians. It is important for the attending pediatricians, pediatric surgeon to be aware of this rare but benign congenital tumor. CONCLUSIONS: Congenital epulis is often misdiagnosed before surgery because of its rarity and a lack of awareness of the condition by clinicians. As the clinical presentation of this congenital tumor can be distressing due to its size and aggressive appearance, it is important for the attending pediatricians, pediatric surgeon to be aware of this rare but benign congenital tumor.

Analysis of Vocal Signatures of COVID-19 in Cough Sounds: A Newer Diagnostic Approach Using Artificial Intelligence.

BACKGROUND: Artificial intelligence (AI) based models are explored increasingly in the medical field. The highly contagious pandemic of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) affected the world and availability of diagnostic tools high resolution computed tomography (HRCT) and/or real-time reverse transcriptase-polymerase chain reaction (RTPCR) was very limited, costly and time consuming. Therefore, the use of AI in COVID-19 for diagnosis using cough sounds can be efficacious and cost effective for screening in clinic or hospital and help in early diagnosis and further management of patients. OBJECTIVES: To develop an accurate and fast voice-processing AI software to determine voice-based signatures in discriminating COVID-19 and non-COVID-19 cough sounds for screening of COVID-19. METHODOLOGY: A prospective study involving 117 patients was performed based on online and/or offline voice data collection of cough sounds of COVID-19 patients in isolation ward of a tertiary care teaching hospital and non-COVID-19 participants using a smart phone. A website-based AI software was developed to identify the cough sounds as COVID-19 or non-COVID-19. The data were divided into three segments including training set, validation set and test set. A pre-processing algorithm was utilized and combined with Short Time Fourier Transform feature representation and Logistic regression model. A precise software was used to identify vocal signatures and K-fold cross validation was carried out. RESULT: A total of 117 audio recordings of cough sounds were collected through the developed website after inclusion-exclusion criteria out of which 52 have been marked belonging to COVID-19 positive, while 65 were marked as COVID-19 negative/unsure /never had COVID-19, which were assumed to be COVID-19 negative based on RT-PCR test results. The mean and standard error values for the accuracies attained at the end of each experiment in training, validation and testing set were found to be 67.34%±0.22, 58.57%±1.11 and 64.60%±1.79 respectively. The weight values were found to be positive which were contributing towards predicting the samples as COVID-19 positive with large spikes around 7.5 kHz, 7.8 kHz, 8.6 kHz and 11 kHz which can be used for classification. CONCLUSION: The proposed AI based approach can be a helpful screening tool for COVID-19 using vocal sounds of cough. It can help the health system by reducing the cost burden and improving overall diagnosis and management of the disease.

Awareness and Availability of Low Sodium Iodized Salt: Results from Formative Research of Promoting Uptake of Low SodiUm Iodized Salt by Rural and Urban HousehoLds in India-The PLURAL Study.

Dietary sodium intake is high among adults in India. Use of low sodium iodized salt (LSIS) can help reduce sodium intake. However, contextually relevant and culturally appropriate interventions to promote LSIS uptake in India have not been developed and implemented. We carried out formative research to inform an intervention to promote uptake of LSIS among rural and urban households in north (Sonipat district) and south (Visakhapatnam and Anakapalli districts) India. Sixty-two in-depth interviews of six focus groups were held with a range of stakeholders-consumers, retailers and influencers. Participant views on availability, affordability, taste and safety of LSIS, along with views on hypertension, its risk factors and potential intervention design and delivery strategies were elicited. Thematic analysis of the data was carried out. While the awareness of hypertension and its risk factors was high among the participants, awareness of LSIS was low. There was also low demand for, and availability of, LSIS. Since cost of LSIS was higher than regular salt, participants preferred that a subsidy be provided to offset the cost. Based on these findings, an intervention to promote the uptake of LSIS was implemented by project staff using various educational materials such as posters, pamphlets and short videos.

N-Myc overexpression increases cisplatin resistance in neuroblastoma via deregulation of mitochondrial dynamics.

N-Myc is a global transcription factor that regulates the expression of genes involved in a number of essential cellular processes including: ribosome biogenesis, cell cycle and apoptosis. Upon deregulation, N-Myc can drive pathologic expression of many of these genes, which ultimately defines its oncogenic potential. Overexpression of N-Myc has been demonstrated to contribute to tumorigenesis, most notably for the pediatric tumor, neuroblastoma. Herein, we provide evidence that deregulated N-Myc alters the expression of proteins involved in mitochondrial dynamics. We found that N-Myc overexpression leads to increased fusion of the mitochondrial reticulum secondary to changes in protein expression due to aberrant transcriptional and post-translational regulation. We believe the structural changes in the mitochondrial network in response to N-Myc amplification in neuroblastoma contributes to two important aspects of tumor development and maintenance-bioenergetic alterations and apoptotic resistance. Specifically, we found that N-Myc overexpressing cells are resistant to programmed cell death in response to exposure to low doses of cisplatin, and demonstrated that this was dependent on increased mitochondrial fusion. We speculate that these changes in mitochondrial structure and function may contribute significantly to the aggressive clinical ph9enotype of N-Myc amplified neuroblastoma.